As the death toll from IEDs grows, Pentagon goes slow on MARPs

Armor intended to protect the Pentagon’s new Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles against the most powerful roadside bombs is too heavy to use, says Senator Carl Levin (D-Michigan), the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. The add-on armor, known as Frag Kit 6, could overwhelm all MRAPs unless they undergo “major redesigns,” Senator Levin says in a letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno,the No. 2 U.S. commander in Iraq, issued an urgent request back in January to require MRAPs to withstand explosively formed penetrators (EFPs). These Iranian-designed and produced weapons use explosives to launch a metal disc, reshaping it into a slug that can penetrate armor. In response to the growing problem with IEDs, of which EFPs are but one example, the Pentagon has approved an Army plan to buy as many as 17,700 MRAPs, whose raised, V-shaped hull withstands underbody blasts better than Humvees.

USA Today’s Tom Vanden Brook writes that the problem with armor which is too heavy is one issue; the other is that although the Army’s and Marine Corps’ requests for MRAPs date back to January, many observers say that the Pentagon appears to be dragging its feet on the issue. The delays in ordering MRAPs are not this year’s problem: Some Pentagon experts had recommended back in 2003 that the MRAPs would work better than humvees, but the Defense Department did not buy them. Representative Louise Slaughter (D-New York), who chairs the House Rules Committee, said the Pentagon must answer to Congress for providing soldiers with substandard equipment. Slaughter had requested a Pentagon’s Inspector General report released last week that said the Marine Corps had given MRAP contracts to companies that could not produce the vehicles fast enough.