MARINE CORPS BASE QUANTICO, Va. – When the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV) fields it will take over for the Humvee in all roles except as an ambulance, which has spurred the Army to fund new construction of the legacy vehicles for the first time in years.
“Right now the plan is to continue to perform the ambulance role with the Humvee ambulance,” said Army Col. Shane Fullmer, director of the JLTV joint program office. “The Army continues to examine the possibility of using the JLTV and some of it surrounds protection of the capsule on the back and how much that would weigh.”
The JLTV comes in two base models – a two-door utility variant and a four-door version. The four-seater can be configured to perform as a heavy weapon carrier, a general purpose vehicle or be mounted with an anti-tank guided missile launcher. It cannot yet be configured as an ambulance, according to Fullmer.
A truck-bed shelter with space enough for four litters that is armored to the same protection level as the JLTV cab would cause an ambulance variant to violate several of the weight and transportability requirements for JLTV, Fullmer said here on June 14. If the Army is not going to go to an armored ambulance, then the Humvee version is a “perfectly acceptable” vehicle, he said.
John Bryant, president of Oshkosh Defense, said the company foresaw the requirement for an ambulance variant and is working to find a solution that is within the weight and transportability range for JLTV.
“We are in discussion with the program office,” Bryant said. “We’ve been examining various alternatives for … the ability to host an ambulance and the alternatives revolve around how much protection you want to put on that ambulance box itself.”
Oshkosh Defense is a division of Oshkosh [OSK].
The Army is working on modernizing its Humvee ambulance fleet to the most-modern M997A3 configuration, which Fullmer said will be the baseline configuration for the Army’s ambulance fleet once JLTV is fielded.
In its fiscal 2018 budget request, the Army set aside $53 million to buy 179 new Humvee ambulances for the active component, Guard and Reserve, which “require their existing [Humvee] fleets be modernized to the current configuration which will require the procurement of new M997A3 ambulances,” the Army’s budget documentation said.
The Army has been modernizing its ambulance fleet since 2014 through an arrangement between Humvee manufacturer AM General and Rock Island Arsenal. AM General supplies new rolling chassis, and Rock Island both builds and integrates a new ambulance box and components onto the chassis, Michael Clow, a spokesman for the Army’s Combat Support and Combat Service Support program office, told Defense Daily in an email.
To date, the program has produced 1,179 ambulances to modernize the Army National Guard and Reserve component’s aging ambulance fleet. In fiscal 2016, the Army bought 204 M997A3s for $60 million. Those trucks were for the Guard and Reserve.
In fiscal 2017 the Army intends to expand the program to include the active component and continue modernizing Humvee fleets across all components, Clow said. The Army’s intent is to achieve a pure-fleet of approximately 3,700 M997A3 ambulances by fielding new vehicles and divesting of older ambulances, consistent with available funding. This program does not involve any other Humvee-related production.
While it won’t take on the Humvee’s ambulance role, the JLTV will perform one mission for which it was not initially intended. The Army plans to outfit a portion of its JLTVs with heavy weapons and other gear so it can operate as a light reconnaissance vehicle (LRV). The decision was made in lieu of buying a purpose-built LRV, at least in the near term.
“Right now, you have Humvees in those reconnaissance roles. It is the plan and has always been the plan for JLTV to replace those Humvees,” Fullmer said. “What they will receive is a dramatic increase in performance in terms of top speed, offroad mobility, soft-soil mobility and underarmor protection and side protection. So, they are already getting that additional capability just by us showing up in the field.”
“The Army as an enterprise is examining what it wants, both in the short term and the long term for the reconnaissance vehicle or light reconnaissance vehicle,” Fullmer added. “There are lots of different opinions out there which I am not prepared to speculate on.”
Top of the Army’s list of capabilities it wants in an LRV is increased lethality, but defining what kind of weapon or offensive capability is required has been difficult to determine, Fullmer said.
“We are currently involved in the process with the Army, the user community, the resource community, to identify what increased lethality means to us,” he said. “As soon as we finalize that, we are going to get after it … I’m waiting for the Army to define what the requirements are. As soon as the Army defines what the requirements are, I will finalize my acquisition strategy … I am expecting it soon.”