Jim Wilson/The New York Times Some soldiers in Iraq waited 10 months for bulletproof vests.
ARTICLE TOOLS
Printer Friendly Format Printer-Friendly Format Most E-mailed Articles Most E-Mailed Articles Reprints & Permissions Reprints & Permissions Single Page Format Single-Page Format
The Reach of War Go to Complete Coverage
READERS' OPINIONS
. Forum: Join a Discussion on The Transition in Iraq
Most E-Mailed 1.
Is a Cinema Studies Degree the New M.B.A.? 2.
Close Doesn't Always Count in Winning Games 3.
On EBay, E-Mail Phishers Find a Well-Stocked Pond 4.
Missing in Action: The Supply Gap in Iraq: Many Missteps Tied to Delay in Armor for Troops in Iraq 5.
Op-Ed Columnist: Taming of the Shrews Go to Complete List
Enlarge This Image
Jason P. Howe/World Picture News for The New York Times The Pentagon has scrambled to protect soldiers from bullets and bombs.
Find out more about:
Related Research: •defense department •missing in action: the supply gap in iraq HighBeam Research has an extensive archive of more than 32 million documents from 2,800 sources.
Technology nytimes.com/tech
Caution Ahead
What gadgets endanger lives on the road?
Also in Technology: Which is the right cellphone for you? Plasma or L.C.D.? Do you need a high speed memory card?
MISSING IN ACTION: THE SUPPLY GAP IN IRAQ Many Missteps Tied to Delay in Armor for Troops in Iraq By MICHAEL MOSS
Published: March 7, 2005
The war in Iraq was hardly a month old in April 2003 when an Army general in charge of equipping soldiers with protective gear threw the brakes on buying bulletproof vests.
The general, Richard A. Cody, who led a Pentagon group called the Army Strategic Planning Board, had been told by supply chiefs that the combat troops already had all the armor they needed, according to Army officials and records from the board's meetings. Some 50,000 other American soldiers, who were not on the front lines of battle, could do without.
Advertisement
In the following weeks, as Iraqi snipers and suicide bombers stepped up deadly attacks, often directed at those very soldiers behind the front lines, General Cody realized the Army's mistake and did an about-face. On May 15, 2003, he ordered the budget office to buy all the bulletproof vests it could, according to an Army report. He would give one to every soldier, "regardless of duty position."
But the delays were only beginning. The initial misstep, as well as other previously undisclosed problems, show that the Pentagon's difficulties in shielding troops and their vehicles with armor have been far more extensive and intractable than officials have acknowledged, according to government officials, contractors and Defense Department records.
In the case of body armor, the Pentagon gave a contract for thousands of the ceramic plate inserts that make the vests bulletproof to a former Army researcher who had never mass-produced anything. He struggled for a year, then gave up entirely. At the same time, in shipping plates from other companies, the Army's equipment manager effectively reduced the armor's priority to the status of socks, a confidential report by the Army's inspector general shows. Some 10,000 plates were lost along the way, and the rest arrived late.
In all, with additional paperwork delays, the Defense Department took 167 days just to start getting the bulletproof vests to soldiers in Iraq once General Cody placed the order. But for thousands of soldiers, it took weeks and even months more, records show, at a time when the Iraqi insurgency was intensifying and American casualties were mounting.
By contrast, when the United States' allies in Iraq also realized they needed more bulletproof vests, they bypassed the Pentagon and ordered directly from a manufacturer in Michigan. They began getting armor in just 12 days.
The issue of whether American troops were adequately protected received wide attention in December, when an Army National Guard member complained to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld that troops were scrounging for armor to fortify their Humvees and other vehicles. The Pentagon has maintained that it has moved steadfastly to protect all its troops in Iraq.
But an examination of the issues involving the protective shielding and other critical equipment shows how a supply problem seen as an emergency on the ground in Iraq was treated as a routine procurement matter back in Washington.
While all soldiers eventually received plates for their vests, the Army is still scrambling to find new materials to better protect the 10,000 Humvees in Iraq that were not built for combat conditions. They are re-enforced by simple steel plates that cannot withstand the increasingly potent explosives being used by the insurgents, according to contractors who are working to develop more sophisticated armor for the Army.
