Army plans to buy up to 17,700 MRAPs

[Eugene]

Source: Stars and Stripes

Army plans to buy up to 17,700 MRAPs
Many vehicles will be sent downrange in the next year

By Jeff Schogol, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Tuesday, July 3, 2007

ARLINGTON, Va. — Get ready for 2008: the year of the MRAP.

The Army plans to buy up to 17,700 Mine Resistant Ambush
Protected Vehicles, known as MRAPs, which have proved to
take blasts from roadside bombs much better than up-armored
Humvees.

While the Army estimates that it won’t be until July 2009
that all of the MRAPs could be manufactured, the Army wants
to send as many as possible downrange next year, said Army
spokesman, Lt. Col. Carl Ey.

“It’s important that the Army supports the warfighter as
quickly and as efficiently as possible,” Ey said.

USA Today first reported on Monday that the Joint
Requirements Oversight Council approved up to 17,700 MRAPs
for the Army. Until now, the Army had been approved for
2,500 of the vehicles.

-snip-

Read more: http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=47099

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Related: Army gets big boost in safer vehicles - USA Today

[papau]

1. The joke is the fact that Stars&Stripes forgot to mention that while better than a hummer the

MRAPs failed IED shaped charge (what Iran is supplying these days) tests and each MRAP will require additional armor to be put on in the "aftermarket" - seems there is not enough time to change the contract to include the extra metal if we want those 17,700 MRAPs in 2009.

[TreasonousBastard]

2. You realize, of course, that these things cost...

up to a million bucks apiece, with the cheapest, and least armored, one at a quarter million. To say nothing of what it costs to run and maintain them.

http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/mrap-advance-purchase-2-oshkosh-pvi-gd-03104/