[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 4]
[HOUS]
[Page 5524]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




       SENDING OUR TROOPS INTO BATTLE WITHOUT ADEQUATE PROTECTION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, I probably will not take my 5 minutes, 
but I was standing here, sitting here listening to my colleague from 
Texas talk about the young man who had been wounded and was recovering. 
And I am reminded that there are some nearly now 600 soldiers who have 
lost their lives in Iraq and we do not know for sure but somewhere 
between 3,500 and 4,000 have been seriously injured.
  I think it is a sad and a tragic fact that the President, Secretary 
Rumsfeld, this administration, sent our troops into battle without 
providing them with adequate protection. As a result, there are those 
who probably have lost their lives simply because they did not have 
body armor; and there are those who have lost their limbs simply 
because this administration has not taken care of the problem of 
unarmored Humvees in Iraq.
  Many, many months ago I wrote Secretary Rumsfeld a letter after I had 
received a letter from a young soldier in Baghdad, a young soldier who 
is a West Point graduate and a gung-ho Army guy. In his letter to me he 
said, ``Congressman, I am so proud of the Army. We are doing everything 
that we can here to help these people.'' But later on in his letter he 
said, ``My men are wondering why they do not have the protection of 
this interceptor vest, this high-tech vest that has the capacity 
because of its construction and the materials used to actually stop an 
AK-47 round.''
  I started exploring that problem, and what I found was that we sent 
soldiers in the initial assault into Iraq without this most basic 
protection.
  Now these vests were used in Afghanistan, and we found out in the 
Afghanistan conflict that they were effective. It is thought that as 
many as 19 lives of our soldiers were saved during the Afghanistan 
conflict because they had this interceptor vest. And yet when we sent 
our soldiers into battle in Iraq many went into those fights without 
this body armor.
  So I wrote Secretary Rumsfeld; and I got a letter back from Mr. 
Brownlee, his Chief of Staff, and in that letter I was told that we 
hoped that we would have all of our soldiers equipped with this body 
armor by November. That was November of 2003. The war in Iraq started 
in March.
  Then a couple of weeks later I get a second letter from General 
Myers, the Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In his letter General 
Myers informed me that it probably would be December before our 
soldiers were fully equipped with this body armor. And I remind you 
that the war started in March.
  I asked Mr. Rumsfeld how many soldiers perhaps had lost their lives 
on the battlefield who were not equipped with this body armor, and he 
indicated to me he could not answer that question because they do not 
collect that data.
  Well, Secretary Rumsfeld said November. General Myers said December. 
Before we left this city for our holiday period, Christmas, the 
Pentagon held a briefing; and one of my staff members went to the 
briefing and the person holding the briefing said it was likely to be 
January before our soldiers were equipped with this vest. The war began 
in March. And, lo and behold, about 3 weeks ago I get a letter 
indicating that finally, finally, a year after the war began, this 
administration is willing to say that all of our troops have access to 
the body armor.
  Now, Chris Matthews visited many of the troops at Walter Reed and he 
had that on his show this weekend. During that show, near the end of 
the show, he indicated that the body armor could protect the lives but 
not the limbs of our soldiers.
  I end my remarks, Mr. Speaker, by pointing out that we have unarmored 
Humvees in Iraq tonight. The only company that produces these armored 
vehicles is in Ohio. They tell me that they can produce 500 a month, 
and the Pentagon is only asking for 220 a month. How many soldiers will 
have their arms and legs destroyed because this administration is not 
providing them with the equipment that could keep them safe?

                          ____________________