Italy postpones Freccia while attempting sales to Columbia...

Thanks for the article Jonathan.

Hmmm.  Missed this one but it makes sense.  Iveco is making inroads into S. America in a big way...or at least trying to.  Check this out.

Italian manufacturers are in talks with Colombian officials to negotiate the delivery of new military vehicles including the 8x8 IFV VBM Freccia. The Colombia Army has a requirement for a new 8x8 Infantry Fighting Vehicle as it is trying to improve its armoured component. The Colombian Army currently operates with the Brazilian made EE-9 Cascavel and EE-11 Urutu....

However, Italian CIO (Consorzio Iveco Oto Melara) is trying to push the Freccia armoured vehicle proposing a large military package also including the Leopard 1 A5 MBT's and the M113 APC coming from the Italian Army's surplus.

The Leopard 1 A5's were placed in storage as Italian armoured brigades dismissed them in favour of new Ariete MBTs. The 31sth Armoured Regiment "Pinerolo" Brigade was the last Italian Army Regiment to be equipped with Leopard 1 A5 as it was converted for the Italian Army's "Forza NEC" Program, the Italian net-centric program.
The Leopard 1 A5 was produced by German KMW and Rheinmetall companies and bought by the Italian Army in the Eighties to use with armoured units alongside American M60s. The Leopard 1 A5's were fitted out with a larger turret than the previous models to host a new fire control systems and enable night operations. Currently in the Italian Army surplus there could be more than 100 Leopard 1 A5's.
The M113's are still in service with Italian Army armoured and mechanized units, but they are being replaced with Freccias and they could be available as second hand equipment for the export. The Freccia armoured vehicle is currently deployed with Italian contingent in Afghanistan in Shindand western province.

That article is from late April.  Hit the link to read it all.  The Italian govt is including a nice package of vehicles to sweeten the pot.  Now add to it this article I got from Jonathan today (Defense News article by subscription only).

ROME — Italy’s newly released Defense Ministry budget for 2012 reveals that a number of key procurement programs are to be slowed as spending cuts announced last year begin to bite.
After deciding last year to slash 28 percent off procurement spending, Italy has reduced its F-35 Joint Strike Fighter order, announced a fire sale of Navy ships and hatched plans to cut 30,000 troops.
But Rome had not, until now, gone public with a full breakdown on its truncated spending plan for 2012. Due for publication last November, Italy’s 2012 budget had been delayed as generals divided up scarce funds for ongoing programs.
Released to the parliament at the end of June and seen by Defense News, the spending document describes a “reduction, remodulation, slow down and reorienting” of procurement in 2012.
The completion of Italy’s purchase of 249 VBM Freccia armored vehicles, built by Iveco and Oto Melara, slips from this year to 2016, while the full buy of Italy’s second pair of U 212 submarines is pushed back from 2016 to 2017.
The upgrading of Italian mine-sweepers is moved back from 2014 to 2018, while the full delivery of Army and Navy NH90 helicopters is pushed from 2018 to 2021. New combat search-and-rescue AW101 helicopters for the Air Force will be fully delivered by 2017, not 2014.
Deliveries of the new Vulcano munition for Army and Navy guns, and small-diameter bombs and a new direct infrared countermeasure system for the Air Force are all put back by at least two years.
“There has been a tendency for a number of years to delay big decisions about a large rebalancing of the budget,” said Roberto Menotti, an analyst at think tank Aspen Institute Italia. “It is a cautious way to proceed that makes sense when the future is uncertain, but you want to be at the table in Europe on major programs.”
The upshot, he added, is that producers such as Italy’s Finmeccanica defense and aerospace group are being driven “to find innovative ways into new markets as their traditional sources of income reduce.”
Total Defense Ministry spending this year stands at 13.61 billion euros ($16.75 billion), down 5.2 percent from 2011, and equal to 0.84 percent of Italy’s gross domestic product.

Why am I am I linking the two developments? 

Because I'm not looking at them in a vaccum.  First.  The delay in production is understandable with the economic troubles hitting Italy.  Remember.  Delayed not canceled.  Second.  Considering the success in Brazil, the pending buy of Gurauni IFV's by Argentina and if they can get Columbia to bite then you'll see a string of success in S. America by the Italian govt and Iveco that is hard to beat.  Quite honestly the only other group that has had equal success would be the Germans and KMW.

Everyone is focused on the Brazillian fighter contest yet the arms race in S. America is zooming along and what many would consider bit players in the defense industry are running away with it.

The big boys better pay attention cause the little guys are kicking there ass down south.