General Dynamics Land Systems (GDLS) is a manufacturer of military vehicles such as

tank A tank is an armoured fighting vehicle intended as a primary offensive weapon in front-line ground combat. Tank designs are a balance of heavy firepower, strong armour, and good battlefield mobility provided by tracks and a powerful engin ...

s and lighter

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 cars, ...

History

In February 1982

Chrysler Stellantis North America (officially FCA US and formerly Chrysler ()) is one of the " Big Three" automobile manufacturers in the United States, headquartered in Auburn Hills, Michigan. It is the American subsidiary of the multinational automoti ...

announced the sale of Chrysler Defense, its profitable defense subsidiary, to

General Dynamics General Dynamics Corporation (GD) is an American publicly traded, aerospace and defense corporation headquartered in Reston, Virginia. As of 2020, it was the fifth-largest defense contractor in the world by arms sales, and 5th largest in the Uni ...

for US$348.5 million. The sale was completed in March 1982 for the revised figure of US$336.1 million. Renamed General Dynamics Land Systems, the division operates the

Lima Army Tank Plant The Joint Systems Manufacturing Center, also known as the Lima Army Tank Plant (LATP) is a tank plant located in Lima, Ohio. It is a government-owned, contractor-operated facility currently operated by General Dynamics Land Systems. Workers at the ...

and General Dynamics Anniston Operations in

Anniston, Alabama Anniston is the county seat of Calhoun County in Alabama and is one of two urban centers/principal cities of and included in the Anniston-Oxford Metropolitan Statistical Area. As of the 2010 census, the population of the city was 23,106. Acco ...

, along with smaller operations in

Tallahassee Tallahassee ( ) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat and only incorporated municipality in Leon County. Tallahassee became the capital of Florida, then the Florida Territory, in 1824. In 2020, the population ...

and

Scranton, Pennsylvania Scranton is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, Lackawanna County. With a population of 76,328 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 U ...

. Headquarters are located in

Sterling Heights, Michigan Sterling Heights is a city in Macomb County of the U.S. state of Michigan, and one of Detroit's core suburbs. As of the 2020 Census, the city had a total population of 134,346. It is the second largest suburb in Metro Detroit, and the fourth la ...

. As of 2016, General Dynamics Land Systems employed 6,800 people.New Products, New Customers - Macomb County
/ref> In 2003 it acquired Steyr-Daimler-Puch Spezialfahrzeug GmbH (SSF), the land defense vehicles unit of

Steyr-Daimler-Puch Steyr-Daimler-Puch () was a large manufacturing conglomerate based in Steyr, Austria, which was broken up in stages between 1987 and 2001. The component parts and operations continued to exist under separate ownership and new names. History T ...

and General Dynamics Land Systems – Canada (GDLS-C), a subsidiary of General Dynamics based in

London, Ontario London (pronounced ) is a city in southwestern Ontario, Canada, along the Quebec City–Windsor Corridor. The city had a population of 422,324 according to the 2021 Canadian census. London is at the confluence of the Thames River, approximate ...

, purchased

GM Defense GM Defense is the military product subsidiary of General Motors headquartered in Concord, North Carolina; focusing on the defense industry needs with hydrogen fuel cell and other advanced mobility technologies. GM Defense projects include SURUS (S ...

from

General Motors The General Motors Company (GM) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automotive manufacturing company headquartered in Detroit, Michigan, United States. It is the largest automaker in the United States and ...

. It supplies such armored vehicles as the

LAV-25 The LAV-25 is a member of the LAV II family. It is an eight-wheeled amphibious armored reconnaissance vehicle built by General Dynamics Land Systems and used by the United States Marine Corps and the United States Army. History During the 1980s, ...

, the

Stryker The Stryker is a family of eight-wheeled armored fighting vehicles derived from the Canadian LAV III. Stryker vehicles are produced by General Dynamics Land Systems-Canada (GDLS-C) for the United States Army in a plant in London, Ontario. It ...

, and other models based on these chassis. SSF merged into the General Dynamics European Land Systems unit. After the division secured a fourteen-year, $15-billion deal to supply light armoured vehicles to

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the second-largest in the A ...

Unifor Unifor is a general trade union in Canada and the largest private sector union in Canada. It was founded in 2013 as a merger of the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) and Communications, Energy and Paperworkers unions, and consists of 310,000 workers an ...

representatives expressed concern that the London plant would suffer financially due to negative publicity surrounding the deal and that union members employed at the plant would lose their jobs. Both

Bloc Québécois The Bloc Québécois (BQ; , "Québécois people, Quebecer Voting bloc, Bloc") is a list of federal political parties in Canada, federal political party in Canada devoted to Quebec nationalism and the promotion of Quebec sovereignty movement, Que ...

Leader

Gilles Duceppe Gilles Duceppe (; born July 22, 1947) is a Canadian retired politician, proponent of the Quebec sovereignty movement and former leader of the Bloc Québécois. He was a Member of Parliament in the House of Commons of Canada for over 20 years and ...

and

New Democrat New Democrats, also known as centrist Democrats, Clinton Democrats, or moderate Democrats, are a centrist ideological faction within the Democratic Party in the United States. As the Third Way faction of the party, they are seen as culturall ...

