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Argentina placed an order for 112 Sk-105 and eigth Greif ARV in 1981, also six repair and maintenance Steyr truck were included in the contract.
Originally, these vehicles were ordered by Chile, but later, international pressures had caused the cancelation of the contract and Argentina acquired the
contract vehicles in 1981 and the first deliveries were in 1983, when "democracy" returned to Argentina.
These tanks equiped the 9th and 10th Tank Cavalry Regiment (41 tank each), 4th Mountain Cavalry Regiment (13 tanks) and 3th Light Cavalry Regiment
(17 tanks), all of them in the Patagonia, in the South of Argentina. They are well suited for the soft and mountainous geography of the south, where the
light weight and high mobility suit the terrain.
In 1994, the argentinian armoured forces started a little upgrade, the TAM VC production was completed and all Sk-105 received many improvements.
In 1996, the Austrian goverment gave to Argentinian Army six JagdPanzer KA2 for use in the UN missions. Four vehicles were deployed in
Bosnia - Herzegovina, with all white paint scheme and UN badges in black. The Argentinian Army had another four Sk-105 in this mission. The
remainning two KA2 tanks was used in Buenos Aires for training. At the same time all the original 112 Sk-105 tanks were upgraded with all improvements
to KA2 standard, except the autoloader. This program finished in 1998.
In 1999, the Army started a program for buy another 67 Sk-105 tanks, for 13th Tank Cavalry Regiment (41 vehicles), 5th and 15th Light Cavalry
Regiments (13 each) to replace the old AMX-13/105 light tank in these units. This program included the adquisition for another four Greif recovery
vehicles and twelve Pioner armoured engineer vehicles, but the program was stopped for economic problems.
In 2002 all 118 argentinian Sk-105 were deployed in Argentina, the six original KA2 used for training in the Cavalry School, and the remaining in the
southern units. The operational availability of the Sk-105 tanks in the Argentinian Army is nearly 75%.
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