Australia’s Bad Choice in Infantry Fighting Vehicles. By David Archibald.
Back in the 1960s, Australia bought some 800 of the M113 armoured personnel carrier for battlefield transport of our infantry. That was when we had a population of 12 million.
In 2004 a project was started to replace them with 1,100 infantry fighting vehicles that would have thicker armour and heavier armament. I attended a briefing on this acquisition 20 years ago, at which it was apparent that the Army was set upon having its own special vehicle instead of buying something that was already in production and already proven to work. Many years passed and the Redback infantry fighting vehicle from the Korean company Hanwha was eventually selected. Hanwha designed the Redback to meet the conditions of the Australian Army tender.
Hanwha Redback
Then in 2023 the incoming Labor Government used the excuse of a strategic review to delay production and cut the order to just 129. This works out to one infantry fighting vehicle for every 209,302 Australians. This is not enough. We need at least ten times that number, as per the original intent in 2004. …
The unit cost of a Redback is $29 million for 40 tonnes of vehicle. The best alternative would have been the CV90 made by BAE — with the same capability, 30 years of operating experience, and a unit cost of $15.6 million. The Koreans aren’t bothering to make the Redback themselves. They think it is too heavy and Hanwha’s alternative weighs 28 tonnes. The Redback is an orphan class which no other country will ever buy. Only 129 of them might ever be built. After that contract is completed, we will still need another thousand or more infantry fighting vehicles to have an army with some substance to it. We would be better off switching to the CV90 and giving the Redbacks that do get built to an Army Reserve unit.
CV90 of the Czech Army
Drones:
On average, it takes about six drones to achieve a kill on a Russian soldier and 15 on a Russian armoured vehicle. There is one video of a Russian soldier surviving 11 near-misses by Ukrainian first-person-viewer drones before the twelfth drone hits him. …
The anti-drone systems already exist –- active protection systems such us Trophy and remote weapons systems. Hanwha’s contract … for the supply of R400 remote weapons systems is $108 million for 129 weapons, for a per unit cost of $0.83 million. Adding Iron Fist would take the cost of protecting a vehicle up to $1.5 million. It is the price of entry to the battlefield these days. So protected, tanks still have a role in demolishing the enemy’s concrete structures even if they don’t get to meet many enemy tanks.
Artillery today needs to be able to run away fast after firing:
In another defence acquisition that has been overtaken by the evolution of the battlefield, Australia bought a handful of Korean K9 self-propelled howitzers. What the Ukraine War has shown is that wheeled howitzers are more survivable than tracked ones.
Ukraine has found that Russian counter-battery radar can detect the firing positions of artillery and have drones swarming on that location within three minutes of firing. Wheeled howitzers can move off far more rapidly than tracked ones.
More at the link.