Humvee's--- Psychological armor

[someguy16]

I was reading this, and I wondered how much actually held merit. Some of it makes sense cause its been said before, but the way the guy talks about the experience and all of it, and the fact he was trying to compete with the HMMVW makers, and he seems pretty far left (Openly anti-American too), I'm really iffy on how many grains of salt are warranted, especially since humvee's held up better then this guy makes them out to be in Mogadishu and the Nuristan Province of Afghanistan, didn't they? Plus, his praise of opening windows and roof's at the same time hes talking about how a lack of armor is getting soldiers killed is a bit... retarded, especially when you consider my two above example places where that would have gotten LOTS of people killed.

http://www.rense.com/general66/pssyh.htm

Psychological Armor
By JB Campbell
6-23-5


Here's one reason that so many American soldiers and marines have died in Iraq...

Back in 1981, I was the head of a bulletproof car company in Monterey, California. We'd construct a box made of Lexgard inside a limo or regular car. It was pretty effective but difficult to install. Lexgard is General Electric's transparent polycarbonate armor, very effective at stopping handgun bullets. If you put a hard surface in front of it, such as glass or sheet metal, it will stop rifle bullets. After the bullet hits the hard surface it is upset slightly on its axis and is then trapped in the dense but crystal-clear polycarbonate material.

The FMC factory was in nearby San Jose. I read a story about the troubles with the aluminum armor on their new Bradley Fighting Vehicle. The Bradley was having PR problems already but now the issue was the armor. Aluminum is a bad material for armor, since it doesn't stop bullets very well. When they come through, they cause something called "spall," which means that the pieces of the armor itself become deadly little weapons. And aluminum burns.

The army, though, wanted to save weight so they told FMC to make the Bradleys out of aluminum. (FMC was later sold and is today United Defense LP, owned in part by George Bush's Carlyle Group.)

So I went to FMC and proposed to line the inside of a Bradley with Lexgard, the way we did with limos. This would protect everyone from spall and fire, because Lexgard is fireproof and non-toxic. Installation would have been relatively easy in the boxy Bradley. I was politely turned down.

Puzzled, I called Dr. Charles Church, the head of research at the Pentagon. He said, "Listen don't try to modify an existing vehicle. If you want to do something, design it from the ground up and make your armor integral with your chassis."

So that's what I did. I came up with something I called "The FLEA," which stood for, "Forward Light Escort, Armored." I used an unknown but powerful fiberglass armor for the body with hardened Lexgard windows. It was to be hydraulically operated with its wheels almost two feet away from the body, for protection against tank landmines. My design was based on my experience with landmines in Rhodesia as a member of their security forces in the terror war in the 70s.

Shortly after my design was complete (1982), the army put out a request for proposal (RFP) for a new vehicle they called the "High Mobility Multi-purpose Wheeled Vehicle," or "HMMWV." The new Jeep and light truck. I duly submitted the FLEA to Tank Automotive Command (TACOM) in Michigan.

After a month or so, I called TACOM and inquired as to the progress of the selection process. The officer said, "The FLEA yes, I have it here Oh, yeah this is armored. We don't want armor."

I knew the specification they wanted. The bodywork had to defeat the equivalent of a pellet fired from a pellet gun. Something like 19 grains at 435 feet per second. Something silly like that. I mentioned this to the officer. "Yeah, right. We call it psychological armor'"

"'Psychological armor?'" I let that sink in to my brain. "You mean, the guys just THINK they're sitting behind armor?"

He chuckled. "Yeah, pretty much."

"But, " I said, "I'm under the weight requirement even with the armor. Why not give them the protection?"

"That's not what we want."

I kept trying to get some interest in the vehicle for its own sake, as a tank killer, not as a Humvee. No sale. Well, actually, there was some interest. I got a retired general to promote it to the army's Advanced Development Experimental Agency at Ft. Hunter Liggett. They liked it and sent it to their commander at Ft. Lewis, who liked it and sent it to TACOM, who didn't like it again.

In 1993 I took a chance and put $80,000 into building the rolling (unarmored) chassis, so people could actually see its basic dimensions and logic. The army still wasn't interested, apparently not wanting to believe that a lightweight vehicle could do what I advertised.

Then I forgot about the whole thing til 2000, when my old friend, Skip, persuaded me to go to a symposium on humanitarian demining in Monterey. I made some good contacts, such as the general who became the head of Army Materiel Command. He was vitally interested in mine protection. But I became vitally interested in humanitarian mine removal. I thought the FLEA would be ideal for this noble effort, since I was by this time a serious opponent of the US Army, the US government and war. I also had been blown up by an anti-tank mine in Africa in 1973 while riding in a police Land Rover, so I appreciated the mine problem made famous by the late Diana, although she was involved more in the small but terrible anti-personnel mines.

By 2003, I moved to Las Vegas and became partners with a guy who liked my humanitarian plan. The FLEA was now patented and protected here and overseas. I began to seek support for the humanitarian version of the vehicle. It turned out that the US Army in charge of humanitarian demining, so they were invited to come to Las Vegas to view the now-armored rolling chassis. The two men who came were the director of combat development at Fort Leonard Wood and a man from Night Vision Labs in New Jersey, a retired colonel. The men were astonished on seeing the FLEA. One said that he'd been asking TACOM for just such a design for years, that is, a lightweight vehicle that could withstand the hit of an anti-tank mine. He was told repeatedly that such a vehicle was impossible. "But here it is," he marveled, "this is how you beat the tank mine, with your wheels way outboard."

