The current mission of the U.S. Army requires the rapid worldwide deployment of troops to scenarios of critical interest to the United States within short notice. Currently, the only troops that can meet this deployment criteria are categorized as light and special operations forces. These forces do not have Armor or Armored Cavalry support because current U.S. Army Armor systems are not transportable within the deployment criteria, neither strategically nor tactically. Armor support traditionally provides combat endurance as well as increased mobility, lethal firepower, and shock effect to the enemy in a manner not attainable by dismounted troops alone. Therefore, the light forces of the U.S. Army are missing a key ingredient to land combat success and have a requirement for a system to provide this capability.

A Light Armored Assault Vehicle (L~V) would meet this requirement. The objective of this project and report is to conduct a feasibility analysis and to establish a preliminary system baseline for a LAAV. The LAAV is designed through the system engineering process to have the necessary operational characteristics and transportability to provide the missing key combat capability. The LAAV would use current, low development risk technologies.

This project and report presents a preliminary system baseline that investigates the performance trade-offs, schedule, potential cost, and recommended configuration for the LAAV system.