There was a revelatory moment on the weekend as Defence Minister Bill Blair attempted to bridge the gap between rhetoric and reality in the Liberal government’s spending plans for his department and the Canadian military.

Asked about an anticipated (and long overdue) update to the country’s defence policy (supposedly made urgent two years ago by Russia’s full-on invasion of Ukraine), Blair acknowledged that the reset is now being viewed through a fiscal lens.

“We said we’re going to bring forward a new defence policy update. We’ve been working through that,” Blair told CBC’s Rosemary Barton Live on Sunday.

“The current fiscal environment that the country faces itself does require (that) that defence policy update … recognize (the) fiscal challenges. And so it’ll be part of … our future budget processes.”

It’s an important statement, in light of today’s federal fiscal update. It also brings up a question: has the Trudeau government — which billed itself initially as an “evidence-based” government — viewed its existing defence policy through the lens of affordability?

For several weeks now, Blair has been called upon to defend a $1 billion annual reduction in planned defence spending during a time of geopolitical turmoil — part of the federal government’s overall spending reduction plan.

After it initially denied it was cutting defence spending, the government’s messaging shifted to focus on fiscal prudence and accountability to taxpayers squeezed by the high cost of living.

The release last week of federal budget estimates and supplementary appropriations effectively put a spike in the claim that the defence spending reductions don’t amount to a cut. It also raised questions about whether the goals of the original defence policy are even being met.

What the estimates say, what the minister says

In 2017, the Liberal government estimated it would spend $29.8 billion at National Defence in the current budget year.

The supplementary budget estimates, meanwhile, record a total appropriation of $28.9 billion for defence in the current fiscal year — $500 million of which is destined not for the Canadian Armed Forces but for the Ukrainian military.

When you add up the difference, you find the “almost $1 billion” cut that the country’s top military commander warned about — or the “$900 million and change” the deputy defence minister described.

And yet, at the Halifax International Security Forum over the weekend, Blair struck a decidedly hawkish tone in front of a hawkish audience.

“Although we are already investing in major new military capabilities in all domains, again, I will reiterate additional investments are needed and they will occur,” he said Friday during his opening remarks. “We know that we need resources to put behind our aspirations.”

Later, during a round of media interviews, the minister was a bit more specific.

“We need to spend more on the right things,” he told CBC News.

“We need to spend more on munitions. We need to spend more on military platforms, planes, submarines and ships. We need to spend more on the equipment, the resources and the training that the Canadian Armed Forces needs.”

The problem with Blair’s remarks is how they keep bumping up against reality. Big cash injections to pay for 88 new F-35 fighter jets, new patrol frigates and even MQ-9 Reaper drones are still three to five years down the road.

Those are the “aspirations” Blair was talking about.

What’s happening now was spelled out quite clearly in those same recently released federal government estimates. They show the Liberals intend to cut $500 million across government during the current fiscal year — $211.1 million at the Department of National Defence alone.

Today’s mini-budget could tell us what the reduction will look like in future years — given that the existing defence policy forecast a spike in appropriations connected to the purchase of big-ticket items, such as the new fighter jets and new naval frigates.

The recent signals from Blair have been unmistakable.

“We may not be able to go as fast as we might have hoped, but we have to continue to move forward,” he said. 

Some defence analysts question whether any new defence policy could be relevant, given that the goals set out in the 2017 policy document aren’t even being met.

Military ‘unable’ to meet terms of 2017 defence policy

One policy goal of the existing defence plan, Strong, Secure and Engaged, was to require that the military be able to concurrently deliver “two sustained deployments of 500 [to] 1,500 personnel in two different theaters of operation, including one as a lead nation.”

In a footnote, the recent estimates said the Canadian military is “currently unable to conduct multiple operations concurrently per the requirements laid out in the 2017 Defence Policy. Readiness of CAF force elements has continued to decrease over the course of the last year, aggravated by decreasing number of personnel and issues with equipment and vehicles.”

Some analysts say they believe that even if the federal government hits its overall budget reduction targets, what has been taken away from defence — and what’s about to be taken away — won’t be coming back, the minister’s public assurances notwithstanding.

