Need some info on mothballed equipment in th Dutch military.

[IPA35]

First of all the Gepard selfproppeled AA guns, 60 were bought and the are now retired.
But as far as I know they were not sold.
Are they still stored (and for sale)?

And Wiki says we have 200 Leopard 1A5's in storage, but that article is probably dated so what happened to them?
Just like the M-109's...

And I read we used to own L118 guns, but they are not in active service and I can't find sources.

And finally, due to the latest budget cuts, we only have 56 Leopard 2A6's and 24 Phz 2000's left.
I know these are put for sale, but what absolute numbers are still owned (both active and stored) by the Dutch army?

 

[Beatmaster]

First of all the Gepard selfproppeled AA guns, 60 were bought and the are now retired.
But as far as I know they were not sold.
Are they still stored (and for sale)?

And Wiki says we have 100 Leopard 1A5's in storage, but that article is probably dated so what happened to them?
Just like the M-109's...

And I read we used to own L118 guns, but they are not in active service and I can't find sources.

And finally, due to the latest budget cuts, we only have 5 Leopard 2A6's and 24 Phz 2000's left.
I know these are put for sale, but what absolute numbers are still owned (both active and stored) by the Dutch army?

Can you provide a link to that wiki? because we do have more then 5 Leopard 2 A6 tanks accoording to Mindef.nl we still own 100 of them but the defence buget cuts will reduce this number to 60.

Source: Link

Also mindef.nl is reporting the same info.
So i do believe that the wiki you did read is not accurate.:unknown
Anyway lets say for a second that the wiki is right than the dutch goverment should go home very fast because if we only own 5 leopart tanks then....this is extreemly bad for the future.:lul

 

[IPA35]

I am terribly sorry, I meant 56.

No that's not from wiki, actually.
But I do believe 56 (or 60 then?) is a bit too few.
And as far as I know not all riterd tanks are sold so they should put atleast 20 back in service + reserves...

According to this, both Mechanised Brigades have 30 tanks left.
43 Gemechaniseerde Brigade | Ministerie van Defensie

And there is this:lul

Leopard 2A6 gevechtstank | Ministerie van Defensie

And this:

Pantserhouwitser 2000 (PzH 2000) | Ministerie van Defensie

I am still waiting for new replies in my Dutch military thread, I have some new idea's

And this links is the Wiki article on the L118...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L118_Light_Gun#Users

And this one on the 1A5's.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopard_1#Operators

I need some more sources you see.

 

[Beatmaster]

I am terribly sorry, I meant 56.

No that's not from wiki, actually.
But I do believe 56 (or 60 then?) is a bit too few.
And as far as I know not all riterd tanks are sold so they should put atleast 20 back in service + reserves...

According to this, both Mechanised Brigades have 30 tanks left.
43 Gemechaniseerde Brigade | Ministerie van Defensie

And there is this:lul

Leopard 2A6 gevechtstank | Ministerie van Defensie

And this:

Pantserhouwitser 2000 (PzH 2000) | Ministerie van Defensie

I am still waiting for new replies in my Dutch military thread, I have some new idea's

And this links is the Wiki article on the L118...
L118 Light Gun - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

And this one on the 1A5's.
Leopard 1 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I need some more sources you see.

Thats correct you are right but keep in mind that both

13 Gemechaniseerde Brigade and 43 Gemechaniseerde Brigade have together 60 leoparts 2A6 so each brigade has 30 of them.

Anyway i agree we could use at least 60 more just to feel good.
On the other hand having these tanks costs alot, and in this case if we need 2A6 tanks than a few phone calls will deliver a complete batch of them.
So in case of need we can triple the amount within 36 hours.

Anyway in on this page you will find a pdf file ( Dutch) that will explain that the total numbers of systems displayed on public pages do not match the reality.
Accoording to this pdf files the dutch armed forces will disband 30 leoparts like you said but it also will invest in some newer more upgraded and advanced systems.
It also shows that the dutch armed forces can call in additional support and main combat systems when needed.
So for me personally iam lost how big are the dutch forces and what do they really have?
Because regardless or iam right or not this pdf file tells the opposite story of every webpage that contains info about the dutch armed forces.
example: 1 page tells us the dutch armed forces are going to cut its numbers, and this pdf file tell a differend story it confirmes the fact that numbers will be reduced and at the same times it tells us that a great number of additional new units will be added to make sure that the defence of netherlands antilles is asured and that the dutch armed forces climb on the ladder to become one of worlds most advanced armies it also tells the story of increasing operational power and managment by adding new information systems and units for logistic's and direct fire support and so on.
So when i understand this pdf file correctly then the dutch forces will decrease with 25% and thats alot on all sections...
But at the same time preparations will be made to increase the dutch overal operation capabilities up to 60% anbove the current levels.
So this basicly increases the numbers of the dutch armed forces.
And on this point iam in great doubt because everyone tells a differend story but this pdf file really tests my judgement because it tells a complete differend story then everyone have said in thë past "dutch army" topic's here on this great forum.
So can someone please tell me what is the deal about the dutch forces.?