It was clear there was no budget for a humanitarian demining vehicle, but there was great interest in this thing for Iraq.

The FLEA is designed to keep moving with the loss of one or even three wheels. By now the design had replaced the hydraulic operation with hybrid-electric drive and steering and air suspension. And it had six wheels instead of four.

The man confided several secrets to us, secrets about the Bosnian adventure and about the six-month old invasion of Iraq. American vehicles were unusable in Bosnia, he said, due to their gross weight. "The roads and bridges couldn't support them and they never left the airport." This would continue to be a problem even in Iraq, where the ballyhooed "Stryker" vehicle would collapse roads and bridges and roll over into canals and drown crewmen.

He said, "You've obviously solved the tank-mine problem, but the real threat in Iraq is the IED (improvised explosive device)." The IED would continue to cause 70% of US casualties to this day. He revealed that even the Future Combat System requirement for mine protection was only against anti-personnel mines!


But, of course, the real scandal is the ridiculous Humvee, perhaps the most preposterous idea of all, after the invasion itself. A preposterous invasion needs a preposterous vehicle.

First of all, the Humvee is just an aggressive-looking station wagon. It has four doors, unless they are removed. If you want to shoot out from the thing, the doors have to be removed, so you can swing your rifle around. That's what we did in Rhodesia, with our Land Rovers. Took the doors off so that when we drove into an ambush we could return fire and save ourselves. The Humvee's windows don't roll down, so you can't shoot with the doors closed. And it's pretty silly to open the door and try to stick your rifle out with the thing swinging around as you're trying to return fire, escaping up the road. A real tactical vehicle has no roof, either, so that you can see and shoot at an overhead threat.

As we saw with the "psychological armor" bit, it doesn't really matter if the doors are on or off, because you have no protection either way. With the doors off, you can at least shoot back. With the doors on, you're a sitting duck. And the real problem is not bullets, but blast from IEDs. Serious armor protection was called for! Duh.

So, when enough people started getting killed in these things, the army decided to armor them. It went from the ridiculous to the insane.

Meanwhile, TACOM (now TAACOM) sent engineers from its R&D group, TARDEC, to Las Vegas for discussions with us in January, 2004. We also had representatives from Michelin, Eaton-Vickers and the armor manufacturer in San Antonio (Safeguard Security) and others present, plus men from Senator Harry Reid, who was backing the project. The TARDEC men said that the landmine requirement for Future Combat System vehicles would have to be rewritten now, due to the FLEA's design. The FLEA would be funded for 2005 and Senator Reid's military liaison said that if TARDEC would go ahead and use some discretionary funds for 2004, the senator would pay them back in '05, so as to get this wonderful vehicle to the troops this year ('04). This was agreed to by the TARDEC men. By all accounts it was an unprecedented meeting of army, industry, political and us entrepreneurs. Michelin has a fantastic new plastic wheel/tire combo that is virtually indestructible. They were interested in introducing it on the FLEA. So were we. And so was the army. I regaled everyone with the story about Psychological Armor. The chief engineer from TARDEC squirmed and said quietly, "Let's hope that doesn't come out"

Later in January my partner and I flew to Washington DC to meet with Senator Reid's chief counsel, the US Army Materiel Command and the State Department's landmine removal personnel.

The Army Materiel Command had tried to get us into business with United Defense, mentioned above. The general thought if UD went ahead and built the prototype, the army could purchase it that way. But United Defense wouldn't do it without millions of dollars being paid to them first. That's how they're used to doing things. It's the Halliburton method.

All went well until we got back to Las Vegas. The army had investigated us and found that we were both politically incorrect. Perhaps "incorrect" is not strong enough a word. Disastrous is the word. Actually, I'd been in a strange situation, a true enemy of the state wandering around the capital of enemy-occupied territory, going into the Senate and House office buildings, gathering congressional support for the FLEA. Several congressmen and two senators signed on with Senator Reid. Reid's senior counsel asked me to draft a letter from Reid to Rumsfeld, which I did do. Reid, Ensign and Carl Levin signed it, along with some congress-people on the House Armed Services Committee who had raised hell with the army chief of staff a couple of days earlier over the failures of the Humvee. My future seemed secure! Anything for the troops! I turned out to be quite an effective lobbyist.

Jeremy Hekhuis was Carl Levin's assistant in the Senate Armed Services Committee office. His eyebrows raised on hearing the Psychological Armor story, since by that time quite a number of GIs had been killed in un-armored Humvees. "Well, let's hope that that doesn't come out"

However, I was the guy who started the militia movement back in the late 80s, with my book, The New American Man. I had also written quite a bit since then against the US government and against the state of Israel, as I still do from time to time. In my book I had actually called for the overthrow of the Zionist US government. No one took me very seriously in 1989 except for the government. The militia movement did take off around 1991 but all it really did was stockpile a bunch of guns and ammo. The FBI and CIA, though, thought that I was very serious, which I was. They followed me everywhere for a year or more. They sent informants to get friendly with me.

The Secret Service in 1991 threatened to kill me if I was anywhere near President GHW Bush, currently the head of United Defense. There was irony all over the place.

