The South Korean Army will deploy 600 wheeled armored vehicles from 2016 to help build rapid-response forces modeled after U.S. Stryker combat brigades, according to the Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA).Go to DN to read the whole story, but I find it interesting that only now the S. Koreans are jumping on the wheeled bandwagon when it seems that the US Army is at the very least re-evaluating its position on them.
The arms agency announced Hyundai Rotem, a subsidiary of Hyundai Motor Group, as the preferred bidder Nov. 26 to develop and produce those wheeled armored vehicles. The company beat a consortium of Samsung Techwin and Doosan DST.
“Hyundai Rotem will develop a couple of prototype vehicles with six and eight wheels by 2015 with investment of about 28 billion won ($26 million),” a DAPA spokesman said. “After field tests, the company will produce 600 vehicles in stages by 2020.”
Want proof? The US Army still hasn't decided to make all its Strykers Double Vee Hulled. Funding is still in doubt for the project, yet the Armored Multi-Purpose Vehicle (its going to be tracked) is full speed ahead.
I don't know what to make of this other than S. Korea putting these types of vehicles into service in order to prime the pump to sell them over seas.
Time will tell though.
PLEASE scrap the Strykers. Having Double-v-hulled Strykers around for urban or built-up areas makes sense so keep a battalion in each brigade, but not an entire brigade.
ReplyDeleteI'd rather see motorized brigades with a mix of Strykers, AMPVs and JLTVs rather than brigades of ONLY Strykers.
wheeled and tracked have varying strengths and weaknesses. There is no one vehicle that can do it all.
ReplyDeleteI've heard that the South Koreans are creating wheeled armored units whose purpose is to move at high speed into the DPRK, if and when that entity collapses, in order to secure the WMDs (especially the nukes) that purportedly abound there. Consequently, they will be deployed to maintain law and order, and to control the movement of the 20 million people in the north who will start heading south in search of a square meal. Overseas deployment for these units is seen as a plus, but not a necessity.
ReplyDeletehigh speed movement of any vehicles acrossthe dmz is going to be a joke. additionally amphibious landings are gonna be questionable. too. i would think that helo assaults wil be used to secure the WMD's. and as far as the population is concerned, they're so beat down that i would bet money that they'll simply remain where they are...or barring that because of all the propaganda i'd bet they'll head toward China and not S. Korea.
ReplyDeleteThe South Koreans have been doing wheeled vehicles for a long time: they license produced the Fiat 6614 as the KM900 for years, and well before the US adopted the Stryker.
ReplyDeleteThey are not jumping on a bandwagon, when they adopted wheeled armored vehicles well before the US finally decided they were cool, nor are they abandoning them just because the US has suddenly decided they are uncool. It is the US Army's love-hate relationship with wheeled vehicles that is dysfunctional, not the South Korean's slow but steady deployment and improvement of wheeled armored vehicles as part of a mix with heavier, more expensive tracked vehicles.
Double V hulling is only really a mine counter measure.
ReplyDeleteIf you dont plan on driving over mine fields, you dont need a V hull.
A split of V hulls for occupation and none V hulls for peacekeeping / rapid insertion is not that inexplicable a decision.
Given Koreas Terrain, any sort of east/west strategic mobility either means air or road transport. Tracked vehicles are going to have little success avoiding roads in the mountains.
However, if you wanted to push into the North, you need tracks.
Paved roads end about a mile outside Pyonyang (seriously, google maps it).
US Army is considering 4 finalists for a huge contract of wheeled IFV.(1)
ReplyDeleteThis is a Made In Singapore IFV called Terrex.(2)
May be it is a good idea if S Korea Army also consider Terrex,
if she trust US Army judgement.
1. http://www.asiaone.com/print/News/Latest%2BNews/Singapore/Story/A1Story20121107-382029.html
2 http://www.stengg.com/products-solutions/listing-by-sector >> Land >> Terrx
3 http://www.stengg.com/AR2009/download/16_land_systems.pdf
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