The weight requirement by Shinseki would have caused us to suffer the same fate as the Russians who also need to move their equipment around quickly and have a vehicle design concept that is very light.
The problem we have today is that we have literally a M113, M109, M2, M1, M88 and all of them use different power packs, different tracks, different sprockets... It’s a logistical mess. These vehicles also have very different off/on road drive qualities, etc.
NOTHING we have was designed with the idea of active defense (hard and soft kill) in mind.
NOTHING was designed with the idea of digital technology and being networked.
NOTHING was designed around the idea of true signature reduction, i.e. stealth.
ALL of these systems are ancient, in some cases as with the M1’s AGT1500 you have a power-pack that hasn’t even been produced for over two decades and everything is refurbished.
Meanwhile, the battle-space has entirely changed, with the Middle East, North Africa, far East Asia, being the center of gravity in what are expeditionary and often offensive campaigns. Instead of having propositioned depots with equipment to fall in on, you have to move much of the material around, you’re not on friendly ground (increased mine and IED threat), the temperatures are much higher, the roads and bridges are crap.
Also the threat technology has evolved a lot since 1956 - 1978 (the era in which all these systems were developed/designed). Today the dive and top attack munition (ATGM) is nothing novel and massive armor merely on the front turret don’t cut it, example Ukraine where Russia has pretty much destroyed most the advanced MBT’s that were sent to the front using FPV drones, quickly.
This is a serious problem/risk!
But no one is talking about it.
Analogy: We are well in the SAM and jet age in 1965, but we’re still flying P51 Mustangs and talking about the glory days where it was a bad @ss fighter sweeping the skies.
I agree with you that the systems are ancient.
Gen. Shinseki had a vision, some call it a nightmare, of wheeled vehicles all on a common platform, fulfilling multiple roles. The Strikers were an interim capability. Afghanistan showed us wheeled vehicles, the Stryker, was not up to snuff. FCS then went to tracks. You have to ask yourself if a chassis for an IFV or SPG should be common to a command post or ambulance.
FCS had a lot of other problems. Everything under the sun was thrown in. A UAV (flying trash can), smart mines, other sensors. Billions of lines of code to make it all work together. It needed a network, which the PEO did not control, and did not exist. For the most part, it still does not exist.
Sen. McCain meddled too. He hated the Other Transactional Authority contracting model and forced to the conventional, “DFARS,” type.
Programs that spun out of FCS, like the GCV, died. We got the M10 Booker, but that traces its roots to the XM8 AGS in the 90’s — killed for the peace dividend. The AMPV and MICV (formerly OMFV) in the works. The Army has killed lots of armor programs since Reagan was president (like ASM), we’ll see what happens.
Oh, the last thing from Gen. Shinseki’s vision, the BCTs, are going back into divisions!