Project Waler

Project Waler was an unsuccessful Australian defence procurement exercise which sought to replace the Australian Army's M113 armoured personnel carriers with new armoured fighting vehicles. It was initiated in October 1980, and proposals were sought from companies the next year. These proposals were submitted in 1982, and further studies were undertaken during 1983.

While the scoping studies demonstrated that it would be feasible to build the armoured fighting vehicles in Australia, a planned tender to acquire to them was not issued. Instead, Project Waler was cancelled by the Australian Government in July 1985 due to concerns over the cost and capabilities of the proposed vehicles. The M113s were upgraded instead, though some were replaced by ASLAV wheeled armoured fighting vehicles that were similar to the designs considered under Project Waler. The project is sometimes cited as an example of a mismanaged Australian defence procurement process, with commentators noting that it had been over-ambitious and not enough emphasis was placed on keeping costs down.

History[]

Objectives[]

Two Australian Army M113A1 armoured personnel carriers in 2005

The Australian Government placed its first orders for M113s during the 1963–1964 financial year.^[1] It was planned to retain the type in service until 1995.^[2] The Australian Army began operating M113s in March 1965, and they were successfully used in combat during the Vietnam War.^[1] Multiple orders for M113s were placed, totalling either 817^[3] or 840.^[4] These comprised nine variants tailored for different roles, though the majority were M113A1 armoured personnel carriers.^[4] Deliveries were completed in 1979.^[5] From 1970 the M113 was the standard vehicle for all of the Army's armoured units other than the 1st Armoured Regiment, which operated tanks.^[6]

Project Waler was authorised by Minister for Defence James Killen in April 1980. It aimed to replace the M113s with new light armoured fighting vehicles (AFVs) that were optimised for operations in Australia. These vehicles were to begin entering service in the mid-1990s.^[7][8] The project was named after the Waler horses that had been used by Australian Light Horse units in the Middle East during World War I.^[9][10]

Between 500 and 1,000 AFVs were to be procured, with the Army considering both wheeled and tracked armoured vehicles.^[8] The vehicles would include variants optimised for transporting troops, reconnaissance, command and control, ambulance functions, repairing and recovering armoured vehicles, carrying radar and moving cargo.^[11] The Australian Army also hoped to acquire a large training area in New South Wales as part of Project Waler.^[12]

The government intended Project Waler to provide Australian's manufacturing industry with a significant opportunity to produce technologically advanced military equipment.^[13] Studies undertaken by the Department of Defence concluded that the Australian defence industry was capable of designing and producing the vehicles as long as some technologies were transferred from overseas.^[14] The Department of Defence's annual report for the 1981–1982 financial year stated that "as far as practical" the Project Waler vehicles "are to be designed, developed and made in Australia".^[15] The project was structured in ways that encouraged Australian industry to be involved, including through the government supporting the development of necessary industrial capabilities while the vehicles were still being scoped. Due to its strategic importance, Project Waler was also identified in 1983 as a procurement exercise where the government was willing to pay a premium for manufacturing the vehicles in Australia rather than importing them.^[16] In December 1981 Killen argued in favour of continued trade protections for the Australian automotive industry. This reflected the Department of Defence's view that the industry was necessary on security grounds and could play a role in Project Waler.^[17]

It was hoped that the Project Waler vehicles could be sold for export.^[18] The project was also was identified in the early 1980s as being one of three major defence procurement exercises where Australia and New Zealand could collaborate. The New Zealand Army is believed to have held discussions with the Australian Army regarding joining it to replace its own M113s.^[19]

Feasibility studies[]

The exploratory studies undertaken by the Department of Defence at the outset of Project Waler identified, in a broad sense, the characteristics that were considered desirable for the AFVs. The Government then launched what was intended to be a four phase process to develop and produce the vehicles. The first phase was to be a feasibility study. The second phase would involve first developing a detailed project definition and then selecting an AFV through a competitive process. As part of the third phase the winning company was to finalise the design. The type would then be produced as the fourth phase of the project.^[20]