“Reversing the trend toward deficit reduction would also not guarantee a major boost to defence spending, as numerous other domestic issues ranging from cost-of-living and housing availability to health care and climate change would be major competitors for additional spending,” Geordie Jeakins, an analyst specializing in defence and aerospace at the consulting firm Oliver Wyman, wrote in a policy paper posted by the Canadian Global Affairs Institute.

“This is all notwithstanding the possibility of a recession or other external shocks further complicating the fiscal picture.”

Jeakins went on to say that the Liberal government’s policy goal of “reorienting the CAF’s mission to be more assertive would likely be an expensive endeavour.

“The new defence strategy will have to consider carefully if Canada wants to undertake this role and, if so, how it intends to marshal the resources to make it a reality.”

It’s not likely Tuesday’s mini-budget will deliver that kind of blinding clarity. That point was tacitly acknowledged by Blair when, in an interview with CBC News, he described his assurances to the security forum this way:

“I was simply acknowledging to the room that we’ve got a lot of work to do, and we’ve got to, first of all, have the funding that we need in order to make those investments,” he said.

Source : CBC

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Ireland has prided itself on neutrality and commitment to multilateral institutions, but the current government in Dublin is preparing a major change.

As multiple international conflicts test the West’s resolve to support the international order, Ireland is on the brink of fundamentally changing its policy toward global security. 

Micheál Martin, who currently serves as both defence minister and Tánaiste (deputy prime minister), told the Irish parliament this week that he is planning to reform the country’s longstanding “triple lock” policy, which says Ireland can only deploy troops abroad with the explicit consent of three parties: the government, the parliament, and the UN Security Council.

Explaining the plan, Martin said that Ireland’s military “agility and responsiveness” would greatly benefit from removing the UN requirement, which effectively means that the US, Russia, China, France and the UK all enjoy unilateral vetoes over Irish military deployments.

“By making this change in the future, we would be removing the veto power of Security Council members over Ireland’s engagement, while safeguarding the essential link with international law and good governance,” he said.

His remarks came after the Irish government convened a forum to discuss the country’s official policy of neutrality, which has held sway for decades. It is not a member of NATO, making it relatively unusual in the EU, and maintains a military of well under 10,000 servicemembers that has almost exclusively been deployed on UN peacekeeping missions.

While the forum did not lead to a mandate to end the policy of neutrality, it left open the possibly of “reform” to the triple lock policy. The reaction from much of the Irish left to Martin’s ensuing announcement has ranged from concern to anger.

In a parliamentary debate on Thursday, Martin was accused of trying to short-circuit public opinion with the policy, which a Sinn Fein opponent demanded he put to a referendum. Martin responded by pointing out that Sinn Fein’s current leader, Mary Lou McDonald, had “erected a statue to Seán Russell, who collaborated with the German Nazis. That is the history of your commitment to military neutrality.”

So why is this issue so heated, why is Ireland debating it – and why now?

The long view

Foreign policy expert Eoin McNamara of the Finnish Institute of International Affairs told Euronews that Dublin has little choice but to face up to reality. “Irish leaders have not been too interested in geopolitics, but geopolitics has started to become interested in their country,” he said.

“Ireland has been geopolitically sheltered for much of its independent history since 1922,”  McNamara said, “and crises involving major military conflict have usually not directly affected the safety of its population.

“Multilateralism and the UN are very important in Irish foreign policy, and the triple lock is an acknowledgement of this in some ways. There has been a paranoid fear that without a UN Security Council mandate, an Irish government at some stage might sanction significant Irish military involvement in a war of aggression.”

But as McNamara sees it, the explicitly pro-UN position held by many defenders of the triple lock does not take account of the full picture.

“Because of the country’s sheltered position, some naïve outlooks have been allowed to dominate the Irish debate. Multilateralism, humanitarianism and peacekeeping are all dimensions of the UN, but the UN also has other less idealist dimensions. It is also an arena for power politics, as is vividly illuminated by great power behaviour at the UN Security Council. This latter point is rarely raised in much detail in the Irish debate.”

This point was driven home by Martin in parliament, where he pointed to the unfolding conflicts in Ukraine and Israel-Palestine as examples of why waiting for the Security Council out of respect for multilateralism does not necessarily make sense.”We have to be honest about the fact that in respect of many of the worst crises internationally, where rapid, impartial and decisive international action is desperately needed, the Council has not been able to act,” he said.

