Dual use ... forced?

(To Andrea Cucco)
01/09/17

A few weeks ago a 5-star delegation visited the Lenta military depot. The idea? Convert to civil use (fire prevention in particular) means that have been uselessly piled up for years to rust under the weather.

The proposal immediately arouses perplexity in those who know the characteristics of a military vehicle and - above all - have some off-road driving experience: a vehicle designed to withstand various calibers has a weight of several tons due to armor / armor and off-road driving. , for example, a few quintals of difference can make the difference between a fair and an excellent one off-road. On the other hand, the tracks could be valid on particularly difficult terrain and / or in extreme conditions, as demonstrated by the use of modified M113s by the Corsican firefighters.

To understand the 5stelle proposal we met a member of the group that reached the Vercelli deposit, Senator Ornella Bertorotta.

Senator, why this visit and what was your impression?

I've read about Lenta only recently, it's a really interesting Park, in the Milex 2017 Slow report it's called a "cemetery" of military vehicles, where two main activities are carried out: the transfer of vehicles to other armies, through bilateral agreements between the Italian State and other States, and the dismantling of vehicles for the recovery of metal parts.

For the public opinion that park is the symbol of waste, trillions of the old liras parked there. Few consider that those vehicles have served in the past as a deterrent force, compared to possible external aggressions. Italy is a rich country, it was above all in the past, we needed those vehicles, even though many have never been used. The transformation of the Army structure itself must be considered, which has made many means, even though functioning, useless.

We have long supported the need to convert part of the industrial production of the defense sector for civil use. More than a cemetery, in Lenta I see a fleet, many of which could be recovered for uses other than military, with the development of a relative economic sector.

If you think that in the world we have many sites at risk of catastrophe, including chemical industries, or that work particularly flammable materials, where the effectiveness of the response and the safety of the operators is essential. If our companies specialize in the recovery and transformation of these vehicles, they could access a niche economic sector, that of the safety of these plants.

We are masters all over the world in light mechanics, in the production of innovative solutions, we have these platforms parked there, why not recover them?

So is it about developing a new market sector or do you have a more concrete proposal?

The purpose of the visit was to be aware of the real situation and possibly prepare proposals for the re-use of these means, which from the military point of view is unthinkable. For example, Australia has tried to upgrade more than 400 M113, but from an initial expense of 40 million, they have come to spend a billion euros. This is because the standards of today's military vehicles are much higher than those with which the vehicle was designed, which has among other things an aluminum armor, absolutely inadequate to resist the blows of heavy machine guns, to imagine a TOW or other modern anti-tank militias.

If from a military point of view these vehicles are now totally inadequate, the proposal on which I am working concerns the recovery of 100 M113 light crawlers to be allocated to the rescue bodies for strarodinari rescue operations.

The strengths of this proposal are many, we have about 1500 of these vehicles, therefore using 100, we would have thousands of spare parts available, already purchased.

That said we speak of very special means, purchased with billions of old lire, so it is mandatory that a policy attentive to waste, try to assess any possibility of another use of these vehicles, before dismantling them.

I believe that from Lenta it can come out a great example of recovery that is good for everyone, a win win strategy.

The idea, valuable in intentions, is difficult to translate into practice for two reasons: the costs of recovering the vehicles, the uneconomic use (tons of armor are not used to extinguish fires) and finally the poor quality of the vehicles off-road when compared to off-road modern. Not to mention the damage to roads that derive from the use of crawler ...

Currently, when there are calamitous events of a certain magnitude, the firefighters have to intervene with the vehicles they use in the city, this obviously increases the wear and tear of vehicles that are used every day, even in situations where they should use other means.

Of course I share his perplexities, but mainly with regard to tanks and other heavy combat vehicles, it would be short-sighted to retrieve a vehicle that weighs 40 tons, but if we restrict the reasoning to light troop transport vehicles, such as the M113, which all vehicles tracked over long distances are transported by rail or by truck, the problem of consumption is relative.

In fact, we thought of distributing a part of these vehicles in areas of particular risk, while transporting the rest on the train wherever accidents of a certain importance occurred.

We think of a use aimed only at exceptional emergencies, certainly not to replace the current trucks with tracked vehicles.

Firefighters, for example, already have light crawlers that they use for special interventions, just as many countries around the world use crawler vehicles derived from military vehicles for rescue activities. We have them, among other things, many of these means would not need any modification, while only a part should be reworked with the installation of fire kits, already on the market.

The possibility of having spare parts, cannibalizing other M113 in storage, the few necessary changes, could reduce the costs of recovery of many vehicles, but obviously it is only a hypothesis that I reserve to investigate.

In Corsica they have been using M113 for many years as firefighters. Do you have any other positive feedback from the experiment?

We do not yet have a definitive picture of foreign experiences, but we know that the use of military-derived vehicles for rescue operations is not new. Corsica is just one example. One of the countries that has invested heavily in the recovery of these vehicles is Russia. The vast presence of an oil industry has led to the need to equip itself with means that guarantee a high level of personnel safety and higher performance in terms of contrast, in the face of extraordinary accidents. I think they developed this awareness after Chenobyl, which marked the collapse of any traditional contrast system. We consider it normal for a firefighter to face a fire on foot with only the protection of clothing or to reach an impervious place with a tanker from the city, but in other countries it does not work like that.

I intend to visit some foreign companies to better calibrate this proposal.

How do you intend to proceed with this proposal?

In the coming weeks we will visit and ask opinions also to the bodies involved, to the companies that are involved in converting these vehicles, making an accurate cost analysis, in relation to the benefits.

I already tell you that if you can take action to better protect the lives of our rescuers and be more efficient, I think the budget will be positive.

(images: web)