While the US Marines are having a lot of trouble developing the new V-22 aircraft, they are doing much better with their new amphibious armored vehicle. This type of vehicle, an armored personnel carrier that can take marines from larger ships off shore to a hostile beach, was first developed early in World War II. The AAAV is ahead of schedule and under budget. Among its many improvements, the AAAV will be much faster in the water (60 kilometers an hour, four times the speed of earlier amphibious assault vehicles) and still carry some 17 marines and three crew like earlier versions. The new vehicles is on track to finish testing and commence production in 2004. The marines will buy a thousand of the air conditioned (for protection from chemical weapons) vehicles.