Senator Reid's chief counsel now said that the army and the senator would have nothing to do with the FLEA because of what I had written about Israel! That was all that mattered, my criticism of Zionism and its control of the US government. The glaring need of a safe vehicle became irrelevant.

Frankly, I was relieved. The whole thing had gotten out of control. I, of all people, trying to protect the troops. Did the troops deserve a decent vehicle? Not really, since they're nothing but vicious, mindless war criminals, like their commander-in-chief and his Zionist controllers.

But maybe the parents of the 1,700 dead troops (or is it 9,000?) and the thousands of injured and maimed troops would not appreciate the army's need to avoid offending the Zionists by refusing on principle to deal with a helpful villain such as I. I'd had a bumper sticker on my truck since 2002, when it appeared that Bush was going to invade Iraq for his own personal reasons: "Bush Is A Liar And An Oil Thief." That was a year before the invasion. I had been severely injured by two poisonings in Las Vegas over that bumper sticker, or maybe the other one, which read, "Stop Obeying Our Zionist Parasites." I paid heavily for my "free speech" right.

I gave the patent to my friend, Skip. It's in his name now. What he does or doesn't do with it is a matter of complete indifference to me. My wife and I are involved in another, much more important project.

Before we leave this ridiculous (but true) story, let's see what happened to the Humvee. It got "armored."

While we were still friendly, Senator Reid had encouraged us to visit the Nevada Automotive Test Center near Reno. This is truly a fantastic if unknown place. Situated on a million acres in the desert and mountains near the ruins of Ft. Churchill, NATC is the test bed for most new military vehicles and many civilian vehicles. The engineers are the best and they know what is needed for vehicles to survive the worst military and off-road conditions. They even have a half-mile oval track with electronic controls under the pavement so that big rigs can be run for a million miles with no drivers, to be stopped only for fuel and maintenance.

The owners gave us the royal treatment and they were enthusiastic about improving the design of the FLEA so that it would pass all tests and be immediately accepted by the army, as well as perform even beyond what I and my design engineer, himself a Medal of Honor winner (Vietnam), had designed it to do. John Martin had also been blown up by a Soviet TM-46 tank mine, as had I. The FLEA is undoubtedly the only vehicle designed by two guys who'd survived tank mine explosions in lighter vehicles.

When we got there I was surprised to see fifteen or so stripped down Humvees parked around the place. Bolted to the front and rear of each vehicle were heavy weights. The chief engineer explained that the army wanted these Humvees tested with the added three thousand pounds to simulate the weight of the new armor kits and OEM armoring that was to be done. The army wanted to test tire wear with the extra weight. Early results showed that the tire wear had gone all to hell.

The NATC guys had just come back from Iraq. Talk about tire wear! Talk about well, you name it. The supply convoys out of Kuwait are run like this: 60+ miles per hour for the 900 mile round trip. If anybody gets ambushed or breaks down, he's on his own. The convoy keeps rolling! See you on the flip side. Or not.

When the vehicles get into the built-up areas, there are nine-inch square curbs along the streets. If there is a problem with a breakdown or ambush, all vehicles have to crash over the curbs to get around the stalled vehicle. This tends to destroy the front ends of all the vehicles. Alignment is not possible. Tires last a few thousand miles. No vehicles will be returned to the US after the war because they are all trashed. This of course makes the truck and car makers very sad, because they all have to be replaced. Se le guerre!

But here is the reality of the "armored Humvees:" These essentially half-ton civilian vehicles in camouflage paint are not designed to have three thousand pounds added to them. That's three times more than their payload in the first place, which means that with the armor added, they have no payload! Instead of carrying four soldiers, they can only carry three. But that's better because only three guys will be killed instead of four. Killed by an IED or by an RPG or killed by the heat.

An early modified Humvee was hit by an IED in Baghdad. The officer reported that "the ass end was blown off and we were stranded, but they couldn't hit us with bullets" They had to get out pretty quickly, though, and brave the bullets because the stranded wreck was soon hit by an RPG. This was the idea behind the FLEA: you have to be able to drive away from the kill zone without having to get out and walk.

There's no air conditioning on any military vehicle. The FLEA would have been the first because it was designed that way. What's the inside temperature of a vehicle in Iraq in the summertime? Pretty much like Las Vegas or Phoenix: over 140. In one of these jobs with sealed, inch and a half thick windows, we can just feel the heat stroke starting. And you still can't defend yourself in one of these rolling ovens because the windows don't open. The doors do, if you're on level ground they weigh 200 pounds. Don't stick your rifle out this open door because if it swings shut, it'll bend your barrel.

These are the kit cars, the ones with aftermarket armor kits. Then there are the new ones, the "up-armored" ones. These guys are so heavy that they had to be totally redesigned with more powerful engines, transmissions, suspensions, brakes just to handle the weight of the armor. There's no payload either because they're just barely designed to carry their own weight, which is pretty dumb.

Back in '82, when the HMMWV was being designed, the US Army must have thought it was never going to be shot at, ever again. That's the charitable view. A more realistic view is that the US Army doesn't give a damn if the troops get shot at or not. They're expendable, just like the vehicles. The army must come up with a way to procure more of them for our next excellent adventure in Zionist genocide.


Comment
From Robert Patrick
6-26-5

In the 1980s, I bounced around a lot of corporations as a temporary employee (a benefit and tax dodge used by corporations against the American people). At one particular corporation, I heard a rumor, I was not a witness, but this came from a reliable source who was a regular employee of this corporation.

