As in the past, the Israeli Defense Force will rely on an effective tool – the armored D9R bulldozer – to root out Hamas militants and clear deadly explosives.
Bulldozers have been useful military tools since WWII when the British developed the first armored dozer, a Caterpillar D7 medium-sized tractor (31, 870 lbs/14,456 kg) fitted with engine and driver-protecting armor.
Produced in preparation for the Battle of Normandy, the D7s were assigned to clearing the invasion beaches of obstacles and quickly making roads accessible by clearing rubble and filling in bomb craters. Over the next days, weeks and months, Israeli D9Rs will take on similar tasks in an environment just as, or more, dangerous.
Based on Caterpillar’s 110,225 lb (50,000 kg), 452 horsepower D9, the D9R is nicknamed “Doobi” – Hebrew for teddy bear. While the massive machines may not look particularly cuddly, they have saved many Israeli lives and arguably, many Palestinian lives as well.
Doobis are operated by the IDF’s Combat Engineering Corps whose roles include road breaching, counter-mobility of enemy forces, construction and destruction under fire, sabotage, explosives, bomb disposal, and counter-weapons of mass destruction.
Commercial market D9s are imported to Israel by local Caterpillar dealer, Israeli Tractors and Equipment (ITE) part of the construction group, Zoko Enterprises. Working in conjunction with the IDF’s Technology and Maintenance Corps, Zoko/ITE and Israel Aerospace Industries add advanced armor to the bulldozers including slat armor (cage or standoff type armor) to base D9s.
The armor kit provides protection to the D9’s engine and hydraulic systems as well as the operator cabin. The D9R is crewed by a driver/operator and commander. Bullet-proof glass and armored cabin pillars are augmented by slat armor which prevents rocket-propelled grenades, anti-tank missiles and rockets from lodging in/around the cab structure. The kit, including belly armor and a beefed-up dozer blade, adds approximately 34,000 pounds (15,422 kg) to the D9s overall weight.
The D9Rs can be fitted with crew-operated machine guns and grenade launchers. The bulldozers also integrate the Active Protection Systems (APS) in use with the IDF’s Merkava tanks including Elbit Systems Iron Fist for which a contract was awarded in 2019. In the future, directed energy weapons could be integrated and would logically find application in mine or IED clearance operations with the machines.
Some of these types of operations are currently carried out by unmanned versions of the bulldozer, older D9N variants colloquially-called “Raam HaShachar” (“thunder of dawn”). Piloted using optical sensors which relay a visual presentation to a remote operator, the D9Ns performed well during the Second Lebanon War in 2006 and Operation Cast Lead in Gaza in 2008-2009.
Previous versions of the D9 armored bulldozer (D9L, D9N) have been central to Gaza Strip campaigns including operations during the Second Intifada (2000-2005) like the Battle of Jenin (2002). Combat use of Caterpillar dozers stretches back to the Sinai War of 1956, the Six-Day War in 1967, the Yom Kippur War (1973) and the 1982 Operation Peace for Galilee.
Several years ago, ITE partnered with Israeli satellite communications company, hiSky Ltd to integrate hiSky’s Smartellite satellite terminal with a range of the machines and vehicle platforms, ITE provides.
The terminals were expected to deliver IoT connectivity, enabling transmission and reception of data to/from control centers, location and data analysis, various telematics, designation of assignments to platforms, remote data transmission and computer updates, via hiSky’s satellite communication system – a service that would work where local cellular and radio networks do not exist or do not function. Like Gaza.
While I was not able to confirm the integration of Smartellite terminals in IDF D9Rs, it would make sense in tactical scenarios and allow for coordination with IDF command-control and other military assets/personnel in the debris-strewn streets of Gaza City.
As of last week, the Combat Engineering Corps had amassed approximately 100 D9Rs at Gaza’s edge, joined by large numbers of tanks and armored personnel carriers. They’ll join with more advanced drone systems, air-dropped precision munitions and small robotic vehicles to wage the fight in Gaza and hopefully, minimize Israeli and Palestinian casualties.
But one of war’s ironies is that machines designed as tools to facilitate human development are often just as effective in destroying it.
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