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thedrifter
04-15-07, 08:02 AM
Article published Apr 15, 2007
Operation: 'Dragon Skin': Parents campaign for better Marine armor

By Mark Boxley
of The Daily Times Staff

Javier and Marian La Rosa are more than a little encouraged by the amount of local support they have received in their effort to buy 12 sets of body armor for a Marine unit about to deploy to Iraq.

Since early March, the pair has received about $14,000 in donations — more than $1,000 of which was donated while they sat behind a table at Smoky Mountain Harley-Davidson in Maryville on a cold and rainy day this past weekend. About $10,000 of the money they've received came in the past week.

They had originally set out to buy the armor for their son, Lance Cpl. Alex La Rosa, who is the unit's leader. But he wouldn't hear of it unless his men were able to get the armor too.

That's when Javier and Marian started their now weekly tradition of setting up their table at area businesses to collect funds.

Overall, they need more than $42,000 to purchase 12 sets of "Dragon Skin" — a high-tech, light-weight body armor made by California-based Pinnacle Armor. The armor currently issued to Marines uses a system of ceramic plates, and Javier, for one, doesn't think it's the best armor available.

The current Marine armor loses effectiveness after four or five hits, he said, because the ceramic plates crack. The "Dragon Skin" — which is lighter, more flexible, protects more of the body and is comparable in cost, he said — can reportedly take 10 times as many hits and remain effective.

Their first deadline, which requires half the total (about $21,000), is the end of April. Originally it would have been next week, but Pinnacle gave the La Rosas two extra weeks to get the money together.

The rest of the total is due by the end of June when the La Rosas plan to fly to California and hand deliver the body armor to the Marines at 29 Palms, Calif., where they are training before heading overseas.Military resistance
As happy as the La Rosas are about the public support they have received — aside from the money, they have been given a free Web site (www.our-marines.com), a Pennsylvania radio station has adopted their cause, the University of Tennessee baseball team has reportedly given the green light for them to set up in front of the stadium on opening day, and PBS's "Newshour with Jim Lehrer" was in town April 14 to profile them for an upcoming story — they have met resistance from an ironic source.

According to Javier, he was contacted by an official from the Marine Corps base in Quantico, Va., saying "that I need to be educated (about the current body armor)," he said. "Here we are just thinking we're buying these 12 vests, and we're walking into this viper's nest."

Along with inviting Javier and Marian to Quantico, the Marine captain said Alex La Rosa would be at the meeting as well, Javier said.

"I said, 'You must have some powerful strings, because my son's in Japan," he said.

There are only two reasons Javier said he could think of that such an invitation would be extended. The first, he said, is that the military thinks allowing La Rosas to spend time with their son would endear he and his wife so much that they would drop their efforts. The other isn't as positive.

"I'm thinking in my negative mind that it is a threat," Javier said. "I'm leaning toward the latter."

Either way, the message was that the Marines weren't happy with their efforts to raise money for "Dragon Skin" and the publicity they have been receiving, Javier said. They don't want them to continue to pursue buying the new body armor, he said. "That was very clear."

After several phone messages and an e-mail to the Quantico Public Affairs Office, a representative could not be reached for comment by press time Saturday.

"They're afraid," Javier said bluntly. "They are just flat out afraid of these things coming up.

"That's what gives me more reason to continue," he added. "I'm nobody — why do they want to stop me?

"Because I'm the only one saying this is criminal. If that is the reason, thank you very much for trying to stop me."A trip to Quantico
Javier said he has accepted the invitation to go to Quantico and hear the Marines out. And if they convince him he's wrong, he said he'll be the first to say so. But it will take a lot of convincing.

"I challenge them to come and tell me why I'm wrong," Javier said. "And after they tell me, prove it.

"If they are willing to try and stop me, I want them to be willing to come and face me."

The issue is that "Dragon Skin" is not completely accepted by the Department of Defense. In fact, the Army deemed it specifically, as well as all other nonmilitary-issued body armor units, as unacceptable, Javier said. The Marines are a little different, he said. It is up to the individual commander to decide if the Marines under his command can wear something other than what they are given by the military.

Javier believes disallowing "Dragon Skin" is a political move that is not in the best interest of any branch of the service. So much so, that even after he has collected enough money to buy the 12 units he is currently working on, he and Marian plan to keep going.

Javier points to a secret Pentagon study that showed 80 percent of the Marines who died from torso wounds from March 2003 through June 2005 — as reported in a Jan. 7, 2006 story by The New York Times — would have lived had they been wearing expanded body armor.

That expanded body armor, he vehemently argues, is "Dragon Skin."

"They know (issued body armor) is not as good as ("Dragon Skin") and yet they're sending our troops into battle with it," Javier said. "It's not a casualty of war, it's murder."

From his weeks of setting up in front of businesses, Javier has received a lot of feedback from people who wear body armor — from police officers and state troopers, to Army National Guardsmen and Marines who have served in Iraq.

"(They) say, 'You are absolutely right. These (issued) vests don't work. They are absolute garbage,'" Javier said.

"And this is week after week after week."

Not a single person has told him the opposite. "Zero," Javier said.

While Javier said his son's commander has given the green light for his unit to use the 12 sets of "Dragon Skin" the La Rosas are raising money for, even if the military turns them away at the gate when they try to deliver them, the effort won't stop. It will just get stronger, Javier said.

"If this (effort) explodes ... that everybody in the nation starts buying these vests, I will grab every penny," he said. "I'll buy 1,000 vests."

If it took going to Washington D.C. to confront Congress, that's what's going to happen, he added.

"I will prop (the vests) up on the sidewalk and say, 'I dare you not to give these to our troops,'" he said.

Ellie