The conventional wisdom is that the US is spending considerable effort and money to protect Israel. I do not believe it is a one way street. In addition to the considerable contributions of Israel in the medical, electronics, computers and other fields, Israel helps the US to improve its military equipments too.

A friend of mine is serving in Afghanistan and we met recently during his short vacation to talk about his experiences.
It is not a place you want to be. It is so easy for a few terrorists to attack a US convoy from their hideaway in the mountains, and hard to detect them even from the air since the region is so large and rugged. The country is in a shamble, and very little central control or security are available. But that is not I want to talk about here.

He told me with great enthusiasm about a few important improvements in their combat gears. But he was not aware they were all invented in Israel and now saves American lives.

Their latest much superior combat transport has the doors in the back, so they can come in or escape in an emergency protected by the bulk of the vehicle. What he did not know is that some three decades ago Israel developed the Merkava tank with doors at the back to protect the soldiers. The US finally copied this important protection.
Another protection is the steel plates hanging all over the vehicles to absorb the shock of incoming missiles/ bazookas. They were invented in Israel decades ago and used on all Israeli tanks.

Another invention come to their aid is the new lighter body armor. He was so happy about that since it is some 20 pounds lighter, protect them better and cover a larger part of the body. All of these with easier mobility too. Again, what he did not know is that it was an Israeli invention now made in the US too.

Another improvement saving US soldier’s lives is the constant air surveillance from drones, pilotless small aircrafts. Israel invented them some 15 years ago and sold them to the US to use and to study how to make US models. This year these pilotless aircrafts have larger procurement rates than typical aircraft in the US Air Force.
Not only that, a PBS program on these very versatile no pilot aircrafts showed that their flexibility and usefulness is so much higher than normal combat aircrafts. They are so superior that the pilot who controlled them from a US base over the Afghanistan sky, a trained pilot, said enthusiastically that they are so much more useful he will never consider going back to the old type of aircraft.

By the way, France is buying only Israeli pilotless aircraft since it consider them superior to others.

Inside the US Israel is also saving American lives. One of my sons, a doctor in a large hospital, told me that their city hired an Israeli emergency expert to teach them how to react and organize more efficiently to handle mass casualties, either from terrorist attacks or medical pandemics, such as the Swine flu. The Israeli expert taught them how to do Triage, initial inspection, of casualty more effectively, and handle related civil emergencies. Israel trouble with terrorists helped developed this unique skill to help America and other countries.

Matania
10/09