Glossary term
ABSV (armoured battlefield support vehicle)
TERM SUMMARY
ABSV is the NATO abbreviation for armoured battlefield support vehicle. NATO's glossary of acronyms lists it, with the French equivalent véhicule blindé d'appui tactique.
- Why it matters
- ABSV stands for armoured battlefield support vehicle . It is an abbreviation listed in NATO's Glossary of NATO Acronyms and Abbreviations (AAP-15), where the French equivalent is given as véhicule blindé d'appui...
- Category
- Canadian government procurement terminology
- Reference role
- This term page is designed to be linkable, crawlable, and easy to quote or summarize.
ABSV stands for armoured battlefield support vehicle. It is an abbreviation listed in NATO's Glossary of NATO Acronyms and Abbreviations (AAP-15), where the French equivalent is given as véhicule blindé d'appui tactique. The entry carries the reference AC/224. You can read it in the NATO glossary.
ABSV is a NATO terminology term. It should not be confused with ACSV, the Canadian Armoured Combat Support Vehicle program run by National Defence and the Canadian Army. The two abbreviations look alike and describe related kinds of vehicles, but the expansions differ, and so do the sources behind them.
Where ABSV sits in NATO terminology
NATO publishes its non-classified military terminology through NATOTerm, which it describes as its official terminology database and which the NATO Terminology Office maintains. The acronym glossary is a companion reference that lists abbreviations alongside their English and French forms. ABSV appears there as a paired English and French entry, which makes it a standardized abbreviation rather than a product name or a program name.
For readers who work with allied or multinational documents, this means ABSV is most likely to appear in NATO-origin text. The reference to check is the NATOTerm database.
ABSV compared with Canada's ACSV
Canada's own program uses a different expansion. ACSV means Armoured Combat Support Vehicle, and National Defence describes it on its ACSV procurement page. The word "battlefield" belongs to the NATO term. The word "combat" belongs to the Canadian one.
- ABSV: NATO abbreviation for armoured battlefield support vehicle.
- ACSV: Canadian program name for Armoured Combat Support Vehicle.
The ACSV fleet is based on the LAV 6.0 platform and is intended to replace the LAV II Bison and M113 Tracked LAV fleets.
What Canada's ACSV program covers
The ACSV project provides a fleet of 550 armoured combat support vehicles for domestic and international operations. In September 2019, the Government of Canada awarded General Dynamics Land Systems-Canada a contract for 360 ACSVs, as recorded in a National Defence proactive disclosure.
The program includes eight variants: command post, mobile repair, maintenance and recovery, ambulance, electronic warfare, engineer, troop cargo and fitter cargo vehicles. National Defence listed these when it announced delivery of the first vehicles to the Canadian Army in October 2023.
The contract also carried an industrial obligation. A related National Defence disclosure states that the contractor was required to reinvest 100% of the contract value into the Canadian economy.
What ABSV and ACSV mean for a supplier bidding on Canadian contracts
Search and monitor for the term that the buyer uses. The Canadian program documents cited on this page use ACSV, so a supplier tracking Canadian armoured support vehicle work should include ACSV, and its variant names, in its keyword lists. ABSV belongs in the list for NATO-origin documents and multinational standards material.
Read each solicitation on its own wording. Do not carry requirements, certifications or contract clauses from one abbreviation over to the other. If a tender document uses either term, confirm the expansion in the document itself before scoping a bid.