What you think of the past MRAP program from the Iraqi and Afghanistan early years?

2022-04-28T05:33:05-04:00

Response by CPT Lawrence Cable made Apr 28 at 2022 9:37 AM

2022-04-28T09:37:22-04:00

What do mean? Like why we went into a situation of non-linear warfare without a hardened supply chain and armored patrol vehicles? Or how come the lessons of Vietnam some 30 years earlier about the vulnerability of a road bound supply chain in areas of insurgency being forgotten? Or the length of time it took to react to the fact that IED's were becoming a primary weapon system for the insurgency?
What still amazes me that the South Africans are the only major military that developed a line of MRAP's to deal with the same kind of issues, just did it thirty years earlier. Almost all of the modern MRAP's are based around the South African Mamba, Cassipir and Ratel.

Response by SGM Bill Frazer made Apr 28 at 2022 1:07 PM

2022-04-28T13:07:25-04:00

Damn vague questions, IED's were killing to many people, impromptu fixes weren't working, so DARPA, etc. came up with the MRAP, It worked but, it was not designed to be bomb-proof against anything they could do. Big damn difference between 81/82mm mortar shell and say, 105/155 arty shell.

Response by CSM Darieus ZaGara made Apr 28 at 2022 2:15 PM

2022-04-28T14:15:57-04:00

The DOD and it’s subordinate commands analyze the global threat, play tgat against the budget and outfits the Services with the most viable equipment available as threats evolve the testing labs partner with company's to develop equipment to meet the emerging threats.

Sometimes there are a number of years where the busget falls behind and DOD has to put on a smiley face and defend our interests with existing equipment.

It would certainly be nice if we had the intelligence, and ours is great, to asses the threat in real-time expecting contractors to keep up pace with innovations meeting those threats.

What a world it would be.

Response by LTC Jason Mackay made Apr 28 at 2022 2:19 PM

2022-04-28T14:19:03-04:00

That’s the fastest Army fielding ever. Institutional and Tactical Army struggled to catch the sustainment piece between training and parts

Response by SSgt Christophe Murphy made Apr 29 at 2022 8:38 AM

2022-04-29T08:38:44-04:00

It was an attempt to deal with what we were seeing in both theaters. You mention it was the early years of Iraq/Afghanistan but it wasn't. MRAPs were ordered in 2007. That's years of combat deployments without the MRAP. I was in Afghanistan in 04 and the best we could hope for at that time was an up armored humvee. To try to help The Marine Corps started fielding under-armor kits for un-armored humvees to help combat IED's. It was basically a set of armored plates under the main body of the humvee. The vehicle might not have doors or only have the canvas doors but you might survive an IED if it wasn't a big one.

From that perspective the MRAP was a major achievement. It wasn't perfect but it was certainly better than what we had in 04.