To protect my employers position and competitiveness in the industry, competitors will not be mentioned by name. Suppliers and customers, however, will be. All information is available to the general public via the freedom of information act, and the media.
Department of Defense, stop lying to us and get your ass in gear.
The last week of November, amid stories of troops not having the protection they require, the U.S. Army announced it was committed to properly armoring 8500 Humvees and an undisclosed number of other support vehicles to correct this huge problem.
Let's see here. 8500 units at four windows a unit. That's 34,000 windows to be purchased and installed. And that is just the Army's intended purchase.
It is now January 12th. To Date, there is only one purchase order open between the U.S. Army and the companies that manufacture these windows, and consequently us, the material fab and supplier to these big three. Secur*Glass in Texas, a competitor in Ohio, and a competitor in Massachusetts. That purchase order is with Secur*Glass, and it is for 3000 windows. That's it. 3000. One TENTH of the number of windows the Army announced to the American public it had intended to use to armor it's vehicles. The defense industry is large. Engineering thermoplastics is small. We know what everyone else is doing. Currently, there are no purchase orders from the Government open with the other of the big three. This is significant. Very significant considering the company in Ohio has reduced it's price per unit from the industry norm of six hundred fifty to three hundred dollars per unit. Think about that. Still no purchases from the government.
Sierracin of Fullerton, Ca, the producer of the windshields for the 'other support vehicles' such as the five-ton transport truck, the backbone of the military, presently has five hundred thousand dollars worth of these units sitting on their facility's floor. The reason? There are currently NO purchase orders open with the Department of Defense. They are not armoring any of these vehicles. Those units are frozen. No movement whatsoever.
What is the Department of Defense doing with all the money set aside to accomplish this mission of making our troop's survival rate after projectile or fragment contact in combat increase by 18 to 30 percent on the battlefield? Please Tell me. Me and all my guys are wondering, because we're all proverbially standing around with our dicks in our hands, knowing our ultimate 'customers' are getting shot and fragmented to doll-rags. Yep. This is the big secret. The Goverment told the public 'We got it covered.' and waited for the hubbub to go down. This pisses me off.
Here's another rant. Troops on the battlefield are short on body armor. Interceptor body armor with the SAPI, or small arms protective inserts. The armor is kevlar, the inserts are silicant-carbide or boron-carbide, a plastic loosely labeled 'ceramic' for it's physical characteristics. These two plastics are virtually absent from the marketplace right now. Here's why.
They are primarily manufactured in India and Europe. To explain this requires a back-story. Bare with me. Europe and Asia, because of their limited land and increasing populations, depleted a majority of their natural resources early in the twentieth century. This forced them to develop 'alternative materials' ie. thermoplastics and laminates, much earlier and at a greater rate than the Americas, so they are light-years ahead of us in plastics technology and manufacturing. That is why these continents have the monopoly on kevlar and silicant-carbides, they had the manufacturing rights decades before American manufacturers. Now, why is there such a shortage? It is two-fold: They can wait out until demand forces a concession by American buyers to accept astronomical price increases on the material, and, given Europe's hatred of the U.S. , especially in the area of foreign policy, ie. this little war we threw, they can stick it to us by just not releasing material for sale. So, the next time you are considering buying a product originating from or produced by a company from France, Germany, or Spain, think about that one. Think about it very hard.
I dont feel much better now, but it's now out there on the 'ole innturweb.
