U.S. military is in search of a new all-purpose vehicle

We talked some time ago about the fact that the U.S. military is looking into replacing their fleet of Hummers in the following years, and about the potential options that they might go for.
Well in related news, it would appear that General Dynamics are hoping to get a different part of that very limited, but very lucrative market, by selling their Land Systems Ground Mobility Vehicle – GMV – to the U.S. Military.
The military is looking for a vehicle to meet some very stringent demands in regards to transportability, mobility, modularity and technology, and the GMV appears to meet all of those requirements.
What all of those things mean is that the vehicle can fit in a standard aircraft, can go into action very quickly after it is unloaded, does equally well both on- and off-road and is also easily adapted to work with other existing technologies.
As far as the information that is out there goes, we know that the GMV features a center-mounted engine – of course – to offer better weight distribution, and the body is built in such a way to maximize modularity, allowing it to keep up as various technologies evolve over the next couple of years.
This isn’t just a project or in the prototype phase either, the vehicle has already went through a two-year testing period meant to prove its viability, and it has also passed user trials at the U.S. Army proving grounds.
That sort of acknowledgement is important because the U.S. Military is planning on acquiring 1,300 vehicles which have to be easily transported by air, feature high mobility and a high weapons capacity. The contract however won’t be awarded till January of 2013, so other contenders may appear in the meanwhile, we’ll keep you posted when we have more information.