West German late 1960's

As I have purchased some SPZ12-3 for another project for which they were replaced, it seems a waste not to do something with them.
From my copy of Bruce Rea-Taylors army lisst for the 1950's and 60's I can create the following.

1968 Panzer grenadier brigade. This is only good to the early 1970's when the Marder was introduced.

Brigade HQ
SPZ12-3 ICT

2 Battalions BHQ SPZ12-3 ICT
1 SPZ 52-3 120mm SP mortar
3 coy 4 SPZ12-3 ICT

1 Battalion BHQ 1 MBT
4 coy 4 MBT
MBT may be either Leopard 1 or M48A3

1 battalion 1 AOP
4 M109G (plain M109)

At Coy
2 JPZ Rackette
4 JPZ Kannone

Recce coy
2 SPZ 11-2

Engineer coy
1 AVLB (M48 or Leopard)

The reserve units are possibly more interesting, though I'm not sure if I'm brave enough to run a battalion of what are essentially STUG's in MSH. this list is good to the late 1970's

Brigade HQ Inf/Truck

3 Battlions BHQ in SPZ 12-3
1 120mm Mortar/truck
1 coy 3 SPZ 12-3 ICT (may swap for M113)
2 coy 3 inf/truck

1 Battalion BHQ SPZ 12-3
1coy 2JPZ rakette
3 coy 4 JPZ Kanone

1 battalion 1 AOP
4 105mm or 15mm 5 M114

Just for completeness I'll include the Panzer or Pz Gr divisional recon battalion.

BHQ SPZ11-2
2 Coy
5 SPZ 11-2
2 MBT

1 Coy
2 MBT
2 SPZ 11-2 ICT
1 SPZ 11-2 81mm Mortar

On the trail

There has been a meme running round the wargaming blogs sphere of late about how we should all get better at project management, to avoid project creep and ensure that we don't wind up with piles of lead that we will take to our graves (creating a stack of mini toxic waste dumps in the process).
personally I think its a nice idea, but fat chance of it happening as wargamers as a breed are restrained and sensible creatures when confronted with the latest models.

This was going to be a discussion on what I should buy next army wise, but rethinking it this is a bit boring really. Instead I will go through a bit of research I've been putting together in the last couple of days.

I've been interested in the Austrian army fixed fortifications for a while now. One of my sources of information was this document, a PDF for the fire and fury rule set. Now, while the lists are possibly the worst format I've ever seen (and I've created lists from the DBM medieval German army list), there are some gems buried in there. On page 10 under the panzer battalion notes it suggests that there was still a battalion of M47 tanks in the early 1980's. Initially I was very skeptical of this, as I knew that the Austrian army had brought the M60 in the mid 1960's. However it seems that they only purchased 120 tanks, which is only enough for 2 battalions plus some spares and training tanks. given that there were 3 brigades in the only regular division it seems possible that the 3rd tank battalion was indeed still M47's. good enough form me to buy a battalions worth.

Its hard not to be tempted by the fortification units as well. while the Centurion and M47 turrets make sense,  the Charioteer turrets with a 20 prd gun are just too tempting.