 

[exported_kiwi]

Question

Thats correct you are right but keep in mind that both

13 Gemechaniseerde Brigade and 43 Gemechaniseerde Brigade have together 60 leoparts 2A6 so each brigade has 30 of them.

Anyway i agree we could use at least 60 more just to feel good.
On the other hand having these tanks costs alot, and in this case if we need 2A6 tanks than a few phone calls will deliver a complete batch of them.
So in case of need we can triple the amount within 36 hours.

Anyway in on this page you will find a pdf file ( Dutch) that will explain that the total numbers of systems displayed on public pages do not match the reality.
Accoording to this pdf files the dutch armed forces will disband 30 leoparts like you said but it also will invest in some newer more upgraded and advanced systems.
It also shows that the dutch armed forces can call in additional support and main combat systems when needed.
So for me personally iam lost how big are the dutch forces and what do they really have?
Because regardless or iam right or not this pdf file tells the opposite story of every webpage that contains info about the dutch armed forces.
example: 1 page tells us the dutch armed forces are going to cut its numbers, and this pdf file tell a differend story it confirmes the fact that numbers will be reduced and at the same times it tells us that a great number of additional new units will be added to make sure that the defence of netherlands antilles is asured and that the dutch armed forces climb on the ladder to become one of worlds most advanced armies it also tells the story of increasing operational power and managment by adding new information systems and units for logistic's and direct fire support and so on.
So when i understand this pdf file correctly then the dutch forces will decrease with 25% and thats alot on all sections...
But at the same time preparations will be made to increase the dutch overal operation capabilities up to 60% anbove the current levels.
So this basicly increases the numbers of the dutch armed forces.
And on this point iam in great doubt because everyone tells a differend story but this pdf file really tests my judgement because it tells a complete differend story then everyone have said in thë past "dutch army" topic's here on this great forum.
So can someone please tell me what is the deal about the dutch forces.?

What was the strength of the Dutch military at it's peak over the last 20 years? I hope that the Netherlands can retain some significant capacity!

 

[Beatmaster]

Acctually i do not know what the real capacity was over the past 20 years but during coldwar times we did have a aircarrier and 1k tanks, at least that is what other webpages and wikipedia showes.

Has anyone some sources about this?

Further it is true that the dutch armed forces have decreased very mutch in the past 10 years but on the other hand the systems available to our boys are the best of the best.
I did read the pdf file again to understand it better and it seems that the dutch armed forces try to raise the level of efficency and they try to make the armed forces even more proffesional then they already are.
And being hyper proffesional is a good thing ill guess, but we need to be on our guard that we do not pass the magic line otherwise we might end up with no army at all.
Anyway the goverment has started new training projects and the goverment is getting help for other nations to bring some fire into the army, so i do believe that they are cutting the forces to get something better in return.
Only tomowow can tell and we should wait to see if this works out the way the goverment planned to.
Because this is acctually the first time in the past 40 years that the goverment is talking this kind of risks to re-build the army from top to bottom.

Edit: o the pdf file is also showing that the goverment has made up its mind and they are raising funds to buy the JSF.

 

[IPA35]

I would like to discuss some of this, but that would be offtopic, I have another topic...

They need those very proffesional troops for peacekeeping purposes I guess.
But I personally oppose the wars we've been in the last 20 years, and would like to see more focus on national defence.
Wereldwijd Inzet is not that valuable, but we should better defend the Antilles (I am thinking, a fighter squadron maybe F-35B because of lack of building space).

And I can't see this as an improvement:
http://www.defensie.nl/actueel/nieuws/2009/06/16/46132597/Korps_Mariniers_verlaat_Curacao


My idea:

2 mechanised bridages each with.