The corporation had a contract to supply Humvees (at that time, I had only heard it referred to as "The new Jeep") and trailers that were constructed on site. The trailers were to haul very large diesel engines used for electrical generators.

The plans called for armor on the trailers, but NOT on the Humvees. The generators were not expendable on the battle front, and were to be protected; not so for the men.

There were some patriots working there at the plant (some how got past the personnel office and were hired at a corporation, don't think that could happen today), they approached the foreman, who approached a higher up, who approached the Pentagon. An offer was made to supply the armor on the Humvees at no additional cost. That offer was turned down. Another offer was made to provide "double doors" at no additional charge. The type doors where the top half can be opened, as the bottom half remains closed. That was also turned down.

The way this was pitched to the higher-ups at the corporation was that, right now, they had a small contract to supply a few vehicles. If they were able to sell the Pentagon on a couple of modifications that the vehicles obviously needed, then that small contract might turn into a very large contract. So the corporation was open to the idea of supplying a better vehicle to our troops, but the Pentagon was not. The Pentagon required a safe vehicle for their generators, but not for our troops. The contract was not expanded, and one employee was fired for embarrassing the Pentagon.

Robert Patrick

[Apocal]

Originally Posted by someguy16

I was reading this, and I wondered how much actually held merit. Some of it makes sense cause its been said before, but the way the guy talks about the experience and all of it, and the fact he was trying to compete with the HMMVW makers, and he seems pretty far left (Openly anti-American too), I'm really iffy on how many grains of salt are warranted, especially since humvee's held up better then this guy makes them out to be in Mogadishu and the Nuristan Province of Afghanistan, didn't they?

http://www.rense.com/general66/pssyh.htm

Uh... zionist conspiracist is far left? Anyway judging from the way the FLEA apparently has no faults compared to the Humvee, I'm guessing he's leaving something out. That and the crux of the story is a quip about "psychological armor" which could've been a joke.

[macgalin]

I wouldnt trust that guy. While he may seem have some experience and knowledge, he sounds a bit like this:

"i am so butthurt that goverment rejected my obviously brilliant and genius idea which was clearly better than everything ever done in that field anywhere. Since our wonderful genius degsin was so brilliant and awesome, its pretty clear that it was rejected because of huge conspiracy of evil mischievious people! Its all part of elaborate zionist-mason scheme!"

Besides, if US didnt care about its soldiers, why the hell US wastes money buying fucktons of MRAPs? (Unless they are buing them form evil Jews! Thats explains why Oshkosh won M-ATV competition. Curse them damn crafty evil jews!)

Saying that, i dont really know jack about armoured humvees. All i know Polish contingent in A-stan was really fucking pissed when they got light uparmoured humvees instead of promised frag kit 4 equipped ones (which were considered pretty decent at that time).

Also, i'd say that proper IED will fuck every HMMWV based light vehicle. No way around this. There is a good reason why MRAPs are so freaking huge.

btw, im pretty sure i seen Iraq photos of uparmoured humvees with bigass air conidtioner units (i might be wrong through)

[someguy16]

... Um. Sure. The Zionist thing is the only thing this guy says that comes off as "Far left". Now that I think of it, not even sure if you can classify it as left or right, but hes far something, even though he might not be an extremist-I'm-going-to-bomb-the-pentagon deal.

The degree of being callous to its troops he seems to paint is a new degree to me too.

[Minohtar]

There's a whole bunch of factual errors or misconceptions (purposeful or otherwise) in that article that I've spotted after just skimming it. I'm about to go make supper, but I'm pretty sure you can pull that article apart paragraph by paragraph....

To be fair, though, I've never been particularly impressed by the idea of using Humvees as much as they currently are -- or were, with many of them now being replaced now by MRAPs of various types and designs. MRAPs have flaws too, but that's another matter.

Moral of the story? Don't go to one of those terrible light infantry units, GO STRYKER!

[LT_Ryguy]

I don't know if I'd trust him as a source on anything without a lot more corroboration. I've heard of this fellow before and ummm, he's a bit of a kook. Not just with the anti-Zionism. He's not so much a radical leftie as one of those radical libertarian types.

The Secret Service in 1991 threatened to kill me if I was anywhere near President GHW Bush, currently the head of United Defense. There was irony all over the place.

But maybe the parents of the 1,700 dead troops (or is it 9,000?)

"Bush Is A Liar And An Oil Thief." That was a year before the invasion. I had been severely injured by two poisonings in Las Vegas over that bumper sticker, or maybe the other one, which read, "Stop Obeying Our Zionist Parasites." I paid heavily for my "free speech" right.

O rly?

Poisoned over a bumper sticker? I'm not saying it couldn't of happened, but I've seen a lot of controversial bumper stickers but I'm somehow doubting large numbers of opinionated drivers are getting poisoned.

[Les]

Please do Minohtar.. for my part the fact that he's a conspiricy theorist nutbar who started the right-wing militia movement and thinks everything is run by Zionist conspirators is only slightly more insane than his complete lack of self-awareness as to how that might make reasonable people feel a bit off-put about his super-vehicle.

