Force Protection pushing ahead with plant for Cheetah MRAP

Busher said the company plans to have the first phase of plant upfitting completed by Oct. 8 and that the first vehicle assembly should take place during the fourth quarter of this year. The company is currently interviewing for assemblers, he said.

By mid-2008, Busher said, the company hopes to have its first Cheetah complete and ready to ship from the Roxboro plant.

The Cheetah is designed specifically for reconnaissance, forward command and control, and urban operations, and combines state-of-the-art ballistic and blast protection with the mobility of a light-armored vehicle. Its speed and road handling make it ideal for homeland security missions, Busher said.

(Roxboro-Courier.com)

The story has Busher going on to say that the Cheetah is the likely successor to the Humvee. Lockheed Martin is reportedly preparing a competing design, and Force Protection's local competitor (also headquartered in South Carolina) Protected Vehicles Inc. has also designed a vehicle intended to replace the Humvee.

clipped from www.weeklystandard.com

The Lockheed Martin design.


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Cougar, Badger ... what's the difference?

April 15, 2007: The Iraqi army has received its first batch of 40 Badger Armored Vehicles. There is some confusion over what the Badger is. It's basically a variant of the popular Cougar armored truck, widely used by bomb disposal teams. The Iraq army is buying 378 Badger armored trucks. Originally called the Iraqi Light Armored Vehicles (ILAV), the Badgers will cost about $432,000 each. The ILAV is based on the four wheel Cougar, which can carry ten passengers. If the Badger proves popular, the contract makes provision for a total of 1,050 vehicles to be delivered by 2009.
(strategypage)

So add the Badger to Force Protection's Cougar-type lineup, next to the UK's Mastiff version.

clipped from www.blackanthem.com

An Iraqi soldier climbs into a Badger for the drive to Baghdad from Taji Army Base in support of Operation Fardh Al-Qanoon March 31. A total of 398 Badgers are to be delivered this year as part of Iraqi military's modernization program. (Photo by U.S. Navy MC2 Elisandro Diaz)

From the same Strategy Page story:

But with as many as 20,000 MRAPs on hand, keeping them in storage may not be an option. As a result, the U.S. Department of Defense has halted work on designing the hummer replacement (the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle or JLTV).

The JLTV, I believe, is the class of vehicle including Force Protection's Cheetah and Protected Vehicles' Protector (not to exhaust the list; I just don't know what other companies are offering, though I know that Lockheed is working on something). Given that both vehicles are designed to resist IEDs while permitting the type of speech and mobility the military had with the Hummer, I find this decision difficult to fathom. The JLTVs have largely been developed already, from what I can tell.

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