| Unit Name: | Australian Armoured Corps Royal Australian Armoured Corps |
| Country: | Australia |
| Type: | Corps |
| Branch: | Armour |
| Dates: | 9 July 1941 – present |
| Command Structure: | Australian Army |
| Role: | Mounted Combat |
| Size: | 3 regular regiments 5 reserve regiments and a training unit |
| Current Commander: | The King |
| Current Commander Label: | Colonel in Chief |
| Garrison: | Puckapunyal |
| Ceremonial Chief: | Major General Craig Orme DSC, AM and CSC |
| Ceremonial Chief Label: | Representative Honorary Colonel |
| Commander3: | Brigadier Chris Gardiner |
| Commander3 Label: | Head of Corps |
| Commander4: | Warrant Officer Class 1 Jamie Adams |
| Commander4 Label: | Corps Sergeant Major |
| Identification Symbol Label: | RAAC Colour patch |
| Nickname: | 'The Black Hats' |
| March: | Radetzky March, Opus Number 228 by Johann Strauss Senior |
| Equipment: | Armoured Fighting Vehicles |
| Anniversaries: | 9th of July 1941 |
The Royal Australian Armoured Corps (RAAC) is an administrative corps of the Australian Army. It provides the Australian Defence Force's Armour capability, which performs the function of mounted combat. Armour combines firepower, mobility, protection and networked situational awareness to generate shock action and overmatch in close combat. Armour is an essential element of the combined arms approach that is employed by the Australian Army.[1]
The RAAC is the senior arms corps within the Army and the custodian of the customs and traditions of Australia's mounted soldiers.[2] The members of the corps are Army's experts in the theory and practice of armoured warfare and operation of armoured fighting vehicles (AFV). While all RAAC members are trained in the technical and tactical employment of armour, they specialise in either the Armoured or Cavalry career streams. Both male and female soldiers and officers serve within the RAAC as armoured vehicle crew. The corps includes both full-time Regular and part-time Reserve units and members. The RAAC provides policy guidance, trade management representation and administrative support for its members.
The RAAC's origins can be traced back to the Australian Tank Corps (ATC), formed in 1928.[3] Around this time the distinctive headdress of Commonwealth armoured corps members, the black beret, was adopted by the ATC which was affiliated with the Royal Tank Corps.[4]
For most of the 1930s the ATC remained an embryonic organisation containing only a small cadre of permanent staff and the militia 1st Tank Section. At the outbreak of the Second World War the ATC had grown to two militia light tank companies. These, in conjunction with the militia 1st and 2nd Cavalry Divisions, which included the Australian Light Horse (ALH) regiments of First World War fame, comprised Australia's mobile mounted combat forces. In the early stages of the war, the ATC and ALH provided many personnel who formed the basis of the mechanised divisional cavalry and armoured regiments. In order to administer the growing number of units, including the 1st Australian Armoured Division, the Australian Armoured Corps (AAC) was formed on 9 July 1941.
The AAC absorbed the ATC and certain other personnel whose primary function was to operate, instruct or manage AFVs. As a result of the increasing mechanisation of the army, and commensurate waning of horse mounted troops, the ALH was also absorbed into the AAC on 8 May 1942.[5] By this time many ALH units had converted to motorised units, such as reconnaissance and motor regiments, others had mechanised as armoured and tank regiments. At its height the AAC included the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Australian Armoured Divisions, the 3rd Australian Army Tank Brigade and various training centres and regiments, located at Puckapunyal and Singleton ranges.[6] While many individual units served overseas with distinction, by the end of the war these large formations were broken up and much of the wartime AAC was demobilised with the rest of the force. The Australian Armoured Corps was granted the Royal prefix in recognition of its service during the Second World War on 14 December 1948.[7]
The role of the Royal Australian Armoured Corps is to locate, identify, destroy or capture the enemy, by day or night, in combination with other arms, using fire and manoeuvre.[8]
To perform this role RAAC units are structured into two types:
Armoured Cavalry. Each contains an Armoured, two Cavalry and a Support Squadron which provide mounted close combat, formation level reconnaissance, surveillance and security and integrated combat service support capabilities.
Light Cavalry. Each contains Light Cavalry and Protected Mobility Squadrons which provide mounted and dismounted reconnaissance, surveillance and security and protected mobility capabilities.[9]
In 2023, the corps has three Regular Armoured Cavalry and five Reserve Light Cavalry regiments and a Regular training unit.
