Harald Hansen said:
A very interesting vehicle, but I've always wondered if it's the
idea or the
execution which is lacking. My only experience with articulated vehicles is the
Hägglunds BV206, which becomes a bit unstable at highway speeds, but otherwise is an excellent offroad vehicle, and very reliable for what it is.
Was the Goat a missed opportunity or just not viable?
I always got the impression it was either poor execution of an otherwise interesting idea, or the answer to a question nobody asked.
I used to subscribe to a couple of magazines for military vehicle collectors (for a couple of years back in the 90's I owned a 1952 Dodge M43 Ambulance that I'd hoped to restore) and there was an article about the 'Goats. I'll see if I can dig it up.
I think the idea was to have a vehicle that was capable of carrying a heavy load across very rough terrain, while keeping a low profile, and also that would be amphibious.
Problem is, while the vehicle itself may be amphibious, by the time you load it up, it sits very low in the water which means anything other than a dead calm will swamp it.
Not sure where they got the idea for the 3 cyl 2 stroke diesel - kind of makes me wonder if they had some leftover engines they needed to use up and couldn't think of anything else to do with them.
In any case, by the time I got into the Army in 1980 the "tactical" use of the 'goat was pretty much gone and they were just used as trucks to haul things, primarily communications shelters (which of course were so heavy the vehicle was no longer amphibious.) I also remember seeing a few that were set up as front-line ambulances.
By the time I got to Germany in 1987 the 'goats were being phased out, and, as I said above, nobody would miss them. Their roles were taken over by the open-topped variants of the HMMWV, which were just then coming into service. Also, the front-line ambulance duties of the 'goat were just as well served by the smaller and more maneuverable M151 Jeep.
Neither the Jeep nor the HMMWV was amphibious, of course, but by then it was apparent that the whole "amphibious" thing was really not an asset anyway (I don't even want to
think about how many GIs died during Cold War training exercises where they tried to 'swim' supposedly amphibious vehicles across the wide and fast rivers of Europe and Korea.)
I never served in any jungle areas (Panama, Vietnam, Southeast Asia, Hawaii) so it may be that the 'goat acquitted itself better there. All I know is that in 23 years of service in the US Army, I have never,
ever, heard anybody express any fondness for the 'goat, nor have I ever heard anybody say anything like "damn, I wish we still had some of those Gama Goats, they could do things our HMMWVs
never could!"
OTOH, the number of times I have heard people express affection for the M151 Jeep (an affection I share, BTW, having used Jeeps extensively as an MP in the CO National Guard) have been more numerous than I can count.
Final point, the US military uses the BV206 to this day. We call it the SUSV (Small Unit Support Vehicle.) My old Guard unit, 5/19th SFG(A) had two in the motor pool for cold weather/heavy snow operations. And when I was in Alaska, I saw motor pools filled with SUSVs.
