Here's How The Toyota Hilux Has Shaped Modern Conflict In The Middle East - HotCars

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It is one of the world’s highest-selling pickup trucks due to its rugged dependability and luxurious styling. Despite not being offered in the US market due to the 25% Chicken Tax, the Hilux ranks fourth in global light pickup sales behind the Ford F-150, Ram 1500, and Chevy Silverado 1500. They are purchased by all kinds of people for various tasks and purposes, including state and non-state militaries and paramilitaries in order to achieve political aims. You can hardly look at news about conflicts around the world without seeing what is becoming an increasingly familiar sight: large guns or armed men loaded to the brim of the bed of a Toyota Hilux pickup, rolling through a desert or mountain battlefield.

Toyota began production of pickup trucks in 1968, reworking the Briska trucks of recently acquired Hino. Since then, the Toyota Pickup, or Hilux, has gone through eight generations, with each one improving on durability, and incidentally, seeing increased usage in more and more rigorous applications. Currently, the Hilux is available in four grades: single cab, extra cab, the four-door double cab, and the beefed-up Invincible double cab, ranging in price in Australia from about $17,000 USD to $52,000 USD. Recently, Toyota has found itself in hot water, with US officials questioning how the automaker's products keep ending up in the hands of non-state actors and terrorist groups in Africa and the Middle East.

It began in 1986, during the latter stages of the Libyan-Chadian conflict that would come to be known as The Great Toyota War (no, seriously). France, in support of Chad’s forces, sent a shipment of 400 Toyota pickup trucks to the Chadian military, likely because they were cheaper than Humvees. In January of the following year, Chad’s forces deployed to recapture the city from the Libyan military in their Hiluxes. They made quick work of the battle, killing roughly half of the 1,600-man Libyan force stationed in Fada, then successfully outmaneuvering the Libyan Air Force’s jets with their Toyotas. Chadian losses were minimal: 18 soldiers and three of their Toyota trucks.

The Chadian military was working with newfangled inventions that would come to be known as 'technicals': they were Toyota pickups outfitted with machine guns or missile launchers. The design is remarkably simple: you take what is normally a stationary weapon on the battlefield and bolt it to the bed of a pickup truck. That’s it. The process can often take as little as ten minutes, and then you have a mobile weapon that is often nearly as well-armed as a tank. These technicals are routinely fitted with the Russian anti-aircraft DShK machine gun or MILAN anti-tank missile systems.

In the decades to come a love affair would be sparked between cash-strapped non-state actors and these technicals. The Mujahadeen used them frequently to combat the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and then in turn the Taliban weaponized them against American forces when the country was invaded by the United States. Perhaps the most well-known use of the technical is by ISIS militants in the recent conflicts in Iraq and Syria, with the machine-gun-equipped Hilux making regular appearances in Daesh propaganda videos and seeing heavy usage in combat – from the traditional technical to the armor-plated, explosive-laced VBIED.

The trucks also saw extensive use on the other side of that conflict, with the US sending 100 Hilux pickups to the YPG (People’s Protection Units), the Kurdish force which did the bulk of the fighting against the Islamic State in Syria. YPG “cavalry” units were created in which YPG forces would aggressively drive their trucks and harass enemy ISIS combatants. In this author’s own experience in the war in Syria, I drove to the frontline in a Toyota Hilux, was shot by what was likely an ISIS unit’s Hilux-mounted DShK, received a ride to an American hospital in a Hilux that had been converted to an ambulance, and then hitchhiked a ride back to my unit at 110mph along dirt roads in, you guessed it, another Toyota Hilux. The Hilux is modern warfare’s version of the American iPhone: it’s everywhere, and if you don’t have one, people tend to give you strange looks.

So, what has Toyota done to push back against the image of rebel fighters, terrorists, and armed paramilitary groups in uniform, hanging from the beds of their trucks wielding AK-47s or handling anti-aircraft weaponry? In short, very little, even in the face of American officials questioning how terror groups get their hands on so many Toyota pickups. One Toyota spokesperson went so far as to say to the New York Times in 2001 that, “It is not our proudest product placement, but it shows that the Taliban are looking for the same qualities as any truck buyer: durability and reliability.” They have certainly found it in the Hilux. And as we see the situation in Afghanistan crumble again, we see more and more Toyotas armed to the teeth. And it is likely we will continue to see the Hilux in combat, shaping the future of conflict in the Middle East and beyond until something cheaper, more rugged, more dependable, or more indestructible comes along, which has not since 1968.

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About The Author

Warren Stoddard II (4 Articles Published)

Born and raised in the Hill Country of central Texas, Warren Stoddard II attended Texas State University and there fell in love with early-model Harley-Davidsons. Following his graduation, he traveled to Syria to fight as a member of the Kurdish YPG, and was later wounded in action against the Islamic State. He is the author of the novella, No Birds in Yesterday, and his short literary work has been featured in Dice Magazine, Into the Void, The Barely South Review, and numerous other publications around the world. Find him on Instagram @warren.stoddard.