Reading this really pisses me off

The last time 1st Lt. William “Eddie” Rebrook IV saw his body armor, he was lying on a stretcher in Iraq, his arm shattered and covered in blood.

A field medic tied a tourniquet around Rebrook’s right arm to stanch the bleeding from shrapnel wounds. Soldiers yanked off his blood-soaked body armor. He never saw it again.

But last week, Rebrook was forced to pay $700 for that body armor, blown up by a roadside bomb more than a year ago.

The story is one of bureaucracy and supply officers who need Form 2319, Affidavit 32c.38b, and three copies of your driver’s license just to lend you a pencil (of which you’ll to file an Equipment Wear and Usage report).

I remember those days in the Marines. I shit you not, I once had to sign a form verifying that I had signed another form.

But here we have a soldier who was wounded in battle, whose story is perfectly plausible, and is still forced to pay for something that should automatically get marked as expendable as soon as it’s put on.

Stories like this aren’t going to help the military find new recruits, that’s for sure.

Hat tip Wizbang