On Monday, January 20, 2025, the Armament Agency published information about its intention to conduct preliminary market consultations regarding new automated mine-laying vehicles on a tracked chassis, which could replace the ISM Kroton based on the SPG-2A armored personnel carrier chassis (a Polish development of the Soviet MT-LB).
IMS Kroton / Photo: Pvt 1st class Natalia Wawrzyniak, 10th Armored Cavalry Brigade
The deadline for submitting participation applications is February 14, 2025, with the consultations planned to be conducted by May 31, 2025.
The subject of the preliminary market consultations is a tracked automated mine-laying vehicle designed for deploying anti-tank minefields, which should include:
- an armored hull;
- a propulsion system consisting of an integrated power-pack configuration, a power transmission system, a tracked drive system equipped with rubber pads allowing movement on public roads, and a suspension system with damping and vibration-reducing functions;
- an information and communication system enabling voice communication and data exchange (up to the classification level of RESTRICTED/NATO RESTRICTED/EU RESTRICTED) between vehicles, as well as with superiors and cooperating units within a range of up to 30 km. The mine-laying vehicle should also include a terminal with specialized software for operating the automated commander’s workstation. This software must be compatible with the BMS (Battlefield Management System) software provided by the contracting authority;
- 12.7 mm HMG armament;
- warning, protection, and self-defense systems;
- systems that enhance maintainability (Automatic Maintenance Control System and the Automatic Fitness Control and Fault Detection System);
- an automated mine-laying system consisting of 6 launchers (mounted on the chassis), each with 20 mine cassettes, and each cassette containing 5 MN-123 anti-tank mines, as well as a control and operation monitoring system
The preliminary market consultations will specifically cover the following areas related to the acquisition of tracked mine-laying vehicles:
- Assessment of the offered vehicle’s ability to meet the preliminarily defined requirements, parameters, and functionalities.
- Specification of conditions related to the logistics support system and training.
- Estimation of acquisition, operation, and decommissioning costs for the vehicles.
- Determination of vehicle acquisition timelines.
- Evaluation of the possibilities to ensure supply chain security, including the potential and conditions for transferring production and servicing technologies to entities within the Polish defense industry.
Currently, the Polish Armed Forces have six tracked mine-laying Kroton vehicles, delivered by Huta Stalowa Wola (now part of the Polish Armaments Group) between 2004 and 2008 (out of an initially planned 81 units). Between 2026 and 2028, deliveries of 24 Baobab-K wheeled automated mine-laying vehicles on a Jelcz 8×8 chassis with an armored cabin are planned. These vehicles were ordered from Huta Stalowa Wola by the Armament Agency on June 14, 2023, for approximately 510 million PLN.
