Alabama Town's Efforts To Fortify Humvees Set Aside

[AvesPKS]

USA Today

USA Today (1/29, Zoroya) reports, "When the 700 men and women of an Alabama National Guard battalion were told last year that they were going to Iraq, they worried about the canvas doors and thin metal floors on their Humvees -- and the hazards of duty overseas. War was something new for the 711th Signal Battalion, which had last been mobilized during the Korean War. To better protect themselves, members of the battalion's Charlie Company, soldiers from the villages of Foley and Bay Minette, hit on a plan to put homemade armor on their vehicles. The unauthorized work was done outside military channels with the help of family and friends." USA adds, "Shortly after they finished, Army officials had the steel plates removed, at least temporarily, from dozens of Humvees that had been modified. 'We felt -- I'm not going to say betrayed -- but you feel hurt that they would remove it,' says Bobby Lay, 47, a Foley city superintendent who worked on the project and who has a brother, a son and a nephew in Charlie Company. 'Even though the people had good intentions, it wasn't the way the military goes about providing modified military vehicles,' says Lt. Col Bob Horton of the Alabama National Guard." USA notes, "The hometown effort was something Army officials say is understandable given the ongoing American casualties from roadside bombs and ambushes in Iraq. ... The Army is trying to produce more than 4,000 heavily armored Humvees for duty in Iraq. ... To further meet demand, the Army has ordered 8,400 add-on 'kits' that will provide armor-like protection to ordinary Humvees and can be installed in the field in about three hours. Officials expect to have all of the kits delivered before the end of this year. On Jan. 16, the Pentagon issued guidelines on what kind of material can be used if individual units want to put armor on their vehicles."

 

[chess9]

What is wrong with those rednecks? Sheezh.... Only when the American taxpayer lays out $50,000 per vehicle to make them "war capable" will they be acceptable to the Army.

The enemy is us. The terrorists are just road blocks on the way.

-Robert

 

[AvesPKS]

I thought it was funny (and sad at the same time) that the people were putting extra armor on the Humvees to try to protect themselves.

 

[tnitsuj]

Noble effort, but you can't really have people doing things like that. I do know that troops in the field are improvising armor, but we don't some kind of mad max type thing to emerge.

 

[Vadatajs]

Originally posted by: tnitsuj
Noble effort, but you can't really have people doing things like that. I do know that troops in the field are improvising armor, but we don't some kind of mad max type thing to emerge.

True, especially with untested civilian modifications. There is really no way to know (until it's too late), whether or not the modifications actually work, or even if they make the vehicle more dangerous (pieces of civilian armor=>shrapnel when hit). I don't side with them much, but I'm on the army with this one. They know best how to keep safe, even if their commander and chief doesn't.