BAE Systems is showcasing its CV90MkIV with a new turret at the Eurosatory defence exhibition in Paris.
This configuration is set to be delivered to Slovakia and the Czech Republic in collaboration with their defence industries, according to a press release from the company.
The CV90MkIV represents the latest evolution in the CV90 family of vehicles, which BAE Systems claims has a legacy of world-class mobility and survivability spanning more than two decades.
“The CV90s that we are working to deliver now will provide crews and soldiers with increased mobility, protection, and lethality as well as improved combat awareness. It is a truly relevant system on today’s battlefield,” said Tommy Gustafsson-Rask, managing director of BAE Systems Hägglunds, which designs and produces the CV90.
“We are committed to delivering defence capability and economic growth through industrial partnerships across Europe, and the CV90 is a prime example of how we are doing that.”
BAE Systems highlights that the CV90 family, particularly the Infantry Fighting Vehicle (IFV) variant, is known for its combat capabilities, agility, and power in the 23-38-tonne class.
The vehicle integrates a wide range of weapon systems, providing comprehensive target capability to land forces globally. According to the company, the CV90 has proven its effectiveness in recent conflicts, including combat in Afghanistan and Ukraine, as well as operations in Liberia.
The company has experienced strong demand for the CV90, securing contracts for multiple upgrade programmes and the development and production of new vehicles.
BAE Systems Hägglunds has invested significantly in its facilities in Örnsköldsvik, Sweden, and has established robust partnerships with local industrial partners in various markets to enhance local supply security.
With a total of 1,700 vehicles ordered in 17 different variants, the CV90 has covered more than eight million kilometers. BAE Systems notes that the vehicle has been selected by 10 European nations, eight of which are NATO members.
What might have been. 🙄
The one that got away 😁
Or was left on the shelf. 🙂
Another George “torture” article for many!
Lol.. 😁 …us die-hards won’t give up on this one!
The fact that the British Army decided to ignore CV90 (coupled with the Ajax and Boxer clusterfuck) tells you all you need to know about why the MoD and armed forces are in such a mess!
Inexplicable to me why Warrior protection, firepower and electronic architecture upgrades just did not happen in the 90s, 2000’s or 2010’s. Only upgrades were the BGTI fit and the Bowman fit.
We always used to upgrade our AFVs regularly and frequently.
Some press articles saying a new labour govt could magic up to £200billion simply by closing various tax allowances/ give aways. No guarantee they would do this of course, and even if they did there is a queue of urgent demands; post office, infected blood, bankrupt local authorities etc. Still, it would be interesting to know what was the cost of the WCSP?
They’re not going to bring back the WCSP at this point though, already getting rid of Warriors.
So you want to take money out of citizens and give it to politics.
Increasing even more the political economy….
Rather a pejorative perspective, but yes. The thinking is that the purpose of the reliefs, to encourage investment, is not being achieved. Individuals exploit them for personal gain rather than business benefit. Or increasing defence spending of course. Just for comparison the UK defence budget is about £50 billion I think 🤔
I thought that personal gain is one of most important things for freedom loving people. But i guess Great Britain is nothing like that anymore, a mere socialist, social democrat country…
The ‘common good ‘ is a better principle. It is both more just and more sustainable. As we are seeing you cannot assume that society as a whole will prosper just because individuals pursue their own interests. The concept of ‘enlightened self interest’ begs the question of the definition of what you understand by ‘enlightened’.
Hopefully they reinvest all those savings back into the UK economy and its people and not into their own pockets!
Exactly!
Given that £1bn had been originally earmarked for upgrade to 245 Warriors and £430m had been spent which included a £227m overrun, no doubt MoD was hoping/expectingthat the production contract might be delivered for c.£797m (£1,227m- £430m) at 2011 prices. I am sure that the numbers of upgraded Warriors might have to be adjusted from the 245 figure and the 2011 estimate would certainly have to be revised to 2021 prices. Background from Wiki: “In March 2011, it was announced that Lockheed Martin had effectively won the competition to develop both the WFLIP and the FRES turrets. Severe budgetary pressures… Read more »
Thanks Graham. All academic now I suppose. The army seem to have accepted that they will have to fight without IFVs. £1billion is not a lot in the grand scheme of things.
