Modern body armor used by soldiers is credited with saving many lives in combat scenarios in Iraq and Afghanistan, but it comes with a tradeoff: The typical protective vest weighs 30 lb.
By itself, this would be a workable scenario when you consider experts say a soldier can carry about a third of their own body weight before there are any adverse effects. Unfortunately, the 30-pound vest is only part of the overall package. Between helmets, weapons, ammunition, and clothing, today’s typical Army rifleman is bogged down with 95 lb worth of gear — well above the recommended weight limit.
The military is then challenged to try to streamline some of these necessary tools in order to whittle away at that number, lest the weight challenges impact these soldier’s abilities in combat zones. One solution, according to Military.com, has been the development of a newer protective vest that is said to cut 20% of the weight, or 5 lb.
The new armor, called the Modular Scalable Vest, weighs 25 lb and was used initially in Afghanistan in February 2018, reportedly with good reviews from the field troops.
A narrowing of the vest makes it slightly less protective, but the service suggests that the original standards for how much deformation would occur with small arms fire to the original vest were very conservative, and they say the more streamlined armor results in an increased risk that’s “negligible.”
Additionally, Brig. Gen. Anthony Potts told reporters at the Army’s 2018 annual meeting and expo that the change in the spec also frees up manufacturers to experiment with different material options for the armor plates.
But it’s not all good news, as defense writer Kyle Mizokami blogs on Foxtrot Alpha. It’s hard to say if the Pentagon will win the war on weight when technology advancements just add to the number of things being used on the battlefield. New and incoming tech such as navigation systems, drone zappers, and communication jammers are just “waiting for someone to carry them.”