Belgian Army admits that their anti-tank vehicles can’t fire armour piercing shells

THE Belgian Army spent €69.9 million ten years ago on purchasing 18 Piranha anti-tank vehicles from their Swiss manufacturer and scrapped its existing vehicles at the time.

Amazingly, although the vehicles were equipped with a special 90-millimetre cannon (DF90) which uses armour piercing ammunition, it wasn’t until May 2017 that the Ministry of Defence actually purchased any armour piercing shells.

Unfortunately it turned out that the Piranhas couldn’t actually fire the anti-tank ammunition and after two years of investigations and attempts to make them work, the Belgian Army has now decided to give up.

They do fire non-armour piercing rounds so aren’t completely useless but are not really fit for purpose which was highlighted when three of the vehicles were sent as part of a NATO initiative to Lithuania as a deterrent against Russian tanks but on return admitted that they didn’t actually have any working ammunition!