{"id":632093,"date":"2026-04-26T13:39:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-26T13:39:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/632093\/"},"modified":"2026-04-26T13:39:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-26T13:39:10","slug":"australia-to-sell-fleet-of-bushmasters-to-netherlands-locks-in-commitment-to-build-268-more-for-itself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/632093\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia to sell fleet of Bushmasters to Netherlands, locks in commitment to build 268 more for itself"},"content":{"rendered":"

Australian Bushmaster armoured vehicles are being sent to the Netherlands following a request to Australia by the Dutch government.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A fleet of troop carriers has been sold to the Netherlands, building on the country’s existing Bushmaster fleet.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The sale of the fleet comes as the Australian government has committed $1.2 billion to go towards 268 new Bushmasters, as well as upgraded army trucks and smaller Hawkei tactical vehicles.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“The Australian-built Bushmaster and Hawkei are recognised as world-leading protected mobility vehicles \u2014 supporting not just the Australian Defence Force, but the defence forces of our international partners as well,” Defence Minister Richard Marles said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The number of Bushmasters bought by the Dutch government, or how much the Dutch are paying for the armoured vehicles, is unknown.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mr Marles will join Defence Industry Minister Pat Conroy in Bendigo today to announce the Netherlands deal and the local investment.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Missiles launched from Bushmaster vehicles on the table<\/a><\/p>\n

The Albanese government has approved a tender process that will pit the StrikeMaster mobile missile launcher against the American-made High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS), currently being used by Ukrainian forces.<\/p>\n

Bushmasters have attracted significant international attention after the Australian government gifted more than 100 to Ukraine for use in the war with Russia<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The government has confirmed that the Bushmasters now scheduled for production were in addition to vehicles already being built to replace those sent to Ukraine.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThrough this $1.2 billion investment, the Albanese government is sustaining local jobs, strengthening our national defence industry and delivering a capability that protects the lives of Australian Defence Force personnel,” Mr Marles said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Builds on StrikeMaster commitment<\/p>\n

The pending 268 Bushmasters will also be in addition to the vehicles diverted to project “Land 8113”, which is looking at adding missile launching capability to the <\/a>armoured carriers.\u00a0<\/p>\n

So far, 59 of the Bushmasters have been acquired for that project.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Known as StrikeMaster, the Australian-developed product utilises a pair of Naval Strike Missiles (NSM) mounted on top of the Bushmaster, which can be fired at enemy targets on land and sea out to at least 250 kilometres.<\/p>\n

First unveiled in 2022 by defence companies Kongsberg and Thales, the StrikeMaster and its ship-killing NSMs have been touted as a sovereign and cost-effective option for delivering a potent “area denial” capability across Australia’s top end.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The Bushmaster armoured personnel carriers are designed to carry and rapidly deploy 10 soldiers. (AAP:\u00a0Diego Fedele)<\/p>\n

The new construction pipeline has, the government said, ensured production out of French company Thales’ Bendigo factory until 2033.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“We’re building close to 300 new Bushmasters, securing around 300 local jobs and delivering long-term certainty to the industry, workers and region that depends on this critical capability,” Defence Industry Minister Pat Conroy said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Upgrades to the medium-heavy ADF trucks, to be done by Rheinmetall, and to the Hawkei vehicles, also by Thales, come at a cost of $450 million and will, according to government-provided estimates, support 150 jobs in Brisbane.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Early rollout of the Hawkei was marred by safety concerns.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Just three months after celebrating the start of full production of the Hawkei vehicles, the government stopped accepting them amid concerns about their brakes<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Hawkei is a smaller tactical vehicle with enhanced protection and was brought in to replace the ADF’s old Land Rovers in high-threat areas.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australian Bushmaster armoured vehicles are being sent to the Netherlands following a request to Australia by the Dutch…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":632094,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[306092,64,63,306091,69,306094,44,49398,84,305881,225286,306093],"class_list":{"0":"post-632093","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-australia","8":"tag-armoured-vehicle","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-bushmaster","12":"tag-federal-government","13":"tag-hawkei","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-pat-conroy","16":"tag-politics","17":"tag-rheinmetall","18":"tag-thales","19":"tag-troop-carrier"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/632093","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=632093"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/632093\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/632094"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=632093"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=632093"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=632093"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}