VietNow National Magazine

Armoring the Strykers in Kuwait

By Jean Brasic, as told to Robert Gutsche, Jr.

Dozens of Strykers, muscled military vehicles used in Iraq, mobile and versatile for urban combat, rolled into Camp Arifjan where I have been working since July 2007. Pushing dust into the air, they came to a stop. I was impressed by their power and their role in the war in Iraq and Afghanistan.

When complete, Strykers look like nasty, brown beasts – with their walls bolted on to protect soldiers from roadside bombs and aggressive attacks. They come onto bases in herds, kicking up dust. And they come in fast. When they leave, they do so heavily armored, noisy, and full of the dedication and fury of those who have worked on them – ready to do their job in the world’s most dangerous place.

But this set of Strykers – heroes of the War on Terrorism, and named after Spc. 4 Robert F. Stryker, who was awarded the Medal of Honor for his Vietnam War service – were not yet the same as those out in the field. This set needed help. They were desperately ill-prepared for combat, missing heavy-duty armor that contractors had yet to add. There was worry that the additions might not come any time soon. It became apparent that the contractor who had won the bid to add the armor to this set of vehicles could not do the job.

The Strykers were here, the armor kits were here, the tools to hang the armor were here, but the contractor could not do the job alone. In this crisis, the hard work fell to soldiers and Department of Army civilians here – a necessary and exciting job, but one that was plagued with a lack of leadership. That was until one young Blackhawk pilot stepped to the plate.

Here at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait, we knew this set of 300 Strykers was underprotected. This day, this set became the job of all, from chaplains to civilians, to fix them up for fighting. I knew there were enough men and women and tools to do this job (in fact, a team of 700 volunteers had stopped their own, crucial missions to assist in this effort), but who would lead this massive effort?
By the time I was able to help out, workers had loaded 10 Strykers into a huge tent, but there was mass chaos. The tent was tight. Tools were everywhere. No one knew their roles. At first, it was taking 48 hours to get one Stryker “armored up.” At that rate, it would take, well, forever to get the work done.
And then came along a 30-year-old Blackhawk pilot, 1st Lt. Jeremiah Lane, who was put in charge of getting this accomplished. That’s when things got interesting – and progress was made. Through the teamwork and his leadership, the amount of time equipping one vehicle dropped. The mantra became: “Git’r done.”

How did he do it? First, he realized something was wrong. “I started laughing” Lane said. The scene was “like ants on a biscuit – that’s what it looked like, because you had all of these people crawling all over these things and nothing was happening.”

His leadership came almost as second nature. He lessened the number of Strykers in the tent at one time, and team leaders were put in charge of the contractors and soldiers at each of the vehicles. The same tools were kept at the same vehicle, and each team for the next week would work together and only work on vehicles in their specific area of the tent, making it their own space.
And somehow, in a way he still can’t describe, he was able to get computer programmers, cooks, soldiers, contractors, and foreign nationals working in the region who didn’t speak English to work on the same specs and the same vehicles – foreign work for them all.

Ultimately, the team worked on the project for more than five days, and they produced a vehicle every 12 hours (down from 48 before Lane came on board). The fastest Stryker was done in nine hours.

This project wouldn’t have been done without the help of all here who gave up their own turfs to help out soldiers, but it certainly wouldn’t have happened without one pilot who, during his task, kept in mind his uncles who had fought for America in Vietnam, and those who had given their lives before – and are sacrificing yet today.

One of our camp’s Champion of the Week awards in August 2007 honored this group for “a five-day mission” where “administrative personnel cleared their calendars and exchanged keyboards for ratchet wrenches, tightened bolts” and made what could have been failed deployment successful. I am proud to have been a part of it.

VietNow Life Associate Member, Jean Brasic is a federal employee working in Kuwait, Iraq, Qatar, and Afghanistan.

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