The Army's Body Armor May Be Too Heavy For Soldiers In Combat

The trade off between weight and speed and injury has always been there. Combat loads have been north of 100 lbs for a long time. In WWII there was no body armor, just the clothing. Who knows how many lives might have been saved with some body armor then.

The challenge always is, will you need it or not. If you take it you have to hump it. If an order is given on a LRP not to take it and people are killed because they have no body armor one can imagine what the inquiry might look like into that matter.

Some things never change. In the late 80s the Army created the Light Infantry Divisions to be more deployable with fewer vehicles. But the joke was that since without vehicles we had to carry everything on our backs, from the grunt point of view it was a heavy infantry division. . When I was an Infantry PLTLDR in the 82d Abn in 78, only the RTOs were issued large rucks. Somewhere along the line things changed, and everybody got large rucks, and still hardly had room to carry all that was required. I cringe when I see photos of today's soldiers with huge rucks plus the vests and gear.

Pounds add up. And there is tons of "useless" equipment on military packing lists. One of the last training exercises I did involved a 1 week competition across the whole BN. My ruck was 93 pounds without vest or rifle. The next week we did a "moto fun climb" with no blouses, helmet, rifle, or vest and the rucks weighed a "light" 63 pounds.

Overseas I kept my plate carrier as light as possible while still maintaining combat effectiveness and readiness, keeping important items like all the plates/IFAK/ammo etc. That ran about 40 pounds. My truck had my ruck with plenty more ammo, water etc for surprise long missions.