[Minohtar]

So that's what I did. I came up with something I called "The FLEA," which stood for, "Forward Light Escort, Armored." I used an unknown but powerful fiberglass armor for the body with hardened Lexgard windows. It was to be hydraulically operated with its wheels almost two feet away from the body, for protection against tank landmines. My design was based on my experience with landmines in Rhodesia as a member of their security forces in the terror war in the 70s.

Alright, fair enough. Those of you familiar with Rhodesian armored vehicles like the Pookie or Leopard will recognize the idea of widely spaced wheels. The author conveniently leaves out here just how well armored his vehicle was. Comparable to an uparmored humvee? Who knows.

I knew the specification they wanted. The bodywork had to defeat the equivalent of a pellet fired from a pellet gun. Something like 19 grains at 435 feet per second. Something silly like that. I mentioned this to the officer. "Yeah, right. We call it psychological armor'"

"'Psychological armor?'" I let that sink in to my brain. "You mean, the guys just THINK they're sitting behind armor?"

He chuckled. "Yeah, pretty much."

"But, " I said, "I'm under the weight requirement even with the armor. Why not give them the protection?"

"That's not what we want."

Yawn. Whether or not it's true, he's trying to make a big point out of this, when for all we know the officer was making a joke. Furthermore, they had good reason not to be worried about armor:

Originally Posted by Wikipedia

The HMMWV was designed primarily for personnel and light cargo transport behind front lines.

There you go. It'd be like armoring a medium truck -- by and large unnecessary. Granted, the Humvee has since been (mis?)used as a combat vehicle, but at the time of procurement that was not the intent. Their lack of armor would obviously not have been thought of as a significant detractor then, since nobody in the 70's would have been anticipating Iraq and IEDs. Hindsight here tells us armor on Humvees would have been useful all along, and the author is using this to his advantage -- but that's not fair to the procurement people at the time.

The man confided several secrets to us, secrets about the Bosnian adventure and about the six-month old invasion of Iraq. American vehicles were unusable in Bosnia, he said, due to their gross weight. "The roads and bridges couldn't support them and they never left the airport." This would continue to be a problem even in Iraq, where the ballyhooed "Stryker" vehicle would collapse roads and bridges and roll over into canals and drown crewmen.

Oh, and of course he has to take a cheap shot at the Stryker as well, even going so far as to put the name in quotations as if that could somehow marginalize it even more.

And now it gets really juicy...

First of all, the Humvee is just an aggressive-looking station wagon. It has four doors, unless they are removed. If you want to shoot out from the thing, the doors have to be removed, so you can swing your rifle around. That's what we did in Rhodesia, with our Land Rovers. Took the doors off so that when we drove into an ambush we could return fire and save ourselves. The Humvee's windows don't roll down, so you can't shoot with the doors closed. And it's pretty silly to open the door and try to stick your rifle out with the thing swinging around as you're trying to return fire, escaping up the road. A real tactical vehicle has no roof, either, so that you can see and shoot at an overhead threat.

Where to begin? It's obvious this guy has never been in one of the numerous Humvee models where you can open the windows. Shooting out of the windows with either a rifle or pistol is perfectly possible and has been done by many a soldier before. How are you supposed to argue with someone this ignorant?

And neither is it an "Aggressive station wagon." Has he ever driven a humvee cross-country? They can be beastly to handle, but they still have good performance over broken ground. This is not a station wagon.

Oh, and my favorite part: "A real tactical vehicle has no roof, either, so that you can see and shoot at an overhead threat."

WTF? A real tactical vehicle has overhead cover to protect you from shrapnel or grenades thrown by the enemy. This was a lesson learned as long ago as WWII. Don't tell me his vaunted FLEA has an open top? But of course, he's wonderfully vague as to the exact nature of his vehicle... how convenient.

I'll also note that a large number of soft-top, unarmored humvees still have a turret ring up top, so you can shoot at targets above you. Again, the author is clearly not at all familiar with the vehicle he is so critical of.

As we saw with the "psychological armor" bit, it doesn't really matter if the doors are on or off, because you have no protection either way. With the doors off, you can at least shoot back. With the doors on, you're a sitting duck. And the real problem is not bullets, but blast from IEDs. Serious armor protection was called for! Duh.

The doors, like overhead cover, are important for other reasons. Crew fatigue? Does he know the term? Try driving a completely open vehicle in bad weather. Yes, you ignorant motherfucker, it does get very cold and rains lots in Iraq in the winter, not to mention the sort of freezing cold you can get in Afghanistan. I suppose the troops should just have to tough it out? Yeah, that's smart.

I had also written quite a bit since then against the US government and against the state of Israel, as I still do from time to time. In my book I had actually called for the overthrow of the Zionist US government.

You know, he' never actually gets to the part about why the FLEA was never bought; I would guess because it didn't meet all of the requirements -- but then, I doubt he wants us to know that part of the story. And, honestly, given statements like the one above, or the ludicrous bit about the poisonings over bumper stickers, I don't really trust him that much.

The supply convoys out of Kuwait are run like this: 60+ miles per hour for the 900 mile round trip. If anybody gets ambushed or breaks down, he's on his own. The convoy keeps rolling! See you on the flip side. Or not.

I am very, very skeptical of this claim. Whatever happened to not leaving anyone behind? You would have to provide some pretty damning evidence before I'd think that it was SOP for units to just leave behind anyone who broke down or was disabled in an ambush.That's so against American military standards I find it unlikely that it would happen -- and if so, only because there was absolutely no recourse, not because that was the planned course of action.

