MBT ARIETE TANK CREW

Italian Land Forces (owner. Esercito Italiana) were formed in 1861 and - as you can easily guess - are now the land component of the entire Italian armed forces. At present, Esercito Italiana is fully professional and composed only of volunteers. In 2004, about 115,000 soldiers served there. One of its main elements is armored forces. At the end of the Cold War, at the turn of the 1980s and 1990s, the Italian army had 20 armored battalions consisting of Leopard 1A2 vehicles, 49 tanks each, 11 mechanized battalions consisting of Leopard 1A2 vehicles and M113 transporters. However, after 1990, the Italian army, including its armored forces, underwent numerous reforms (in 1991, 1997, 2002, 2011 and 2013), which led to a reduction in the size of the Italian army, changes in its structure and the introduction of new combat vehicles. The 2013 reform assumed that the core of the armored forces would be 2 heavy brigades (named after Ariete and Garibaldi) armed with Centauro wheeled tank destroyers, Ariete MBTs, Dardo IFVs and PzH2000 self-propelled howitzers. It is assumed that at present Esercito Italiana has around 200 Ariete tanks and around 400 wheeled Centauro tank destroyers in the line.