Medium Armored Vehicle (MAV)
Interim Armored Vehicle (IAV)
In October 1999 the Army leadership announced a vision of the future. US forces must be lighter, more lethal and less dependent on logistic tails to rapidly deploy
from multiple dispersed locations worldwide. Agile, highly capable forces that can react quickly to emerging crises may be able to prevent crises from escalating into
war. US forces must be sufficiently versatile to sustain a high operating tempo and defeat an opponent with minimum losses. They must then quickly reposition,
refocus, and execute subsequent missions against an adversary employing asymmetric means, including chemical/ biological warfare and information operations. An
immediate upgrade of current forces is required in order to provide an interim capability to meet this requirement.
The Fiscal Year 2001 Army budget request included decisions to restructure or "divest" a number of programs in order to provide some of the resources to
support its transformation to achieve the ambitious deployment goals outlined in the October 1999 Army Vision. The restructured programs are the Crusader
and the Future Scout and Cavalry System. The "divestitures" include Heliborne Prophet (Air), MLRS Smart Tactical Rocket (MSTAR), Stinger Block II,
Command and Control Vehicle (C2V), Grizzly, Wolverine, and the Army Tactical Missile System Block IIA. Funding for these programs was reallocated to fund
the Army Vision transformation strategy.
The Army Vision includes a Brigade structure and organization which is crucial to the Army’s strategic responsiveness goals of deploying, from the CONUS base
to global theater of operation, one (1) Brigade within 96 hours, one (1) Division within 120 hours and five (5) Divisions within thirty (30) days. The air transportable
Interim Brigade Combat Team (IBCT) is intended to be capable of deployment to anywhere on the globe in a combat ready configuration. The range of tasks to be
accomplished by the IBCT requires a family of vehicles that are air transportable, capable of immediate employment upon arrival in the area of operations, and have
the greatest degree of commonality possible. Force effectiveness is achieved by an organization built around mounted and dismounted infantry enabled by a family
of internetted platforms and situational understanding.
Maintaining and sustaining war-fighting capability is paramount for the Family of Vehicles and throughout the Brigade structure. To meet this interim requirement
the Army provided funding in the FY01 budget to field an Medium/Interim Armored Vehicle as a common baseline capability for a mounted Brigade Combat Team
(BCT) which will function as a full-spectrum combat force. Several families of medium based platforms exist or are under development throughout the world that,
with slight modification, could meet the initial MAV/IAV requirement. One or more of these family options, with appropriate technical insertions, is expected to meet
the interim requirement.
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/mav.htm