There's no air conditioning on any military vehicle. The FLEA would have been the first because it was designed that way. What's the inside temperature of a vehicle in Iraq in the summertime? Pretty much like Las Vegas or Phoenix: over 140. In one of these jobs with sealed, inch and a half thick windows, we can just feel the heat stroke starting. And you still can't defend yourself in one of these rolling ovens because the windows don't open. The doors do, if you're on level ground they weigh 200 pounds. Don't stick your rifle out this open door because if it swings shut, it'll bend your barrel.

First of all, there's a number of military vehicles that come with air conditioning as the standard; and secondly, he must be talking about the earliest model uparmored humvees, because every single one I've rode in has air conditioning and windows that open. Again with the ignorance thing; although in this case he may be excused by the age of this article.

These are the kit cars, the ones with aftermarket armor kits. Then there are the new ones, the "up-armored" ones. These guys are so heavy that they had to be totally redesigned with more powerful engines, transmissions, suspensions, brakes just to handle the weight of the armor. There's no payload either because they're just barely designed to carry their own weight, which is pretty dumb.

No payload? Uhhh.... right. No payload other than 5 soldiers with all their gear, a .50 cal or Mk19 up top, loads of extra ammo, AT4s, water, MREs... what more does he want?

Back in '82, when the HMMWV was being designed, the US Army must have thought it was never going to be shot at, ever again.

The intent was that Humvees would not be shot at, yes, because they were light trucks to be used in rear areas, not combat. The armed variants were intended for reconnaissance and rear-area security, not open fighting by infantry battalions. Modern mis-use does not somehow translate to negligence on the part of the procurement team.

That's the charitable view. A more realistic view is that the US Army doesn't give a damn if the troops get shot at or not. They're expendable, just like the vehicles. The army must come up with a way to procure more of them for our next excellent adventure in Zionist genocide.

Whatever. I certainly hate some aspects of the Army, and I'll be the first to stand up and complain about them if given the chance. Being so uncharitable as to think that the leadership doesn't care if troops live or die is, however, stupid. Plain and simple. Army generals are not evil boogeyman that care nothing about the men under their command.

EDIT: Oh, and just for the record, I think the US Army totally should have bought the Lamborghini SUV design instead of the Humvee. Driver satisfaction would be much higher, I'm sure.

[StarSpawn]

I don't think it is to much of a strecht to say the man is a rightwing moron politically, but that might not invalidate his design for a Jeep replacement which the Hummer is NOT, the differences between between the Jeep and Hummer is simply to great in all relevant stats, in fact just about the only thing they have in common is four wheels and thats it.
His FLEA design might very well be a good true Jeep replacement since it seems both lighter and smaller in dimensions than a Hummer, also overhead protection from grenades dropping in can be as simple as a streched tarp, you dont have to be armored.(Tarp is in fact exellent because most thing dropped on it has a tendency to jump of like a trampoline)

It should be rememberd by the way that a true Jeep replacement is excellent for behind the lines operations that the HUMMER was said to do, while an uparmored HUMMER is fairly good in low intensity conflicts.

[Major Diarrhia]

I remember reading that originally the hummer was going to be armored and had the engine and suspension needed for the armor, but that Congress ordered it be made cheaper, so the armor was pulled, a weaker engine installed, and light suspension put in. Did he mention cost?

[Firethorn]

Hmm...

First, I'd say that this wouldn't be the first time the military screwed the troops, equipment wise.

Just look at the M-16 - original specifications had a chromed barrel, cleaning kit in the stock, and the .223 round was to use a modern(for the time) cleaner burning powder.

After sabotaging the acceptance testing and being forced to take it anyways, the board removed the cleaning kit on the basis of the gun not needing to be cleaned(via exagerating colt's claims), deleted the chromed barrel(big reason it didn't need to be cleaned much/often), and changed the round to use older stockpiled powder that burned dirtier.

The M16A1 was essentially the restoration of Colt's original specifications.

Minohtar - I agree with your points. The HMMWVs I worked with had windows that could be dropped.

Originally Posted by Minohtar

I am very, very skeptical of this claim. Whatever happened to not leaving anyone behind? You would have to provide some pretty damning evidence before I'd think that it was SOP for units to just leave behind anyone who broke down or was disabled in an ambush.That's so against American military standards I find it unlikely that it would happen -- and if so, only because there was absolutely no recourse, not because that was the planned course of action.

Standard procedure depended on actual area and risk factors. If the vehicle couldn't be towed, if it was in a low threat area and the tow vehicle was expected quickly, they'd detail another vehicle and crew to stay there until a tow vehicle could get there. If the vehicle was disabled such that it couldn't be towed/salvaged, they'd unload it, haul it to the side, and blow it up.

That's the real reason a lot of HMMWV had three passangers, not four. So if a vehicle DID break down, they'd have room to absorb the extra passangers if necessary. Plus it just gave people a bit more room - always a premium with all the stuff they're required to haul along.

Originally Posted by LT_Ryguy

Poisoned over a bumper sticker? I'm not saying it couldn't of happened, but I've seen a lot of controversial bumper stickers but I'm somehow doubting large numbers of opinionated drivers are getting poisoned.

I have to agree. First somebody would have to care enough to take action. Then they'd have to track him down, gain access to his food. Oh yeah, and be hauling something that can be used as a poison(or at least find it).

