40 deg south
Well-Known Member
Australian DoD seeks 450 tracked IFVs under Project Land 400 Phase 3 RfI | IHS Jane's 360
Janes covers the same news.
Janes covers the same news.
Infantry Dismounted Support Vehicle
The latest infantry magazine talks about a dismounted support vehicle which will be used obviously by dismounted infantry to reduce the loads they need to carry. This project is meant to kick off next year. Anyone have any idea what type of vehicle is being considered for this and exactly how it will be employed?
The latest infantry magazine talks about a dismounted support vehicle which will be used obviously by dismounted infantry to reduce the loads they need to carry. This project is meant to kick off next year. Anyone have any idea what type of vehicle is being considered for this and exactly how it will be employed?
everything under LAND 121 qualifies.
FormerDirtDart
Well-Known Member
I'm going to go out on a limb, and suggest that the dismounted support vehicle is probably more along the lines of the US Army's Squad Multipurpose Equipment Transport (S-MET) program. A unmanned, or optionally manned vehicle that can carry the squads equipment.
Along the lines of the Lockheed Martin Squad Mission Support System:
View attachment 6606
View attachment 6607
Which looks very much like a Supacat ATMP, which is what I had thought was a possibility.
I would think that virtually any of the Land 121 vehicles is totally inappropriate, being too large/heavy/expensive.
Phase 4 of 121 is too heavy???
Well yes I think phase 4 probably is too heavy, given my very limited understanding of the role of this vehicle. Whilst I haven't seen the official requirement (hence the original post) I don't think the vehicle will be heavily if at all armoured (given it is likely to be carrying the driver only), so I suspect it will be considerably lighter than a Hawkei, and given its for load hauling, I suspect it will not require the performance specs of a Hawkei.
Prev IMV's were the 4wd and 6wd land rovers....
when I worked at JRA the IMV's we worked on for years were landies..... and the 6wd were the primary dismount trucks....
they were only thins as the threats were very different then - and it was only when IED
s became the fashion that the primary US IMV (humvee) started to get armoured add on panels.
any IMV under todays common threat scenario against the current notional threat would be thicker skinned - and that means hawkei as a minimum I suspect - or the armoured G-wagens (ie thins plus kits) which are also there to be used as IMV's
I remember the old Land Rover based interim IMVs, but from the way the article reads this vehicle will be a different beast. It will not be be an IMV and will not be used to transport troops....it seems that it will only be used to transport some of their gear, thus reducing the load individual soldiers need to carry. If this is in fact the case, the armour/weight/performance/cost of a Hawkei seems a bit over the top.
Last edited:
Yes, my take is an ATV and possibly, eventually something like the automated or robotised systems the US are looking for that will follow the troops with their packs, extra supplies and maybe heavy weapons. Like I said more of an ATV, not a combat vehicle or troop carrier in any way shape or form, except maybe when carrying casualties.
The dismounted support vehicle will be very much along the lines of a militarised Polaris/Gator type vehicle, nothing bigger than that. Think the sort of thing you would have in your own backyard to move firewood around the place. SOCOMD already have a vehicle in service that has been used in trials and is the exemplar of the type of vehicle to be bought. It won't be unmanned or anything complicated like that - the simpler the better.
I've seen their 4 and 6wd gators, they are a nifty piece of kit.
but even their 6wd gator/polaris is not an IMV by any means - or has the definition of an IMV beyond being a green taxi changed?
I think you have confused matters by introducing the term IMV. The term used in the original post was DSV, dismounted support vehicle, which I imagine was a term invented by the staff officer who wrote up the capability needs statement.
IMV still means what it always did, it just doesn't have anything to do with the topic of discussion.
Read back and think you are correct, it does appear to be DSV (dismounted support vehicle / deep sea vessel? ) .
Gawd acronyms are a pain, especially when there are ones with multiple meanings, or perhaps worse, when new ones are introduced although what is being specified or described could be perfectly adequately covered by an existing term. OCV/OPV/OPC/LCV, or corvette come to mind, then there is DE/FF/PF/LCS, while the cavalry vehicle descriptor always eludes me as I always think cavalry fighting vehicle, then armoured cavalry vehicle, cavalry scout vehicle before reading back to check.
