General Dynamics Delivers First Stryker Mobile Gun System to U.S. Army
Stryker to be Centerpiece of Millennium Challenge 2002
MUSKEGON, Mich.– General Dynamics (NYSE: GD) delivered the first of eight pre-production Stryker Mobile Gun Systems to the U.S. Army today. It is part of a $4 billion order awarded in November 2000 to GM GDLS Defense Group to equip the new Brigade Combat Teams with 2,131 Stryker armored vehicles. GM GDLS is a joint venture between General Motors and General Dynamics Land Systems.
Stryker is a family of eight-wheel drive combat vehicles easily transported in a C-130 cargo plane. The Army has deployed 13 Stryker vehicles as part of its forced entry package for Millennium Challenge 2002, the Joint Forces Command field experiment and demonstration, which runs from July 24-August 15. The Strykers were deployed from C-130 and C-17 aircraft during the exercise.
“We will be doing an airborne operation followed immediately by the assault landing of the Stryker vehicles,” said Gen. William Kernan, chief of U.S. Joint Forces Command at a July 18 briefing. “And they will subsequently be looking at repositioning those from intra-theater [C-130] airlift to rapidly take advantage of an opportunity that we create.”
Traveling at speeds of 62 mph on highways, Stryker has a range of 312 miles. In the Mobile Gun System configuration, it carries a General Dynamics 105mm tank cannon in a low-profile, fully stabilized, “shoot on the move” turret. Its armor protects the three-soldier crew from machine gun bullets, mortar and artillery fragments on the battlefield. The Stryker Mobile Gun System can fire 18 rounds of 105-mm main gun ammunition; 400 rounds of .50 caliber ammunition; and 3,400 rounds of 7.62-mm ammunition. It operates with the latest C4ISR equipment as well as detectors for nuclear, biological and chemical weapons.
Other Stryker configurations include the nuclear, chemical and biological reconnaissance vehicle; anti-tank guided missile, and medical evacuation vehicles; and carriers for mortars, engineer squads, infantry squads, command groups, and fire support teams. General Dynamics and General Motors share fabrication and final assembly of the vehicles among plants at Anniston, Alabama; Lima, Ohio; and London, Ontario. Deliveries of Stryker infantry carriers began from General Motors London, Ontario, plant in March and General Dynamics Anniston, Alabama, facility in April. The U.S. Army has accepted 106 Strykers to date.
The pre-production Stryker Mobile Gun Systems are being assembled in the General Dynamics Muskegon technology center through December, using $62 million in research and development funds of the $4 billion contact. Production of an additional 72 mobile gun variants begins in 2003 at General Dynamics Anniston, Alabama, facility.
General Dynamics, headquartered in Falls Church, Virginia, employs approximately 54,000 people worldwide and anticipates 2002 revenues of $14 billion. The company has leading market positions in land and amphibious combat systems, mission-critical information systems and technologies, shipbuilding and marine systems, and business aviation.
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Any "forward-looking statements" contained in this press release are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995.
General Dynamics Corporation (ticker: GD, exchange: NYSE)
News Release - Friday, July 26, 2002
Press Contact: (586) 825-7980
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