Tiny, lightweight, underpowered and ancient, the Canadian Iltis jeep is unlike other modern small military vehicles -- it offers no protection against mines or anything else in a combat zone.
"If there is a danger of mines -- and everywhere in Afghanistan has a mine danger -- it is not an appropriate vehicle," one retired Canadian general with long experience in war zones said yesterday. But for the Canadian military, he said, there is simply no option. Starved of new equipment for decades, it simply doesn't have the right vehicles.
Long past its replacement date, the Iltis remains ubiquitous on Canadian military deployments overseas because the contract for its replacement -- a heavier, safer, more powerful successor -- has been repeatedly delayed.
All modern armies need small, relatively lightweight vehicles, but the Iltis is smaller, lighter and offers less protection than anything used by the American, French or British militaries.
For instance, the U.S. Army and Marine Corps use the HMMWV, known as the Humvee. By comparison to an Iltis, it is massive. Even the unarmoured, canvas-sided version weighs nearly twice as much, is more than twice as long.
Frustrated by its tiny size and lack of power, Canadian soldiers routinely make field modifications to the Iltis, including tearing out a seat to make way for radio equipment.
Nominally capable of carrying five people, the reality is that an Iltis can barely carry two soldiers and their gear.
While no small military vehicles are designed to protect their occupants against large antitank mines -- which are designed to cripple hulking 60-tonne tanks by tearing off a tread -- HMMWVs have proved unexpectedly capable of surviving encounters with antitank mines in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Although American soldiers have sometimes suffered serious injuries, few have been killed and often the occupants have escaped unscratched even after an antitank mine has blown away a front wheel and a large part of the Humvee chassis.
Ordinary Canadian soldiers -- long aware of the vulnerability of Iltis jeeps -- often resorted to unorthodox measures to add a little protection. In Bosnia, soldiers would often sit on a flak jacket in the hopes of providing a modicum of protection from mines, which posed -- and still pose -- a serious threat.
(In Bosnia, the Defence Department bought armoured Land Rovers for Canadian battalion commanders because driving around in an unprotected Iltis was considered too dangerous.)
Even when the vehicle was new, in the mid-1980s, the Canadian Iltis was widely regarded as out of date.
The German version went out of production in 1982 and Volkswagen sold the worldwide rights to Bombardier, Inc.
During its deployment in 2000 to Afghanistan, the 3rd Battalion of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry borrowed Humvees from their U.S. army allies and found them far superior to the Iltis.
Not surprisingly, ordinary Canadian soldiers hoped that Humvees, or its export derivatives, would be the army's choice for a replacement jeep. The Humvee is not produced in Canada and its maker, General Motors, opted to offer the Canadian army a light tactical vehicle developed and produced with a Swiss partner. Land Rover offered a Defender version of its jeep, used by elite British and U.S. forces, and Mercedes with its G-wagen also initially submitted Iltis replacement proposals.
To save money, the Defence Department divided the Iltis replacement program into two chunks. Last year Ottawa announced a $49-million contract to buy 861 beefed-up Silverados, essentially GM heavy-duty pickups. They will never be sent on operational deployments, the Defence Minister said.
Little and large
Comparing the Canadian iltis jeep with the U.S. Army HMMWV (also known as the Humvee):
ILTIS
Weight: 1,550 kg
Top Speed: 130 km/h
Engine: 74 hp., 4 cyl., gasoline
HMMWV
Weight: 2,358 kg
Top Speed: 120 km/h
Engine: 150 hp., 8 cyl., diesel
SOURCES: WWW.ILTIS.CA/WWW.FAS.ORG/WWW.ARMY.DND.CA/WWW.ARMY.MIL