Source : Euronews

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Ukraine’s Defence Minister Rustem Umierov has signed an order approving the Military Personnel Policy Concept through to 2028, which focuses on meeting the human resources needs of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU).

Quote: “The document defines a strategic vision for developing military personnel policy in defence over the next five years, both during martial law and peacetime.

The main emphasis of the concept is to ensure that the needs of the AFU in personnel are met during a full-scale war, integration into the Euro-Atlantic security space, and interoperability of the AFU with the armed forces of NATO member states.”

Details: The Ukrainian Defence Ministry expects the following effects:

The AFU will switch to contract military service. Conscript military service will be replaced by intensive military training for citizens of draft age;

Ukraine will have an effective system of recruiting professional and motivated personnel for the AFU;

A human-centred approach to career management of military personnel, taking into account their education;

Professional development, and gender equality. Equal opportunities for men and women in the AFU;

Improved electronic military registration system;

Automated and digitalised personnel management processes;

Expanded cooperation between Ukrainian higher education institutions and those of NATO and EU member states;

An effective and transparent system of financial support for servicemen and women and provision of housing;

Improved psychological support;

A new style of relations between commanders and subordinates;

Proper conditions for transitioning from military career to civilian life for service members subject to discharge from military service.

Source : Yahoo

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Today marks the 12th anniversary of the repeal of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy that was effective from Feb. 28, 1994, to Sept. 20, 2011.

Sept. 20, 2011, was “a historic day for the Department of Defense that made our military stronger,” Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks said at a Pentagon news briefing today.

Hicks also said the Defense Department is now working to upgrade veterans’ discharges that were less than honorable as a result of the policy.

DOD Instruction 1304.26, widely known as the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy,” prohibited military personnel from discriminating against or harassing non-heterosexual service members who did not reveal their sexual orientation, while barring openly LGBTQ+ persons from military service.

Some LGBTQ+ service members were given discharges that may have resulted in denied access to veterans’ benefits — including home loans, health care, GI Bill tuition assistance and even some government jobs, she said.

Since the repeal, DOD has helped eligible veterans discharged because of their sexual orientation access the benefits they deserve. More than four out of five veterans who’ve applied for discharge upgrades or records corrections have been successful — but others might not have taken the opportunity, she said.

Hicks said some veterans haven’t gotten their discharges upgraded because:

• The application process was harder to navigate than it is today.
• They’re worried about whether they would be treated with dignity and respect after the painful experiences suffered.
• They didn’t know it was an option.

Over the last two-plus years, DOD has worked to make the process easier, she said, explaining steps the department has taken.

The department is re-doubling its outreach to LGBTQ+ veterans discharged under “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell,” to encourage anyone who might be eligible to apply for corrections to their military records, including to their discharge paperwork, she said.

This outreach campaign will be online, by mail, through nonprofits and veterans service organizations, and other avenues. It starts today with a new online resource, which will be continuously updated with relevant information, she said.

There will be more information, including on podcasts and webinars, to explain how the process works and encourage those who aren’t sure if they’re eligible to consider applying, she said.

Also, beginning today, DOD will, for the first time, begin proactively reviewing the military records of veterans discharged because of their sexual orientation to identify those who may be eligible for discharge upgrades, but haven’t yet applied, Hicks said.

DOD will first identify veterans discharged during the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” period and then take steps to retrieve their relevant military records, for example from the National Archives. After a preliminary review and an assessment that an upgrade in discharge may be warranted, DOD will transmit the names to the service secretaries for consideration and potential correction through the Military Department Boards for Correction of Military/Naval Records.

DOD will seek to collaborate with the Department of Veterans Affairs and the National Archives in cases where they might have digitized records that can help expedite the review, she said.

“When we find indications that someone’s less-than-honorable discharge was due to their sexual orientation, we’ll put their name forward to their respective military department’s review board for consideration,” Hicks said.

This will be done with measures to preserve the privacy and dignity of each veteran, she added.

Even as DOD begins these systematic records reviews, it may not catch everyone who’s eligible. For instance, if someone’s military records or discharge papers don’t say why they stopped serving, then it might be hard to discern whether Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was a factor, she said.

Hicks encouraged everyone to visit the new webpage, Spotlight: Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Resources, and share it with others.