I suppose it was the offended CIA agents following him around?

Finally, I'll have to agree with the others. The most likely explanation is that his vehicle didn't actually meet specifications, was vaporware, etc...

I find the idea that his vehicle would be lighter than a hummer, while being both more armored and able to haul more stuff to be 'too much of a good thing', IE unlikely.

[Minohtar]

Originally Posted by Firethorn

Minohtar - I agree with your points. The HMMWVs I worked with had windows that could be dropped.

Standard procedure depended on actual area and risk factors. If the vehicle couldn't be towed, if it was in a low threat area and the tow vehicle was expected quickly, they'd detail another vehicle and crew to stay there until a tow vehicle could get there. If the vehicle was disabled such that it couldn't be towed/salvaged, they'd unload it, haul it to the side, and blow it up.

That's the real reason a lot of HMMWV had three passangers, not four. So if a vehicle DID break down, they'd have room to absorb the extra passangers if necessary. Plus it just gave people a bit more room - always a premium with all the stuff they're required to haul along.

Yeah, I find that a lot more likely than just leaving broken or disabled vehicles and their crews out in the middle of nowhere and driving on. Figured there was a better explanation than what he was saying.

And four people plus gear in a humvee does suck. Been there, done that, for a whole week.

Originally Posted by StarSpawn

I don't think it is to much of a strecht to say the man is a rightwing moron politically, but that might not invalidate his design for a Jeep replacement which the Hummer is NOT, the differences between between the Jeep and Hummer is simply to great in all relevant stats, in fact just about the only thing they have in common is four wheels and thats it.
His FLEA design might very well be a good true Jeep replacement since it seems both lighter and smaller in dimensions than a Hummer, also overhead protection from grenades dropping in can be as simple as a streched tarp, you dont have to be armored.(Tarp is in fact exellent because most thing dropped on it has a tendency to jump of like a trampoline)

Tarps or similar systems like sniper netting over chicken wire (which we do use) work pretty well against hand grenades, but don't do anything against other fragmentation like air-burst artillery. If the rest of your vehicle has no armor then it's kind of a moot point, but since a proper tactical vehicle should be armored it'd be dumb not to give it top armor of some sort as well. Has he ever heard of hatches? Y'know, those things you can put in the roof so you can have armor *and* someone watching up top?

Close urban combat, especially in an insurgency, is not a time you want to have an open-topped vehicle. We saw plenty of casualties from hand grenades, and that was *with* overhead cover.

[Les]

Seemed to me it was simply a case of something too new and too different being rejected mostly on those basis. The guy tried to design an ultimate uber armored-car of the Future when the Army just wanted Jeep 2.0, the new and exotic armor materials, the use of hydraulic (later electrical) power to drive the wheels instead of a conventional transmission, all things that'd make the traditionally conservative army procurement system leery...

...then he went on his little rant about Zionist Space Lizards in Government and I just had to

[CommanderRazor]

Originally Posted by Minohtar

*snip most of your previous posts so far*

Well said, and saved me a lot of typing. Tango-mike.

Tarps or similar systems like sniper netting over chicken wire (which we do use) work pretty well against hand grenades, but don't do anything against other fragmentation like air-burst artillery. If the rest of your vehicle has no armor then it's kind of a moot point, but since a proper tactical vehicle should be armored it'd be dumb not to give it top armor of some sort as well. Has he ever heard of hatches? Y'know, those things you can put in the roof so you can have armor *and* someone watching up top?

Close urban combat, especially in an insurgency, is not a time you want to have an open-topped vehicle. We saw plenty of casualties from hand grenades, and that was *with* overhead cover.

Oh yes. I'm sure you've seen how that works with the MCVs. Rolling Grenade Basket, anyone?
Had a vic from battalion mortars have exactly that happen to them during Jan'07 in Baghdad when we were recovering a downed Blackwater chopper/shooting the fuck out of 30-40 Hadj.
Some sneaky Hadj fucker dropped a hand grenade right down into the floor of the MCV, luckily right between the pedestal and the radios on the right side of the interior, so the worst cas of the lot was some SSG that literally caught an ass-full of frag and flash.

[FBH]

sounds like advertising for his mine protected vehicle.

Edit: this might have been addressed but can you really not roll down the windows on a Humvee? Cause going by generation kill (book or TV series) you could.

[Apocal]

Originally Posted by FBH

sounds like advertising for his mine protected vehicle.

Edit: this might have been addressed but can you really not roll down the windows on a Humvee? Cause going by generation kill (book or TV series) you could.

You can't roll them down, but you can open some models.

[Jebe]

We have a article making claims that should have led to a paper trail, that doesn't seem to exist, nevermind things like a product website, and is talking about polycarbonate windows + fiberglass armor. I'm calling it a outright hoax.

[CommanderRazor]

Originally Posted by FBH

sounds like advertising for his mine protected vehicle.

Edit: this might have been addressed but can you really not roll down the windows on a Humvee? Cause going by generation kill (book or TV series) you could.

Originally Posted by Apocal

You can't roll them down, but you can open some models.

Nope, no rolling down any humvee windows.

Old-school humvees with canvass doors: You can unzip the transparent plastic upper half of the door that's supposed to be a 'window. Yes, they zip.