The School of Armour provides mounted combat and combat communications training to officers and soldiers in the Australian Army and selected individuals from abroad.[10] It executes both tactical and technical training for AFV and armoured support vehicle crews. Training at the School of Armour is conducted in the following sub-units:
RAAC units are primarily equipped with the following vehicles:
The Australian Army is undertaking major modernisation efforts over the next decade to upgrade or replace all of its AFVs and supporting infrastructure, facilities and equipment.[13] The next generation of AFVs will be delivered via a number of projects, these are:
These combined AFV acquisitions will result in a very significant capability increase for the Australian Army which, under the Defence Strategic Review, will create a combined-arms, amphibiously deployable Armoured Brigade.[19] This capability is being delivered in conjunction with other major projects such as Land 8710[20] which will deliver a range of littoral manoeuvre vessels, Land 8113 delivering self-propelled howitzers, Land 8116 which will deliver a light multiple rocket launcher capability and Land 4503 delivering the AH-64E Apache helicopter gunship. It will be complemented by Land 200 command, control and communications systems and existing Land 121 logistics capabilities.
The first Regular Army Armour unit created after the Second World War was the 1st Armoured Car Squadron, created in 1946 to serve as part of the British Commonwealth Occupation Force. It was retitled the 1st Armoured Regiment in 1949, in conjunction with a broader reorganisation of the existing Citizens Military Force (CMF).[21] While additional 'numbered' Regular RAAC units were created in the following decades, e.g., the 1st Armoured Personnel Carrier Squadron, CMF unit titles continued to reflect the numbers of amalgamated former Light Horse regiments and their territorial affiliations which signify their links to their recruiting catchment areas, e.g., the 6th New South Wales Mounted Rifles, 7th/21st Australian Horse and 8th/13th Victorian Mounted Rifles. During the early 1950s Army maintained two CMF armoured brigades, the 1st Armoured Brigade in New South Wales and the 2nd Armoured Brigade in Victoria. In addition, divisional reconnaissance and other specialised mechanised units, such as an amphibious armoured assault unit, self-propelled artillery, and motorised infantry were also part of the force. However, as a result of the adoption of the Forward Defence Policy and subsequent restructure of the Army, the brigade headquarters and various units were either disbanded or amalgamated by the end of that decade.[22]
Since the 1960s Army has maintained three principal types of Armour unit: Armoured regiments equipped with tanks, Cavalry units equipped with reconnaissance vehicles and Armoured Personnel Carrier units equipped with APCs. The latter's role was to provide armoured mobility to elements of its parent brigade such as infantry, engineers and artillery observers. While various structures combining these unit types were trialed or even adopted for short periods, such as the RAAC Regiment, Regular Armour units generally conformed to these singular roles.[23] From the early 1970s the 1st Armoured Regiment served as the Australian Army's sole tank unit, building and maintaining Australia's conventional warfighting capability in conjunction with mechanised infantry, combat engineer and medium artillery units. The 2nd Cavalry Regiment primarily served as a formation reconnaissance unit with B Squadron, 3rd Cavalry Regiment and the 4th Cavalry Regiment performing the Armoured Personnel Carrier role. Army Reserve units generally adopted a composite structure of Cavalry and Armoured Personnel Carrier squadrons.[24]
The 1980s witnessed the amalgamation of the 3rd Cavalry Regiment and the 4th Cavalry Regiments into the 3rd/4th Cavalry Regiment in 1981, followed by the reduction of the regiment to a single squadron based in Townsville in 1986. Brisbane-based personnel of the regiment were transferred to the 2nd/14th Light Horse Regiment (Queensland Mounted Infantry) which integrated both Regular and Reserve personnel. While there were fluctuations in the size and part-time/full-time nature of the units throughout the 1990s, this period was generally stable for the RAAC. Changes to the Army force structure in the 2000s resulted in the 2nd/14th Light Horse Regiment becoming a Regular unit in 2005, the removal of the Armoured Personnel Carrier role from the Regular units, and the adoption of the Protected Mobility role within Reserve units. This resulted in the corps adopting Armoured, Cavalry and Light Cavalry unit structures.[25]
The implementation of Plan Beersheba from 2012 led to significant changes in Army's force structure which impacted the corps.[26] First, this led to the transfer of 2nd Cavalry Regiment from 1st Combat Brigade based in Darwin to the 3rd Combat Brigade in Townsville. This meant that each brigade had an Armour unit within it, which offered the promise of improving the combined-arms training of these brigades. Second, the Armoured Cavalry Regiment (ACR) structure was adopted by the three regular regiments. This resulted in each regiment restructuring to an Armoured Squadron, a Cavalry Squadron and an Armoured Mobility Squadron, however these units lost their organic supporting Headquarters and Support Squadron capabilities. This was short lived, as this approach was reversed in 2017 with the armoured mobility role divested to newly (re)raised mechanised infantry battalions and mechanised combat engineer squadrons. As these elements contained their own organic mobility in the form of APCs, the Armoured Mobility Squadrons were converted to Cavalry and reequipped with ASLAV. The Regular ACRs have maintained this structure since. The third aspect of note was the relocation of 1st Armoured Regiment in 2018 south to Adelaide to collocate with the 7th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment. Both units initially remained part of the 1st Combat Brigade but were later transferred to the Reserve 9th Combat Brigade in 2022 under the Army Objective Force plan.[27] This approach integrated 1st Armoured Regiment, the 7th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, 144th Signal Squadron and elements of the 1st Combat Service Support Battalion into the 9th Combat Brigade in late 2022; and was earmarked to introduce into service the self-propelled artillery capability to be acquired under Land 8113.
