Fightiest wheeled APCs?

[Come-quickly]

Just out of curiousity given the current propensity for next generation "Infantry fighting vehicles" to be wheeled fabtrapulations i.e. VBCI, Freccia, how far had anyone pushed this with current generation wheeled APCs?

E.g. LAVIIIC/H or Patra XA-200s designated and roled as Fighting vehicles rather than buses or recce platforms?

I do have one semi-relevant anecdote of an Australian officer talking about how the commander of his ASLAV equipped Cavalry/Reconnaissance unit kept wanting to fire and manoeuvre up and fight through targets instead of just quietly dropping off his dismounts over a ridge; but I'm more interested in armies having officially roled their wheeled armour for close support of infantry and perhaps equipped/modified to fit that profile.

[Aidan]

Are we talking wheeled APCs or dedicated fighting platforms?

There's a quite a difference between something like a Rooikat, Centauro or AMX-10RC and a the current crop of upgunned, up armoured APCs a la Boxer/VBCI/Freccia/Piranha IV (though much less than between previous generations of APC).

[Come-quickly]

Rooikat, Centauro and AMX10RC aren't APCs although Centauro is the basis for one.

I'm specifically looking for the proverbial square peg of current operational wapcs being used in the fashion that the people calling VBCI an IFV seemingly intend.

[Aidan]

Cool. There are really two questions there then, one being how far are people pushing the platform, the other being doctrine and use thereof.

Plenty of countries have bought current gen APCs with with what would have previously been considered IFV turrets (including Ireland), and many of those have put current generation anti-tank missiles on them too (Javelin/Spike etc). The Belgians (as previously discussed) and a couple of middle eastern countries aside, very few have put any large calibre guns on them.

Use is a different question though, and not going to be as well recorded for obvious reasons. To the uneducated eye (mine) it looks like the usage is pretty similar across Western Countries - the French, Canadians and Australians all have kind of the same mission profile - long distance recce, patrolling and high speed offensive moves. The USMC may have a different recent experience in iraq maybe?

[Come-quickly]

Another example springs to mind in the form of the Canadian LAV25s giving close fire support in Afghan, although I think that was more down to there being nothing else to rely on prior to the Leopard's arrival.

[DeV]

What you seem to be asking about is how are wheeled vehicles carrying dismounts and armed with something like a 20-35mm cannon employed?!

Are they employed like an APC? Ie stop well short of enemy posn, let troops dismount and stay in cover/withdraw

Are they employed like an IFV? Ie assault onto enemy posn, dismount on enemy posn and give fire support from there

[Come-quickly]

Thank you for restating part of my question in a more unwieldy fashion...it really added a lot to proceedings

[DeV]

Or does anyone employ their wheeled APCs (armed with medium calibre weapons) like IFVs?

[PK Krukov]

The CF does - when the transition was made to M113 the justification was that we were losing two men to a vehicle but could go much faster and further, and in some circumstances the M2HB on the track would be useful, but it was an APC and used as such. The Grizzly, Bison and other AFVs that carried infantry were wheeled M113 substitutes despite having turrets (Grizzly) and the like.

When LAV-III was adopted the idea was that the greater firepower would be wasted if the vehicle was employed in an APC role and so it became a quasi-IFV; as far as I know the doctrine doesn't say it's an IFV, it just gets used that way. I've heard multiple stories of mechanized infantry assaults on prepared positions using the LAV-III in a very IFV-y way.

[Come-quickly]

These two articles give some insight I think

https://www.casr.ca/bg-army-close-combat-vehicle.htm

https://www.army-technology.com/news/newscanada-receives-first-upgraded-lav-iii-vehicle