August 31, 2018 | International, Land
By: Todd South
After more than 40 years of service, the robust little all-terrain vehicle that can climb mountains, ford rivers and churn through snow needs replacing.
And the Army, Marines and National Guard are asking industry to give them a new ride.
Back in June, Army Contracting Command officials put out a Request for Information for industry to share what they think can replace the Small Unit Support Vehicle, a tracked vehicle that's been in service since the mid-1970s.
At one point, there were 1,100 of them in the U.S. military inventory. Now, only a few dozen remain, mostly in service in cold weather areas such as U.S. Army Alaska.
The new program to replace the SUSV has been dubbed the “Joint All Weather All Terrain Support Vehicle," or JAASV.
So far, Army officials have only asked for information, but they are expected to issue a proposal with more detailed requests for requirements and timelines from industry in the coming weeks or months.
The upgrade and replacement are important for a variety of reasons, some of which are near-term, such as National Guard disaster response to blizzards, floods and fires, which can't be navigated easily by the current Humvee fleet.
Others are for mobility in the Arctic. Leaders are shifting training and resources back to the Arctic as Russia has beefed up its capabilities and manpower in the region in recent years, from new units and commands to upgraded equipment and weaponry.
BAE Systems built the original SUSV, or Bv206, and has since built a modernized version called the BvS10 in both armored and unarmored types.
The newer model has been fielded to military units in the United Kingdom, Norway, France and the Netherlands. It has seen real-world operations in Afghanistan and the Balkans on NATO missions, according to company officials.
Last year, ST Kinetics unveiled its own version of a small, all-terrain tracked vehicle, called the Bronco 3, at DESI, a defense conference in London, England, according to Army Times sister publication Defense News.
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