Europe is demilitarizing.
And with Europe making itself less relevant, it making the militarization of the Pacific accelerate. Check this out from Tempointinteractive...
The government will buy a German Army Leopard tank and Apache helicopter, Defense Minister Purnomo Yusgiantoro has confirmed.Wow.
Indonesia is also looking at buying main weaponry systems from France, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy and Spain. These countries have recently reduced their military budgets.
Purnomo said the budget would depend on the equipment that will be purchased, but assured that spending would not exceed the targeted budget. Currently, he added, the Defense Ministry is waiting on the list of weapons required by the army, navy and air force. “We haven’t decided about the budget to buy the equipment from Europe,” he said.
Previously, the Army chief of staff, Gen. Pramono Edhie Wibowo, said his unit was given a special allocation of Rp14 trillion to buy weapons, including 100 2A6 Leopard tanks and eight Apache helicopters.
Other weapons to be purchased include multi-barrel rocket launchers, a helicopter type 1412 and a 155 mm cannon from France. Pramono said that only 15 countries in the world use the 2A6 Leopard. “In Southeast Asia, only Singapore has it,” he said.
Maybe my thoughts on taking a capability holiday and dropping Tanks from Marine Corps rosters needs to be re-examined.
Singapore has new tanks. China has new tanks. India has new tanks and it appears that there is an armor race in the Pacific.
Maybe we should keep ours awhile. Damn. Another decision for HQMC to make. Can we afford to stick with the M1A1 or do we join the Army with an upgrade to the M1A3?
We better get this right. KMW pumps out upgrades like a pez dispenser...in some ways the Leopard 2A7 is already superior to the M1A2 TUSK....Who knew? We have to prepare for armored warfare in the Pacific now!