The Armed Forces of Uruguay facing 2023: a year to get excited… or not

As has become a custom in recent governments, year after year the big decisions related to the Uruguayan Armed Forces are postponed. 

While the rest of the world can go through periods of less or more investment in the military sector, the scarcity of resources for investment in defense is the common denominator of almost all Uruguayan governments of the last 40 years. 

Perhaps, on rare occasions, very specific items were granted for the acquisition of some medium, but the vast majority were obsolete systems with relatively little military utility. In that sense, this government is not being very different from its predecessors. 

Although a good excuse for the country’s economic problems can be attributed to the pandemic and the global economic crisis that it generated, the truth is that not much effort was made to achieve alternative solutions to those originally projected and all branches of the Uruguayan Armed Forces have seen the loss of operational capabilities in recent years.

ARMY

The Army is waiting for the United States to find a replacement for the M1117 Guardians it originally offered and is now committed to Ukraine. 

Although there would be some minimal chances that some units of the model could be available, the truth is that the probabilities are very low. 

The amount of about US$7 million that the United States has available for these vehicles is approved and it only remains to define what units they could be. 

As an alternative to vehicles from the United States, the provision of units from other NATO countries, particularly Canada, is being analyzed. 

Additionally, the government is looking for alternatives to equip a rapid reaction force for Operational Peacekeeping Missions under the UN flag, in this case there would be 20 vehicles that would be under UN order to be deployed anywhere in the world with minimal notice. This has already been approved by the UN, but the force has yet to be equipped.

Other than that, not much else is expected, with the exception of a potential purchase of civilian pick-up trucks to be militarized and replace the tactical Land Rovers used by force, which have begun to be phased out.

NAVY

With the reception of the three Marine Protector-class boats in 2022, the Uruguayan defense minister said that the process of replacing the material of this force was beginning, something that the government had promised. 

However, very little else is known about the rest of the plans. The donation of a Chamsuri-class patrol gunboat by South Korea and expected in the second half of 2023 is the only acquisition already confirmed for this year. 

Another purchase that should move forward would be the oceanographic/hydrographic vessel Mt. Mitchel, which is currently for sale by a private company and which was inspected by Uruguayan sailors. 

This ship, if it is acquired, would be with the Navy’s own funds that are already budgeted and that were originally marked for the remotorization of one of the existing ships in the force, potentially the Oyarvide. 

However, the equipment and general conditions of the Mt. Mitchell are far superior to what the Oyarvide has, already decommissioned. 

In this sense, when interviewed by Infodefensa.com, the Commander-in-Chief of the Navy, Admiral Jorge Wilson, expressed that the experiences with the repowering of the Capitán Miranda training sailboat and the ROU 4 Artigas allowed the force to analyze the feasibility of remotorize the Oyarvide, opting for the purchase of a unit to replace it.

Regarding the long-term acquisition of two or three OPV ships for the Navy, a process that the country officially began a decade ago and that has not yet borne fruit, the defense minister made public statements during the month of December informing that he hoped to have a resolution in this regard before the end of the Uruguayan summer of 2023. 

Regarding what could be decided, he limited himself to not delving into his statements and admitted that, despite the fact that a call was made to interested parties and that from the three shipyards presented, the one from China being the best technically qualified, all options are on the table. 

These offers would include used units from the United States as well as Norwegian ocean patrol vessels, which were analyzed by committees of Navy officers during 2022.

This last offer was approached to the Uruguayan Ministry of Defense through the Italian embassy in Uruguay with the Fincantieri shipyard as an intermediary to carry out a reconstruction of the ships and their systems. 

The minister said that everything was going to be analyzed and that it will surely be decided in the first quarter of 2023. The three companies that submitted their offers have received requests to maintain their offers until January 31, 2023. 

The truth is that, if the option chosen were the Chinese one, the first ship will hardly be ready within the current government period, something that the government expected to be able to highlight it as an achievement of this administration.

AIR FORCE

The Uruguayan Air Force plans to receive a second Bell 212 Twin Huey by 2023 and wait to see if the reception of more units can be consolidated. 

Regarding transport aviation, some Beechcraft B200 Super King Air would be being managed with the United States to compensate for the loss of the Embraer C-95 Bandeirante. 

As far as combat aviation is concerned, the minister has continuously stated that acquiring combat aircraft is very expensive and almost impossible for the country. 

This beyond prices have been requested and there were visits to different factories to learn about the available material. 

The FAU’s intention to acquire a modern jet, with good interception capabilities, fast, and with on-board radar, dates back to much earlier than the OPV process, when in the 1970s the Kfir or F were seen as potential aircraft for the FAU. 

Since then, a replacement has been sought for the venerable Cessna A-37B Dragonfly, which until now have fulfilled all the roles of Uruguayan combat aviation. 

With that history, it is difficult to expect that there will be many changes for 2023, except that units continue to be retired that cannot be replaced in the short term. 

The useful life of the A37B tends to be shorter and shorter and the possibilities of acquiring a new combat vector are increasingly distant, not only due to economic issues, but also due to the constant loss of qualified personnel both to fly the aircraft to maintain.

The reduction of the country’s military capabilities to a minimum has been a constant in the last decades in the different Uruguayan governments and this one, which is in the middle of its administration, has not been different. 

The conversion of military forces into a kind of national guard, with civilian means falsely called ‘dual’ use by politicians, has become a constant. 

The need to almost have to apologize to the citizens for having to equip the Armed Forces of Uruguay is the common currency of political speeches, where over and over again the issue of equipping the forces has to be hammered so that they take care of the sovereignty of the country, protect natural resources, be ready to safeguard human life and an endless number of subsidiary tasks that they fulfill. 

But the truth is that the constitutional mandate of the Armed Forces is to protect the country in case of aggression and to be militarily equipped for war. They must have the tools to wage war and eventually destroy or at least deter an enemy from attacking. 

Unfortunately, these are bad words for the different politicians who have governed and govern Uruguay, so the trend will continue on the same path, with the reduction of capacities, without items to acquire the material that the forces need and with the slogan of treating to obtain the greatest amount of equipment donated or ceded by friendly countries.

With information from Infodefensa