Kunduz or AZMİM (short for ) is a Turkish tracked amphibious

combat engineering A combat engineer (also called pioneer or sapper) is a type of soldier who performs military engineering tasks in support of land forces combat operations. Combat engineers perform a variety of military engineering, tunnel and mine warfare tas ...

History

The Kunduz was developed and produced in less than four-years work for the

Turkish Armed Forces The Turkish Armed Forces (TAF; , TSK) are the armed forces, military forces of the Turkey, Republic of Turkey. The TAF consist of the Turkish Army, Land Forces, the Turkish Navy, Naval Forces and the Turkish Air Force, Air Forces. The Chief of ...

(TSK) by the Turkish company

FNSS Defence Systems FNSS Savunma Sistemleri A.Ş. () is a Turkish defense manufacturer founded in 1988. It is owned 51% by Nurol Holding of Turkey and 49% by British–American firm BAE Systems Inc., and operates facilities located in Gölbaşı, Ankara. FNSS was ...

. The prototype was delivered to the TSK on January 11, 2013 in

Ankara Ankara is the capital city of Turkey and List of national capitals by area, the largest capital by area in the world. Located in the Central Anatolia Region, central part of Anatolia, the city has a population of 5,290,822 in its urban center ( ...

. AZMİM will be operated to move earth, clear terrain obstacles, cut steep slopes and stabilize stream banks for easy river crossing of combat vehicles during

Turkish Army The Turkish Land Forces () is the main branch of the Turkish Armed Forces responsible for Army, land-based military operations. The army was formed on November 8, 1920, after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. Significant campaigns since the ...

amphibious warfare Amphibious warfare is a type of offensive military operation that today uses naval ships to project ground and air power onto a hostile or potentially hostile shore at a designated landing beach. Through history the operations were conduc ...

. The contract to develop the armoured amphibious bulldozer was signed on March 10, 2009 between the Ministry of National Defence and the FNSS. The project, which began to develop on June 15, 2009, foresees the production of twelve units until the end of 2013. The first was delivered on January 11, 2013.

Specifications

AZMİM has two crew, one operator and one attendant. It is capable of shoveling, smoothing, hauling and excavating. Tests showed that it is resistant to

land mine A land mine, or landmine, is an explosive weapon often concealed under or camouflaged on the ground, and designed to destroy or disable enemy targets as they pass over or near it. Land mines are divided into two types: anti-tank mines, wh ...

s and

armour-piercing shot and shell Armour-piercing ammunition (AP) is a type of projectile designed to penetrate armour protection, most often including naval armour, body armour, and vehicle armour. The first, major application of armour-piercing projectiles was to defeat the t ...

. AZMİM is equipped with daylight camera system,

night vision device A night-vision device (NVD), also known as a night optical/observation device (NOD) or night-vision goggle (NVG), is an optoelectronic device that allows visualization of images in low levels of light, improving the user's night vision. The ...

, multi-purpose

LED display A LED display is a flat panel display that uses an array of light-emitting diodes (LEDs) as pixels for a video display. Their brightness allows them to be used outdoors where they are visible in the sun for store signs and billboards. I ...

and air conditioner. The tracked vehicle can accompany other military combat vehicles without the need of a carrier thanks to its max. speed of . Two installed

pump-jet A pump-jet, hydrojet, or water jet is a marine system that produces a jet of water for propulsion. The mechanical arrangement may be a ducted propeller (axial-flow pump), a centrifugal pump, or a mixed flow pump which is a combination of bot ...

s enable the amphibious bulldozer to conduct a 360 degrees turning movement in rip current waters.

Operators

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References

Bulldozers Amphibious military vehicles Military engineering vehicles Tracked armoured fighting vehicles Armoured fighting vehicles of Turkey Post–Cold War military equipment of Turkey Military vehicles of Turkey

Kunduz Kunduz (; ; ) is a city in northern Afghanistan and the capital of Kunduz Province. The city has an estimated population of about 268,893 as of 2015, making it about the List of cities in Afghanistan, seventh largest city of Afghanistan, and the ...

Military vehicles introduced in the 2010s {{Turkey-mil-stub