On Tuesday, July 2, Argentina’s Minister of Defense, Luis Petri, announced the signing of a Letter of Offer and Acceptance (LOA) for the acquisition of the first 8×8 Wheeled Armored Combat Vehicles to equip the Argentine Army. The signing took place at the Pentagon during his official visit to Washington, where he was received by U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.
The announcement, made by the minister via his social media accounts, was presented as part of the ongoing process to incorporate new military capabilities driven by the national government, with the goal of modernizing the Argentine Armed Forces and strengthening bilateral ties with the United States. “We continue to recover strategic capabilities to defend our sovereignty and ensure peace for all Argentines,” said Petri after the meeting.
According to the information available so far, this initial batch would include eight turretless 8×8 Stryker armored vehicles, presumably of the M1126 variant, sourced from U.S. Army surplus. The vehicles are reportedly in preserved condition, having not undergone overhauls, and would be equipped with a mount for a 12.7mm machine gun as their main armament.
Although the detailed terms of the signed LOA have not yet been made public, it is believed that the wheeled armored vehicles may come with spare parts, support tools, and certain logistical elements to ensure their sustainment. The conditional nature of this information is due to the fact that the final terms will be determined during the execution phase of the LOA, which will be key to ensuring the project moves forward.
As previously reported by Zona Militar, the incorporation of Wheeled Armored Combat Vehicles into the Argentine Army has been a long-standing requirement, forming part of a broader reequipment strategy aimed at providing the force with a platform offering tactical mobility, ballistic protection, and rapid deployment capability. The original project, developed over several years, envisions the need for a significant number of units that can be operated at section and company levels, under sustained conditions and with their own logistical structure.
This initial batch of eight vehicles should be seen as a first step toward a broader program—one that will require continued budgetary support and political will to avoid repeating past experiences where the limited scale of acquired equipment reduced its operational impact.
In this context, the timely execution of the LOA and the advancement of future purchases reaching the volumes originally planned by the Argentine Army will be crucial for consolidating the modernization process. The acquisition of 8×8 Stryker vehicles—widely deployed by the U.S. Army in various operational theaters—represents a significant step toward addressing some of the Argentine Army’s long-standing capability gaps.
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