In fact, why IMV at all, or MRAP in the various iterations, they are basically wheeled APCs? That's what the Saxon, VAB, Transporter, BTR(X), Condor, and dozens of others that range from trucks / 4x4s fitted with add on armour, through armoured bodies on a commercial chassis, COTS components on a monocoque armoured body, even a bespoke military platform, they are all APCs. A Bison / LAV/PC derivative was even offered for Project Bushranger, would that have been called an IMV?
ta. I guess I crossed wires when I looked at the dismounted issue as the IMV was also supposed to be a dismount taxi...
so I did the cardinal sin of extrapolating and adding 1 plus 1 and got 3
I worked on the JRA solution for Bushmaster which was their armoured IMV - it ended up being sold to SA Parks as a fire truck - and we sold 25 to Kuwait as "police cars"
Todjaeger
Potstirrer
As I understand it, there is a notional difference in how an APC would be employed, vs. an IMV. An APC is to transport troops to and on a battlefield, possibly even accompanying dismounts or at least being nearby them. An IMV however, is largely just to transport troops to or from a battlefield, with the armour there to provide some protective vs. ambushes or barrages while in transit.
It's all just semantics. Unless a definition is given, I wouldn't read much into names/acronyms, as meanings and interpretations change over time.
Just look at the interpretation of 'IMV' and how it has changed. The IMV was so named (infantry mobility vehicle) based on a concept that came out of defence of Australia, which was the need to transport infantry over large distances in a protected and comfortable manner. As time went on and the concept was further developed, it was realised that the vehicle would be of value to more than just the infantry. Hence, the term evolved into 'protected mobility vehicle,' which was more descriptive of the actual use of the vehicle. The term was synonymous with the name Bushmaster, to the point that it was rarely called a Bushmaster any more, but simply a PMV.
The term PMV then stopped becoming a specific vehicle, but then a type of vehicle. When the powers that be decided that a smaller, lighter vehicle with equivalent armour protectiom was required, it was called a PMV-L, even though the program for what became the Hawkei had very little to do with the concept that lead to the original PMV. Where once the army had only 'armoured' or 'non-armoured vehicles,' we now also had 'protected vehicles.' What was the difference between an 'armoured vehicle' and a 'protected vehicle?' No one knew because they were essentially meaningless terms.
So, the Army invented some definitions. The catalyst was LAND 400, and the need to demonstrate to government why the PMV wasn't a fighting vehicle and that they should spend tens of billions of dollars on new vehicles despite the fact they had just bought 1000+ Bushies. So an 'armoured vehicle' is now a vehicle designed to enter the direct fire zone (ie an M113, IFV, tank etc) while a 'protected vehicle' is a vehicle that is not designed to enter the direct fire zone, but is simply armoured to enable the occupants to survive the hit and get away in one piece (ie, every other vehicle that happens to have some armour).
Essentially, all the terms are meaningless other then to give a purpose in life to some staff officers.
Just look at the interpretation of 'IMV' and how it has changed. The IMV was so named (infantry mobility vehicle) based on a concept that came out of defence of Australia, which was the need to transport infantry over large distances in a protected and comfortable manner. As time went on and the concept was further developed, it was realised that the vehicle would be of value to more than just the infantry. Hence, the term evolved into 'protected mobility vehicle,' which was more descriptive of the actual use of the vehicle. The term was synonymous with the name Bushmaster, to the point that it was rarely called a Bushmaster any more, but simply a PMV.
The term PMV then stopped becoming a specific vehicle, but then a type of vehicle. When the powers that be decided that a smaller, lighter vehicle with equivalent armour protectiom was required, it was called a PMV-L, even though the program for what became the Hawkei had very little to do with the concept that lead to the original PMV. Where once the army had only 'armoured' or 'non-armoured vehicles,' we now also had 'protected vehicles.' What was the difference between an 'armoured vehicle' and a 'protected vehicle?' No one knew because they were essentially meaningless terms.
So, the Army invented some definitions. The catalyst was LAND 400, and the need to demonstrate to government why the PMV wasn't a fighting vehicle and that they should spend tens of billions of dollars on new vehicles despite the fact they had just bought 1000+ Bushies. So an 'armoured vehicle' is now a vehicle designed to enter the direct fire zone (ie an M113, IFV, tank etc) while a 'protected vehicle' is a vehicle that is not designed to enter the direct fire zone, but is simply armoured to enable the occupants to survive the hit and get away in one piece (ie, every other vehicle that happens to have some armour).
Essentially, all the terms are meaningless other then to give a purpose in life to some staff officers.
Careful, they may make you into one and you'll then be responsible for developing new acronyms for old capabilities
Makes sense when you put it like that, use terminology in such a way the political classes will not mistake a Bushmaster for an Abrams.