Gates: MRAPs reduce troop deaths, injuries

[unhappycamper]

Gates: MRAPs reduce troop deaths, injuries
By Tom Vanden Brook - USA Today
Posted : Tuesday May 13, 2008 6:42:37 EDT

WASHINGTON — Few troops have been killed or wounded by roadside bomb attacks in Iraq while riding in the Pentagon’s new armored vehicles, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said, evidence of the value of the vehicles that he made the military’s top priority.

In about 150 attacks, 6 percent of U.S. troops have been injured or killed while in Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles, including six deaths, Pentagon records show. Humvees, the military’s main vehicle, have had a 22 percent casualty rate. Even attacks on Abrams tanks are more than twice as likely to produce casualties than attacks on MRAPs.

“The reaction of the troops in the field has been extraordinary,” Gates said. “They are considered the vehicle of choice. I had a wounded warrior who was here for a lunch a couple of weeks ago who was going around telling anybody who looked like they were in a position of authority that an MRAP had saved his life.”

Gates made his comments Friday, exactly a year after he announced that he was making MRAPs his top priority. Since then, more than 14,000 vehicles have been ordered. There are 4,200 in Iraq, and 1,200 more in Kuwait waiting to be delivered. Troops in Afghanistan have 320 MRAPs. The Pentagon may order a few thousand more of the trucks, which cost about $1 million each, he said.

Gates credited Congress for giving the Pentagon $22 billion for the MRAP program. He also praised the manufacturers for delivering thousands of the vehicles to Iraq in less than a year. The truck’s raised chassis and V-shaped hull deflect the force of bombs buried in roads, the top killer of U.S. troops in Iraq.


Rest of article at: http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/05/gns_mrap_051208/



uhc comment: I went looking for the MPG figures on an MRAP and came up blank. Anybody out there know? BTW, here's an interesting defensetech article and discussion on the MRAP --> http://www.defensetech.org/archives/003456.html