Was it a Tank?

Requiem for what may or may not have been a tank:

The M10 Booker is dead. What was the M10 Booker? That’s a more complicated question than you probably realize. But now, possibly because no one could figure out what it was, and US Army generals had tired of the conversation, the M10 Booker light tank (or assault gun) project has been canceled.

Depending on your perspective, the M10 Booker was an Assault Gun, an Armored Infantry Support Vehicle, or a Light Tank. The Booker carries a 105mm turreted gun on a 40-ton armored chassis and can make about 40 miles per hour under its own power.

Named for an American tank commander who died in 2003 in Baghdad and an infantryman who won the Congressional Medal of Honor in 1943 in North Africa, the design process for the Booker began in late 2018, with the first prototype delivered in 2022. About eighty Bookers have been delivered to the US Army thus far. 

Generally speaking, tanks are expected to be armored, to locomote on treads, and to have a rotating turret with a large caliber gun, all of which fit the description of the Booker. However, according to US Army General Glenn Dean, “the M10 Booker is an armored vehicle that is intended to support our Infantry Brigade Combat Teams by suppressing and destroying fortifications, gun systems and trench routes, and then secondarily providing protection against enemy armored vehicles.”

Evidently, in the view of the Army, these criteria make it Not a Tank.

There are also some interesting bits about the DoD pushing for Right of Repair, in a rare case where the Pentagon and Elizabeth Warren are fighting the same fight on the same side. For those not in the know, the Tank or Not a Tank Discourse is strong, and includes mockery of Michael Tracey.