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Military Body Armor News
The Marine Corps issued to nearly 10,000 troops body
armor that government experts urged the Corps to reject after tests
revealed critical, life-threatening flaws in the vests.
In all, the Marine Corps accepted about 19,000 Interceptor outer
tactical vests from Point Blank Body Armor Inc. that failed government
tests due to “multiple complete penetrations” of 9mm pistol rounds,
failing scores on other ballistic or quality-assurance tests, or a
combination of the two.
“Since these are lifesaving pieces of equipment and are being used in
support of the Iraq war, I urge immediate action since this technical
office has little confidence in the performance of the items to provide
the contracted levels of protection as defined in the performance
specification,” wrote ballistics expert James MacKiewicz in a memorandum
rejecting two lots of vests on July 19, 2004.
MacKiewicz is responsible for verifying that each production lot of
Marine vests meets protective requirements and other quality standards.
He works at the Army Soldier Systems Center in Natick, Mass., and has 18
years of experience with ballistics and armor systems.
A second government agency, the Defense Contract Management Agency,
backed Natick’s conclusion and also recommended against the waivers.
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Deployment demands
The judgment call fell to Patricio, who over 10 months last year
would waive and accept at least 20 lots of outer tactical vests that
didn’t pass muster with government testers.
Systems Command did not inform field commanders about the waivers
when the equipment was distributed, Reinwald said.
Patricio said he briefed Catto in February 2004 when the first
waivers were issued, as well as in subsequent meetings on
procurement of various types of armor to protect Marines and their
equipment from the growing threat of insurgent attacks in Iraq.
In his written statement, Catto said he agreed with the decision to
issue the waivers.
“I concurred with the program manager’s decision to waive the 11
lots in order to rapidly replace the PASGT flaks with a superior,
advanced body-armor system,” Catto said in the statement. “Due to
the massive deployment associated with [Operation Iraqi Freedom],
this was considered to be an urgent need, and was deemed to be in
the best interest of deployed Marines at that time.”
Both Reinwald and Patricio said the notion of redistributing
Interceptor vests already fielded among deploying forces was
considered, but deemed too difficult to execute in time for the
deployments.
“This was one of these situations where they’re screaming for these
OTVs [and] these guys have to get them,” Reinwald said. “At that
time, we had the operational requirement that we didn’t have the
schedule to play with.”
The waivers came at a time when U.S. forces were facing increased
risk from roadside bombs, ambushes and intense urban combat. The
military rushed to field the Interceptor armor to all its troops,
not just those typically involved in close combat, pushing the vests
to the field as quickly as they were produced.
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