| What I am wondering here, is why you believe these individuals have the knowledge to buy the proper armor. I don't think you fully understand the problems this is causing. We have guys that are wearing their SAPI plates as standalone, and you think they have the knowledge to get a) the proper armor and b) wear it properly? One of the defining characteristics of an army is uniformity. Everybody doesn't get to wear whatever they want or shoot the gun they want. And not everyone is willing to educate themselves enough to choose their own kit, and even worse when they have family members do it for them.
I will also bring up another point, familiarity with the systems. EVERYONE needs to be familiar with the system you're wearing. SOPs have to be made, I need to know what's on your body, where it's at, and how to get it off. There have already been cases of civilian body armor failing (due to improper wear/defective armor/wrong armor) and medics being unable to remove it quickly enough to address the wounds. In two cases that I am aware of, medics had to spend an inordinate amount of time trying to remove the armor and were shot in the process. I have experienced this myself, but fortunately, my guy survived despite his wounds. He's now living at Walter Reed trying to recover.
Some civilian armor is better than what is currently being issued, much of it is not. There are more "wrong" choices out there than "right" ones. It is easy to make a blanket statement about civilian armor being better, a lot harder to actually name brands and types and give definitive proof that it is.
It sounds well and good to just say "let them choose whatever they want!" But without direction and testing this is not realistic or practical, and is more dangerous than requiring them to wear the entire IBA.
By making this decision, they have essentially taken on the responsibility and moral obligation to put more into armor R&D and come up with a complete solution. But no matter what improvements are made, one thing will always be true; not everyone is going to be happy.
There's a saying I am sure all of you mil guys have heard; "big boy rules."
I advocate letting guys decide how much of the IBA fashion kit they wish to wear based on the operations being conducted, but I don't advocate letting every Joe Snuffy out there buy whatever armor he thinks is the best.
Whatever the reason for this decision, CYA or not, it is a smart one, and hopefully one that will require them to now get off of their rumps and start doing the leg work to find better, lighter and more effective solutions. But no matter how much research, or how good armor gets, people WILL continue to die in war. This is a cold hard fact of armed conflict.
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Ugh. |