WP: Fatal Inaction, Father Seeks Answers on Body Armor

[Rose Siding]

Page W08

The world's most powerful military failed to provide the armor that would have saved scores of American lives. One father wouldlike to know why
...
Private 1st Class John Hart whispered into the phone so he wouldn't be overheard......

Now, talking on the phone with his young warrior, Brian tried to understand what he was hearing. Don't believe spinmeisters on TV, Brian recalls his son saying; the Iraqi insurgency is real and building. John and his buddies in Charlie Company of the 508th Infantry Regiment of the 173rd Airborne Brigade were patrolling ever longer distances in thin-skinned Humvees suited for hauling cargo, not for carrying soldiers under fire.

This was not the first time John had confided that the U.S. military was failing to provide him with essential equipment. In previous calls home, Brian recalls, John recounted a bewildering array of shortages and snafus. Before landing in Iraq that scorching July, John told his father, he'd been issued a winter-weight camouflage suit, body armor with protective plates too small to shield his broad chest, and a broken rifle. An expert marksman and former co-captain of the Bedford High School shooting team, John had been told to conserve scarce bullets by not taking practice shots to sight his weapon, he said. Summertime water rations were so inadequate that guys were passing out in the Iraqi heat.
...
Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) was planning to attend John's November 4 funeral. Brian contacted his office and asked if he and Kennedy could meet before the service to talk. Some of Brian's relatives were aghast. Brian grew up in a family of fundamentalist Christians who vote Republican. At the University of Texas, Brian was president of the campus Republicans. Now some of his Texas relatives warned Brian not to be seen with Kennedy, he recalls. Brian didn't care. To get answers, he needed allies.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/14/AR2006061401928.html

Insanity.

[wizdum]

1. This is unbelievably tragic...may bush, rove, cheney, rumsfeld, and kinda.

sleezy rice rot in hell for this.

[MADem]

2. Jesus....that is one HELLUVA read.

The incompetence of our leadership is well known, but it still manages to stun.

[biscotti]

3. To me it was

apparent from the start that Meyers was a complete airhead, involved in matters way over his head. He was their yes man. Combine that with maniacal twisted Rumsfeld and you have disaster.