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Q Thank you. I was wondering if we should be thinking about the difference between soldiers who are going to be headed into Iraq and Soldiers who are already there. A lot of the concerns about who did and didn't have were from soldiers who were going in, and I didn't -- I personally didn't get a sense of what the people who are already there are using and what their needs and gaps are.
GEN. SPEAKES: Very, very good question. The first point is that you'll recollect that one of the questions was the status of the 278 ACR; in other words, the date that we had the visit by the secretary of Defense, we had a question about their up-armoring status. When the question was asked, 20 vehicles remained to be up-armored at that point. We completed those 20 vehicles in the next day. And so over 800 vehicles from the 278 ACR were up-armored, and they are a part now of their total force that is operating up in Iraq.
Q When you say they're 100 percent up-armored, does that mean 100 percent of their requirement or 100 percent of their vehicles?
GEN. SPEAKES: Yes, what we did is there was a total of 804 vehicles that were identified as part of our up-armoring strategy. That's the wheeled vehicles that they brought north with them or drew when they got up in country. And so at this point the vehicles that they're operating, that they're driving, are all up-armored. There were a few vehicles that were put on heavy equipment transporters and moved up. The example would be, for example, the shop van, which is a large, essentially static vehicle. And it was taken up by a truck and dropped in position, but it was not operated on the way up there. So at this point, if you're in Kuwait and you're headed north up into Iraq, General Schoomaker's guidance is real clear: you're not going north of the berm, which means north of the border, in a non-up- armored vehicle, and that's our requirement. And so what you now have is an accountability process during the reception, staging and onward movement where every vehicle's accounted for and it gets up-armored or it doesn't go north.
And then the other question was, where are we with people who are operating up in sector right now? What we've been able to do is get enough up-armoring of humvees where, as I mentioned, our telephonic check yesterday with the theater said that when they need an up- armored humvee, they're using it. The estimate, frankly, just to give you an idea of the op tempo, is on any given day, about 50 percent of their humvees are in use. And so by that standard, you could see that we've got plenty of up- armored humvees -- either add-on armor or up-armored humvees -- to be able to operate to meet daily requirements. We're not satisfied with that, and that's why the guarantee is that essentially we're going to go ahead and replace every un-armored vehicle with an add-on armor or up-armored piece of equipment.
Q Are there soldiers who are in the sector right now who are scrounging around looking for extra things who aren't comfortable with what's been provided?
GEN. SPEAKES: Ma'am, I don't know the answer to that question. What I think that ought to be clear to every Soldier, is the Army's commitment to make sure that we provide them everything we can.
Q On the 278th, can you repeat this? At the time the question was asked, the planted question, the unit had 784 of its 804 vehicles armored?
GEN. SPEAKES: Here is the overall solution that you see. And what we've had to do is -- the theater had to take care of 830 total vehicles. So this shows you the calculus that was used. Up north in Iraq, they drew 119 up-armored humvees from what we call stay-behind equipment. That is equipment from a force that was already up there. We went ahead and applied 38 add-on armor kits to piece of equipment they deployed over on a ship. They also had down in Kuwait 214 stay- behind equipment pieces that were add-on armor kits. And then over here they had 459 pieces of equipment that were given level-three protection. And so when you put all this together, that comes up with 830.
Q At the time of the question -- summarize this, now -- that unit that the kid was complaining about was mostly armored?
GEN. SPEAKES: Yes. In other words, we completed all the armoring within 24 hours of the time the question was asked.
Q So it's possible that -- from these numbers -- it's possible that he had a vehicle that had not been armored that was slated to be armored or that had not been armored that was not supposed to be armored, that would be carried on a heavy truck?
GEN. SPEAKES: Both were very possible. And very frankly, if you live out at one of those camps, the level of chaos and confusion as you're going through the final stages of getting a unit ready to go north -- to me the fact that every soldier in that unit didn't have a picture of this is not surprising. This operation took place over about four different locations, widely separated in various locations across Kuwait. And then, of course, he may not have even understood that a part of the solution was waiting for them up in Iraq because the stay-behind equipment that was up in Iraq that had already been add-on armored was never seen by the soldier until he or she got up north and actually drew it in Iraq. And so it's a complex picture. And the bottom line is right now it was successful. We accomplished the missions that General Schoomaker gave us, and it's frankly something that's very, very important that we continue to do.
Q If he hadn't asked that question, would the up-armoring have been accomplished within 24 hours?
GEN. SPEAKES: Yes. This was already an existing program. Remember that when I began this presentation we talked about General Schoomaker in his testimony in front of the HASC in November -- made it real clear. He said all vehicles operating north of the berm will be up-armored, and what that meant in common-sense language is you don't leave Kuwait without either an up-armor or an add-on armor solution. And we understood that, and most importantly the theater did. And so we were in constant dialogue, ensuring that we provided everything that was required to make this happen. And this didn't happen just for the 278th. In other words, the 256th, which was the Army Guard brigade directly in front of it, had the same identical solution; and although different numbers of vehicles, approximately the same solution in terms of percentage of fill.