Last Hurrah

The 10th Para CO with his soldiers from Skn Armor and their vehicles. Picture taken in 2018. BTDM

SHAH ALAM: Last hurrah. Newly appointed 10th Para Brigade Commander Brig Jen Khairul Azmizal Ahmad Natal made his introductory visit to the formation’s armor unit, Skuadron Armor Para on Jan. 9, BTDM online reported. Khairul Azmizal was appointed as the brigade’s commander on Oct. 23, 2018 replacing Mej Jen Tengku Muhammad Fauzi Tengku Ibrahim.

The visit to the Armor Squadron, based at the Sirajuddin Camp in Gemas, Negri Sembilan, came shortly after it was announced that the unit’s main vehicles, the Scorpion light tanks would be retired soon.

The 10th Para CO with his soldiers from Skn Armor and their vehicles.

As usual the BTDM Online posting on the visit were very brief although from the pictures that accompanied it revealed that the unit has five Scorpions, four Stormers and one Adnan ambulance vehicle. I am not sure whether the vehicles represented are the actual number of vehicles assigned to the unit, of course. From the pictures, it is also revealed that most of the soldiers and officers of the squadron are qualified parachutists.

The Brigadier checking out the Adnan ambulance variant.

Based on the pictures, we can assumed that the Armour Squadron could still be operational following the retirement of the Scorpions and Stormers, as well, if the Army could assigned Adnan ACV or other vehicles to the unit until a replacement is chosen and funded.

Checking out the Stormer. It appears that the Stormers are fitted with the Helios turret with a 20mm Oerlikon gun.

I have no idea whether the Armour Squadron will still be in business following the retirement of the Scorpions (and the Stormers), it is something I am following up with the Army, of course. Apart from the Armour Squadron, the Brigadier also visited the co-located 10 Semboyan 10 Para.

Updated with fixes thanks to …

–Malaysian Defence

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7 Comments

  1. Even after many years since its intro, not all the vehicles have changed to the digital camo pattern

    Reply
    It was not important to have new paint job

  2. BTW the new CO also visited the 10 Skn RAJD PARA, there he is pictured with a few interesting hardwares, among them Outboard Motors, Industrial sized portable gensets, offroad forklifts, skid steer loaders and a Champion 710A motor grader.

    Before that he visited 1RAD PARA and 361bti RAD PARA

  3. Capability is not measured just on what hardware that we have. It is mostly on how prepared we are on using what we have to do what we are asked to do.

    For example for our airlifters. We do practice for paradrop, but we have not practiced austere field deployment and landing for quite sometime.

    For the vehicles, do we routinely practice rigging for loading into airlifters? How quickly can we move our vehicles to be loaded into our Hercules or A-400Ms?

  4. The army said vehicles would be converted only when they were due for repainting.

    The only exception to this rule was probably those vehicles repainted for the national day parade.

  5. I am for our army and even air force and navy vehicles to be painted plain olive drab.

    For armoured vehicles get them multispectral camouflage nettings.

  6. @Marhalim
    May not be important but it does show consistency and cohesiveness. An effective fighting force is all about those 2 and discipline. Uniformity is the basics of basics in this manner.

    PS Sorry if I got your name wrong.

  7. Others are contemplating buying F-35 but some here are more concerned about inconsistant camo scheme?

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