history help: After more than 5 years of war, inferior body armor is still a scandal for US troops. - Help.com

I’m glad you wrote your reply, Boyrs. You make intelligent points worth considering. So to addres them…

One - I’m not sure the US military should care about owning the rights to a design if it is something that works. The US military should use what works - even if it’s something they don’t own the intellectual rights to.

Two - yes it is more expensive, but why should we be quibbling over the cost of basic protective gear? When it is so difficult to recruit new troops, we really need to focus on improving the survivability of the soldiers we already have. New volunteers for the infantry are not easy to come by in our society.

Three - yes you are correct. The Dragon Skin armor is hot and bulky - but so is all body armor. The kevlar vests I use to wear was also uncomfortable in the heat - but even so, I would have gladly traded up for an even hotter, heavier model if I knew it had better bullet stopping power.

Fourth - it is true that survivability is not directly addressed in these penetration tests. In part this is because nobody is assuming that body armor will make you invulnerable to damage. You definitely will be bruised, and it is possible to suffer broken bones and even internal bleeding from the kenetic force of non-penetrating bullet impact. However, the damage caused by a non-penetrating bullet impact is still preferable to the alternative. Most modern assault rifle bullets will enter a body, cavitate and punch out a tunnel through your body big enough for you to push a golf ball through. So on balance, I don’t think this is a fair reason to be critical of the Dragon Skin armor.

Well, here’s my rebuttal:

1 - The owners of the Dragon Skin technology are willing to sell. “Stealing” is not an issue here.

2 - I agree, cost matters in war fighting. Resources are not unlimited. Everything cannot be gold-plated. Trade-offs exist. Dragon Skin can cost anywhere from $3,000 to $5,000. But body armor is more than a luxury. Good equipment improves a soldiers morale. And soldiers do fight more aggressively and fearlessly when they think their equipment will give them an edge in surviving combat. There’s a reason why the Presidential body guards of the US Secret Service already use Dragon Skin. It makes them that much more willing to put themselves in the path of a bullet. Ultimately, I think the benfits to morale are so useful, it is worth taking the money from other parts of the Defense budget to pay for Dragon Skin. (And fat from other programs do exist. Do we really need three new advanced fighter programs when our current F-15s are more than a match for any enemy? Are the billions for “Star Wars” defense actually a good investment?)

3 - Your point about dehydration is well taken. The effect of heat is nothing to joke about. I was in Germany (which is a lot less hot than Iraq) and I remember being useless and gasping when forced to run in my full bio-chemical protective suit and mask. It’s my understanding that in Vietnam, US soldiers would avoid wearing helmets and flak vests if they could. Protection be damned, it was hot and they carried 100 lbs. of gear on their backs. But combat in Iraq is primarily urban combat. Generally soldiers on patrol are easily resupplied by vehicle and are not weighed down with combat packs like in Vietnam. I think the calculation under these conditions is that an armored vest is worth wearing. So it’s not like we are buying expensive equipment that soldiers will quietly refuse to use in Iraq.

4 - So we want a cost-benefit analysis? Well, in that case, I think we should think of the $5,000 Dragon skin as an insurance policy. It helps guarantee that a soldier will complete their enlistment and “pay back” the value of all their very expensive training. My own security cleareance alone represented a $20,000 gamble from the Army that they would have an option on getting at least 8 years of service from me. And if I had died early? Dead soldiers are expensive. I was eligible for a SGLI $100,000 life insurance benefit (which I increased to $200K). In addition, the Army would have lost the value of my practical real-world experience: veterans are much more useful than green soldiers.

Thanks for the debate…

Oops. Baddly designed body armor is worse than having no armor. The UK is having big troubles with their new Osprey Improved Combat Body Armour. It’s so bulky, troops actually try to take it off prior to combat.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live…

Luckily, I haven’t heard anyone complain about Dragon Skin being like this. The British armor uses solid ceramic plates, not the flexible scales of Dragon Skin.