LAV 6.0

[FJAG]

For me the issue has always been one of: what problem are we trying to solve?

I sometimes think that our whole defence plan is premised on the question: how can we keep our current regular force the size that it is and what limited level of "toys" do they need to have in order to have some capabilities.

We did Afghanistan and as a result we now have a vehicle which would do about as well there as any, the LAV6.0. Luckily it also has a useful purpose in North Europe because of the terrain there (albeit I'm always happier with tracked IFVs when accompanying tanks). That also saved our armour capability but because of the permissive air, completely gutted our artillery and air defence.

We aren't really prepared for North Europe (otherwise we'd have air defence, long strike artillery, a standardized tank--rather than three versions--and a robust sustainment capability instead of the cobbled-together ad-hocery that we go through for every mission. Luckily we did have some TOWs in storage this time instead of having sold them off to someone else). Its a minor diversion to keep us in the NATO face-saving game but our army isn't structured or equipped to fight seriously there.

Let me finish this piece of bile by adding two points:

1. I hate to throw anything with some life in it out. Stuff should go into preservation storage because when you need something, you'll need it quickly and may not find it on your local arms merchant shelf ready to use. M109s, and the whole fleet of tracked vehicles and old Coyotes and Bisons - store them. There are lots of old factories around Southern Ontario to keep them warehoused or send them out to the US Army's Sierra Storage facilities in California - that would cost us nothing except a train trip; and

2. Unless and until we seriously ramp up the manpower and workshop capacity of our maintenance arm, we might as well forget about having a "mechanized army" (and really, what war time use is there for the pure ground pounders and towed guns anymore except in very specialized and minimal roles). We need to breath a lot more life into the RCEME. If there's one branch that needs more full-timers and equipment (and a reliable spare parts supply system) it's them.

:2c:

 

[quadrapiper]

I hate to throw anything with some life in it out.

Is there anything currently in the fleet (and on its way out) that would serve better by being concentrated somewhere and driven into pieces, rather than tidily lifecycled out?

 

[MilEME09]

Is there anything currently in the fleet (and on its way out) that would serve better by being concentrated somewhere and driven into pieces, rather than tidily lifecycled out?

Project to replace MILCOT and G-wagon is well underway, so there's two fleets there.

 

[FJAG]

Is there anything currently in the fleet (and on its way out) that would serve better by being concentrated somewhere and driven into pieces, rather than tidily lifecycled out?

I haven't been on a base for a while nor looked at the condition of these vehicles so I'm partially talking out of my hat but there are some vehicles which could offer a decent service still in a training role for reservists who, quite frankly have sweet FA as it stands right now. If things like older M113s, Bisons and even M109s (if there are still some in storage) were put at centralized training centres where their use would be limited to some summer training exercises and the odd course or two then some of our reservists would gain some experience in working in a mechanized environment and one would have the entire winter period to bring up their maintenance standards.

The question isn't so much as to whether we could get more life out of them (other armies are still getting valuable use out of much older equipment than this) but whether the senior leadership thinks that there's enough value coming out of the training to justify the ongoing maintenance costs involved.

Quite frankly, I'm a great pessimist in that I've watched year-after-year of divestment of equipment which still had a residual value for training and even operational use notwithstanding its maintenance costs while new directorate after new directorate is formed in Ottawa to take care of piddling administrative issues. The problem is that the those "necessary" directorates are an immediate and necessary problem for the folks that walk the halls up there while the training of reserves or having some spare emergency equipment around is an easily rationalized away expense.

I must admit the LAV6.0 is growing on me. I've always been a track fan ever since my M113 churned past an entire company/squadron group of AVGP Grizzlies and Cougars which were stuck hull deep in a field in Gagetown. I'm still not so sure that can keep up with Leopards. I've been in Marders which did easily. But I do like it's ability for rapid redeployment when even a marginal road system exists and it's armor and weaponry is pretty much up there with everything but the most high end IFVs. We do need more of them in all variations (and especially AD, mortar and anti-armour versions)

:cheers:

 

[Good2Golf]

In the reserves, if it can be fixed by the local GM dealership we've got the wrong vehicles.

Unless, of course, it’s the Infantry Squad Vehicle...

:nod:

 

[MilEME09]

If any of you have DWAN access, I recommend going to the Army Electronic Library, and read some of the papers released this past January on the future out look of the CAF, in the capabilities area the shift appears to be in using the LAV 6 as the main vehicle family for as much as possible. Which most of us have stated and agreed upon here as one of the best moves the CAF can make given limitations of our resources.