Humvees pre-AOA/Up-Armor: There's a window, but instead of rolling it down you have to pull on this retaining knob, and then keep it pulled out as you manually lower the glass portion to a level that seems not-as-shitty, having to set it in one of like 4 or 5 holes said retaining knob can be spring-pushed back into. Of course often times the springs don't even work so you end up having to push it in just right to keep it falling right back out.
Oh, also, the window is about a foot and half long and one foot high, with the bottom edge well above the elbow rest mark on most people.

AOA/Up-armored humvees: Just fucking forget it. Seriously. There's technically a window, but it's really a several inch thick block of layered impact resistant glass that's about 6 inches square more or less and on an external mounted hinge.


I've said it numerous times and I'll keep saying it until I'm gone; Fuck humvees.

[advanced adept]

for some reason, reading that article reminds me of that idiot who keeps calling the m113 the "gavin"[or something close to it.]

[Les]

I remember that guy, subscribed to his newsletter once in fact. He did have some good points with regards to tracks and the faults of the Stryker.. then I got kicked-out for suggesting another re-fit and re-commission of the Iowas at their age may Not be a good idea. -.-

[Thanatos]

We have a article making claims that should have led to a paper trail, that doesn't seem to exist, nevermind things like a product website, and is talking about polycarbonate windows + fiberglass armor. I'm calling it a outright hoax.

Yeah, I'm calling no way on this.

[General Schatten]

Originally Posted by Les

I remember that guy, subscribed to his newsletter once in fact. He did have some good points with regards to tracks and the faults of the Stryker.. then I got kicked-out for suggesting another re-fit and re-commission of the Iowas at their age may Not be a good idea. -.-

Is this the same guy who thought we should've just bought more M113's?

[Magni]

Originally Posted by advanced adept

for some reason, reading that article reminds me of that idiot who keeps calling the m113 the "gavin"[or something close to it.]

Ahh, Sparky.

Anyone wishing to lose a few braincells should visit his site.

I remember that guy, subscribed to his newsletter once in fact. He did have some good points with regards to tracks and the faults of the Stryker.. then I got kicked-out for suggesting another re-fit and re-commission of the Iowas at their age may Not be a good idea. -.-

Yeah, that's Sparky alright. You know what the real joke is by now? For the effort and cost it'd take to recomission the remaining Iowas, you'd be better off building a completely new batch.

[CommanderRazor]

Ah, Sparky. Kind of reminds me of those goons that think we should still be using M14s as the main infantry weapon, that anything smaller than good ol' .30cal is too small for a 'real weapon'. Same sorts of morons that told the Brits to go fuck themselves when they came up with a pretty good idea in their .280/7mm, which ended up costing NATO in both converting to the 7.62 and the 5.56. So much for logistics and budget efficiency.

While a modernized M113, a sort of M113A4 if you will, would be a good idea going by the M113A3 modernized versions I've found info on in the past, you still wouldn't get quite what the Strykers provide in speed and such.
On another note, I can't fault using the name Gavin, simply because it keeps in line with the convention for nicknaming most things we (the US military) put out. Politics and stupid shit aside, it makes it easy to refer to, or easier than using an alphanumeric designation.

"Get in the Gavin, damnit!
vs.
"Get in the One-One-Three, damnit!"

Realistically, we'd probably further shorten it to 'the Gav' like what's commonly done in calling the Bradley a 'Brad'.

So, I wouldn't mind seeing a M113 successor that truly solves most of its issues; being quite low to the ground with a rather thin floor and thus having shitty resistance to mines/IEDs, having tracks that get torn up quite a bit quicker than wheels, tracks that tear up roads faaaar quicker than wheels, having it ride better so that it reduces crew fatigue, etc.

Reminds me of the modular AFV series concept I thought up a while back. Instead of trying to have a 'one size fits all' you'd have 2 separate families of AFV, a light one and a heavy one.
The light one would be based around a solid, fast, compact, reliable APC. Use band tracks and other newer technologies to get past most of the issues with the usual tracked APCs. Have it made modular like the CV90-series so that it can be easily altered without having to use a different vehicle chassis like how was done with the Strykers' variants.
Basically a less ambitious FCS.

The heavy one would basically be almost like what the Israelis did with their Merkava; they have IFV, MEV, etc. variants based from the Merkava-series chassis. I say do one up on that and make a base chassis that's intended for a MBT, but has sufficient configuration and modularity to allow for being able to convert a base heavy chassis's config to accommodate other roles, but still primarily being an MBT.

This way, lighter forces have their mobility that's still reasonably protected and heavy forces retain their ability to push through enemy attacks while retaining a versatility that overall cuts down on the tail that's usually very big with mech/armor units.

Naturally, this sort of thing would get screwed over by US military R&D and procurement practices as is, so nothing more than wishful thinking for the most part. Oh well.


As for the humvee...it was never intended for front line combat, only intended for second-line combat if it absolutely has to and certainly not for anything really serious, and in itself isn't very impressive as a military utility vehicle with its only real redeeming feature being that they are indeed versatile.
So, either you invest in something that can do both the utility role and the actual light combatant role by design, or you don't bother and make a utility vehicle and a separate light wheeled combatant vehicle that actually is survivable by design. Given the nature of modern warfare, i.e. 'there is no frontline', we'd probably be better off with the former over the latter.

*steps down from soapbox*

[LT_Ryguy]

Toyota Trucks with machine guns and AT rockets on the back!