Key Points and Summary – The U.S. Army’s M10 Booker, intended as the Bradley Fighting Vehicle’s successor, was canceled due to a cascade of critical flaws.
-Its primary problem was excessive weight; at 42 tons, it was too heavy for its air-deployable “light tank” role, offering tank-like weight without tank-like protection.
PD1 – Delivery of First Production Vehicle M10 Booker Combat Vehicle. Image Credit: U.S. Army.
The M10 Booker Combat Vehicle proudly displays its namesake on the gun tube during the Army Birthday Festival at the National Museum of the U.S. Army, June 10, 2023. The M10 Booker Combat Vehicle is named after two American service members: Pvt. Robert D. Booker, who posthumously received the Medal of Honor for actions in World War II, and Staff Sgt. Stevon A. Booker, who posthumously received the Distinguished Service Cross for actions during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Their stories and actions articulate the Army’s need for the M10 Booker Combat Vehicle, an infantry assault vehicle that will provide protection and lethality to destroy threats like the ones that took the lives of these two Soldiers. (U.S. Army photo by Bernardo Fuller)
-These fundamental design and safety failures ultimately doomed the once-promising Mobile Protected Firepower program after it had already entered low-rate production.
Too Heavy, Too Hot, and Toxic: A Post-Mortem on the M10 Booker
The Bradley Fighting Vehicle has faithfully served as the U.S. Army’s mainstay armored fighting vehicle (AFV) and infantry fighting vehicle (IFV) since 1981.
In that time, it has proven its combat mettle in numerous conflicts, including Operation Desert Storm, Operation Iraqi Freedom, and the current Russo-Ukrainian War.
However, the Bradley is starting to get a bit long in the tooth.
Moreover, it is showing itself to be increasingly vulnerable.
With that in mind, the U.S. Army in June 2023 unveiled its would-be successor to the venerable Bradley: the M10 Booker armored combat vehicle.
The Booker seemed to have a lot of promise, yet earlier this year it was cancelled. Why did the M10 Booker fail?
Bottom Line Up Front (BLUF): M10 Booker Too Heavy
One of the biggest reasons for the Booker’s cancellation was its excessive weight, a staggering 42 tons. That defeats the whole purpose of an IFV, or a “light tank” (depending on which semantics one prefers).
Beyond conceptual incompatibility, its weight made the M10 incompatible with air mobility doctrines (i.e. the capability of being air-dropped by C-130 Hercules) and unusable in many of the rapid-deployment scenarios for which it was originally conceived.
To put it another way, the M10 Booker offered the worst of both worlds: It approached the weight and form factor of a main battle tank such as the M1 Abrams, but without the corresponding armor protection or firepower.
Additional Woes for the M10 Booker
As if that excess weight weren’t bad enough, the Booker endangered its own crews. Toxic gas would fill the turret after the main gun was fired, and the vehicle would overheat under hot performance conditions because of air flow issues. The good news is those issues do seem to have been fixed.
According to the Centuries of Combat website, further maladies included “inconsistent performance in fire control systems and “challenges with vehicle vision systems.”
In Happier Times for the M10 Booker
The M10 Booker was the winner of the Army’s Mobile Protected Firepower (MPF) program.
As stated by Maj. Gen. Glenn Dean, program executive officer for ground combat systems, “’It’s been a tremendously successful program … on schedule, on budget, and performing well in testing.
“It’s very exciting for us to name a new combat vehicle—this hasn’t happened, at least in my portfolio, since we fielded the Stryker—and to name it after two great American heroes”
The beneficiary of that initial MPF success was General Dynamics Land Systems, (GDLS), winner of a $1.14 billion U.S. Army contract that was part of a broader $17 billion program.
Production began early in 2023, with the Army expecting a full battalion of 42 Booker Combat Vehicles by late 2025. The service hoped to eventually field more than 500 M10s.
M10 Booker. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
M10 Booker Double-Namesake
The M10 Booker had two namesakes. The first was Pvt. Robert D. Booker, who was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor after being killed under heavy machine-gun fire in the vicinity of Fondouk, Tunisia, on April 9, 1943.
The other was Staff Sgt. Stevon A. Booker, who was killed in Iraq on April 5, 2003, during the Thunder Run in Baghdad.
He was posthumously awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, the Army’s second-highest honor.
Thus the M10 Booker has the distinction of being the first U.S. Army vehicle to be named for a post-9/11 veteran, and the second to be named in honor of two soldiers (the first being the Stryker, named in honor of two Medal of Honor recipients: Pfc. Stuart S. Stryker, who served during World War II, and Spc. Robert F. Stryker, who served in Vietnam).
These two brave soldiers are probably rolling over in their graves over the failure of their armored namesake.
About the Author: Christian D. Orr, Defense Expert
Christian D. Orr is a Senior Defense Editor. He is a former Air Force Security Forces officer, Federal law enforcement officer, and private military contractor (with assignments worked in Iraq, the United Arab Emirates, Kosovo, Japan, Germany, and the Pentagon). Chris holds a B.A. in International Relations from the University of Southern California (USC) and an M.A. in Intelligence Studies (concentration in Terrorism Studies) from American Military University (AMU). He is also the author of the newly published book “Five Decades of a Fabulous Firearm: Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Beretta 92 Pistol Series.”
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