“We know correcting these records cannot fully restore the dignity taken from LGBTQ+ service members when they were expelled from the military. It doesn’t completely heal the unseen wounds that were left. It doesn’t make people whole again, even for those many who received honorable discharges.

“But this is yet another step we’re taking to make sure we do right by those who served honorably despite being forced to hide who they are and who they love while serving the country they love. Even if the department didn’t see it then, we see it now,” she said.

Source : US Department of Defense

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The US Military Academy at West Point is being sued for its race-based admissions policies by the same group that won a landmark case against Harvard University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in the Supreme Court over affirmative action earlier this year, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday.

In June, the Supreme Court ruled that colleges and universities could no longer take race into consideration as a specific basis for granting admissions – except for US military service academies. It was a significant decision against affirmative action policies, which have focused on improving opportunities for historically excluded minorities.

The new lawsuit asks the court to find the use of race in admissions at the military academy in New York unconstitutional and prohibit them from “considering or knowing” an applicant’s race during the admissions process.

“West Point has no justification for using race-based admissions. Those admissions are unconstitutional for all other public institutions of higher education,” Students for Fair Admissions, a conservative group, said in the complaint. “The Academy is not exempt from the Constitution…Because West Point discriminates on the basis of race, its admission policy should be declared unlawful and enjoined.”

When reached by CNN, a spokesperson for West Point said, “The U.S. Military Academy does not comment on ongoing litigation to protect the integrity of its outcome for all parties involved.”

West Point has nearly 4,400 undergraduates, 2,693 of whom are White, 483 Black or African American, 545 Hispanic/Latino, 414 Asian and 38 American Indian or Alaska Native, according to October 2022 data from West Point’s website.

“West Point sets benchmarks for the percentage of each class that should be filled by ‘African Americans,’ ‘Hispanics,’ and ‘Asians,’ and it meticulously tracks its compliance with those figures down to a tenth of a percentage point,” the suit alleges.

“Race is, indeed, determinative for hundreds of applicants each year,” the suit alleges.

Applicants nominated by US representatives and senators make up 75% of each incoming class, the suit states, citing the military academy.

The suit also adds that “in most cases, up to ten qualified applicants compete against one another for the single slot afforded to their Senator or Representative each year.”

“Because skin color can be—and often is—a decisive factor for successful applicants who are chosen from those congressional nominee pools, it is equally dispositive for the other qualified nominees who are turned away. Put differently, because race is a “positive” factor for some West Point applicants, it is necessarily a “negative” factor for others,” it adds.

Students for Fair Admissions has two members who are White males who are set to apply to West Point, according to the complaint.

The group argues that because the Academy uses race as a factor in admissions, both are prevented from competing for admission on an “equal footing.”

“If West Point is allowed to continue making admissions decisions based on applicants’ race, SFFA’s members—including Members A and B and other similarly-situated applicants—will suffer harm because they will be denied the opportunity to compete for a West Point appointment on equal grounds, solely because of their race,” the suit claims.

In the Supreme Court ruling that gutted affirmative action, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the opinion for the conservative majority, saying the Harvard and UNC admissions programs violated the Equal Protection Clause because they failed to offer “measurable” objectives to justify the use of race. He said the programs involve racial stereotyping and had no specific end point.

In a footnote, Roberts said the cases before the court did “not address the issue” and left open the possibility that there are “potentially distinct interests that military academies may present” in a future case.

Source : CNN

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China will send warships to a multilateral naval exercise hosted this month by Indonesia, which has also invited countries such as North Korea, Russia, South Korea and the United States, amid rising tension in the Asia-Pacific region.  The drills come as China and the United States ramp up military diplomacy in the region, staging more frequent war games with allies and partners around Taiwan, the busy waterway of the South China Sea, and the west Pacific.  China’s navy will send its destroyer Zhanjiang and frigate Xuchang, both equipped with guided missiles, to the 2023 Multilateral Naval Exercise Komodo (MNEK), the defence ministry said in a statement on Wednesday

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“Some allies are strongly in favor of turning the current 2% target into a minimum,” DPA quoted Stoltenberg as saying in an interview published on January 3.

Stoltenberg said that he would head the negotiations. “We will meet, we will have ministerial meetings, we will have talks in capitals,” he said.

He did not say which NATO countries were calling for a more ambitious target, according to DPA.