40 ACTIVE Leopards (I can live with 3 but they should have reserves in the county)
24 active Phz2000's (12 is way to few IMO).
12 HIMARS (Guided missles and a few dozen ATACMS's no cluster munition ofcourse).
CV90 (as planned but a few extra with Spike-LR's).
And the light vehicles as planned (and extra Bushmasters).

Who about reforming the complete NATRES into a reserve light infantry brigade?

But what about the mothballed 1A5's?
The've sold them or scrapped them?

And did we own L118 guns in the Coldwar??

 

[Beatmaster]

I would like to discuss some of this, but that would be offtopic, I have another topic...

They need those very proffesional troops for peacekeeping purposes I guess.
But I personally oppose the wars we've been in the last 20 years, and would like to see more focus on national defence.
Wereldwijd Inzet is not that valuable, but we should better defend the Antilles (I am thinking, a fighter squadron maybe F-35B because of lack of building space).

And I can't see this as an improvement:
Korps Mariniers verlaat Curaçao | Ministerie van Defensie


My idea:

2 mechanised bridages each with.

40 ACTIVE Leopards (I can live with 3 but they should have reserves in the county)
24 active Phz2000's (12 is way to few IMO).
12 HIMARS (Guided missles and a few dozen ATACMS's no cluster munition ofcourse).
CV90 (as planned but a few extra with Spike-LR's).
And the light vehicles as planned (and extra Bushmasters).

Who about reforming the complete NATRES into a reserve light infantry brigade?

But what about the mothballed 1A5's?
The've sold them or scrapped them?

And did we own L118 guns in the Coldwar??

Your Idea about 2 mechanised bridages sounds great i would even increase that number to 4 or 5 just to feel good, but it seems that this will not happen very fast due cuts and reform plannings.
I do not wanna compare the dutch armed forces with a international army, but you should know that the dutch armed forces might be small but they are very capable so national defence matters are wel taken care of.
One of the foundations rules of nato is that a member needs to be able to defend itself, at least that is what i have been told^^
So decreasing the army has its negative effect but it also enables new investments and options to reform and rebuild the forces to a level that will last at least 10 years.
Currently the dutch armed forces have high tech systems, but they also use older systems ( outdated might be to heavy to say) but those older systems need to be updated or replaced and this costs a huge amount of money.
To make this happen the dutch armed forces need to lose weight so that additional funds become available otherwise it will be way over our buget.
So the decreasing army might make the dutch armed forces look like a joke for now, but when the reform projects start to kick in and the replaced systems become active than i do believe that the dutch ared forces are ready to face another 10 years without worries.
At least i do hope so.

As far as i can tell the 1A5's are being used as training models and some of them got scrapped, ia not sure but i do believe that a few of them where edited for differend tasks (service vehicles?)

I do not know or we did own L118 guns but when you search google than you will see that the dutch armed forces could use these guns so ill guess that we did own them.

 

[IPA35]

2 mechanised brigades will do with the armament I propposed.
The airborne brigade is good as it is.
And the size should only increase to man the new systems.
(I forgot to mention 12 CV90's with AMOS per brigade.)

The soldiers are proffesial enough IMO, and not all have to be 'worldwide avaiable'.
IMO only the air assault brigade and the marine corps.
The marine corps should recieve some IFV's (with ATGM's) and 24 M777's to do this.

But I don't believe they want to downsize actually, they still have a personel shortage and open 'vacatures'.

We could make a 4th brigade.
A reserve brigade with light equipment.
Composed of the entire NATRES and 400-500 proffesial soldiers and officers.
They too should have 24 m777's and some Boxers.

Some 1A5 based engineering vehicles remain in service, but not MBT's.
Maybe a few are still in reserve?
You have any idea were these numbers could be stored?
At the barracks?

 

[Beatmaster]

2 mechanised brigades will do with the armament I propposed.
The airborne brigade is good as it is.
And the size should only increase to man the new systems.
(I forgot to mention 12 CV90's with AMOS per brigade.)

The soldiers are proffesial enough IMO, and not all have to be 'worldwide avaiable'.
IMO only the air assault brigade and the marine corps.
The marine corps should recieve some IFV's (with ATGM's) and 24 M777's to do this.

But I don't believe they want to downsize actually, they still have a personel shortage and open 'vacatures'.

We could make a 4th brigade.
A reserve brigade with light equipment.
Composed of the entire NATRES and 400-500 proffesial soldiers and officers.
They too should have 24 m777's and some Boxers.

Some 1A5 based engineering vehicles remain in service, but not MBT's.
Maybe a few are still in reserve?
You have any idea were these numbers could be stored?
At the barracks?

