The term ‘technical’ itself comes from Somalia in the early 90′. Some private security agencies were hiring mercenaries, but officialy the expense was filed as ‘technical assistance’. The term would quickly gain popularity and it is now used to describe any civilian car with improvised weapons. Toyota pickups are know for their reliability and sturdiness, so naturally they became one of the first choice. The technical will usually be armed with a heavy machine gun, a recoilless gun or an AA auto-cannon. The safety of the soldiers isn’t usually a priority, although there are technicals partially or fully covered with armoured plates.
A technical seems a perfect weapon in guerilla and terrorist tactics. It is very cheap, fast and reliable. Armed pickups can move quickly providing the element of surprise and run away before the regular army can regroup and fight back. So it makes sense that the tacticals has been playing a great part in many local conflicts, especially in north Africa and the Middle East. We could see them all around the news when the Arab Spring, a series of armed rebellions, burst out a couple of years ago.
One of those uprisings was the conflict in Libya in 2011. A series of protests against the dictatorship of Muammar Kaddafi escalated to a regular civil war. The vehicle I’ll be working on was used in Libya by the rebel forces.
Let’s look at other technicals from Libya as it’s a goldmine for us modellers.