In the Cold War years, the USA, which wanted to be able to transport division-level power from the air to any point in the world within 96 hours, started to prıcure Stryker 8×8 platforms.
The USA, which has hundreds of Stryker 8×8 wheeled armoured vehicles of different variants in its inventory, signed a sustainment agreement with General Dynamics Land Systems, one of the country's leading defence companies. Under the contract of US USD 428 million, the company will provide logistical support in the fields of field level maintenance, maintenance support, equipment procurement, training and maintenance. According to the statement of the Department of Defence, the contract will remain valid until 2025.
Developed on a common chassis, Strykers have a total of 18 variants, 10 of which have a flat bottom structure, seven with a V-type hull form and one with increased firepower. Some of these models are; armoured personnel carrier, mobile gun system, reconnaissance vehicle, armoured mortar vehicle, command-control vehicle, engineering squad vehicle, fire support vehicle, armoured anti-tank vehicle, edical evacuation vehicle, CBRN reconnaissance vehicle and Stryker Dragoon. The USA, which had 4,466 Strykers in its inventory when production ended in 2014, had procured about 60 Strykers to Thailand in recent months.
Due to the changing threat scales, the US Army decided to modify some of the vehicles to have a double V hull form. Steps were also taken to modernize some Stryker by equipping it with a 30 mm turret and renaming it Stryker Dragoon.
