New vehicles approved for New Zealand's special operations forces

The special operations forces of the New Zealand military are to get a fleet of new vehicles, Defence Minister Gerry Brownlee said Tuesday.

The government was spending 28 million NZ dollars (20.48 million U.S. dollars) on new high mobility specialist vehicles for the Special Air Service (SAS) Regiment to replace its old Pinzgauer fleet, Brownlee said in a statement.

The Pinzgauer fleet would be replaced with four different types of vehicles to ensure the special forces could continue to meet all their operational requirements.

The Pinzgauer vehicles entered service in 2005, and since then had seen extensive and arduous service.

"This experience, combined with the demands of contemporary missions and equipment, has led to the need to replace the Pinzgauers with a range of more modern vehicles that keep our elite special operations forces at the leading edge," Brownlee said.

The first new vehicle type to be acquired was the Supacat Extenda high mobility vehicle, which would be provided by Supacat Australia in the final quarter of 2017.

For operational security reasons, the number of vehicles in the SAS fleet was not revealed.

The government's Defence White Paper published in June noted the SAS needed to be trained and equipped to deploy across a range of operations, from long-range reconnaissance to domestic counter-terrorism and explosive ordinance disposal.

"Work continues on identifying a number of other vehicles suitable for a range of possible operations for the SAS as part of this project," Brownlee said.

The White Paper outlined an overhaul for the military valued at 20 billion NZ dollars (14.61 billion U.S. dollars) over the next 15 years, including plans to replace or enhance major capabilities such as the navy's two ANZAC frigates and strategic and tactical airlift capability. Endit