Over the past few weeks, the German government has boosted its sales pitch with a pledge to buy more than 100 Australian-made Rheinmetall Boxer heavy weapon carriers, which company insiders concede is contingent on winning the much larger LAND400 deal. With the Albanese government now searching for further savings in defence to cover the enormous cost of acquiring nuclear-powered submarines, Labor is even exploring the possibility of instead building the IFVs overseas. Rheinmetall is offering an existing vehicle known as Lynx made in Queensland, while Hanwha has developed an entirely new product for Australia known as Redback, which it is proposing to build at a Geelong facility in Defence Minister Richard Marles's electorate.Įarlier this year, Labor's Defence Strategic Review dramatically reduced the scope of the LAND 400 Phase 3 project which aims to replace the Australian Army's Vietnam War-era M113 Armoured Personnel Carriers, from an original 450 IFVs to 129. Away from the realistic war-fighting scenarios they are rehearsing, a far more ferocious battle is playing out inside the corporate boardrooms of their respective countries, as a decision looms on a five-year-long tendering process for one of the Australian Army's most lucrative contracts on record.Īs early as this week, a government decision is expected to be made on whether German company Rheinmetall or South Korean rival Hanwha is chosen to construct new state-of-the-art infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs) in a defence prize worth around $10 billion.
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