European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - June 17, 1992, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Wednesday june 17, 1992 the stars and stripes b Page 3 a Ops swear by their think tank sep comes up with items to improve infantryman s lot by Chuck Vinch Washington Bureau Washington a an improved flashlight or a multipurpose pocketknife might not be things Quot to make your average citizen queasy with  but for grunts who live in the Field for Days and weeks at a time there Are occasions when something that simple could be the difference Between maintain Quot ing sanity and going Stark raving mad. The people who run the Soldier Marine enhancement program know that and Are diligently working on dozens of items aimed at modestly improving the lot of the . Infantryman. The 3-year-old program was launched at the Behest of lawmakers who Felt do faces were being overlooked in the annual defense budget wars. The Way sep is set up makes it a Paragon of efficiency a at least by the standards of the military where research testing evaluation and procurement can take years. For one thing it is run on a virtual shoestring. The army Side of the program has a budget of $18 million this fiscal year while the Marine corps has a budget of $12 million. Second and More important the programs mandate is to do it fast. As soon As it becomes Clear that a particular initiative can to go from initial research to full bore procurement within three years it is immediately shelved. That results in a phenomenally Low failure rate with just three initiatives being terminated last fiscal year. A this is undeniably a successful program a said it. Col. George Kingsley Soldier systems integrator under the army a Deputy chief of staff for operations. Potential items Are grouped into one of four categories a weapons and munitions combat clothing and individual equipment communications and navigational aids and food water and  building rebounds after april decline Washington apr housing starts jumped 11.0 percent in May partially recovering from a huge 17.3 percent decline a month earlier the government said tuesday. The gain the largest in More than a year was spread across All regions of the country. In Advance of the report some analysts had said the housing sector after leading the economic recovery for much of a year had reached a plateau that could last through the summer. The Commerce department said construction of new single family Homes and apartments totalled 1.23 million at a seasonally adjusted annual rate up from 1.11 million in april. It was the largest Advance since starts Rose 19 percent in february 1991. But the revised april plunge was even steeper than the original 17.0 percent estimate. It was the largest since a 26 percent drop in March 1984. The decline had followed four months of Sharp increases which analysts attributed in part to unseasonable weather that spurred building and relatively Low mortgage rates that attracted buyers. However rates fell Back during May from an average of 8.84 percent at the beginning of the month to 8.60 percent during the week ending May 29. They were Down to 8.54 percent last week. Housing construction up at an 8.4 percent annual rate during the first Quarter had been credited with pacing the Economy a 2.4 percent growth rate from january through March. Housing traditionally has been the Leader As the Economy emerges from a recession. Despite the april decline the first in seven months starts for the first five months of 1992 were 27.7 percent above those during the same period last year. New Home sales Rose just 1.3 percent in april after falling 15.9 percent in March the largest decline since a 20 percent drop in january 1982. Construction of single family Homes which fell 10.9 percent in april for the second straight monthly drop Rose 9.8 percent in May to a 1.05 million rate. Multifamily construction an often overbuilt sector that has shown extreme volatility recently jumped 18.6 percent to a 185,000 rate. It had fallen 42.6 percent in april after surging 83.8 percent in March. Suggestions for various initial is come from a \ ninety of sources Kingsley said. A Many come from our t raining and doctrine command which is the a Soldier representative for the program he said. A it Radoc gets its ideas from All Over a from commanders military research and development labs some individual soldiers. Sometimes sue a we take the items to infantry divisions and let the soldiers evaluate  it. Col. George Kingsley Gest ions come from me or from  to keep costs Low and fulfil its mandate to work fast the program looks primarily at a non developmental items a a off the shelf commercial products that can be adapted to military use. Since the focus is on items that individual soldiers can use in the Field the soldiers do most of the hands on testing. A we take the items to infantry divisions and let the soldiers evaluate them a Kingsley said. Products that make the Cut and enter the inventory Arentt limited to use by infantrymen but they Are the primary customers. The troops appreciate the Chance to provide meaningful input Kingsley said As evidenced by their reaction to one successful item that has already been fielded under the programs auspices a a simple lightweight hand held flashlight. Quot it s a mundane item but its something the soldiers Hae traditionally bought out of their own pockets a a Kingsley said. Quot be went out and got five different com Mercial flashlights and let the soldiers pick the one they liked Best. A Quot i was in Korea last Winter taking a look at How distribution of the flashlights was going and a Young sergeant came up to me to say he was absolutely thrilled about the army issuing these flashlights. He thought it was just  a a other successful items developed through the program include improved gloves and boots that will keep hands and feet warm even when wet by incorporating a thin layer of cortex in their design. A partial listing of other items under development includes a blameless ration heating devices a Seal lock Pouch that uses a chemical reaction to bring water to a boil and heat the rations. A improved water purification tablets that both purify and clarify water in half the time it takes current iodine tablets. A chemical foam Spray for defusing anti personnel mines. A lightweight digging and cutting tools. A Soldier ground insulators a either a self inflating mat or a folding foam mat a for More sleeping Comfort in the Field. A digital hand held compasses that Are More accurate and less susceptible to fluctuations from Metal objects than current models. A miniature disposable shaving and Hygiene Field kits. A durable versatile Multi Lade pocket knives. A ear microphone and speaker systems to provide hand tree voice activated two Way radio communications for dismounted troops. Disputed aircraft a Model of the european fighter aircraft appeared monday at the International aerospace exhibition at berlins Schonefeld Airport. However its appearance led Manfred Stolpe the social democratic prime min ister of Brandenburg to cancel his speech. The state had agreed to co Host the show on condition there would be no promotion of the Jet and that military participation be kept to a minimum. Quayle flunks As Schoolboy s Heroe from wire reports Trenton . A vice president Dan Quayle puzzled elementary school pupils at a spelling Bee he held for them during a visit monday when he misspelled the word potato. He could however spell president. On his second word Quayle asked 12-year-old William Figueroa to spell the word potato. The boy went to the blackboard in a classroom at Rivera elementary school wrote a a potato and then was told by Quayle he was missing a letter. When the puzzled boy added an a be a making the word a a potato a Quayle praised him to the amazement of a crowd of reporters. William said later he suspected the vice president was wrong. A you can to argue with the vice president can you a he said. The vice president was Reading an incorrect spelling on a Handwritten flashcard he was using. The Blunder followed the Correct spelling of the first word Quayle chose from the set of flashcards president. Quayle Drew chuckles As he gave pupils an example of How the word is used while one of them wrote on the Hoard. A a i he president always tells the vice president what to it Lithe said