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Gun truck
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A gun truck is an improvised military armoured vehicle, based on a conventional cargo truck that is able to carry a large weight of weapons and armour. They have poor off-road performance so have mainly been used by regular armies to escort military convoys in regions subject to ambush by guerrilla forces.
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During the Vietnam war, United States Army supply convoys from coastal ports to inland locations came under increasingly effective attack by NLF forces. As a response, the Army's 8th Transportation Group, headquartered at Qui Nhon fitted two and a half-ton trucks with sand bags and pairs of M60 machine guns to act as convoy escorts. The crew consisted of a driver, two gunners and a non-commissioned officer.
The two and a half-ton trucks soon proved inadequate and were replaced with five-ton trucks. Steel plate replaced sand bags and the trucks were equipped with heavier weapons such as .50 caliber machine guns, miniguns and grenade launchers in addition to M60 machine guns. As these heavy weapons were not issued to transportation units, they were often salvaged from shot-down helicopters.
The improvised nature of the trucks meant they varied considerably in appearance. They were given colourful nicknames such as "The Untouchable," "Satisfaction," "Iron Butterfly" or "Pandemonium" that were often painted on the sides in large letters. An estimated 300 to 400 gun trucks were deployed during the war.
With the end of the Vietnam war, the need for such vehicles disappeared and most were either scrapped or returned to cargo carrying. One truck, "Eve of Destruction," has been restored and is on display at the Army Transportation Museum at Fort Eustis, Virginia.
The conditions of the Iraq War have led to the re-invention of the gun truck. M939 Trucks were initially equipped with improvised 'Hillbilly armor'. These have since been replaced with trucks equipped with purpose-designed armour kits.
They have seen less use than in Vietnam. A possible reason is that roadside bombs are the major threat to road convoys of Iraq Coalition forces, not small-arms ambushes by the local guerillas as was the case in Vietnam.