Australia replaces the Leopard I MBTs with the M1A1 Abrams

Australia is replacing their old Leopard I MBTs with 59 re-conditioned M1A1 MBTs. It will not be a one to one replacement. Australia previously employed the Centurion during the Vietnam War. These were later replaced by German Leopard Is.

Quoting from an article in the Australian government website:

"The Government will equip the Australian Army with a fleet of 59 United States M1A1 Abrams Integrated Management main battle tanks to replace the ageing Leopards, Defence Minister Robert Hill announced today.

The projected cost is about A$550 million."

I wonder if Australia has the strategic assets to deploy these elsewhere. One of the reasons given in the strategic rationale:

"This means that, even when we do not expect to meet major opposition (such as in peacekeeping or evacuation operations), our soldiers can encounter, without warning, highly lethal weapons of a standard that simply did not exist a few years ago."


Points to note from the Fact Sheet issued:

"The M1A1 AIM vehicle that Australia will procure will not be equipped with either Depleted Uranium armour or munitions. The armour on offer is of an advanced composite design, which is in accord with our capability requirements.

The new tank will fire an advanced kinetic energy Tungsten penetrator against vehicles and a multi-purpose round for infantry support."

Politically safe choices. No depleted uranium (DU) penetrators or armour.

There are already criticisms of this purchase. I wonder if there were previous criticisms when it came to the purchase of the Centurion and Leopard I MBTs.

This purchase reminded me of the Mahathir regime that bought quite a number of the Polish PT-91 MBTs. Meanwhile, Poland has converted to German Leopard 2A4s MBTs. Heh. Interesting development.

Image source: Border Morning Mail, AAAP