Ajax, the British Army’s newest generation of armoured fighting vehicles, has successfully completed rigorous trials in the challenging sub-zero conditions of Sweden.
The trials, which saw temperatures plummet to as low as -36 Celsius, were conducted by the Defence Equipment & Support (DE&S) Ajax delivery team in collaboration with the Household Cavalry Regiment (HCR).
This marks the first time that a Field Army crew has operated and fired the Ajax, showcasing its cutting-edge Intelligence, Surveillance, Target Acquisition, and Reconnaissance (ISTAR) technology in extreme conditions.
The vehicle was tested for its ability to manoeuvre over snow-covered terrain and execute firing on the move with remarkable accuracy.
Warrant Officer Class Two (WO2) Paul Martin, the Range Conducting Officer, oversaw the range and firing serials, mirroring his duties in the UK. Reflecting on the trials, WO2 Martin remarked in a press release, “It was great to work alongside our Army colleagues and industry who all have one common purpose and that’s the end goal of delivering this exceptional platform to the Field Army. It was an extremely challenging environment, but working as a group we were able to successfully deliver our objective of demonstrating that Ajax can travel long distances over snow-covered terrain and fire on the move with great accuracy.”
Lieutenant Colonel James Glossop, the DE&S delivery team’s Operation and Army HQ liaison, also shared his observations: “It was very impressive to see Ajax perform in Sweden. I was lucky enough to see the platforms fire during a snowstorm and use its sighting systems to identify, engage and hit targets that were simply unable to be seen by the naked eye. It was incredibly impressive and a reminder of the competitive edge this armoured vehicle will bring the British Army.”
The troubled Ajax programme involves the delivery of a family of 589 tracked and fully digitised platforms, comprising six variants, through a contract with General Dynamics Land Systems (UK). The successful completion of the cold weather trials in Sweden is a crucial step towards confirming the Ajax’s readiness for global deployment under various environmental conditions.
With a substantial increase announced by the PM, Britain is to boost its defence spending. I wonder if that might include more Ajax variants and a new medium tank to complement the CH3s plus an increase in artillery platforms?
In 2030 mate. Meaningless political spin.
Sadly you are correct, the Tories are a spent force but thankfully the current raft of conflicts dictates that the UK has to build up its forces, whichever party is in power.
Exactly. Last year it was 3% in a few years so if anything the announcement is a reduced promise.
My equally irrelevant press release is by 2050 troops will need to pay a Rishi coin to access to boiling vessel. Like a bit coin but a bit worse and it says a famous Rishi quote each time it’s used.
Stop the boats, brexit mean brexit
stoping the boats means Brexit etc you can mix them all up to make so many pointless statements.
Agreed
It was a bit depressing to see the 2030 date..when we know the hight of the threat will be before 2030..but at least we are now seeing senior politicians who are not the defence secretary seriously talking about defence as part of the run up to elections…if it’s seen as an election issue it may get more attention in the future..I await labours commitment.
It’s incremental apparently, so uplifts on going from now. But if Labour do not match it meaningless.
Indeed I really want to see what Labour says…it now gives them the green light to say exactly what they are doing on defence..if they don’t it will be a worry…I suspect they will hold the line around needing the defence review in 2025, but personally I think they should set a minimum level of funding to at least match the conservative promise and then say the defence review may increase this after a full review of defence needs.
Funding is only one aspect, its what its spent on of thats important. We won’t know that until after the election. Tories achillies heel is the constant eye on the penny’s, Labours will be getting good value for the % spend.
But I doubt either party wants to commit to capabilty upfront. As a politician its better to jsut say your spend x% and therefore doing the right thing.
The actual %GDP doesn’t mean much, its what capabilites we’ll have. I’ve said before I’d prefer politicians to commit to capabilites. I’d like to see these in the manifiestos not, ‘we’ll spend x% but on what, depends on a review’. As a voter I want to know what I’m getting. Otherwise they can blow the lot on painting curbs stones, they still spend x% but its done nothing to enhance our war fighting abilities.
