individual soldier armor rarely weighed more than ten pounds. Since then, it has rarely weighed less than 25 pounds, as the added weight of the pursuit of protection offset efforts to reduce the burden on the soldier.
The motto "speed equals safety" applies to vehicles and aircraft, as well as to individual equipment. However, increasing armor for safety will inevitably reduce mobility. Since World War II, the U.S. Army has been working to develop armor that balances these two conflicting factors and is acceptable to those on the front lines.
This observation was made in 1952 by a U.S. Army armor test team during field testing of the Army's T-52-1 armor vest by frontline troops in Korea. The team found that the new vest stopped 75.7% of fragments and 24.4% of small arms warheads. Considering the state of development of body armor when the Korean War began in 1950, this was a remarkable advance.
Since then, the U.S. Army has continued to develop body armor to improve soldiers' survivability. This article summarizes the development and advancement of the U.S. Army's armor system from World War II to the present. This article also includes a brief description of the U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) armor program, specifically through its Special Operations Forces (SOF) Personal Equipment Advanced Requirements (SPEAR) program.
Since the Korean War, the U.S. Army has issued body armor to improve soldiers' survivability. Since the first batch of M-12 vests entered the Korean battlefield, the level of protection provided by the armor has improved significantly, but the resulting increase in weight has had a negative impact on the soldier's mobility and combat effectiveness. ​Before the advent of the RBA and ISAPO in the mid-1990s, individual soldier armor rarely weighed more than ten pounds. Since then, it has rarely weighed less than 25 pounds, as the added weight of the pursuit of protection offset efforts to reduce the burden on the soldier.