The Pentagon is fighting one of its toughest battles: against an outsider who wants to supply US troops with superior body armor.
A couple of years ago I interviewed Murray Neal, CEO of Pinnacle Armor, about the company's Dragon Skinflexible armor . He reeled off a list of Dragon Skin's advantages over the current Interceptor armor: its high protection level, robustness, ability to take multiple hits, wearability. So why hadn't it been adopted?
"It the Not-Invented-Here syndrome and the Old Boy Network," he told me. "Some suppliers are preferred over others. The Pentagon are reluctant to buy from 'outsiders'."
Neal was so emphatic on this point that I thought he must be exaggerating. But subsequent events suggest he may have a point. Last year Karl Masters who organized the US Army's testing revealed a slight conflict of interest- his day job is product manager for Interceptor.
Predictably enough, Dragon Skin got the thumbs down amid allegations that the tests were not valid. The whole thing has been quite a soap opera. In May the Army had to stage a desperate rearguard action when NBC ran a news report that questioned their choice. The line seemed to be holding, but new information is emerging. As reported on the Soldiers For The Truthwebsite:
Yet another independent technical assessment that directly refutes specious claims made at the June 6 hearing before the House Armed Services Committee that Dragon Skin failed to meet Army specifications for personal body armor at "high temperatures".
…. "Two Dragon Skin Level IV panels (slightly larger than the standard ESAPI plate) took four & five ESAPI-FAT specification shots respectively, after high temperature exposure/conditioning, and defeated every shot."
SFTT calls this, "great news for America's Grunts, and some bad news for the Army's acquisition mafia"
I don't know whether Dragon Skin really is as good as Neal claims. But I do know that open, independent testing is badly needed. Because that's the only way we can guarantee that troops get the armor that's best for them, not the armor someone in Washington happens to prefer.
This story has only come to light because Neal is outspoken enough to challenge the procurement process and put up with the flak. But somehow I doubt this is an isolated incident.
