Italy seeks partners to develop new main battle tank

The Italian Ministry of Defense is in contact with some EU countries, including Poland, with a proposal to cooperate on a project related to land platforms. The Ministry of National Defense analyzes this proposal. The Italian initiative, which is also reported to be offered to Spain, stems

from its failure to gain a role in the Franco-German partnership . After two years of discussions, these two countries want to get the project up and running before opening it to new members.

Italian Deputy Defense Minister Angelo Tofalo told Italian parliamentarians, “ We are looking for potential partners to propose a coherent project aimed at the collaborative development of a common European tool. ” said. Tofalo, held outside the French-German program by adding the words Poland and Spain is on the table the possibility of an alternative approach, the possibility that in a bilateral program with Israel is far also noted .

It is not known which countries Italians are heading to, but experts from the Italian Istituto Affari Internazionali (Institute of International Relations) believe that cooperation between Italy, Poland and Spain may be sufficient to develop a new main battle tank.

In a report published in April of this year under the title ” Main Battle Tanks, Europe and the implications for Italy “, the Italian army is not bound to wait for a German-French design because a competitive tank design has been successfully implemented by a consortium of countries with armored vehicle industry such as Spain and Poland. It was stated that it could be overcome.

“ Italy and Poland have repeatedly requested participation in German-French cooperation, but Paris and Berlin want to keep it bilateral only until a prototype is developed. Therefore, Italy must quickly choose from a limited number of options to meet the military’s urgent need for AMT and maintain a reasonable level of technological dominance in this sector. It was said.

Meanwhile, Italy will develop the Ariete tank. Tofalo told parliamentarians that Leonardo and Iveco were awarded the first tender to the IOC Consortium. Three functional prototypes are requested as part of a proposed half-life modernization worth 35m euros. When the project is approved, it will be applied to 125 tanks of the Italian Army.

Source: defenceturk.net

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