Egy érdekes és példásan nyílt Q&A. Nyálazzátok át, én csak gyorsan átfutottam rajta idő hiányában.
Obsolescent and outgunned: the British Army’s armoured vehicle capability: Government Response to the Committee’s Fifth Report of Session 2019–21
First Special Report
On 14 March 2021 the Defence Committee published its Fifth Report of Session 2019–21,
Obsolescent and outgunned: the British Army’s armoured vehicle capability (HC 659). The Government’s response was received on 6 May 2021, and is appended to this report.
https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm5802/cmselect/cmdfence/221/22102.htm
"The focus will remain on two modernised Heavy Brigade Combat Teams with the necessary supporting elements.
There are no current plans to develop an Infantry Fighting Vehicle variant of AJAX."
WHOAH,
ez nagyon durva, igazan
stinging minden ertelemben, hajmereszto a tartalom es stilus tekinteteben egyarant - ilyenek vannak benne:
"27. The preceding Chapter’s summary of the development of UK armoured capability since the end of the Cold War makes for depressing reading. It is clear that the Ministry of Defence and the British Army repeatedly failed to procure the range of new armoured vehicles required by our Armed Forces. This resulted in the spending of at least £321m on programmes that were subsequently cancelled and a further £2.8 billion on filling an urgent capability gap.
We are astonished that between 1997 and late 2020 (with the exception of a small number of armoured engineering and Viking protected mobility vehicles) the Department had not delivered a single new armoured vehicle from the core procurement programme into operational service with the Army. It is clear that the Ministry of Defence’s armoured vehicle programmes requires independent scrutiny. We ask the National Audit Office to revisit this issue to establish the costs incurred since its 2011 report, progress in delivering current programmes, current armoured capability gaps and the coherency and delivery realism of the Army’s current portfolio of armoured vehicle programmes, particularly in the context of the forthcoming Integrated Review.
28. Partly as a consequence of this failure, British Army personnel were inadequately protected on operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, and some of those currently on deployment in Estonia are equipped with lightly armoured (for example the open-topped Jackal) or obsolescent (FV430 series) vehicles in the face of a significant potential peer threat from Russian forces.
29. Since the Cold War, the British Army’s armoured forces have contracted significantly. The assumed removal of the Soviet threat and the requirement to reduce public spending on Defence have led to the Army moving from maintaining three warfighting divisions in the 1980s to struggling to meet a requirement to deliver a single division by 2025."
Ezt a kepet figyeljetek, nagyon gyilkos - igazan kemeny es rendkivul ugyes, eros a hatasa:
"
What was happening when the Army’s vehicles first came into service
31. The
Ministry of Defence and the British Army have been aware for decades that some of the Army’s current vehicles require replacement. For example, in evidence to this inquiry Francis Tusa noted that: “In
1991 (the first Gulf War), one absolutely critical lesson had been learned:
Warrior needed a stabilised cannon. The other one was the recce vehicles. They were listed as being close to lethal”.(30) Programmes such as FFLAV, TRACER, MRAV and FRES (see paragraphs 16–20) were intended to replace the FV430 and CVR(T) vehicle families. The failure of these programmes means some of the current vehicles are either already obsolete or increasingly obsolescent, having been retained in service for much longer than planned. This obsolescence impacts on the overall capability and combat power of the Army, particularly in the face of a potential peer adversary such as Russia. Furthermore, the Department and the Army now find themselves in a position where a wide array of critical equipment need replacement or upgrade.
As Nicholas Drummond told us: “in terms of modernisation, successive governments have kicked the can down the road to the point where the Army is now facing block obsolescence across a broad array of capabilities. This includes armoured vehicles, but also artillery and communications systems”.(31)
(30) Oral evidence: Progress in delivering the British Army’s armoured vehicle capability, HC 659,Tuesday 6 October 2020, Q1
(31) Drummond, N. Written Evidence to Support HCDC Inquiry: “Progress in Delivering the British Army’s Armoured Vehicle Capability”, para 1
