The General Dynamics Griffin is a series of

armored fighting vehicle An armoured fighting vehicle (AFV) is an armed combat vehicle protected by armour, generally combining operational mobility with offensive and defensive capabilities. AFVs can be wheeled or tracked. Examples of AFVs are tanks, armoured c ...

s under development by General Dynamics Land Systems (GDLS) for the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...

. The Griffin is a derivative of

ASCOD The ASCOD (Austrian Spanish Cooperation Development) armoured fighting vehicle family is the product of a cooperation agreement between Austrian Steyr-Daimler-Puch AG and Spanish General Dynamics Santa Bárbara Sistemas ( both companies are now ...

family of AFVs, which was also designed by GDLS.

Platform

Griffin - Technology Demonstrator (TD)

At AUSA 2016 annual meeting, General Dynamics unveiled 120mm Griffin Technology Demonstrator (TD) as a "conversation starter" for the US Army Mobile Protected Firepower (MPF) program. MPF is a light tracked vehicle intended to provide support of large caliber direct fire for Infantry Brigade Combat Team. The chassis of Griffin I shown at AUSA is from British Scout SV program (now called Ajax), but it only has six road wheels. The welded aluminum turret is armed with 120mm XM360 lightweight gun which was developed by the Army Research, Development and Engineering Center. The XM360 gun was developed as part of the canceled

Future Combat Systems Future Combat Systems (FCS) was the United States Army's principal modernization program from 2003 to early 2009. Formally launched in 2003, FCS was envisioned to create new brigades equipped with new manned and unmanned vehicles linked by an unp ...

(FCS) program.

Griffin II

Griffin II is offered under Army's Mobile Protected Firepower (MPF). In accordance with the program's caliber requirements, it incorporated a

105mm caliber 105 mm (4.1 in) is a common NATO-standard artillery and tank gun caliber. The rifled tank round is defined by STANAG 4458. The artillery round is defined by AOP-29 part 3 with reference to STANAG 4425. Artillery Since the early 21st century, mos ...

M35 gun and a redesigned chassis. The M35 was originally designed and developed by Benét Laboratories,

Watervliet Arsenal The Watervliet Arsenal is an arsenal of the United States Army located in Watervliet, New York, on the west bank of the Hudson River. It is the oldest continuously active arsenal in the United States, and today produces much of the artillery for ...

in 1983 for the Marine Corps' Mobile Protected Gun Program. It was later incorporated in the Army's M8 Armored Gun System light tank, which was canceled in 1996. The M35 is about lighter than the M68 used on the M60 tank. In December 2018, GDLS was downselected, along with BAE Systems, to develop prototypes. GDLS presented its first prototype in April 2020. BAE's M8 AGS proposal was disqualified in March 2022. In June 2022, GDLS won Mobile Protected Firepower program competition and was awarded a contract worth up to $1.14 billion.

Griffin III

Griffin III was first unveiled at the

Association of the United States Army The Association of the United States Army (AUSA) is a private, non-profit organization that serves as the professional association of the United States Army. Founded in 1950, it has 121 chapters worldwide. Membership is open to everyone, not ju ...

's 2018 Exposition in

Huntsville, Alabama Huntsville is a city in Madison County, Limestone County, and Morgan County, Alabama, United States. It is the county seat of Madison County. Located in the Appalachian region of northern Alabama, Huntsville is the most populous city in th ...

. It was being offered under Army's

Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle The Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle (OMFV) is a U.S. Army program to replace the M2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicle. OMFV is one part of the Next Generation Combat Vehicle portfolio of programs. After the cancelation of the Ground Combat Ve ...

(OMFV) program with six fully equipped infantry carrying option in the back. This version, while similar in weight to Griffin II, scaled down the main gun from 105mm caliber to the 50 mm XM913 gun system. It is equipped with the IMI Systems’

Iron Fist Iron Fist, Iron fist or Ironfist may refer to: Military * Iron Fist (exercise), an Indian Air Force exercise held in 2013 and 2016 * Iron Fist (countermeasure), an Israeli counter-weapon system * 20th Armoured Brigade (United Kingdom) or The Iron ...

Active Protection System An active protection system is a system designed to actively prevent certain anti-tank weapons from destroying a vehicle. Countermeasures that either conceal the vehicle from, or disrupt the guidance of an incoming guided missile threat are desig ...

(APS) and AeroVironment’s

Switchblade A switchblade (aka switch knife, automatic knife, pushbutton knife, ejector knife, flick knife, Stiletto, flick blade, or spring knife (Sprenger,Benson, Ragnar (1989). ''Switchblade: The Ace of Blades''. Paladin Press. pp. 1–14. . The sw ...

loitering munition A loitering munition (also known as a suicide droneLoitering Muniti ...

system.

References

{{Authority control Experimental military vehicles General Dynamics land vehicles Tracked armoured fighting vehicles Tracked infantry fighting vehicles Light tanks of the United States

Platform

Griffin - Technology Demonstrator (TD)

Griffin II

Griffin III

See also

References