MOD orders more Big Buses of Death for Iraq and Afghanistan - Order one and 343 more come along
The beleaguered prime Minister (Gordon Brown as at mid-day) announced to Parliament today providing £100m of funding for 140 extra Mastiff (known by US as Cougar see pic) Mine Resistant Armoured potection (MRAP) vehicles for use in Iraq and Afghanistan.... that's about £750,000 a pop... which makes it a VERY heavy bus for 6 soldiers.
Secretary of State for Defence believed to be Scottish Solicitor Des Browne said:
"Mastiff has proved its value on operations offering high levels of protection against mines and roadside bombs. Today I am pleased to announce our intention to purchase 140 extra Mastiffs. (MOD pictures of complete vehicles from MOD here)
These vehicles will be ugraded from Cougars obtained from Force Protection in the US to Mastiffs by NP Aerospace in Coventry. This company was owned The Carlyle Group, the global private equity house who bought the company for £30 million from Reinhold Industries in 2005 and it was bought out by Management with help from Morgan Crucible, who have a small share holding and Barclays Bank.
Meanwhile Force Protection are having some problems with deliveries .... Saturday, August 25, 2007 - MRAP delays -"Different things happen in the continuum and there are certainly going to be time lags associated," but it doesn't seem to have occurred to any MP to ask Gordyor any journo to ask Des when delivery is expected.
The news simply consolidates the belief that defence planning is haphazard, last minute, ad hoc, unplanned, panicky, ill planned, hasty, and unco-ordinated.
10 comments:
Well, well....You'd think you could at least get one fact straight. How hard could it have been to check out Force Protection's web-site to see that they are AHEAD of schedule. Yes, other manufactures are behind (like BAE for instance) but not the makes of the Mastiff (Force Protection, Inc.)
You should be thankful that your PM's think enough about the troops to get them in vehicles that will save their lives
Here's a couple links for you since you seem to be having problems finding information about FPI and their ability to support the MoD.
Force Dynamics, LLC Breaks Production Records in September - http://www.forceprotection.net/news/news_article.html?id=203
Force Protection, Inc. Announces Record Production in August - http://www.forceprotection.net/news/news_article.html?id=199
Gee thanks for your kind words - Yes our fact checkers have visited the FPI website.
One thing breaking production records - another thing being behind with orders.
Check out the link to previous posting about details of how far behind every supplier is.
If you are so well informed you will see our Prime Minister is sending troops in totally unprotected 6x6 Cats, Snatch landrovers and even totally unrpotected Land Rovers, plus the disastrous air cooled Pinzgaurs as well as the 24 ton behemoths from FPI.
It seems remarkable that the best military response after 6 years in Afghanistan is to order these massive vehicles to carry just 6 soldiers and kit - which are susceptible to IED's that can be knocked up in any back street tool shop.
The only thing that sems to work in an offensive capacity in Afghanistan seems to be dropping laser guided 50lb (and upwards) bombs and guided Air to ground missiles from Apaches... Hearts and Minds operation.
We see Ellicott City is one of the best places to live not only in Maryland but in the US.
Looks like you have a nice place there.
Yes, it's wonderful to live here....Thanks for checking my IP address and posting my location.
Now back to your misunderstanding of the facts.....
You are again saying that the article you cited said FPI is behind schedule. I just re-read it to make sure I didn't miss anything. Nowhere does it even suggest that FPI is behind schedule. The Marines are behind in fielding what they thought they had projected in January concerning how many vehicles would get to the field by the end of the year (because of system integration at SPAWAR and because of the other manufactures that are behind on deliverires (BAE, Navistar, GDLS-Canada, PVI/Oshkosh, etc.)
Did you happen to READ the articles? Did you not see where it stated "Ladson, SC – Leading armored vehicle provider Force Protection, Inc. (NASDAQ:FRPT) today announced record production numbers for the month of August, as well as an ahead-of-schedule delivery performance on its Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicle program contracts to date in 2007."
Yes, the words WELL AHEAD-OF-SCHEDULE, means exactly what it says. Then they announced record production in September...So, your July article must not be referring to FPI, right?
Once we can agree on this one part, I will show you where you are mis-guided in other parts of your blog.