FYI This year the UK is set to spend £64.6 billion on the military budget, which is just over 2.3 per cent of GDP.
That figure will rise to £67.5 billion next year and £71 billion in 2026-27, before climbing more rapidly to a total of £87.1 billion in 2030-31.
Yes, ABC corrected me on the other thread. I’d taken it that the increases would begin in 2030.
Mark, where are you getting that £64.6bn figure from?
It wasn’t long ago that Sunak and Shapps were bragging about spending over £50bn.
I got it from the Telegraph but the standard of journalism being what it is today, I wouldn’t be surprised if the the dolt mixed ùp £s and $s.
Yep! Just looked at UK gdp in dollars and applied the 2.5%. Amounts quoted are correct but currency used by Telegraph is wrong. These are dollars not pounds.
The standard of journalism these days, even on media outlets such as Telegraph, BBC, FT and Times, is atrocious. They should employ some editors.
That is absolutely shocking..not only is it crap journalism, but it means they are printing what is essentially lies if that is true.
Due to sloppiness and being unprofessional, it certainly is misleading and as such is misinformation but I doubt deliberate lying. Dolt just got his currencies mixed up. Though you would expect better from the Chief Political Correspondent, Nick Gutteridge. I guess being chief, nobody checks his work😂
Just very poor journalism, which unfortunately is the norm in the internet age. Speed over accuracy. Forget about fact checking, don’t let the competitors get ahead of you.
Pretty standard these days we had UK papers publishing company’s global profits as if they we’re UK profits to deliberately miss lead the public, like you say shocking.
The Defence correspondent of the Telegraph is often inaccurate.
That’s meaningless. Go by the recited of last few years. Cut cut cut. Latest budget £3billion cut.
It is a lot of money. Where does the money go. With that much money, you should have a lot of planes and IFWv’s, and a lot of combat drones. The fleet should be big. And well, when we look at numbers, it is not bad, far from that, but not impressive either. Am I missing something?
Yes, the treasury management fee of £10Bn on the increase because they have to work harder not to allow you to spend it
Hehehe, good one
VAT on all purchases too. There’s lots of overheads.
Just replied with a link to an explanatory video from WSJ explaining why US can’t build ships as quickly, as efficiently or as cheaply as China which can also be applied to all military production in the West. But it’s awaiting approval. Should take a day or two.
So instead Google
“Wall Street Journal, China’s Shipyards Are Ready for a Protracted War. America’s Aren’t.”
👍
An increase to 2.5% by the end of the decade (which is over 5.5 years away) – would the incoming Labour Government honour that?
There is very little history of the army getting more equipment than they had before – there may be a first time, though I suspect the army will remain at the bottom of the priority list.
Problem is Graham we have deby interest thats more than 2 times the defence budget. The quicker we reduce that debt the more we have to spend on other thing like defence. But somethings got to take short term hit to do that.
Thanks mate. Short term hit whilst National Debt is being drawn down? Is that Debt really going down? – there seems to be a PSBR every month? Thus Debt is probably increasing. Short term hit? The army has been reduced once or twice a decade since the end of the Korean war in 1953 and is the smallest it’s been since the Napoleonic Wars. It is half the size it was in the 1980s. Defence was savagely cut by Denis Healey which was in the 60s, and Options for Change cut (but with reason) in 1990. Cameron cut Defence savagely… Read more »
Apologies I didn’t mean defence should take a short term hit to pay down debt. The defence budget if cut would barely dent it. Ministers need to look elsewhere for the money. I’ll add I actually think if we do the right thing with equipment purchases we could see the defence budget assisting the economy.
Great to hear of the super performance of the 40mm stabiised cannon. A pity our infantry won’t benefit from the same cannon due to the demise of the upgraded Warrior programme.
Could still fit them in a Cockerill turret. Just takes some engineering and a cheque.
Supposedly the Army staff were tasked with reviewing how to increase the lethality of British Boxers, way back in March or April last year! Wonder what they concluded?
