Army Scraps Second Armoured Squadron
I mentioned on 5 April that a squadron of tanks has been removed from Army’s order of battle.
It is now evident that a cavalry (reconnaissance) squadron has been removed as well.
This seems doubly surprising in the current strategic circumstances.
These are major manoeuvre units and their absence has a significant impact on Army’s available combat power.
Army decided to give priority to the creation of a unit to manage emerging technologies, and, as a consequence, 1st Armoured Regiment was stripped of its tanks.
The Defence Strategic Review called for an armoured brigade to be located in Townsville.
The maximum span of command for the 2nd Cavalry Regiment, located there, is two tank and two cavalry squadrons – overall, a loss of two armoured squadrons.
It seems that maximising combat power is not high on Army’s agenda at present.
Lieutenant Colonel Bruce Cameron, MC, RAAC (Ret’d)
FILE PHOTO (2022): An Australian light-armoured vehicle (ASLAV) negotiates a creek crossing during an exercise at Jungle Training Wing, Tully, Queensland. Photo by Corporal Nicole Dorrett.
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Anyone observing the unfolding war in Ukraine will undoubtly notice that either side loses the numbers of armour nearing to our WHOLE armored stock. I can see the need to establish the unit type required in Adelaide (long overdue) but to trash such a large amount of learned skillsets and deny ongoing combined arms training to the few troops we have seems unexplainable.
The development unit requires multiple skillsets to develop the tools needed going forward (armour being one) but this scenario depletes the core force upon which to build future armoured forces if ever the politicians decide to spend some money on recruitment and equipment.
If they were building battalions of drone type units with ISR functions on the Ukraine model I would be less concerned.
Can you imagine how many drones would be deployed against us in any theatre going forward??