The NATO chief said he aimed to reach an agreement no later than NATO’s next regular summit, which will be in Lithuania’s capital, Vilnius, on July 11-12.

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“The F-35 delivers unsurpassed capability to our warfighters and operational commanders,” said Air Force Lt. Gen. Mike Schmidt, program executive officer, F-35 Joint Program Office. “This contract strikes the right balance between what’s best for the US taxpayers, military services, allies and our foreign military sales customers. The F-35 is the world’s premier multi-mission, 5th-generation weapon system, and the modernized Block 4 capabilities these new aircraft will bring to bear strengthens not just capability, but interoperability with our allies and partners across land, sea, air and cyber domains.”

The agreement includes 145 aircraft for Lot 15, 127 for Lot 16, and up to 126 for the Lot 17 contract option, including the first F-35 aircraft for Belgium, Finland and Poland.

Lot 15-17 aircraft will be the first to include Technical Refresh-3 (TR-3), the modernized hardware needed to power Block 4 capabilities. TR-3 includes a new integrated core processor with greater computing power, a panoramic cockpit display and an enhanced memory unit.

These aircraft will add to the growing global fleet, currently at 894 aircraft after 141 deliveries in 2022. The F-35 team was on track to meet the commitment of 148 aircraft as planned; however, due to a temporary pause in flight operations, which is still in effect, necessary acceptance flight tests could not be performed.

The finalized contract caps off a year of the F-35 delivering combat-proven airpower around the world and continued international growth. This year, Finland, Germany and Switzerland signed Letters of Offer and Acceptance (LOAs) as an important step in their procurement of F-35 aircraft.

F-35 program participants currently include 17 countries. To date, more than 1,870 pilots and 13,500 maintainers have been trained, and the F-35 fleet has surpassed more than 602,000 cumulative flight hours.

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Milrem Robotics, the EU’s poster child for military robot development, is testing the bloc’s rules for keeping defense-technology cooperation strictly a European affair, after the UAE’s state-owned EDGE Group acquired a majority stake in the Estonian company.

Announced on the eve of last month’s IDEX defense exhibition in the UAE capital Abu Dhabi, the takeover is meant to bolster EDGE’s technological prowess in an “increasingly diverse and fiercely competitive marketplace” while underwriting Milrem’s international growth as part of the new ownership, the companies announced Feb. 15.

“A presence in Estonia also provides EDGE with strategic access to Northern Europe, increasing valuable opportunities for us across the continent and further afield, and strengthens our position as a serious global player in this sector,” Mansour AlMulla, CEO of EDGE, said in a statement.

Left unmentioned was Milrem’s role in the EU’s ecosystem for military robotics and other capabilities, nurtured through subsidies from Brussels and an understanding that knowledge gained collectively among bloc governments and their defense companies should remain principally in European hands.

Milrem spokesman Gert Hankewitz told Defense News that the company has erected “clear legal boundaries” to restrict sharing of sensitive EU and NATO intellectual property with EDGE, vowing that such information would stay “explicitly” with Milrem.

“The acquisition of Milrem’s shares was negotiated and concluded considering the specific requirements of current and upcoming EU, NATO programs where we already participate or plan to in the future,” he said.

The spirit of EU access rules for cooperative defense programs is restrictive by design, barring even close, democratic allies such as the U.S. from participating in technology-heavy programs, where haggling over the flow of intellectual property is expected to become a sticking point.

An EDGE spokesperson declined to comment.

Contract award for iMUGS uncrewed system

Milrem gained a foothold in the EU-wide field of defense robotics through the iMUGS project, short for integrated Modular Unmanned Ground System, where the Estonian company leads a consortium of 13 entities hailing from seven European countries. The European Commission awarded iMUGS a contract in 2020 worth close to $40 million to define a standard architecture for military unmanned ground vehicles, with Milrem’s “THeMIS” as the reference platform.

The program started under the aegis of the European Defence Industrial Development Programme, or EDIDP, which began funding a collection of defense capability projects in the 2019-2020 budget cycle to the tune of €500 million ($538 million). The push aimed to support “the competitiveness and innovation capacity of the Union’s defense industry,” according to the EC website.

The regulation governing EDIDP projects, including iMUGS, states that companies are barred from participating if they are “subject to control by a third country or a third-country entity.”