The first phase of Project Waler began in September 1981 when the Department of Defence sought proposals that covered how the vehicles could be built and maintained in Australia and the estimated costs. The for these proposals was required to be an Australian firm, but they could partner with foreign companies.^[9][14][21]

A German Marder infantry fighting vehicle in 1986; this design was similar to the Army's requirements for Project Waler^[12]

A total of 14 companies submitted proposals by the deadline in February 1982.^[21] The Sun-Herald reported that one of the companies that had considered submitting a proposal had asked the Japanese embassy in Canberra for a copy of invasion plans drawn up by the Japanese military during World War II to use as the basis for a scenario that the new armoured vehicles could counter. The Japanese defence attaché rejected this request and complemented the company for its enterprise.^[22] Three proposals were selected for further consideration in July that year. The three companies selected were the Australian branch of EASAMS which was teamed with EASAMS and Vickers Defence Systems of the United Kingdom, Evans Deakin Industries which had partnered with the French firms SOFMA and GIAT and Goninan which was teamed with the American FMC Corporation.^[21]

The three companies were then funded by the Department of Defence to conduct further studies to "provide the Army with information upon which to base realistic vehicle requirements" and consider the extent of Australian content in the vehicles. The studies would include further consideration of whether the vehicles should be tracked or wheeled, and what engines and armament should be fitted.^[23] The companies were required to submit four designs each for infantry fighting vehicles, including tracked and wheeled vehicles.^[20][21] The Army did not set specifications for the vehicles at this stage, as it wanted to encourage the companies to propose solutions to its requirements. The Bulletin noted that this was a good example of the approach the military was taking to involving the Australian defence industry in processes to acquire new equipment.^[24] After the initial four designs were submitted by each company, the Army selected two of them and asked that they be further developed. This involved the companies providing outline designs for other variants, as well as information on the expected costs and how the vehicles could be built in Australia.^[20] At this time, it was intended that a tender for formal proposals to design and build the new vehicles would be issued as the next stage of the project.^[23]

The studies were completed in early 1983.^[13] In December 1983 the Minister for Defence, Gordon Scholes, announced that the studies conducted by the three companies had confirmed that it would be feasible to build the vehicles in Australia. It was expected that, subject to further approvals by the government, tenders for the project definition phase of the process would be advertised in August 1984.^[14][25] This phase of the project was expected to cost $25 million.^[26] By mid-1984 the date for the project definition phase had been pushed back, and it was now scheduled to take place between 1986 and 1988. Two firms were to be selected to undertake this work via a tender. It was intended that the project definition phase would result in a single lead contractor being selected, with this firm then conducting further development work between 1989 and 1995. Production of the vehicles was to begin during the 1996–1997 financial year.^[27]

Other work related to Project Waler was conducted separately from the feasibility studies. The Department of Defence Support assisted the Australian defence industry to establish the capacities needed to produce the advanced optical instruments that the new armoured vehicles would require.^[28] The Department of Defence's Material Research Laboratories also conducted background metallurgical research relating to vehicle armour that was to be applied to the new AFVs.^[29] A terrain analysis study of North Western Australia was undertaken using geographic information system software to identify the most important environmental factors to consider when designing the vehicles.^[30]

Cancellation[]

The Department of Defence recommended to the government in May 1985 that Project Waler be deferred by five years. This was based on an assessment by the Department that the Army's plans to obtain a large number of armoured vehicles were ill-founded. The Sydney Morning Herald reported that Minister for Defence Kim Beazley shared this view, based on a belief that the Army needed to become more mobile. The newspaper also reported that a five year deferral was likely to lead to the project being cancelled.^[26] The Sydney Morning Herald reported that manufacturing the Project Waler vehicles in Australia was expected to cost $800 million^[31] and The Age stated that the project as a whole could cost up to $1 billion.^[32] The vehicles would be more expensive than comparable designs produced overseas as Australian industry would not be able to achieve economies of scale due to the relatively small number to be procured.^[33]

