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Even since Gen. Shinseki began pushing wheeled armored vehicles in the 1990s, the USA has shifted away from tracked carriers - and a number of European countries are moving toward all-wheeled forces. Canada was on that road, too - but it would seem that they are taking some of the lessons re-learned during Operation Medusa in Afghanistan to heart. Canada's DND:
"The heavily protected direct fire capability of a main battle tank is an invaluable tool in the arsenal of any military. The intensity of recent conflicts in Central Asia and the Middle East has shown western militaries that tanks provide protection that cannot be matched by more lightly armoured wheeled vehicles.... [Canada's existing Leopard C2/1A5] tanks have also provided the Canadian Forces (CF) with the capability to travel to locations that would otherwise be inaccessible to wheeled light armoured vehicles, including Taliban defensive positions."
In October 2003, Canada was set to buy the Styker/LAV-III 105mm Mobile Gun system to replace its Leopard C2 tanks. In the end, however, the lessons of war have taken Canada down a very different path - one that now has them renewing the very tank fleet they were once intent on scrapping, and backing away from the wheeled vehicles that were once the cornerstone of the Canadian Army transformation plan.
And so it goes... Read the rest at Defense Industry Daily.