>>49345
Low weight is indeed a point the Brazilian Army cares about, the competition for a new MBT has a 50 ton restriction. A friend looked into the details (it's public) and he calls it unrealistic and too conservative.
Infrastructure and jungles are irrelevant because our armored cavalry in flat terrain with good roads in the south. Only the 20th armored cavalry regiment is a bit more remote, facing Paraguay, and even then it's on flat ground.

>>49347
The Guarani is by Iveco and already assembled locally, the Centauro is by Iveco + Leonardo.
>They can catch up with subsequent modernization, maybe til 2030 or something. It's not that South America will see any major conflict. Need to just match neighbours' preparedness.
It is Argentina that will have to step up their game now. But on armored cavalry we're about even, the modernized TAM isn't any better than the modernized Leopard 1. It's silly to compare the two militaries because relations have been friendly for decades, there's no way a war will break out in core Mercosul, and yet the Army's commanders still have to menacingly place all tanks facing Argentina and Uruguay.

>>49348
>Is there any border disputes in South Am?
A tiny island and a piece of scarcely populated, windswept steppe are contested with Uruguay, but nobody cares. Border disputes aren't a real issue if the competing parties care more about their friendly relations. The disputes that do matter are on the other half of the continent: Peruvian and Bolivian claims on Chile, the Ecuadorian Amazon and Venezuelan claims on Guyana.
>A possible source of conflict could be if things in one of the countries getting out of hand and (some of) the rest would intervene on behalf of one side, "making order".
Could be separatism in Bolivia or an insurgent group like FARC spilling across the border.