The US Army/US Marine Corps (USMC) manual on counter-insurgency lays out one of the fundamental dilemmas of irregular warfare: "Sometimes, the more you protect your force, the less secure you may be." In recent years, the United States military has invested astronomical sums in force protection equipment and technology. For Fiscal Year 2008 alone, the Bush administration requested USD15.2 billion in war funding to buy force protection equipment and to counter improvised explosive devices (IEDs), which are the major cause of casualties for US and coalition forces in Afghanistan and Iraq.
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