By SYDNEY J. FREEDBERG JR.
The Army’s novel body armor package, the Soldier Protection System, is designed to scale upwards as well as downward depending on the tradeoff commanders desire to brand betwixt protection as well as mobility.
After a generation of guerrilla warfare, the Army is issuing new, lighter body armor that tin live tailored for a wider make of missions, from plainclothes advisor roles to high-intensity combat. It’s purpose of a novel force to improve infantry equipment, from rifle calibers to targeting optics to augmented reality training, coming from the Secretary of Defense himself.
Lt. Col. Ginger Whitehead, Army Product Manager for Soldier Protective Equipment, shows off the new, better-fitting woman mortal body armor.
“We pick out to pick out the powerfulness to scale up…and scale down,” said Lt. Col. Ginger Whitehead, “from armed individuals with rifles — mayhap they’ll pick out an RPG or grenade … all the agency upwards to a near-peer, where you’re going to reckon the total gamut of weapons systems,” from heavy machinegun bullets to Russian-style storms of artillery shrapnel. The solution forthwith entering service? Influenza A virus subtype H5N1 Soldier Protection System of carefully thought-out pieces that the wearer tin mix as well as jibe to come across the mission, said Whitehead, a Republic of Iraq veteran who’s forthwith Army production director for soldier protective equipment. Soldiers tin strip the novel organization downward to a 2.8 pound vest concealed nether their uniforms or fifty-fifty civilian article of apparel to halt handgun rounds — ideal for advisors who desire to maintain a depression profile but who powerfulness larn shot past times their sometime advisees inward a so-called “green on blue” incident. (The get-go unit of measurement to larn it was the initial Security Force Advisory Brigade to Afghanistan). Or they tin layer on armor for all-out combat, with a mix of difficult plates as well as soft (kevlar-like) fabrics to halt bomb blasts as well as rhythm out fragments — but without weighing them downward equally much equally before armor kits.
“You’ve got to climb over obstacles, you’re getting inward as well as out of vehicles, you’re low-crawling,” Whitehead said. “Even with your marksmanship” — which requires fluidly raising as well as aiming your rifle — “the to a greater extent than make of motion you’ve got, the amend off y'all are.”
The rugged Afghan mountainsides forcefulness soldiers to hike miles uphill, weighed downward past times heavy body armor as well as oft outmaneuvered past times lightly equipped Taliban.
Slow Is Dead
There’s a lot of history here. In Afghanistan as well as Iraq, the Army had to uparmor its soldiers inward a hurry, only equally it uparmored its vehicles. That armor saved lives, but for humans as well as Humvees alike, the layers of protection grew as well as thus heavy they oft impaired mobility.
The cost of protection had many parts. Heavy armor slowed soldiers climbing Afghan mountainsides or boiled them inward Iraqi deserts. Ceramic plates cutting off circulation when smaller soldiers — including most women — sat downward inward vehicles for hours-long convoys. The backs of helmets snagged on collars when soldiers hitting the dirt as well as went prone, making it harder to plough your caput to see. Torso armor restricted arm movements, impairing aim.
Troops inward Republic of Iraq typically patrolled inward vehicles, as well as thus armor that weighed them downward when moving on human foot seemed a tiddler tradeoff for increased protection.
In Iraq, for many missions, these trade-offs were tolerable: Soldiers spent a lot of their fourth dimension on bases or inward vehicles, as well as if they waddled similar the Michelin human being when they got out, it was a pocket-size cost to pay. In Afghanistan, where much of the province is only accessible on foot, the weight meant U.S. of America patrols were oft outmaneuvered past times lightly equipped Taliban. And inward a major war, with heavy weapons firing all around, soldiers absolutely pick out to live able to sprint, crawl, as well as climb from i foxhole, rock, or ruined edifice to the next. Having as well as thus much armor it slows y'all downward tin kill y'all only equally dead equally having no armor at all. The Army invests heavily inward researching lighter-weight armor, as well as Whitehead says they’re inward negotiations with manufacture for a novel generation of stiff armor plates that should weigh 10 to twenty per centum less. But the large weight as well as mobility gains inward the novel organization come upwards from careful pattern — the tailoring, if y'all will. “These are non wildly unlike materials. (They’re) a petty scrap lighter,” she told me. “It’s by as well as large … a unlike design.”
Army soldiers develop inward total armor at the peak of the Republic of Iraq War inward 2009. Note the awkward trapezoidal groin protection, widely detested past times wearers.
A Better Fit
Consider groin protection, a peculiarly sensitive area. After beingness wounded past times a roadside bomb, many manful mortal soldiers’ get-go inquiry is whether they’ve been castrated past times the blast.
The old armor had 2 pieces. One was a protective undergarment, basically “ballistic underwear,” Whitehead said, with inserts to protect the femoral artery within the thigh. The other was a stiff trapezoid — non a shape unremarkably associated with the human body — that attached to the soldier’s belt as well as to straps running dorsum betwixt the legs, giving the wearer what Whitehead said amounted to a permanent wedgie. Soldiers, understandably, hated it.
The novel armor’s torso, groin, as well as high protection tin live layered or slimmed downward depending on the threat.
The novel organization consists of a unmarried flexible garment roofing the inner thighs — that femoral artery i time again — as well as groin. In a recent field-test at Fort Lewis, Washington, “their reply was overwhelming,” Whitehead said. “They’re non walking bowlegged, they’re non chafing. It’s to a greater extent than comfortable, peculiarly when it gets hot.”
There are similar, if less obvious, improvements inward the body armor. It’s cutting shorter, making it easier to curvature at the waist as well as to sit down downward inward vehicles. It’s also got larger openings around the shoulders, letting troops heighten as well as aim their rifles better. That reduces the expanse covered with the thickest protection, but Army enquiry shows that wounds inward the specific areas affected are really rare. In fact, the Army volition before long start testing a “shooter’s plate” that cuts the stiff armor plate fifty-fifty farther dorsum from the shoulders to farther increment liberty of movement. As a woman mortal soldier, Whitehead peculiarly appreciates a number of subtle improvements, from a greater make of smaller sizes — early on armor tended to run huge — to a helmet that doesn’t larn hung upwards on your rule pilus bun. Only i slice of the kit is truly gender-specific, however: Women larn a vest with relatively shorter sleeves, a wider waist, as well as a notch inward the dorsum of the neckband to adjust the omnipresent bun. Countless comic books as well as video games aside, female armor does non require conspicuous bulges, although Whitehead says the Army is trying out additional padding nether the armor plate to improve comfort for peculiarly well-endowed servicewomen.
Integrated Head Protection System
The get-go endeavour was modular headgear that weighed 5.8 pounds with all the pieces inward place, which soldiers rejected inward acre testing equally also heavy. So the Army went dorsum to the drawing board as well as is testing Next Generation Integrated Head Protection that, alongside other things, replaces some traditional materials with polyethylene.
“We’re inward the middle of testing correct now,” Whitehead told me. “If the vendors tin brand this as well as it tin overstep ballistic testing, this volition live a game changer.”
“These are exciting times,” she told me. “We’re saving lives.”
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