Iraqis working to shield US Humvees to save GI lives

Rush is on to shield Humvees
In a former presidential palace, Iraqi workers are welding steel plates to the vulnerable vehicles in an effort to protect GIs on patrol in Baghdad

By Bill Glauber
Tribune staff reporter
Published February 4, 2004

BAGHDAD -- On the grounds of Saddam Hussein's former presidential palace, near an ornamental pond and fountain, a few dozen Iraqi workers are engaged in one of the most crucial military undertakings in the country.

They're putting armor on U.S. Army Humvees.

Banging, sanding, welding and painting, laborers who earn $6 daily are creating from steel a life-saving skin for American soldiers traveling the mean streets of a dangerous country.

These workers have hands as rough as the steel they're shaping, and courage too. They returned to the palace-turned-U.S.-occupation-headquarters less than a week after 16 of them were injured and one of their colleagues killed in the Jan. 18 car bombing at the so-called Assassins Gate in front of the compound. Twenty-four other people died and scores more were wounded in that blast.

Shield weighs 1,000 pounds

The workers, who don't want their names used or their faces or creation pictured, now turn out four armor kits a day, providing a 1,000-pound layer of protection for American troops who face daily threats of attacks from roadside bombs, grenades and large-caliber bullets.

"We want to help America," said one of the workers, a welder with a dirty orange shirt and scuffed mask.

Since production began in August, the workers have created more than 200 of these kits that provide a canopy over the Humvee's passenger compartment and flatbed, with plates forming heavy doors and steel securing the floor. Each kit costs $1,200, a bargain in the high-priced world of military hardware.

"It's a godsend," said the project's manager, Maj. Phillip Logan of the Army's Maryland-based 352nd Civil Affairs Command. "I've heard of numerous lives being saved by this."

Logan 50, of Woodlawn, Md., said several soldiers have picked up their newly armored Humvees and then survived attacks on the way to their units.

"The main idea was to do anything we could to allow the soldiers to do their mission safely," Logan said.

Since mid-June, 29 soldiers have been killed in unarmored Humvees and 290 wounded, according to the U.S. military in Baghdad.

Humvees, or High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles, were introduced in the mid-1980s to transport troops and equipment in rugged terrain. After the conflict in Somalia, demand grew for armored Humvees, which were fielded during operations in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo. The fortified vehicle is known as the up-armored Humvee and costs about $150,000, nearly twice as much as the regular version.

AM General Corp., of South Bend, Ind., makes the Humvees and O'Gara-Hess & Eisenhardt of Fairfield, Ohio, provides the armoring.

The Army also has added armor to it newest fighting vehicle, the Stryker.

Stryker manufacturer General Dynamics has built a protective grille that is bolted onto the vehicle. The grille, called slat armor, is designed to deflect a grenade's blast before it reaches the Stryker's ceramic skin.

More armor kits on order

In the theater of operations, which includes Afghanistan, there are more than 12,000 Humvees, including 1,800 up-armored vehicles, with plans to have at least 4,000 more of them in the future.

By spring, manufacturers are expected to boost production of up-armored Humvees to 220 a month. The Army also is procuring about 6,000 add-on armoring kits made of Kevlar and steel for Humvees and other tactical vehicles.

But soldiers in the field can't wait for assembly lines and have improvised.

"There has been an evolution, a period of adaptation," Logan said.

That adaptation went on throughout Iraq, with units using local steel to strengthen doors and floorboards, loading up sandbags to cushion blasts, and searching for any protection they could.

In the northern city of Mosul, the 101st Airborne Division's 2nd Brigade Combat Team blew up several steel-door prototypes before deciding on a model and contractor to outfit scores of vehicles.

Nowhere have the adjustments been more dramatic than in Baghdad, where a civil affairs officer and Iraqi contractor came up with a unique solution dubbed the "Butler Mobile."

The contraption was created in part by Capt. Darryl Butler, an engineer with the 354th Civil Affairs Brigade based in Riverdale, Md. It includes 25 pieces wrapping the door, floor, rear bed and roof.

Butler worked on the project with an Iraqi contractor, who wants to remain anonymous for fear of retribution. The contractor said he hasn't even told his family of his work.

"It was a good job for me and a good job for the Army," the contractor said. "They saved me, and I saved them."

The contractor said he admires the craftsmanship of the Humvee "but the body is aluminum, it is not strong."

He said it took 10 days to develop the prototype "Butler Mobile" with the final paint job done by hand with brushes. After five days of testing, the kit went into production in the Green Zone at Hussein's former Republican Palace. Supplies are purchased locally, and the workforce is homegrown too.

The contractor and workers are eager to expand production in Iraq. And if asked, they said they would gladly go to the United States to show the manufacturers there how to provide armor quickly and inexpensively.

But they remain willing, at the risk of their lives, to work for the Americans in Iraq.

"We need to live in this country for our children, for the future," the contractor said. "I must help the Army, and the Army must help us to live safe."