But there is a loophole. Non-EU influence is permissible when the project’s host government gives certain “guarantees” to Brussels that the foreign ownership won’t undermine the bloc’s wider security interests and that project-related information stays in the EU sphere.

The Estonian government, for its part, has already signaled it would take up the case with Brussels.

When contacted by Defense News this month, the Estonian Ministry of Defence noted that Milrem’s change of ownership had not been yet officially approved, as the transaction was still being concluded.

“The Estonian Ministry of Defence will assure that the participation of Estonian companies in EU defense industry programs follow EU rules,” a MoD spokesperson told Defense news. “If Milrem’s change of ownership is approved and such an assessment is deemed necessary, it will be done in accordance with the relevant EU legislation and in cooperation with the European Commission.”

Spotlighting a blind spot

The Milrem takeover by EDGE, billed as the largest foreign investment in Estonia’s defense industry, puts the spotlight what EU officials fear is a blind spot in the bloc’s exposure to foreign interests.

Leaders in Brussels have repeatedly urged all member states to adopt screening laws, especially with an eye toward Russian and Chinese business ties in the EU. So far, roughly two-thirds of the bloc’s 27 member nations have registered with the EC the existence of a national policy covering the screening of foreign direct investments, Defense News reported last fall.

Depending on the foreign investor, external control of key companies could directly challenge the vision of Europe’s strategic autonomy, Pieter Taal, head of the European Defence Agency’s industry strategy and EU policies unit, told reporters at the time.

The Milrem spokesman pointed to an existing organization within the Estonian government, the interagency Strategic Goods Commission, as playing a role in approving certain exports, including to “non-allied partners” like the UAE.

The commission’s website indicates its focus lies on enforcing export controls, as opposed to considering strategic ownership questions typically associated with foreign direct investment, or FDI.

The Estonian parliament, meanwhile, has prepared legislation for the government to scrutinize foreign direct investment, according to a Feb. 10 online fact sheet by business law firm Sorainen, which has offices in all three Baltic countries and Belarus.

“The primary objective of the new FDI regime is to screen both direct and indirect investments made by non-EU investors in strategically important and sensitive areas in Estonia,” Lauri Liivat, an attorney at the firm, told Defense News. “This means acquiring 10% or more of the shares or control in the companies falling under the regulation or relevant assets of such companies.”

While lawmakers adopted the Foreign Investment Reliability Assessment Act, as the law is called, in January, it won’t take effect until September.

Milrem, for its part, said it expects to keep the prominent role the company has assumed in military-robotics development in an EU context, even under Emirati ownership.

The responsible officer for iMUGS on the Estonian government side, Martin Jõesaar, backed that assessment, telling Defense News: “Milrem Robotics will continue to lead the EDIDP19 iMUGS project after the acquisition by EDGE takes effect. Furthermore, they have no problem taking part in other EDF project in the future as long as they have methods in place to keep these projects clearly separate from the outside of EU owner.”

The acronym EDF is a reference to the European Defence Fund, a multibillion-euro pot that has since replaced the EDIDP scheme – with the same language on exceptions for third-country ownership.

It’s still unclear if fellow European companies working with Milrem care about the implications of the Emirati takeover. Of those pinged for comment, only Krauss-Maffei Wegmann, which also holds a minority stake in Milrem, responded. A spokesman told Defense News that the German armored vehicles specialist had been informed of the new stakeholder mix but wouldn’t comment further.

A spokesman at the European Defence Agency, or EDA, in Brussels said the agency has no position on the matter, stemming from a policy of not commenting on individual countries and companies. An EC spokesperson did not return a request for comment.

Next up for a funding decision under EDF rules is a follow-on project to iMUGS, simply known as a version 2, that would expand autonomy features to larger military vehicles.

According to Jõesaar, the nations currently involved in the project have shown strong support for the next stage, and more information is expected by summer. For now, it is known that there likely will be a greater number of European states coming onboard and that different financing alternatives will be considered to fund the program’s second stage, he said.

In addition, the EDA in early February announced a project, led by Italy, toward a common architecture for Combat Unmanned Ground Systems, or CUGS. Milrem and its Themis and Type X vehicles are part of the study lineup along with vehicles from Italy’s Iveco, Finland’s Patria and Germany’s Rheinmetall.

Source : Defense News

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