The army has been forced to accept that they will not fight with IFVs in the two armoured brigades. You can’t argue with a ranking politician, who has been guided by beancounters. It was said (in March 2023?) that the army staff was going to determine how to increase the lethality for the Boxer fleet – no idea if that got anywhere, but RS4 Kongsberg RWS for the first tranche were already ordered (RS4 cannot take a cannon, just a MG or GMG) £1bn is not a lot in AFV upgrade or new purchase terms. Our Boxers will cost about… Read more »
I believe RS4 does take ATGM
True. I deliberately missed that out as I was comparing Warrior cannon to Boxer MG only.
I don’t believe that we have specified any kind of ATGM for Boxer though.
Complete list of weapon options from Kongsberg RS4 datasheet:
‘Browning M2 and WKM-B (12.7 mm), M249 (5.56 mm), M240, UKM-2000C and M134 Gatling (7.62 mm), MK19, MK47 and H&K GMG (40 mm grenade launchers with airburst option), various Non-Lethal effectors. The RS4 allows for M240 (6.62 mm) coax kit or various ATGM integrations’.
So have we changed our tactical approach to accommodate the fact that IFV’s are obviously now no longer required- or have we (as is more likely) now just decided that even the little number of soldiers we have are not worth the cost of paying for the protection these vehicles afford.
Its no wonder no one wants to join.
“Join the Army – see the world …from sub standard accomodation and with sub standard protection”
Hardly a great tag line is it…
IFVs are very much required (that is why the army staff wrote a Requirement document), just that the MoD at the highest political level has de-funded (ie cancelled) the IFV programme (Warrior upgrade), and forced the army to accept Boxer APCs into the armoured brigades to work alongside tanks. The army staff was supposed to be determining how to increase the lethality of Boxer, which is difficult given that the RWS ordered for the Infantry carriers (APCs) in the first tranche of 523 vehicles cannot take a cannon, just a MG, GMG or ATGM. The army staff will also have… Read more »
So is the general.consensus on here that Boxer was picked purely due to defined role. in strike brigades which are now defunct before they even started …and that is has been shoe horned into a role it was neither designed for, nor best equipped for at the expense of a more suitable vehicle?
If that’s the case why is it continuing to be procured( at least in the.numbers touted) surely it can’t just be cost,it must have some technical and strategic merits over a Warrior type vehicle…surely?
That is a good summary. Tragic, isn’t it? Bringing the Boxer programme forward was a massive mistake for 2 reasons – 1. The Boxer programme (a lengthy one) then collided with many other AFV programmes – CR3, Warrior upgrade (WCSP), AS90 replacement (MFP) – and something had to give, financially. 2.There possibly wasn’t a sanity check done on whether the army needed as many Boxers – without the two Strike brigades in the Orbat, where was it to go? To 1st Deep Recce Strike Bde (although that had not been configured to have Infantry) or to 7 Lt Mech Bde?… Read more »
Sadly mate, the money normally earmarked for upgrades went to the UOR MRAP programs. No excuse for before we went into Iraq then Afghan though!
That shouldn’t have happened. UORs are direct-funded by HMT and the MoD for core equipment should be untouched.
True, but the Army decided to keep all of its UOR MRAPs. Which then meant they had to come out of the core budget. The rules are that if UORs become supported, ie an Army based contract. The Treasury gets its money back.
Thanks Davey for that explanation.
Actually efforts to upgrade Warrior started in early 1990s and dragged on for years because of a decision to develop and install CT40. BAE warned that a brand new turret would be needed. LM didn’t listen but eventually had to agree. Yet more delay and major problems with recoil forces never fully resolved.
The lesson from this is to avoid gold plating solutions. Warrior could have been improved adequately, with gun stabilisation and automatic 30 mm and remained in service for years. For once this was not the fault of politicians, rather an engineering failure.
The earliest reference I can find to Warrior upgrades (not BGTI and Bowman) is dated 12 Jun 2001. army-technology dot com website. “Warrior manned turret integration programme Under the British Army’s manned turret integration programme (MTIP), a new two-person GKN Sankey turret with a 40mm stabilised case telescoped weapon system (CTWS) cannon, to allow firing on the move is being trialled. GKN Sankey’s turret is equipped with L21A1 30mm Rarden cannon that can destroy the most advanced APCs from a maximum range of 1,500m. The turret was developed by CTA International, a joint venture formed by BAE Systems and Nexter… Read more »
Yes, BAE and LMUK competed for the upgrade contract with BAE putting forward a new turret and LMUK (who had zero experience of AFVs) advocated retaining the original turret. Both of course required the installation of the 40mm CTAS cannon as it was mandated GFE. Amazingly, and disastrously, LMUK won the contract and as you say were forced to change their mind and agree to develop a new turret. An inexperienced company doing a crucial AFV upgrade – much like an inexperienced company being contracted to build Ajax! What could possibly go wrong with either project??!! It was MoD and… Read more »
Peter, Certainly there were engineering failures at LMUK, a company totally inexperienced at AFV design and development work, and which should never have been selected for WCSP over the OEM & DA for Warrior, BAE Systems.
