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[Fluff]

As long as the hatches are closed it looks like a regular Boxer. It doesn't stand out in a crowd.

Like this:

 

[Talibanhunter]

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[morris]

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Britain has ordered the upgrade of some of its Challenger 2 tanks to the Challenger 3 standard.

Anglo-German armored vehicle-maker Rheinmetall BAE Systems Land has signed a deal with the British Defence Ministry to upgrade Challenger 2 main battle tanks.
The £800 million (U.S. $1 billion) contract announced May 7 will see 148 British Army tanks upgraded to the Challenger 3 standard.
The British confirmed a cut of 35 percent in its main tank fleet in the recently published integrated defense, security and foreign policy review. At one point, speculation among media and analysts suggested the government was looking to ax the entire Challenger tank force.

Britain awards $1 billion contract to upgrade Challenger 2 tanks

Anglo-German armored vehicle-maker Rheinmetall BAE Systems Land has signed a deal with the British Defence Ministry to upgrade Challenger 2 main battle tanks.

www.defensenews.com

 

[Deleted member 11302]

Yes, finally! Good things come to those who wait. No more "joint"! (Source, German)

The German Minister of Defence, Kramp-Karrenbauer, and the service's senior general, Zorn, are set to announce a major reform which will dismantle the Bundeswehr's Central Medical Service and Joint Support Service in favour of their return to their erstwhile parent branches in the army, navy and air force. The reform will affect some 60,000 troops.

At the turn of the millenium, the German armed forces had decided to pool their individual branches' rear services in a unified structure; synergetic effects were to be exploited and redundant structures streamlined. In reality, however, the reform created a severely top-heavy organisation with overlapping responsibilities all the while draining frontline units of their organic support.

For instance, the German Army is officially 63,000 personnel strong – but an additional 52,000 "army uniform wearers" (official term) serve in the unified structure. They will now boost the Army's divisions. Even better, a blood-letting among the higher echelons is planned in order to shift budgeted posts from staffs and headquarters to frontline units.

Said plans are said to have prompted negative reactions amongst the leadership [no one votes themselves out of office, do they?]. Apparently, the Minister shot down an attempt to advocate the polar opposite of her plans: creating a "Joint Support Service XXL" with even more subordinate units and responsibilities. Dodged a bullet there!

What was the rationale for establishing the Streitkräftebasis in the first place? I was too young back then to give a toss so I didn't really pay attention to that strange reform and the ideas behind it.

 

[muck]

The rationale was the same as behind the creation of the Central Medical Service: synergetic effects. A lot of troops in all three branches of the armed forces were doing (more or less) the same thing with(more or less) the same equipment, receiving (more or less) the same training and abiding by (more or less) the same regulations and procedures.

If you lumped them together, not only could you get the most out of the available resources (for instance, in a land-based foreign deployment the navy's combat service support forces would go unutilised). The rear services' daily workload would also be exposed, and you could skim off the fat. In the beginning, this saved a lot of money.

The idea wasn't even bad so long as the German armed forces were only to deploy to missions like Afghanistan, were the entire military apparatus was practically geared to producing contingents for rotation. However, in an all-out war a military organised that way is woefully unable to sustain itself. The supporters must go back to those needing their support.

 

[TheKiwi]

Britain has ordered the upgrade of some of its Challenger 2 tanks to the Challenger 3 standard.

.....

No sign of an active protection system in any of these articles which is a bit concerning.

 

[muck]

Well, they said: "British Army to possess most lethal tank in Europe". They didn't say "most survivable" or "best". ? That's the issue with the inflationary use of superlatives.

 

[muck]

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[Fluff]

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its obviously the water heater, that is beyond reproach!

 

[muck]

Do the Challenger 2's still have a water heater to make tea? That's awesome.

 

[TheKiwi]

No sign of an active protection system in any of these articles which is a bit concerning.

I now see that there is going to be an APS "subject to contract". Which makes it sound like the worst five words in military procurement: "Fitted for but not with".

 

[morris]

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[muck]

Today, the German Ministry of Defence has presented its structural review and outlined its reform plans for the Bundeswehr. The original report has an extent of 27 pages, here's the gist of what the minister's plans entail:

[Squared brackets indicate explanations added by me]​

Overall structure

• the current overall structure of the Federal Defence Force is to be abandoned
• both the traditional arms of the military and the unified capability commands (Central Medical Service, Joint Support Service, Cyber- and Information Domain Service) are to be disbanded
• the traditional arms and the Cyber- and Information Domain Service will form new Domain Commands
• each Domain Command will be divided into Component Commands for a more streamlined command structure and easier access to certain capabilities
• as many staffs and administrative units as possible are to be disbanded or reduced in size, their budgetary posts being reallocated to front-line units; there will be no reductions of manpower or redundancies, with the budgetary manpower ceiling remaining at 203,000 troops (including 184,000 professional soldiers, 12,500 volunteers and 4,500 activated reservists)
• the number of unified major commands will be reduced to two: the [existing] Operations Command in Potsdam and the [new] Territorial Command in Berlin and Bonn, in charge of all troops deployed abroad and those within Germany's borders respectively

Federal Office for Equipment, Information Technology and In-Service Support

• will hand over responsibility for in-service and life-cycle management to newly created management centres in each of the domains mentioned below, reinstating the forces using the equipment in question with the authority to independently manage its maintenance and overhaul