That Boxer is terrible off road with the added weight of the turret. Something the Aussies have also experienced and reported on. There’s a reason they haven’t gone all-in with Boxer.
I had thought as much. Standard Boxer is well over 35t and some variants are 41t.
Our Boxers will have to keep up with CR3s doing 40-55kph cross-country (my guess).
I should qualify for ‘purity’ Graham. It’s terrible on soft ground off road. Hard ground it’s ok, but has a heightened roll risk because it’s particularly top heavy with the turret.
Essentially (and we all knew this) – it’s great as a mech inf vehicle in old money. It’s not an IFV and no amount of bolting turrets and guns to it will make it so.
Bob, as we know, Boxer always was our MIV for the Mech Inf. I fully agree that it can’t be turned into an IFV for the Armd Inf.
We really should have stuck with WCSP for the IFV – development was nearly done, the spec was great (lethality, protection, mobility, digitisation) and it was very affordable.
I have a feeling that the Boxer Inf Carriers in Tranche 2 may well come with that turreted cannon, notwithstanding the problems you mention.
A 41t wheeled APC…blimey.
Yes, its staggering…and physically huge too.
very heavy weight and huge…I’m not sure that’s a great set of characteristics…smaller and agile may be a better way to go for an IFV/APC that will be on a front line.
Its because of the armour requirement. It has a similar protection level to Warrior. Where it is supposed to be protected over the frontal arc against 30mm APFSDFS rounds. Whilst being protected against 14.5mm AP rounds on the sides and rear. Sadly if you want armour protection it comes at the cost of weight. Just look at Ajax, its protection levels as a base vehicle is better than Warrior with the theatre entry applique armour. A lot of the other wheeled 8×8 armoured vehicles do not have the same level of protection!
Hi Davy but even if you look at something like the Bradley it’s only 27t or 30t with its theatre level entry kit..warrior was 25.5 tons..and these are tracked turreted IFV with very good protection…40t on a wheeled platform..without the load spread of a tracked vehicle..in Eastern European mud..I’m not convinced….wheels are fine for something that is less dependent on tactical mobility..but an IFV will live and die on its agility and speed….
Knowing our Army staff; “give them heavier gloves” Binky, where’s my horse?
I had to look up your Binky expression! I am showing my age (67!).
Warrior IFV represented such an advance over the FV432 APC when introduced from 1986. To me it is a tragedy for the Infantry that, 40 years later, we lose our tracked, cannon-equipped IFVs.
Why not a CV90? I whisked we bought some with 40mm CTA canon if doable.
This was sadly never about buying the army the right kit, the kit they needed. It was about Politics and Money.
ie finding a home for the Boxers that had already been ordered and avoiding having three big army AFV programmes on the go at once consuming big money – CR3, Warrior upgrade, Boxer.
Exactly this. The 1997 2010 years of Labour not getting on and actually seeing a program through replacing some of the main armoured force, be it CVRT, Warrior, whatever.
Instead, we went around in circles. TRACER. FRES, FRES UV, Boxer MRAV. All cancelled. All now reach obsolescence at once and the money is no there.
Yep, On these pages I once mapped out a replacement timeline for every key AFV assuming a 25 year life – and all replacement programmes would have dovetailed perfectly with no years of unaffordable spend! Starting with CVR(T) being replaced in the mid-late 90s!
Logic would also have had upgrades being done periodically during that 25 year life.
Alas, all screwed up.
We can blame the army staff as well as the Labour Government.
Exactly. This is my beef when posters rightly criticise the current shambles of a government. These things are often long in the brewing!
It’s freaking massive was probably the first thoughts. Then wait a minute as it’s so big the armour has to be quite thin to cover it all.
Then this is ok and has its place but not where the army are trying to put it.
I think we should accept that it’s not the Army trying to put it somewhere, their hand has been forced by a gaping hole in the equipment budget – the Army wanted tracked AFV in an all tracked armoured fighting division, with a lighter armoured rapid intervention force. But the real term cut in spending has resulted in this fudge. But some programmes (ie Boxer procurement) were too far advanced to cull (and too much the baby of Nick Carter – thanks Nick 🙄) In my job in Army Strat we were asked to do a study on the historical… Read more »
Thanks, I bet that your work in Army Strat was interesting.
