WASHINGTON \u2014 If the US Army doesn’t want the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle to fulfill its requirement for a nascent Lightweight Reconnaissance vehicle, what does it want?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Officials at General Dynamics believe the answer could be a variant of the Flyer 72, a\u00a010,000-pound\u00a0truck\u00a0which is its offering for a US Special Operations Command program, the Ground Mobility Vehicle 1.1.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The comments come after Army acquisition chief Katrina McFarland told Defense News that the Army is not longer married to plans to use the\u00a0Oshkosh Defense-made\u00a0JLTV to bridge a lethality shortfall for infantry brigade combat teams. Though the requirements are still being developed,\u00a0JLTV lacks the seats for an entire reconnaissance squad and would need weapon mounts and other mission-related equipment\u2014\u00a0a possible opening for ultralight vehicle manufacturers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Our interpretation is the Army has realized there is a capability now that exists for the lightweight reconnaissance vehicle with a variant of our program with SOCOM,” Sean Ridley, the program director at General Dynamics Ordnance and Tactical Systems (GD-OTS). “Six soldiers, under armor with overmatch lethality is available now and ready to go.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At the Association of the US Army’s annual meeting this week, GD-OTS leaned in with marketing materials touting a “Lightweight Reconnaissance Configuration” of the Flyer 72. It would have sensor and scalable armor packages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
GD-OTS in August demonstrated one of its Flyer 72 variants, with a 30 mm gun, at\u00a0at Fort Benning, Georgia,\u00a0for officials with the Army’s Maneuver Center of Excellence and the Army Capabilities Integration Center.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We’re very light, we’re very mobile, we’re under-slung capable, we’re internally transportable, and that allows the Army to be much more mobile with a lightweight vehicle,” Ridley said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Three years ago, SOCOM selected the Flyer 72 for its GMV 1.1 program. It has since completed testing and is in low-rate initial production. Fifty of the first 91 trucks will be delivered by November, and next year, capacity is set to double to 170 trucks, Ridley said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“From our perspective, it takes very little effort on our end to meet the [Army’s provisional LRV] requirements, with a program of record that we’ve got,” Ridley said. “It’s an easy shoo-in from a hardware perspective when you already have those capabilities in hand and ready to go.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The LRV is a procurement associated with the Army’s ground mobility vehicle program, a larger effort to quickly field an off-the-shelf vehicle that provides an infantry squad with\u00a0enhanced tactical mobility. \u00a0The idea is if troops cannot drop directly on target airfield, for instance, because its protected by anti-aircraft weapons, those troops would drop some distance away and speed to it in ultralight vehicles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Not every off-the-shelf vehicle considered a contender for the GMV is a natural contender for the LRV.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Polaris Defense’s offering for the GMV, the air-droppable, nine-person, 4,500-pound DAGOR, has been demonstrated to use a .50-caliber weapon, but a 30mm cannon would require significant changes, said Mark McCormick, director of US government sales for Polaris.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“From what we can bring to the party, we’re more tied into the light capability,” said Mark McCormick, director of US government sales for Polaris.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While a 30mm weapon is not a traditional requirement for a scout vehicle, McCormick said the Army appears to want to broaden what such a vehicle could do. “But I’m not sure that’s a great fit for us, because this vehicle is designed to be very light,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Otherwise, the US Marine Corps announced plans to provide its infantry regiments with a version of the Polaris Defense MRZR, a four-seat, all-terrain vehicle, McCormick confirmed. The vehicle would be transported inside a V-22 Osprey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Under the Utility Task Vehicle program, the Marine Corps plans to buy 144 MRZR-D vehicles, which is able to run on both diesel and JP-8 fuel, McCormick said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If the US Army doesn\u2019t want the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle to fulfill its requirement for a nascent Lightweight Reconnaissance vehicle, what does it want?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":115400,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":78,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[78,29,14],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3446],"class_list":["post-57571","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ausa-digital-show-dailies","category-digital-show-dailies","category-land"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"A6JE27IIVNCG5HC5H62YTXVXNE","arc_canonical_url":"\/digital-show-dailies\/ausa\/2016\/10\/05\/general-dynamics-leans-in-for-us-army-s-light-reconnaissance-vehicle\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n