{"id":1061149,"date":"2026-07-01T05:28:16","date_gmt":"2026-07-01T05:28:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1061149\/"},"modified":"2026-07-01T05:28:16","modified_gmt":"2026-07-01T05:28:16","slug":"ukraine-refuses-irish-offer-of-armoured-combat-vehicles-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1061149\/","title":{"rendered":"Ukraine refuses Irish offer of armoured combat vehicles \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Ukrainian<\/a> government has rejected a donation from Ireland of a fleet of armoured combat vehicles to aid in the fight against Russia<\/a>, The Irish Times has learned.<\/p>\n

The Irish Government recently offered all of the Defence Forces\u2019<\/a> 27 light tactical armoured vehicles (LTAVs), which were first acquired 17 years ago but rarely used.<\/p>\n

The vehicles, which were made by a South African company, had a poor reputation and frequently broke down<\/a>.<\/p>\n

They were eventually withdrawn from operations in 2024 and put into storage.<\/p>\n

Earlier this year, the Irish Government asked Ukraine if it would like to take possession of the 27 vehicles as part of an international military aid programme to assist Kyiv in repelling the Russian invasion that began in February 2022.<\/p>\n

Ireland frequently donates military equipment to the armed forces of Ukraine while Irish soldiers also provide training to Ukranian troops under an EU programme.<\/p>\n

Under the Government\u2019s policy of military neutrality, both the training and equipment is designed to be \u201cnon-lethal\u201d in nature. Previous equipment donations have included unarmed military transport vehicles, demining vehicles and body armour.<\/p>\n

Military training has concentrated on demining, medical care and combat engineering.<\/p>\n

The proposed donation of the LTAV fleet appears to push up against Government policy. The vehicles are typically equipped with remote weapons stations on the roof as standard, which are usually mounted with machine guns or grenade launchers.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Ireland retains out-of-date air navigation systems in response to Russian jammingOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Last month, during a meeting of the Defence Forces\u2019 general staff, officers were informed that Ukraine had rejected the Irish offer and that the LTAVs could finally be removed from military stores and scrapped, a process known as \u201cboarding\u201d.<\/p>\n

In response to queries, a Department of Defence spokesman confirmed the move. \u201cThe Ministry of Defence of Ukraine expressed its sincere gratitude to Ireland for the offer, as well as for Ireland\u2019s continued support for Ukraine. <\/p>\n

\u201cHowever, it ultimately declined the offer on the basis that this type of vehicle is not currently in service with the Armed Forces of Ukraine and would therefore require separate training, maintenance and spare parts support.\u201d <\/p>\n

Asked about the apparent contradiction with Government policy on only donating non-lethal equipment, the department said \u201cany such offer would have been consistent with the Government\u2019s policy of providing non-lethal support to Ukraine\u201d.<\/p>\n

The LTAVs, also known as RG32M Outriders, were purchased in 2009 from the now defunct BAE Systems Land Systems South Africa for just under \u20ac20 million, or \u20ac726,000 each. They outperformed similar vehicles from Switzerland and Italy in Irish field tests.<\/p>\n

They were designed to serve as an intermediary option for situations judged too dangerous for soft-skinned vehicles but not necessitating an armoured personnel carrier (APC).<\/p>\n

Problems with the vehicles were evident from the start. Users reported reliability and maintenance issues including electrical connections not matching up and driveshafts shearing off.<\/p>\n

Reliability issues meant officers frequently refused to deploy them on patrols in Lebanon and other potentially dangerous areas. One military source said an LTAV deployed to Unifil<\/a> in Lebanon remained consigned to base for an uninterrupted 18-month period.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0French air defence ship operates off Dublin Bay ahead of EU presidencyOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Mileage figures previously provided to The Irish Times under Freedom of Information legislation show the vehicles recorded low mileage during their 15-year lifetime. One vehicle drove an annual average of 540km, the rough equivalent of one full fuel tank a year.<\/p>\n

A programme to replace the entire Defence Forces\u2019 armoured fleet, including the LTAVs, with modern French-made vehicles was agreed earlier this year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Ukrainian government has rejected a donation from Ireland of a fleet of armoured combat vehicles to aid…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1061150,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[7654],"tags":[41229,2000,299,657,9041],"class_list":["post-1061149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ukraine","tag-defence-forces","tag-eu","tag-europe","tag-ukraine","tag-ukraine-crisis"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116843073163870167","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1061149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1061149"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1061149\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1061150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1061149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1061149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1061149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}