That said to make it a reality I think we would need a LAV 6 based SPG, SPAAG, Armoured Logistics Vehicle (if we insist on towed arty we need a armoured gun tractor), mortor carrier, TUA, Route clearance vehicle.

 

[daftandbarmy]

If any of you have DWAN access, I recommend going to the Army Electronic Library, and read some of the papers released this past January on the future out look of the CAF, in the capabilities area the shift appears to be in using the LAV 6 as the main vehicle family for as much as possible. Which most of us have stated and agreed upon here as one of the best moves the CAF can make given limitations of our resources.

That said to make it a reality I think we would need a LAV 6 based SPG, SPAAG, Armoured Logistics Vehicle (if we insist on towed arty we need a armoured gun tractor), mortor carrier, TUA, Route clearance vehicle.

Probably not a bad idea as about 99% of the conflicts we're likely to be involved in don't/won't require the 'Panzer Grenadier' treatment.

 

[FJAG]

Probably not a bad idea as about 99% of the conflicts we're likely to be involved in don't/won't require the 'Panzer Grenadier' treatment.

I disagree on the "panzergrenadier" issue as we've plunked ourselves into Latvia and tied ourselves to it.

If you look at the other national companies in the eFP Latvia battalion you'll find: Spaniards with 6 Leopard 2Es and 15 Pizzaro IFVs; Italians with C1 Ariete tanks and both Freccia and Dardo IFVs; Poland with a company of PT-91 Twardys; and Slovakia with a company of BMP 2s. Latvia has just acquired two battalions of M109A5Os (previous owner, Austria). While a mixed bag and subject to change on rotations, that's as much of a panzer reinforced panzergrenadier battalion as you'll find in the Bundeswehr.

The question is really as to whether or not the LAV6.0 is up to an IFV status. I've read articles coming out of the US National Training Centre where there was much criticism of pairing Strykers with Tanks. That's based on a) Strykers don't have the mobility to accompany the M1; b) Strykers are too lightly armoured (but LAV6.0s have more armour protection which is similar to some tracked IFVs); and c) Strykers are too lightly armed for the role (Stryker section carriers have only a .50 remote weapon system while the LAV6.0s 25mm is a pretty fair anti-APC weapon)

So we're really only talking mobility (as well as the glaring deficiency in sufficient anti-armour capability in our overall current establishments). Most of Latvia strikes me as terrain that wheeled apcs can handle (albeit not at speed accompanying tanks (been there and done that on the relatively smooth Shilo prairie and believe me when I say that the speeds that a Leo and a Marder can attain cross country leaves everyone else in the dust - not to mention tracked and armoured howitzers)

I'm a strong believer in that we need three separate capabilities (read three asymmetrical brigades): one heavy armour and IFV(and I don't rule the LAV6.0 out of this role) specifically for Europe (read Baltics); a light rapid reaction brigade for immediate deployment to elsewhere in the world and a medium LAV6.0 brigade for follow on forces to the rapid deployment for other missions elsewhere. This  concept of the all singing and dancing agile symmetric brigades we have now makes little sense to me other than for stroking the egos of the three Reg F infantry regiments to make sure no one is any better off than the other.

The light and medium brigades may do the majority of our "shooting situation" deployments, but on that 1% day in Latvia, we want the right gear and the right people there.

:cheers:

 

[daftandbarmy]

I disagree on the "panzergrenadier" issue as we've plunked ourselves into Latvia and tied ourselves to it.

If you look at the other national companies in the eFP Latvia battalion you'll find: Spaniards with 6 Leopard 2Es and 15 Pizzaro IFVs; Italians with C1 Ariete tanks and both Freccia and Dardo IFVs; Poland with a company of PT-91 Twardys; and Slovakia with a company of BMP 2s. Latvia has just acquired two battalions of M109A5Os (previous owner, Austria). While a mixed bag and subject to change on rotations, that's as much of a panzer reinforced panzergrenadier battalion as you'll find in the Bundeswehr.