Thomas Mulcair Thomas may refer to: People * List of people with given name Thomas * Thomas (name) * Thomas (surname) * Saint Thomas (disambiguation) * Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) Italian Dominican friar, philosopher, and Doctor of the Church * Thomas the Ap ...

challenged Prime Minister

Stephen Harper Stephen Joseph Harper (born April 30, 1959) is a Canadian politician who served as the 22nd prime minister of Canada from 2006 to 2015. Harper is the first and only prime minister to come from the modern-day Conservative Party of Canada, ...

on the secrecy surrounding military sales to Saudi Arabia, while David Perry, senior analyst with the

Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute The Canadian Global Affairs Institute (Global Affairs) is an independent, non-partisan research institute based in Calgary with offices in Ottawa. Incorporated as a charitable organization in 2000, the institute pursues new ideas to focus the nat ...

, argued that secrecy in trade details is part of a pragmatic foreign

trade policy A commercial policy (also referred to as a trade policy or international trade policy) is a government's policy governing international trade. Commercial policy is an all encompassing term that is used to cover topics which involve international t ...

necessary for a domestic industry in a global market.

Vehicles

M1 Abrams The M1 Abrams is a third-generation American main battle tank designed by Chrysler Defense (now General Dynamics Land Systems) and named for General Creighton Abrams. Conceived for modern armored ground warfare and now one of the heaviest ta ...

, the American

main battle tank A main battle tank (MBT), also known as a battle tank or universal tank, is a tank that fills the role of armor-protected direct fire and maneuver in many modern armies. Cold War-era development of more powerful engines, better suspension sys ...

K1 88-Tank The K1 is a South Korean main battle tank designed by Chrysler Defense (later General Dynamics Land Systems) and Hyundai Precision Industry (later Hyundai Rotem) for the Republic of Korea Armed Forces. The vehicle's design was based on Chrysle ...

, the South Korean

Light Armoured Vehicle A military armored (or armoured) car is a lightweight wheeled armored fighting vehicle, historically employed for reconnaissance, internal security, armed escort, and other subordinate battlefield tasks. With the gradual decline of mounted c ...

, a family of

infantry fighting vehicle An infantry fighting vehicle (IFV), also known as a mechanized infantry combat vehicle (MICV), is a type of armoured fighting vehicle used to carry infantry into battle and provide direct-fire support. The 1990 Treaty on Conventional Armed Forc ...

s *

, a family of eight-wheeled armored fighting vehicles derived from the Canadian LAV III *

Ajax Ajax may refer to: Greek mythology and tragedy * Ajax the Great, a Greek mythological hero, son of King Telamon and Periboea * Ajax the Lesser, a Greek mythological hero, son of Oileus, the king of Locris * ''Ajax'' (play), by the ancient Greek ...

, a family of tracked

armoured 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 car ...

s being developed for the

British Army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...

* Buffalo, a wheeled mine resistant, ambush protected (

MRAP Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP; ) is a term for United States Armed Forces, United States military light tactical vehicles produced as part of the MRAP program that are designed specifically to withstand improvised explosive device (IE ...

) armored

military vehicle A military vehicle is any vehicle for land-based military transport and activity, including combat vehicles; both specifically designed for, or significantly used by military and armed forces. Most military vehicles require off-road capabiliti ...

Cougar The cougar (''Puma concolor'') is a large Felidae, cat native to the Americas. Its Species distribution, range spans from the Canadian Yukon to the southern Andes in South America and is the most widespread of any large wild terrestrial mamm ...

, an MRAP and

infantry mobility vehicle An infantry mobility vehicle (IMV) is a wheeled armored personnel carrier (APC) serving as a military patrol, reconnaissance or security vehicle. Examples include the ATF Dingo, Iveco LMV, Oshkosh M-ATV, AMZ Dzik, AMZ Tur, Mungo ESK, and Bushma ...

structured to be resistant to

landmine A land mine is an explosive device concealed under or on the ground and designed to destroy or disable enemy targets, ranging from combatants to vehicles and tanks, as they pass over or near it. Such a device is typically detonated automati ...

s and improvised munitions * Multi-Utility Tactical Transport (MUTT), currently being trialed by the United States military *

Griffin The griffin, griffon, or gryphon (Ancient Greek: , ''gryps''; Classical Latin: ''grȳps'' or ''grȳpus''; Late Latin, Late and Medieval Latin: ''gryphes'', ''grypho'' etc.; Old French: ''griffon'') is a legendary creature with the body, tail ...

, a series of armoured fighting vehicles under development and being offered under the United States Army

Next Generation Combat Vehicle The Next Generation Combat Vehicle (NGCV) is a United States Army program intended to procure a variety of armored vehicles to add new capabilities to Army units and replace existing platforms that are nearing the end of their service life. The pro ...

program *

Mobile Protected Firepower The Mobile Protected Firepower (MPF) system is a U.S. Army program to procure a light tank that is capable of providing mobile protected direct offensive fire capability. The program is part of the Next Generation Combat Vehicle program. A previo ...

(MPF), a prototype undergoing Soldier Vehicle Assessment (SVA) * Tracked Robot 10-Ton (TRX), a robotic combat vehicle platform

References

External links

* Land Systems Defense companies of the United States Military vehicle manufacturers Motor vehicle manufacturers based in Michigan Companies based in Macomb County, Michigan Sterling Heights, Michigan American companies established in 1982 Vehicle manufacturing companies established in 1982 1982 establishments in Michigan Chrysler {{US-manufacturing-company-stub