I would like to read the General’s Exec Summary.
I don’t agree with him, except if he was just looking at warfighting against an opponent who had heavy metal in Theatre or readily summoned. There are many examples where use of medium and/or light forces alone has been successful. Just one example for now – the land campaign of Op Corporate.
Not sure if we are talking about Ajax, Boxer or Warrior! Certainly Ajax and Boxer are much bigger than Scimitar and Saxon!
Good b it of kit, better than what it replaced, but weight will be an issue,
Just over 20bhp/tonne compared to CR2 at c.18.2bhp/tonne. Very mobile platform but of course any dumb f*cker can still bog it in.
i know, crap driver or crap commander can bog any vehicle in. A slab of beer to be towed out back in the day, or now its a pack of fair trade fruit juice.
The old “yellow handbag” for services rendered. SQMS or BQMS always had a 4 tonner full👍
those were the days, proper army
👍
Absolutely this. I threw a track heading back to camp up at Hohne. Had 6 M109s and a couple of command posts behind me, needless to say no one was going anywhere any time soon. Took the Reme guys about 3 hours to get me out and track back on. Back into camp at about 02:00. I was not very popular that night and it also cost me a fair few yellow handbags.
🤣👍
REME boys saved my bacon that night. They could easily have pulled me out of the way and let all the other vehicles by but they didn’t, they even put the track back on for me. What state is the REME in these days, we’d be right in the smelly stuff without them.
I was REME for 24 yrs👍 a Tech for my sins but crewed plenty of 434’s and ARV’s. The Corps is alive and well but depleted and thin on the ground, ask Daniele M.
A bit undervalued. We’re never going to get anywhere with you guys. RA myself, so we always had quiet a large LAD within the Regt.
Served with RA and RHA, fixed Cymbeline generators too! Abbots were keeping me busy🤔
Ever with 4th?
25 Fld and 3 RHA Paderborn👍
Ah apologies, I think I might have asked you the same question a few years back. It’s just I’m pretty sure we had an Ian in our 1st line Tech Support in Aldershot. I can remember instructing on a Radar course down in Paderborn in 1990,but I think it might have been 45 Regt then.
I eas in Paderborn in the early / mid 80’s, Lionheart and firing camps on Munsterlager😳
Germany wise, I was up in Osnabruk from 84 – 93. But yes, Lionheart was massive, I think we were still based in Aldershot then and drove from there via Harwich- Hook of Holland – Cologne then down to our start point which I think might have been about 10/15 clicks from the West/East German border. Then the next couple of weeks continually falling back till End Ex. Was a good exercise.
REME is smaller.
I understand that a lot of first line Regimental Workshops were reduced to LAD size some years back.
19 Brigade has no regular second line REME (19 Bde), and 4 Lt Bde has just an AR REME battalion.
This happened over a month ago
Yup, crews all thawed out now.
Is it basically test in desert now and then IOC?
Would seem like a plan.
Seems likely. There are supposed to be 96 coming through this year. If passing cold weather tests, got to be reasonably close.
Also they must desperately need them with the equipment they are sending to Ukraine and retiring early etc.
Ajax replaces CVR(T) Scimitar – don’t think we sent any of those to UKR – but instead withdrew them from our Field Force a year ago and temporarily substituted Warrior in a recce role in the interim until Ajax comes in. Bit of a bizarre idea, if you ask me.
See UKDJ article 22nd Mar this year.
James Cartlidge stated numbers to be fielded as follows:
2024 93
2025 89
2026 66
2027 125
2028 73
No plan survives first contact…………..😳
Haha. Often true. But hopefully the plan will last until the Election at least. But, clearly if RGT throws something up there will need to be some re-work – or has RGT finished?
Ongoing Graham
Yes, I heard it was planned to take 15-18 months.