In 1916, the first battle tanks crossed the Somme on metal tracks to overcome mud that no wheel of the era could master. A century later, the mud of Ukraine has again demonstrated that tracked tanks have not lost their usefulness, but between these two episodes a new doctrine has taken root across defense ministries around the world.
And to deploy forces quickly, reduce maintenance costs and move them by road from one end of Europe to the other, it’s better to use a wheeled armored vehicle.
The heyday of wheeled armored vehicles
All of Europe is witnessing it live. The Spanish VCR Dragon, the 8×8 that UROVESA and General Dynamics are manufacturing to replace the veteran BMR-600, must reach 348 units at a value of 1.741 billion euros before 2030. Italy has pushed the concept further with the Centauro II, a 30-ton eight-wheeled vehicle equipped with a 120-millimeter cannon—the same caliber as a Leopard 2—and with enough autonomy to cross half of the peninsula without refueling.
Germany bets on the Boxer, France on the Griffon and the Jaguar, Poland sticks with its Rosomak, and the United States has supported its Stryker-based combat brigades for two decades. Australia and the United Kingdom have followed the same line with Boxer variants, signaling that the phenomenon is not the result of a national whim, but a NATO-wide consensus.
The logic behind this shift is more economical than tactical. A wheeled vehicle requires between 50% and 100% fewer refueling stops than a tracked one to cover the same distance, according to studies cited for years by the U.S. Army, and its maintenance is noticeably cheaper because it does not suffer the mechanical wear of a chain of linked tracks.
Moreover, it weighs less, which is crucial when it has to be transported by air: a Centauro II, for example, fits in an A400M, while a heavy tank demands a much larger transport means, such as special trucks, and a logistics chain (trucks, trains) that many armed forces can no longer afford to deploy rapidly. Added to this is the acoustic signature: a metal-link track can be heard from a greater distance than a wheel rolling on asphalt or dirt, a decisive detail when the enemy has a listening drone at two kilometers altitude.
In a sense, the armies are prioritizing one or two of the four essential functions of armored fighting vehicles, namely mobility, firepower, information and protection. Yet these dimensions are inseparable.
In most European armies, “having concentrated for 20 years on counterinsurgency warfare, the wheel is prioritized, well-suited to the terrains of external operations, over the track, and in terms of protection armor is reinforced to withstand improvised explosive devices,” explains Marc Chassillant, professor of weapons systems architecture at ENSTA. “However, modern assaults have changed the rules of the game. Hence ballistic protection requirements are rising, which leads to a constant increase in weight.”
The war in Ukraine complicates that idea of abandoning tracked tanks even further. Drones have decimated armored vehicles on both sides, with more than 13,800 Russian vehicles lost in 2025 according to Oryx’s tally, but when autumn rains turn the front into mud, it is the tracked units that keep advancing while the wheeled ones get stuck.
It is a conclusion that Ukrainian analysts such as Oleksandr Kovalenko have made clear during the late-2025 Russian offensives. The wheel wins on roads and in cost. The track continues to win in mud and under direct fire.
What is really changing is not the farewell to the battle tank, but the distribution of roles within each army. European countries, constrained by tight budgets and by the need to move entire brigades by road across NATO from one flank to another, are now focusing their investments on 8×8 armored fleets.
And these 8x8s serve for everything, such as infantry transport, reconnaissance, light fire support and even air defense, while reserving heavy, very heavy tanks—each time fewer in number—for direct clash. It is a redistribution of resources dressed up as a technological revolution. The track does not disappear. It simply no longer has to do it all.
Images | IDV, Army, Paul Korecky (militarnyi)
