Technical (vehicle)
[1][2] Barred from bringing in private security, non-governmental organizations hired local gunmen to protect their personnel, using money defined as "technical assistance grants".
[3] However, an alternative account is given by Michael Maren, who says the term was first used in Somalia in the 1980s, after engineers from Soviet arms manufacturer Tekniko mounted weapons on vehicles for the Somali National Movement during the Somaliland War of Independence.
Generally costing much less than purpose-built combat vehicles, the major asset of technicals is speed and mobility, as well as their ability to strike from unexpected directions with automatic fire and light troop deployment.
[citation needed] Light improvised fighting vehicles date back to the first use of automobiles, and to the horse-drawn tachankas mounting machine guns in eastern Europe and Russia.
At the Bombardment of Papeete during World War I, the French armed several Ford trucks with 37 mm guns to bolster their defense of the city.
1 Demolition Squadron or 'PPA' (Popski's Private Army), and the Special Air Service (SAS) were noted for their exploits in the deserts of Egypt, Libya and Chad using unarmored motor vehicles, often fitted with machine guns.
The SAS painted their Land Rovers pink as it was found to provide excellent camouflage in the desert and they were nicknamed 'Pink Panthers' or Pinkies.
[10] Tactics for employing technicals were pioneered by the Sahrawi People's Liberation Army, the armed wing of the Polisario Front, fighting for independence against Mauritania (1975–79) and Morocco (1975–present) from headquarters in Tindouf, Algeria.
MILAN anti-tank guided missiles provided by France were key to the Chadian success, while the Libyan forces were poorly deployed and organized.
Throughout the conflict in Northern Ireland (1960s-1998), the Provisional IRA fitted vehicles, especially vans and trucks, with automatic weapons, heavy machine guns,[13] and also improvised mortars.
[16][17] The IRA employed tractors and trailers to transport and fire improvised mortars, and heavy equipment to tear down fences and barbed wire and break into fortified security bases.
[23] Proving their susceptibility to heavy weapons and their value as a military prize, the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) was able to capture 30 "battlewagons" during the defeat of warlord Abdi Qeybdid's militia at the Second Battle of Mogadishu in 2006.
[26] However, forced into conventional battles in the War in Somalia (2006–2009), the unarmored technicals of the ICU proved no match for the T-55 tanks, Mil Mi-24 helicopter gunships and fighter-bombers employed by Ethiopia.
[30] The Iraqi Republican Guard and Fedayeen emulated tactics of the Somali National Alliance with limited success,[31][32] but were outmatched by Coalition armor and aviation.
[41] Some rebels have improvised with captured heavy weaponry, like BMP-1 turrets[42] and helicopter rocket pods, as well as lower-tech methods such as using doorbells to ignite rocket-launched ammunition.
The kind of weapons mounted on technicals varies widely, including machine guns, recoilless rifles, anti-aircraft autocannons (commonly ZPU and ZU-23-2) and even BMP-1 turrets.
[48] OSCE monitors recorded 15 Russian armored utility vehicles (UAZ-23632-148 Esaul) in a training area near non-government-controlled Oleksandrivska in April 2021.
