Seen in the crush of combat, or driving down a street, any observer could be forgiven for thinking a Rheinmetall Lynx is a tank. The tracked vehicle is armored and turreted, and it was built by the German arms giant as a way to counter new developments in Russian armored vehicles in the 2010s. February 2022 saw the introduction of the Lynx 120mm, which sports a main gun as big and powerful as that of a proper battle tank. Understanding the Lynx is a way to glimpse the last decade of thinking about medium armor, the vehicles designed for all but the heaviest fighting on the ground.

The Lynx, at least initially, was offered in Infantry Fighting Vehicle form. That’s a sort of hybrid category, which best describes in the United States. Built to replace a lightly armed Vietnam-era transport, the Bradley shed about half its passenger capacity, but gained a set of powerful weapons. This process became the dark comedic heart of 1998’s HBO film , though high-profile criticism and satire wasn’t enough to abandon the Pentagon’s plans for transports that can out-fight other transports.

One reason for the durability of IFVs is that the platforms can be adapted to a bunch of useful forms. Ultimately, what drew my eye to the Lynx was a display in Australia of a couple variants:

The IFV version is the Infantry Fighting Vehicle — in other words, a troop transport plus gun. In the initial model, it takes a crew of three to operate, and can seat six passengers in the back. The version on display in Australia had room for 8 passengers. The turret can either fit two crew or be operated entirely remotely. In the combat support vehicle (CSV) option, the Lynx trades weapons for utility tools, in this case a crane. While not as flashy or dramatic as a weapon, the ability to bring armored cranes to combat improves the odds of recovering vehicles that are merely damaged or stuck, letting mechanics work to help them fight another day.

With all the passenger space inside the default Lynx, that room can also be adapted to fit a mobile command center, bristling with screens and communication nodes, as commanders in the field move within armor to direct the fight in or near the front. These vehicles are all fundamentally vulnerable to direct hits from enemy tanks or aircraft, but the armor is still built up to NATO standards against , fired from half a kilometer away or more.

The first Infantry Fighting Vehicles were drawn for the expected reality of combat in Europe in the late Cold War, where it was assumed that the USSR would advance with a massive amount of tanks and artillery through West Germany. In these conditions, transports needed to be able to fight as they moved, and then ensure that the infantry inside could keep fighting from favorable terrain. This was, like all Cold War warplanning, a deep exercise in trying to win a war that nuclear weapons were expected to end. Still, the armored vehicles were at least a nod to the , with the armor protecting inhabitants enough to keep fighting through irradiated battlefields, at least for a little bit.

Today, these kinds of vehicles have seen action in counter-insurgencies, and especially in the war in Ukraine, where the ability of armor to move over uneven ground (especially after mud season) will likely shape how Ukraine fares against the continuing Russian invasion in 2023.

As foreign-supplied tanks join the ranks of , they are joined by armored vehicles like and . Armored transports require more sophisticated countermeasures to stop than what most infantry has as a baseline, and while the armor isn’t as heavy as that of truly dedicated tanks, the mobility ensures soldiers on the move are much safer from artillery fire than they would be if caught in the open.

The ability to resume the same hull shape and basic features for other tools, from scout models to the tank-hunting heavy barreled version, mark the Lynx specifically and the IFV broadly as the kind of armor militaries can use for most purposes, bolstering reach and numbers without needed the dedicated resources for heavy tank operations. Lighter IFVs can more easily cross , and at faster speeds than tanks.

Marketed at the United States, Rhenimetall is competing for the Optionally Manned Infantry Fighting Vehicle (), built on the Lynx body. This version of the vehicle can still operate as a transport and with a two-person crew, but it could also be configured as a wholly uncrewed vehicle, ordered into battle and directed from afar.

Watch a video about the Lynx OMFV below: