As you know, the Russian army currently uses the Russian-made Tiger family of armored vehicles as armored vehicles. But it could happen that instead of "Tigers" in the Russian army could operate the Italian armored cars Iveco M65E19WM 4x4, better known in Russia as "Lynx". Where did Italian armored cars come from in our army and why they never came up for adoption, let's try to answer in this material.
Italian Iveco
The first appearance of Iveco armored vehicles in Russia was in 2009: two light armored vehicles Iveco M65E19WM 4x4, better known as LMV (Light Multirole Vehicle - light multi-purpose vehicle), were purchased and imported into Russia by KamAZ. The purpose of the import was called the test cycle.
Note that it is unlikely that Italian armored cars appeared in Russia without the approval of the highest military-political circles, and Anatoly Serdyukov was the Minister of Defense at that time, who initiated large-scale reforms: changing the organizational structure of the army and the procurement system, reducing the number of military personnel, launching a rearmament program, and etc. Therefore, soon after the appearance of IVECO in Russia, there were reports in the media about the imminent acceptance of the "Italians" into the arsenal of the Russian army. While the first two Ryssey units were being tested (Lince is the Italian name of the armored car), at the beginning of 2010 KamAZ bought two more armored cars, and at the end of the year the Ministry of Defense purchased as many as 10 IVECOs, "assembled" at KamAZ by screwing the nameplate with the inscription "Lynx" on the radiator. The machines were sent for testing.
In the future, the Ministry of Defense signed an agreement with IVECO on the joint assembly of "Rysya" at an enterprise in Voronezh, in total since 2011, within five years, it was supposed to collect 1,775 armored vehicles for the Russian military department. While the cost of one "Italian" at that time was more than 20 million rubles, the entire procurement program was estimated at more than 30 billion. At the same time, Serdyukov planned to increase the purchase of "Rysey" to 3 thousand units, and a corresponding request was even sent. However, in 2013, the production of an armored car, by the way, which was adopted by the Russian army in 2010, was discontinued.
What's wrong?
In 2013, already under the new Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, information appeared that the Russian army was abandoning the Italian armored car in favor of a domestic development, as it turned out later, it was the Tiger armored car. There were many reasons for the refusal at that time, even more assumptions were made, both supporters of the refusal and ardent defenders of the Italian armored car appeared.
Earlier, the Ministry of Defense explained the need for a mass purchase of light armored vehicles "Lynx" with plans to create several light brigades that were supposed to move on these armored vehicles. In addition, they were supposed to arm special forces, reconnaissance, airborne forces, that is, those units that are fighting far from good roads. This was one of the reasons for abandoning the "Lynx" in favor of the "Tiger". In fact, an armored car of the MRAP class, intended mainly for use on paved roads as a convoy or patrol vehicle, was tried to be put into service with units that did not even dream of moving on the highway. The second reason was the small capacity of the armored car, which could accommodate only five people and a small amount of space for equipment and ammunition.
In 2016, information appeared that the armored vehicles "Lynx" remaining in service with the Russian army would go into service with the military police. It was assumed that armored vehicles will be used to escort convoys and patrol the perimeters of military facilities. At the same time, insufficient maneuverability was called the reason for abandoning the "Rysey".
According to a representative of the Ministry of Defense, "on the basis of tests carried out from November 2013 to December 2014, the Lynx (IVECO) in the field of cross-country ability, armor protection and weapons was recognized as not fully meeting the requirements of the Russian military."
Most likely, having thoroughly studied all the capabilities of the Italian armored car, the Russian Ministry of Defense came to the conclusion that the domestic "Tiger" is better suited for use as a light off-road armored car, as well as for performing other tasks, at least the family of Russian armored vehicles from the military did not cause.
Perhaps there are other reasons for the refusal of the "Italian", because the decision was made at the highest level, but they will not be brought to us. So we will restrict ourselves to the option where the Italian road armored jeep simply did not fit the Russian army exactly in the capacity in which it was supposed to be used. The option with the continuation of purchases of Italian armored cars and the consequences for the Russian army from this, we will not consider now.
