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Please Support As and Give me a Feed Back to Improve. The U.S. Army is set to acquire and field a new light tank. The service announced that General Dynamics Land Systems has won its Mobile Protected Firepower program competition and has been awarded a contract worth up to $1.14 billion.
The initial Mobile Protected Firepower (MPF) Light Tank contract award will cover an initial low-rate production order of 96 vehicles. The service presently plans to buy a total of 504 new light tanks, with most of them arriving by the end of 2035.
The General Dynamics light tanks design, which is set to public receive a formal name this fall at the Association of the U.S. Army's main annual convention in Wasghtion, D.C, is based on the company's Griffin II. Its main armament is a 105mm gun – unlike the 120mm type found on the original Griffin demonstrator – mounted in a turret derived from the one on the M1 Abrams tank. It uses a version of the fire control system used in the M1A2 (SEPv3) variant.
General Dynamics light tanks has also put forward another version of the Griffin, known as the Griffin III, as a contender for the Army's Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle (OMFV) program, which is focused primarily on finding a replacement for the service's Bradley fighting vehicles.
The MPF light tanks program began in 2015 and the Army down-selected to designs from General Dynamics Land Systems and BAE Systems in 2018. BAE Systems' entry was based on the M8 Buford Armored Gun System light tank, which was developed for the Army in the 1980s under a separate program that was then canceled in 1996.
The M8 had been slated to replace the service's last light tank, the M551A1 Sheridan, a Vietnam War-era design that had an overly complex 152mm gun and missile launcher as its primary armament.
Under the Army's current plans, the majority of the new light tank will be spread across four battalions. These units will provide additional armored firepower for the service's dismounted Infantry Brigade Combat Teams, which currently only have light tactical vehicles Humvees.
The Army had originally described light tank more in terms of a spiritual successor to the Sheridan, which was not only air-transportable, but also air-droppable. A single Air Force C-17A Globemaster III cargo aircraft is expected to be able to carry two of them at a time when flying them to forward airstrips.
The Army's selection of a winning light tank design also comes amid a renewed debate about the future of tanks and other heavier armored vehicles.
Regardless, a quarter of a century after the retirement of the M551A1 Sheridan from combat duty with no direct replacement in the wings, the Army is now set to begin buying a new fleet of light tanks.
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