The Defence Department’s decisions on acquiring tanks and the next generation of armoured vehicles are contentious and seem to always generate passionate responses. In 2018, former major general and now senator Jim Molan duked it out with ASPI’s Marcus Hellyer in The Strategist over armoured fighting vehicles (AFVs). Both put some great arguments forward, and the matter rested there for a while.
In 2019, James Rickard and I stepped into the fray, addressing rumours that Defence was planning that the Darwin-based 1st Brigade’s infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs) be located in Adelaide to allow for year-round training. We argued that for the strategic and tactical value of IFVs to be realised, they’d need to operate across the length and breadth of Australia, regardless of the season or the weather....MORE