German Army

• becomes the Land Domain Command
• receives the following units from the erstwhile Joint Support Service: 1st NBC Defence Regiment, 7th NBC Defence Battalion, 750th NBC Defence Battalion, NBC Defence School, 1st Military Police Regiment, 2nd Military Police Regiment, 3rd Military Police Regiment, Military Police and Staff Duty School, Civil-military Co-operation Command
• [slated to receive operational units from the erstwhile Central Medical Service]
• will reduce the number of its commands for a more streamlined command structure and consolidate its support centres under the umbrella of a Land Warfare Centre
• is given back control over land materiel management

German Air Force

• becomes the Aerospace Domain Command
• receives a Space Component, overseeing Germany's military satellites and being tasked with developing capabilities to counter the "growing militarisation of space"
• will reduce the number of its commands for a more streamlined command structure and consolidate its support centres under the umbrella of a Air Warfare Centre
• is given back control over air materiel management, will likely be tasked with air materiel management across all domains

German Navy

• becomes the Maritime Domain Command
• will reduce the number of its commands for a more streamlined command structure and consolidate its support centres under the umbrella of a Maritime Warfare Centre
• is given back control over naval materiel management

Cyber- and Information Domain Service

• formally upgraded to the regular fourth arm of the Federal Defence Force [with its own uniform and all]
• becomes Cyberspace Domain Command
• receives a Joint Intelligence Centre to provide a holistic twenty-four-seven situation picture to the German government and NATO
• will reduce the number of its commands for a more streamlined command structure and consolidate its support centres under the umbrella of a Cyberwarfare Centre
• is given control over information technology materiel management

Joint Support Service

• to be disbanded
• the future of the following major commands is still a "subject of investigation"; in all likelihood, they will either be split up and/or continue to exist in a more streamlined form under the Ministry's direct control:
  • Armed Forces Office, in charge of cross-sectional tasks like canine training, military music etc.
  • Logistics Command with Armed Forces Logistics Centre, Armed Forces Logistics School, 164th Construction Engineer Regiment, 161st Logistics Battalions, 171st Logistics Battalion, 172nd Logistics Battalion, 461st Logistics Battalion, 467th Logistics Battalion, 472nd Logistics Battalion) [due to its being partially responsible for corps-level and theatre-level tasks such as movement control, pipeline operations or wartime host nation support, this command is likely to continue to exist in some form or another]
  • the Multinational Joint Headquarters at Ulm, a Force Command/Joint Support Enabling Command under NATO

Central Medical Service

• to be disbanded
• the current Inspector-general of the Central Medical Service will become the Surgeon-general of the German Armed Forces, in charge of a unified Healthcare Command being solely responsible for providing troops with day-to-day health care through territorial medicare centres and maintaining medical standards throughout the armed forces
• [the report does not directly allude to the future parent commands of the erstwhile's services operative units (1st Medical Regiment, 2nd Medical Regiment, 3rd Medical Regiment, 4th Medical Regiment, Medical Training Regiment, Medical Rapid Reaction Command); however, as there is no mentioning of them continuing to fall under a unified command structure, I'm inclined to believe earlier reports that they will be transferred to the Land Domain as well]

Reserve

• will be transformed from a mere replacement holding organisation to the Homeland Defence [as it once had been during the Cold War]
• as an initial step, 5 Homeland Defence Regiments and 36 companies will be raised and equipped till 2025

 

[BravoZulu]

Germany:
Rheinmetall announced that it signed a contract worth $359 million with the country's defence procurement agency for the supply of 44 Kodiak armoured engineering vehicles (AEVs) for the German Army.

Production will begin in 2023, with delivery scheduled to be completed by 2029, said the company.

According to Rheinmetall, the Kodiak is an AEV and mine clearance tank that can meet the technical and tactical needs of modern combat engineers. It features a bulldozer blade with adjustable cutting and tilt angles.

The Kodiak vehicle is known as the "Pionierpanzer 3 Kodiak" in German. It is based on the Leopard 2 main battle tank that was developed by German company Krauss-Maffei Wegmann (KMW).
https://www.rheinmetall.com/de/rheinmetall_ag/press/news/latest_news/index_24960.php

 

[Picanha]

New Hensoldt Systems and Visions (Commercials)

MGCS (Main Ground Combat System)

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MK1 Radar for Typhoon

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[Miller]

Austria is selling off their SPHs:

Latvia to purchase another batch of M109A5 155mm self-propelled howitzers from Austria​

According to information released by a Latvian press agency on May 18, 2021, citing information from the Latvian Ministry of Defense, the country has signed an agreement with Austria to purchase another batch of 18 second-hand M109A5 155mm tracked self-propelled howitzers.

Latvia to purchase another batch of M109A5 155mm self-propelled howitz

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www.armyrecognition.com

 

[muck]

The Austrians are really dismantling their army, my goodness.

 

[muck]

A Swiss F-5E crashed in the High Alps yesterday after experiencing what looks like an engine fire during a training exercise. The pilot managed to punch out despite being inverted and landed safely. Perhaps due to its fall being cushioned by the snow cover, the aircraft seems to be in a remarkably good shape. They'll be able to salvage many spares from this bird.

 

[Stormovik]

The Spanish Infanteria de Marina is going to get HK416A5 rifles as new assault rifles.

https://www.defensa.com/.../nuevo-fusil-asalto-brigada...

 

[Deleted member 11302]

The Austrians are really dismantling their army, my goodness.

We should grasp the opportunity and invade. I could use a nice apartment in Vienna, not to mention a steady supply of good coffee.