NATO explores APS standardisation

Work is proceeding within NATO toward establishing STANAG 4686, which would define the performance levels of armoured vehicles' active protection systems. This would be in addition to the existing, well-established standardisation agreements embodied in STANAG 4569 on the levels of ballistic protection of armoured vehicles and the threat of blast mines to them. The new STANAG has been ratified recently in principle and the first three of its eight volumes are now being ratified but details of it all remain to be released. In the meantime, Czech magazine ATM has reported that tests have already been carried out in the Czech Republic according to STANAG 4686 with the Czech Explosively Formed Axe (EFA) active protection system. The tests were conducted against RPG-7 rocket-propelled grenades and, in keeping with STANAG 4686, took into account not only the failure of the grenades to defeat their targets but also how little, if any, collateral damage the active protection system caused. So far, only the EFA's developers have agreed to have their system tested in accordance with STANAG 4686. However, its tests represent a significant contribution to the efforts of the NATO working group to finalise the new standard. The chairman of the working party has been Ricolt Boeschoten of the Netherlands' TNO research organisation and he, together with a group of international observers, attended the Czech tests