The government decided to cancel Project Waler on 24 July 1985, and directed the Army to prepare new plans for recapitalising its fleet of transport vehicles that were focused on increasing its mobility rather than armoured protection or firepower. The Army was also told to develop options to upgrade the M113s.^[31] Beazley stated that while the designs under consideration for Project Waler were superior to the M113, they would be very costly to procure.^[34] He also noted that the cost of the project had doubled in real terms since it began.^[35] The Canberra Times reported that it had proven difficult to tailor the designs to Australian conditions, and that the government regarded them as unsuited to Australia's needs.^[34] The analyst Stanley S. Schaetzel has also suggested that the Army may have not been fully committed to the project and greatly under-estimated its cost, and was surprised by the estimates of actual costs provided in the scoping studies.^[36] Following the project's cancellation the partnerships between Australian and foreign firms which had been established to prepare proposals were dissolved.^[37]

The federal opposition criticised the decision to cancel Project Waler, which had been initiated while it was in office, arguing that the M113s were obsolete and in poor repair.^[38] During a parliamentary question time session in May 1986, Beazley claimed that the requirements which had been set for the Project Waler vehicles were unsuited to Australia's needs. He gave as examples the expected weight of the vehicles' armour preventing them from being carried by the Royal Australian Air Force's C-130 Hercules transport aircraft and the project documents requiring that they have the "capacity ... to keep going for a period of one hour after a nuclear attack on the battlefield with a loss of half its crew".^[39]

Aftermath[]

An ASLAV in 2011

In 1987 the Government decided to procure wheeled armoured fighting vehicles to replace the 2nd Cavalry Regiment's M113s as part of a project that would also see the unit transferred to Darwin, Northern Territory. Due to the regiment's armoured reconnaissance role and location, these new AFVs were to be optimised for surveillance tasks and northern Australian conditions.^[40] The Canberra Times noted that the vehicles would be similar to those considered under Project Waler.^[41] The ASLAV was selected and phased into service during 1995 and 1996.^[42] The basic vehicles were built in Canada, then shipped to Adelaide in South Australia where British Aerospace undertook final fitting out before they were issued to the Army.^[43]

Planning for the M113 upgrade project began in the early 1990s.^[2] The government approved the project in November 1993.^[44] The upgrade project was protracted, and the first upgraded M113s were accepted by the Australian Army in November 2007.^[45] Deliveries were completed in September 2012.^[46] All of the upgrade work was undertaken in Australia by the company Tenix.^[47] Some of the metallurgical research undertaken as part of Project Waler was drawn on for the upgrades to the M113s' armour.^[29] By the time the M113 upgrade project was complete, the vehicles were no longer suitable for combat. This was because they did not provide adequate protection against heavy machine guns, most forms of modern anti-tank missiles, mines and large improvised explosive devices. The shortcomings of the upgraded M113s left the Army with a significant capability gap, requiring a replacement project to be launched.^[48]

Tenders were sought for infantry fighting vehicle designs to replace the M113s in 2018, and a decision on the type to be procured is scheduled to be made in 2022.^[49][50] The Australian Government plans to acquire up to 450 of these vehicles, with the majority being built in Australia.^[51][52]

Assessments[]

Project Waler is sometimes cited as an example of the mismanagement of Australian defence procurement projects.^[53] A December 1985 editorial in The Sydney Morning Herald judged that Beazley was correct to cancel it as the Army's objectives were over ambitious and producing the vehicles in Australia rather than buying them from overseas would have led to wasteful spending.^[33] Schaetzel argued in 1986 that Project Waler was, like the Australian light destroyer project, an example of the Australian Defence Organisation initiating an over-ambitious and speculative project that ended in a "fiasco". He also stated that the failure of these projects may have discouraged firms from submitting bids for subsequent Defence procurement exercises given the costs involved in preparing proposals.^[36] In 1990 Lieutenant Colonel Gregory C. Camp, a United States Army officer who had served on exchange with the Australian Army, argued that those responsible for Project Waler "fell prey to a desire to incorporate more and more into the equipment". Camp noted that the contemporary US Army project to develop the Armored Gun System and the fast attack vehicle had experienced similar problems, with the planned vehicles becoming unaffordable as a result.^[54]