Regards,
From sunny Ellicott City, MD USA
Yes, it's wonderful to live here....Thanks for checking my IP address and posting my location.
Now back to your misunderstanding of the facts.....
You are again saying that the article you cited said FPI is behind schedule. I just re-read it to make sure I didn't miss anything. Nowhere does it even suggest that FPI is behind schedule. The Marines are behind in fielding what they thought they had projected in January concerning how many vehicles would get to the field by the end of the year (because of system integration at SPAWAR and because of the other manufactures that are behind on deliverires (BAE, Navistar, GDLS-Canada, PVI/Oshkosh, etc.)
Did you happen to READ the articles? Did you not see where it stated "Ladson, SC – Leading armored vehicle provider Force Protection, Inc. (NASDAQ:FRPT) today announced record production numbers for the month of August, as well as an ahead-of-schedule delivery performance on its Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicle program contracts to date in 2007."
Yes, the words WELL AHEAD-OF-SCHEDULE, means exactly what it says. Then they announced record production in September...So, your July article must not be referring to FPI, right?
Once we can agree on this one part, I will show you where you are mis-guided in other parts of your blog.
Regards,
From sunny Ellicott City, MD USA
Yes, it's wonderful to live here....Thanks for checking my IP address and posting my location.
Now back to your misunderstanding of the facts.....
You are again saying that the article you cited said FPI is behind schedule. I just re-read it to make sure I didn't miss anything. Nowhere does it even suggest that FPI is behind schedule. The Marines are behind in fielding what they thought they had projected in January concerning how many vehicles would get to the field by the end of the year (because of system integration at SPAWAR and because of the other manufactures that are behind on deliverires (BAE, Navistar, GDLS-Canada, PVI/Oshkosh, etc.)
Did you happen to READ the articles? Did you not see where it stated "Ladson, SC – Leading armored vehicle provider Force Protection, Inc. (NASDAQ:FRPT) today announced record production numbers for the month of August, as well as an ahead-of-schedule delivery performance on its Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicle program contracts to date in 2007."
Yes, the words WELL AHEAD-OF-SCHEDULE, means exactly what it says. Then they announced record production in September...So, your July article must not be referring to FPI, right?
Once we can agree on this one part, I will show you where you are mis-guided in other parts of your blog.
Regards,
From sunny Ellicott City, MD USA
Yes, it's wonderful to live here....Thanks for checking my IP address and posting my location.
Now back to your misunderstanding of the facts.....
You are again saying that the article you cited said FPI is behind schedule. I just re-read it to make sure I didn't miss anything. Nowhere does it even suggest that FPI is behind schedule. The Marines are behind in fielding what they thought they had projected in January concerning how many vehicles would get to the field by the end of the year (because of system integration at SPAWAR and because of the other manufactures that are behind on deliverires (BAE, Navistar, GDLS-Canada, PVI/Oshkosh, etc.)
Did you happen to READ the articles? Did you not see where it stated "Ladson, SC – Leading armored vehicle provider Force Protection, Inc. (NASDAQ:FRPT) today announced record production numbers for the month of August, as well as an ahead-of-schedule delivery performance on its Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicle program contracts to date in 2007."
Yes, the words WELL AHEAD-OF-SCHEDULE, means exactly what it says. Then they announced record production in September...So, your July article must not be referring to FPI, right?
Once we can agree on this one part, I will show you where you are mis-guided in other parts of your blog.
Regards,
From sunny Ellicott City, MD USA
Apologies - getting them out the door is one thing - getting them into use is another. OK maybe that isn't FPI problem but it sure is for the customer... in this case HMG.
Always happy to correct mistakes ... unlike some folks always happy to accept and correct .. gee there is so much to be ignorant about in this world.
Glad you enjoy reading the blog .. even if its only to find the mistakes, typos etc., By our reckoning you've been noseying around for nearly 2 hours.
You should think yourself lucky, Shutter.
My blog gets typically 3 visitors and 3.4 page views per day, and the average visit length is a shade under 1.82 seconds.
Then again, unlike you, I do post crap.
Oh I forgot.
It's Ealing W5, and it's currently dark with some cloud cover with a light south-easterly wind.
And for the benefit of Anon in MD, Ealing W5 is in London, England, which is near Scotland.
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