Netherlands Leopards (Leopard 1-V)
The Dutch Leopards have the EMES-12A3 FCS, PZB II night sight, different radios, Dutch type smoke dischargers, and three stowage panniers. They are fitted with the same applique turret armor as is on the Leopard 1A1A1. The Dutch Leopards use the British L52 APDS round for the main gun.

The 1A5's are now used as:
Leopard Armored Recovery Vehicle (ARV)
The ARV has a tank chassis with a new hull. Standard equipment is a dozer blade, hydraulic crane pivoted on the front right of the hull, a 35-ton winch, electric winch, and welding system. With a crew of four, the ARV recovers and tows damaged or disabled vehicles. It can lift complete vehicles or components up to 20 tons. It carries a spare powerpack, dozing equipment, and refueling equipment. The ARV is armed with two 7.62mm machine guns, one for anti-aircraft defense, and smoke dischargers.

Leopard Armored Engineer Vehicle (AEV)
The AEV is based on the ARV. The only differences are that the AEV has a heat exchanger, explosives are carried for demolition work, an auger is carried in place of the spare powerpack on the rear, and the dozer blade can be fitted with scarifiers.

Leopard Armored Vehicle Bridge Launcher (AVLB)

25% of them have training status the rest of them are in use/parked and waiting to be scrapped/sold or modified.

Edit:
The dutch forces did have originally 468 Leopard 1A5s; and now the still have 200 Leopard 1A5s in storage and ready for use as secondary MBT and some of them have support functions.

Little leopard 2A6s info
The Royal Netherlands Army has operated 445 Leopard 2s. Many were sold after the end of the Cold War. Currently the Netherlands Army operates 82 Leopard 2A6s and have an additional 28 Leopard 2A6s in storage plus a damaged hull.

The location of those MBT's is:
Leopard 1V Oirschot, the Netherlands
Located at building 250 of the 11th (NLD) tankbattalion. Not an original 11th tkbat vehicle but painted in the colours of one of battalions staff vehicles. This type was used by the battalion from 1985 - 1993. It was also in use with 49th, 52nd, 58th and 59 Tkbat and 101st, 102nd, 104th Recconnaissance battalions. Registrationnumber is KU-93-65 and serialnumber 12367

And here is a link to some updated info because mindef and wikipedia provided some outdated info about the MBT's so many thing have changed again.


This is al the info i could find so far.
If anyone has updates than please share.

Source: Mindef and wikipedia

 

[IPA35]

10 out of 73 to be converted to Kodiak, aii...
And they don't want to use some to convert them to bridgelayers?

We should buy a few dozen from German reserves IMO...

On 1V...
Leopard 1V; inzetbaarheid

 

[Beatmaster]

10 out of 73 to be converted to Kodiak, aii...
And they don't want to use some to convert them to bridgelayers?

We should buy a few dozen from German reserves IMO...

On 1V...
Leopard 1V; inzetbaarheid

Honestly? If they would convert a few to bridgelayers than this could be a nice bonus, because other options are not available anymore or way to outdated for the old leo's.
Ill guess that the have they have enough genie vehicles, so the only thing they can do with those old MBT's is using them for training.
So i really do not know what they are upto at this point but it would be wise to use the old MBT's as mutch as possible now we still can use them because now they are rotting away in some shitty bunker building. Anyway if the last link i posted is correct then they will be scrapped in 2011 and 2012.
So for now we have to count our blessings and hope that the rebuild/upgrade projects that the goverment started a few years ago finally are going to pay off.

 

[IPA35]

I read the planned to mount the Leguan system on a MAN truck, is this true?
They should mount them on Leo2's but the numbers are to few.
Buy 30-35 second hand ones and keep 20 in reserve or active service as MBT.

Those Leo1's, in the link I read they only made 1 prototype of the 1V, and the rest are just normal 1A5's.

Maybe we could sell them to poor countries in South-America or Africa?

We also need more CV90's.
And 60 should have 1 or 2 spike-ER missle launchers.
And 25 with AMOS.

We must fase out the YPR's as soon as possible.

 

[IPA35]

Even more mysteries:

FH-70 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

What happened to those?

 

[Beatmaster]

Even more mysteries:

FH-70 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

What happened to those?

Are they not replaced by the PHZ?
Because on the Mindef page they do not show any info about them.

 

[IPA35]

Probably, but the phz were bought to replace the M109's.