Our soldiers are the bravest and most well equipped fighting men and women in the world.  It is a shame that one single tactic is responsible for most of the success of our enemies in Iraq and we failed to counter it.  Our troops are in Iraq fighting hard.  Many are getting killed.  Our soldiers are not getting killed by air power because of our air superiority.  Our soldiers are not getting killed by tanks because the enemy doesn't have any.  Most of our soldiers have been killed with IED's (Improvised Explosive Devices).  Basically these things are glorified pipe bombs.  They are placed on the road and wait until our Humvee patrol drives by before they detonate it.  This was the chink in the mighty American military machine and the insurgents exploited it at the price of our men and women.  MRAP's would have and will save the majority of the deaths and injuries that our soldiers are suffering in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Our soldiers knew this right away as they began putting make-shift armor of scrap metal on their Humvees before going on patrol.  They knew that Americas weakness was in the patrol vehicle.  Donald Rumsfeld failed the troops when he uttered his famous phrase at the press conference 'You go to war with the army you have, not the army you would like to have'.  There could not be a more obvious expression of the people in charge not understanding what their job is.  I would bet that Rumsfeld would not have gone on patrol in those ill equipped death traps like he asked our brave men and women to.

Our troops did not need more bullets, nor tanks, nor aircraft.  Rumsfeld offered up plenty of those hugely expensive pieces of military hardware.  They needed MRAP's.  These vehicles offer the protection that our soldiers need to do the job that they are doing.  These vehicles withstand IED explosions to save the lives and limbs of our troops.  The pentagon has about 1500 scheduled to be in combat by the start of 2008, and they have ordered another 20,000 of them.  This should be priority number ONE.

During WWII all of our production capacity went into building tanks and planes.  A result of that production is that we won the war.  Thus far, we have basically 'gone to war with the army we had.'  None of our soldiers should have gone on patrol in vehicles that could not withstand the only threat that the insurgents posed to our troops.  These vehicles should have been ordered immediately after our first soldier was killed.  Many battles in history were not waged because the generals determined that they did not have the proper resources to fight without losing our soldiers.

When the enemy has success against us such as this, it emboldens them and makes them want to fight more.  If our troops had these MRAP's earlier, the war would be over because the insurgents would not have any way to fight successfully against us.  Back home the anti-war effort gains traction each and every time one of these roadside bombs does what it is intended to do and kills one of our men.  If the soldiers had these vehicles, Rumsfeld would likely still have his job because loss of life would have been so minimal you would not be able to be against this operation to spread freedom.  These vehicles would likely have kept the enemy at bay so that the war could be ended and our troops could come home.

When the enemy does not have success, they stop fighting.  We are not trying to fight against anyone as much as trying to keep others from fighting us at this point.  Once the enemy stops fighting, the war will be over and all of our troops can come home.  At that point we can all rest assured that not one more of our soldiers will die on the sands of Iraq.

Please urge Congress to pay for these vehicles that the troops need.  With these vehicles, America wins.  Without these vehicles Iraq 'becomes another Vietnam'.  Success for our troops can be had, but they must be given the equipment that they need to do the job right.  I hope that this lesson is learned by all future leaders as we possibly fight more wars.  Our soldiers should never be placed in a situation that their lives are in danger simply because they don't have the equipment (that is available) that they need.  We owe that to our soldiers.