You may be interested in this. Blame for WCSP project failures can also be laid at the door of MoD:
https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/12158/html/
Should be in the British army as well…
It’s not impossible for a bit of a backflip if there’s a real need for a tracked IFV and having a mixed fleet.
The requirement for an IFV remains – that is why the army staff wrote a requirement for one, to be met by an upgraded Warrior. But ‘politics’ has intervened and our Infantry won’t now get an excellent modernised tracked IFV. They won’t even get a wheeled IFV – they will get a wheeled APC with just a MG to face BMP-3s and similar vehicles in the future – the outcome in combat is sadly not going to be in our favour – we will lose men and vehicles at an awful rate. [BMP-3 is fitted with one of the followIng… Read more »
Evening Graham, one can only hope that the powers that be see sense and make better choices. If its going to be as bad as you say then that’s criminally stupid. The Army deserves the best and what’s fit for purpose. They have the Ajax family already, at worse add a tracked IFV from that, it’s not that difficult. Why not have an actual live competition between the two types to truly know whats best? Help silence all us armchair critics.. Lol 😁
One hopes that better choices are made in the future. Most AFV decisions on either upgrade or new procurements in the last 30 years have been non-existent, slow, expensive or just terrible! Boxer is an excellent, if hugely expensive, Mechanised Infantry Vehicle (MIV). It has very good Protection, adequate Mobility and huge Capacity; many are impressed with its party trick of modularity. But, it is not at all suited for the Armoured Infantry who work closely with tanks in the armoured brigades and are going up against well armed IFVs (and tanks of course, but then our tanks take care… Read more »
Morning Graham, I enjoy reading your replies. Sorry if we’re a bit aggravating… Lol 😁. You can see in Gaza the Israeli tank with wheeled apc and tracked ifv combinations, very different adversary to Russia in Ukraine, but we can bet “military” eyes are on what works and what doesn’t do so well.
No-one is aggravating to me…usually. The IDF of course has completely different terrain and threats to deal with, compared to us. Regarding terrain/weather, I doubt the IDF has to operate in much deep glutinous mud in the pouring rain or in snow and ice conditions. So, hard to draw too many relevant lessons. It was of course envisaged that we would have continued with tracked IFVs (upgraded Warrior) for the Armoured Infantry working with tanks in the armoured brigades – and (for a previous Orbat) Mechanised Infantry (different to armoured infantry) in Boxers working with Ajax in the two Strike… Read more »
We should have bought cv 90 and not mucked about with the ajax
CV90 recce variant. Yes, too true.
The army certainly knows how to bugger things up the 5 billion wasted on ajax could have been put to better use As90 and warrior upgrades
David, I don’t see that £5bn has been wasted on Ajax – it came right in the end (after endless engineering issues and major delays). A good number (30-40?) have been issued to the HCR (Ajax) and 6 Bn REME (Apollo/Atlas) who are gaining familiarity with their vehicle whilst it undergoes Reliability Growth Trials (RGT). I have heard no negative reports during RGT. For a bit over £5bn the army is getting 589 modern and effective Ajax recce vehicles and variants. [Mind you, it is not the vehicle or the company that I would have selected – CV90 Recce from… Read more »
It seems politicians have already decided the royal artillery is going to get a boxer with a turret on it instead of trials between it and k9
I was aware that there are 19 OP vehicles in Tranche 1 but had not heard any details of its specification.
But are you talking instead about Boxer RCH-155, the AS-90 replacement? Yes, it is a SPG, so it clearly has a turret – the gun has to go somewhere!
The discussion in this thread was really all about the infantry section carrier.
True I merely pointing out that politicians are getting involved with procurement. We had some ajax at the rsa when it was being initially trialled I must admit looking at the size of the vehicle compared to a cvrt you can hide in a bush it really didn’t impress me . Cv90 would have been a far better option it’s used by a number of nato countries so spares would be readily available in the feild .
It is hard to reconcile the large signature of Ajax with the British philosophy of conducting recce by stealth!
Yes ajax certainly isn’t stealthy that’s for sure
This CV90 doesn’t go away 🤗 you never no Ajax might get some sales 🙄 🇬🇧
Unlikely I think the ajax build line will be dismantled a lot of nato countries went for cv90