Notably, the April 2023 response to the Defence Strategic Review directed Army to provide an Armoured Brigade capability. To perform the roles and functions of such a formation, this brigade would need to include command, control and communications elements, armoured, cavalry, armoured infantry, mechanised combat engineers and self-propelled artillery units as well as significant logistics support. However, the DSR also drastically reduced the number of infantry fighting vehicles to be acquired under Project Land 400 Phase 3 from 450 to 129.[28] Significant numbers of IFV and IFV based variants are needed to not only re-equip the infantry but also the engineer, artillery and supporting elements within any proposed Armoured Brigade. However, these elements continue to operate the M113AS4 APC which was considered obsolete by the Australian National Audit Office in 2012 even after Defence had upgraded 431 of the legacy vehicles.
Analysis published prior to the DSR response is illustrative of what the reduction in Land 400 Phase 3 might mean for the Army:
Commentary from Andrew Greene of the ABC in early September 2023 indicated that the Army was about to undergo another restructure stemming from the Defence Strategic Review, which would directly impact the RAAC. Greene wrote that the Adelaide-based 1st Armoured Regiment and 7th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, are 'likely to be absorbed' by the Townsville-based 3rd Combat Brigade.[29] He quoted Army insiders who believe that 1st Armoured Regiment personnel will be transferred to supplement the 2nd Cavalry Regiment. Greene suggested a key factor for the restructure is that the current structure, without adequate IFVs, was no longer viable. Neil James of the Australian Defence Association commented that "The DSR in terms of the army and in the short term, was mainly concerned with saving money and that's probably driving this change rather than any long-term thought". Others have suggested that the 'Army is change fatigued' [30] which may be contributing to retention and recruiting issues and the desire to remove underpopulated 'hollow' units from the force.[31] [32] [33] Likewise, the issues of an army model based on brigades of singular capabilities are not new and have been addressed in previous restructures. Significant issues were identified during the deployment to East Timor in 1999,[34] which manifested during subsequent missions to Iraq, Afghanistan and the Solomon Islands over the 2000s, where there were simply not enough units, units were under-equipped for close combat, there was a lack of combined-arms training and there was widespread shallowness of capability across Army. These issues ultimately resulted in a range of initiatives such as the Hardened and Networked Army, Enhanced Land Force,[35] Strategic Force Generation Cycle[36] and Plan Beersheba to address the challenges of simultaneously deploying forces to fight in multiple theatres and perform a broad range of missions.[37]
This plan was confirmed on 28 September at a press conference by the Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles at Townsville[38] with further detail in other reporting. These stated that 1st Armoured Regiment would lose its armoured vehicles and be reduced to an 'innovation and experimentation unit' while remaining in Adelaide.[39] However, its sister infantry unit, 7th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment is to be disbanded, with the unit number re-linked with the 5th Battalion in Darwin to reform 5th/7th Battalion. This decision consolidates all the Army's heavy armour, including all its tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, armoured personnel carriers, self-propelled howitzers and armoured engineering systems in a single brigade in Townsville. Concurrent to this, the Army's attack aviation and heavy-lift aviation is also being consolidated into Townsville and the 9th Combat Brigade is to be re-roled as a Security and Response brigade, reducing the Army's four Combat brigades to a Light Littoral Brigade, an Armoured Brigade and a Motorised Brigade. Ground-based air defence and long-range strike capabilities will now form part of another formation, the 10th Brigade, in Adelaide. The removal of 1st Armoured Regiment as a combat unit, the RAAC's oldest regular unit and one of its most decorated, effectively reduces the number of active combat Armour units in the Army to two; the 2nd Cavalry Regiment in Townsville and 2nd/14th Light Horse Regiment in Brisbane, with the latter equipped with the Boxer CRV only. This is the fewest number of regular Armour units in the Australian Army's order of battle since 1966, when 1st Cavalry Regiment was raised to serve alongside 1st Armoured Regiment.[40]
The corps has served in wars, conflicts and peace support missions across a wide range of theatres. These include the Second World War, the post-war occupation of Japan, South Vietnam, Somalia, Rwanda, East Timor, Iraq and Afghanistan.
1940–41[41]
1941
1941
1941–42
1941–1945
1941–45
1944–45
1944–45
1946–49
1965–71[42]
1999–2010[43]
2003–2008
2006–2012
Members of the corps have participated in a wide range of individual and small group deployments from Korea to the Sudan and the Solomon Islands as well as domestic support operations in Australia and its territorial waters.
The RAAC publishes an annual journal Ironsides. This provides current and former members of the corps with an update of the direction of the future of the corps from its key leadership, reports from each of the units on their activities, modernisation updates and historical articles of interest.