The lessons of Iraq and Afghanistan, medical experts say, are still emerging. One legacy is new ways to control bleeding before soldiers lapse into comas or their vital organs shut down. Thanks to new clotting agents, blood products and advanced medical procedures performed closer to the battlefield, wounded American soldiers are now surviving at a greater rate than in any previous war fought by the U.S.
The rising survival rate, now touching 95% for those who live long enough to get medical treatment, is in turn introducing new problems caring for patients with serious and chronic injuries, including multiple amputations and brain damage. The cost of treating such lasting injuries will be borne by the U.S. medical system for decades to come.
And yes, as I've noted before, survival of troops who'd normally die in past wars leaves us with the responsibility to help those veterans cope with those wounds--for decades to come.
The cost of wartime logistics will also advance green technologies like solar power for field units:
Combat commanders have done the math, and with more combat units out and about these days, they are demanding more solar panels and fuel cells, in order to lower the demand for generator fuel. With all those computers and electronic gadgets out there, the demand for electricity, especially by units in combat, is huge. If each combat battalion can get by with one, or more, fewer fuel convoys a month, that means more troop support from helicopter gunships and UAVs. Moreover, the cost of protecting those fuel convoys makes solar-panel juice cost about the same as the conventional generator electricity. Commanders also found that water purification equipment quickly paid for itself by cutting the amount of water that had to be trucked in.
It really is a matter of blood for oil out in the field.
Solar power doesn't make much sense for much of the civilian world's energy needs. But, just as medical technology and methods will spin out to the civilian world, solar technology built for military needs will likely hasten the day when solar power makes sense in the civilian world.