More recently, in 2011 the Australian Defence Magazine noted that Project Waler was one of several procurement exercises that failed due to "poor (and always, it seems, interminably slow) requirements development and poor project management" as well as under-performance by the Australian defence industry.^[53] Australian Strategic Policy Institute analyst Ben Coleman observed in 2018 that Project Waler "proved to be an overreach for its time; the expected financial and political costs didn’t seem commensurate with the strategic benefit".^[12]

References[]

Citations[]

Works consulted[]

• Australian National Audit Office (2005). Management of the M113 Armoured Personnel Carrier Upgrade Project (PDF). Canberra: Australian National Audit Office. ISBN 978-0-642-80860-8.
• Australian National Audit Office (2012). Upgrade of the M113 Fleet of Armoured Vehicles (PDF). Canberra: Australian National Audit Office. ISBN 978-0-642-81241-4.
• Camp, Gregory C. (January–February 1991). "The Motorization of the Australian Army" (PDF). Defence Force Journal (86): 33–42. ISSN 0314-1039.
• Cecil, Michael K. (2009). Mud & Dust: Australian Army Vehicles & Artillery in Vietnam. Chatswood, New South Wales: New Holland. ISBN 978-1-74110-767-8.
• Coleman, Ben (16 February 2018). "Project LAND 400: defining the army". Canberra: Australian Strategic Policy Institute. OCLC 1041140438. Retrieved 31 July 2021.
• Davies, Andrew (17 November 2015). "ADF capability snapshot 2015: Part 3—Army" (PDF). Canberra: Australian Strategic Policy Institute. Retrieved 10 August 2021.
• Department of Defence (1982). Defence Report 1981–82. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service. ISSN 0587-5811.
• Department of Defence (1984). Defence Report 1983–84. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service. ISSN 0587-5811.
• Department of Defence (2012). Defence Portfolio Additional Estimates Statements 2012–13 (PDF). Canberra: Department of Defence. ISBN 978-0-642-29773-0.
• Department of Defence Support (1983). Annual Report 1982–83. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service. ISSN 0810-9311.
• Department of Defence Support (1984). Annual Report 1983–84. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service. ISSN 0810-9311.
• Foss, Christopher F., ed. (1985). Jane's Armour and Artillery 1985-86. London: Jane's Publishing Company. ISBN 978-0-7106-0820-8.
• Foss, Christopher F. (1985a). Jane's Armoured Personnel Carriers. London: Jane's Publishing Company. ISBN 978-0-7106-0354-8.
• Handel, Paul (1998). Fifty Years of the Royal Australian Armoured Corps, 1948 to 1998. Puckapunyal, Victoria: Royal Australian Armoured Corps Memorial and Army Tank Museum. OCLC 222940907.
• Houston, Bill; Handel, Paul (9 April 2015). "Half a Century's Service" (PDF). Army. Department of Defence. ISSN 0729-5685. Retrieved 1 August 2021.
• Jennings, Peter (October 1987). "New Zealand Defence Policy Under Labour" (PDF). Sub-thesis. Australian National University.
• Perrett, P.; Lyons, K.J.; Moss, O.F. (1989). "Military Geographic Information". In Ball, Desmond; Babbage, Ross (eds.). Geographic Information Systems: Defence Applications. Rushcutters Bay, Australia: Brassey's Australia. ISBN 978-0-08-034444-7.
• Schaetzel, Stanley S. (1986). Local Development of Defence Hardware in Australia. The Strategic and Defence Studies Centre Working Paper No. 100. Canberra: Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian National University. ISBN 0-86784-845-6.

Further reading[]

• Schaetzel, Stanley S. (1989). Fourteen Steps to Decision, or, the Operations of the Defence Department. Canberra: Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian National University. ISBN 978-0-7315-0830-3.