The question is really as to whether or not the LAV6.0 is up to an IFV status. I've read articles coming out of the US National Training Centre where there was much criticism of pairing Strykers with Tanks. That's based on a) Strykers don't have the mobility to accompany the M1; Strykers are too lightly armoured (but LAV6.0s have more armour protection which is similar to some tracked IFVs); and Strykers are too lightly armed for the role (but Stryker section carriers have only a .50 remote weapon system while the LAV6.0s 25mm is a pretty fair anti-APC weapon)

So we're really only talking mobility (as well as the glaring deficiency in sufficient anti-armour capability in our overall current establishments). Most of Latvia strikes me as terrain that wheeled apcs can handle (albeit not at speed accompanying tanks (been there and done that on the relatively smooth Shilo prairie and believe me when I say that the speeds that a Leo and a Marder can attain cross country leaves everyone else in the dust - not to mention tracked and armoured howitzers)

I'm a strong believer in that we need three separate capabilities (read three asymmetrical brigades): one heavy armour and IFV(and I don't rule the LAV6.0 out of this role) specifically for Europe (read Baltics); a light rapid reaction brigade for immediate deployment to elsewhere in the world and a medium LAV6.0 brigade for follow on forces to the rapid deployment for other missions elsewhere. This  concept of the all singing and dancing agile symmetric brigades we have now makes little sense to me other than for stroking the egos of the three Reg F infantry regiments to make sure no one is any better off than the other.

The light and medium brigades may do the majority of our "shooting situation" deployments, but on that 1% day in Latvia, we want the right gear and the right people there.

:cheers:

So that means, of course, that a great politician can argue that we can deploy a capability the others don't have as part of an Allied 'full spectrum of operations' force, right?

 

[MilEME09]

So that means, of course, that a great politician can argue that we can deploy a capability the others don't have as part of an Allied 'full spectrum of operations' force, right?

If you want a good laugh, the CAF long term outlook is a deployable division level HQ

 

[daftandbarmy]

If you want a good laugh, the CAF long term outlook is a deployable division level HQ

I don't think we have enough elephants for that...

 

[CBH99]

If you want a good laugh, the CAF long term outlook is a deployable division level HQ

Hey now, a division level HQ is something we actually COULD do!!

As long as it's commanding someone else's division.  Surely you don't mean a division level HQ, with our own division under it?  That would be RIDICULOUS 

 

[FJAG]

So that means, of course, that a great politician can argue that we can deploy a capability the others don't have as part of an Allied 'full spectrum of operations' force, right?

Kind of funny actually. I've been working this last week on another article that discusses how we could do a minimal and an optimal solution for placing a prepositioned brigade into Latvia (or Poland). Should have it done in a few days and I'll post links to it here. The minimal solution is not as far fetched an idea as one might think although we do need to fill some of the "real war" capability gaps that we have and knock a few rough edges off our current belief systems.

If you want a good laugh, the CAF long term outlook is a deployable division level HQ

Well? Why not? We have three manoeuvre brigades and a combat support brigade and about ten thousand spare people in Ottawa that we can drag out of the headquarters to fill in the manning.

:stirpot:

 

[MilEME09]

Well? Why not? We have three manoeuvre brigades and a combat support brigade and about ten thousand spare people in Ottawa that we can drag out of the headquarters to fill in the manning.

:stirpot:

Sure, if we can get them to pass a valid medical, fitness test and PWT 3 without the use of a 5.56 pencil.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

If you want a good laugh, the CAF long term outlook is a deployable division level HQ

To command a host of units made up of Brigade/Battalion and company HQ's with L/Col, 10 majors, 5 Captains, 2 Lt's and 3 harassed Sigs ops. Each unit under them has a Major, 3 Captains, a few sigs and 1 under-strength section.

 

[FJAG]

Sure, if we can get them to pass a valid medical, fitness test and PWT 3 without the use of a 5.56 pencil.

Personally, I'd waive all those requirements and issue them 51 pattern webbing, a grey blanket and Lee-Enfields.

:stirpot:

 

[Good2Golf]

...and make them wear puttees!

 

[OldSolduer]

Personally, I'd waive all those requirements and issue them 51 pattern webbing, a grey blanket and Lee-Enfields.

:stirpot:

Oh you are nasty.....

...and make them wear puttees!

And you're even nastier.... :rofl:

 

[CBH99]

Are we trying to use the bodies to flesh out the battalions?  Or organize them into their own battalion and distract the enemy as the waddle over the horizon?

Frankly, I'm fine with either.  Just wondering where we insert the new slab of molasses into the new ORBAT  ???

 

[daftandbarmy]

...and make them wear puttees!

Dude. I wore DMS boots and puttees for years. They’re awesome! (As long as, you know, it doesn’t rain much of course).