Desert Patrol Vehicle The Desert Patrol Vehicle ( DPV ) , formerly called the Fast Attack Vehicle ( FAV ) , is a high - speed , lightly armored sandrail - like vehicle first used in combat during the Gulf War in 1991 . Due to their dash speed and off - road mobility , the DPVs were used extensively during Operation Desert Storm . The first U . S . forces to enter Kuwait City were United States Navy SEALs in DPVs . Performance . The DPV was built by Chenowth Racing Products , Inc . The German Volkswagen Kübelwagen was the first military Light Utility Vehicle based on the Volkswagen Beetle which uses rear - wheel rather than four - wheel drive for mobility . Volkswagen components were also the basis for the postwar dune buggy , and its layout is used in the DPV with rear - mounted air - cooled Volkswagen engine . This makes the lightweight vehicle capable of accelerating from 0 to 30 mph ( 0 – 50 km / h ) in only four seconds and able to travel at speeds of up to 80 mph ( 130 km / h ) . With its standard 21 gallon ( 79 . 5 litre ) fuel tank , the DPV has a range of about 210 miles ( 338 km ) . An optional fuel bladder can extend the range to over 1 , 000 miles ( 1 , 610 km ) . Payload capacity is 1500 lb ( 680 kg ) . History . The DPV is a variant of the Fast Attack Vehicle , which was developed during the 1980s as part of the United States Army ' s High Technology Light Division ( 9th Infantry Division ) . The HTLD was given carte blanche to develop doctrine , decide force structure , and design equipment by then Army Chief of Staff Edward C . Meyer . One of the pieces of equipment created was the Fast Attack Vehicle . Chenowth delivered 120 FAVs to the Army in 1982 . HTTB ( High Technology Test Bed ) in the units in the 9th Infantry were first to deploy these vehicles . Along with light off - road motorcycles , the FAV was intended to provide a highly mobile component to the mostly foot infantry unit . Eventually , the FAVs were replaced by Humvee s in general military use , which did not provide nearly the speed nor extreme off - road capabilities of the FAVs . FAVs were transferred to special forces use where it has been largely replaced by the Light Strike Vehicle . Armament . The original tests used commercial dune buggies modified to carry weapons such as TOW missiles and recoilless rifle s . The recoilless rifles still had enough recoil to flip the lightweight dune buggies and were abandoned . The TOW missiles had much greater success , but they violated existing Army TOW doctrine . The Army had determined that a TOW needed a 3 man team to operate it . The DPVs could only carry a two man crew and they seemed perfectly capable of operating the TOW , but this would have meant revising Army doctrine and possibly changing TOW deployment throughout the Army . Fort Benning decided to offer a " superior " DPV design that allowed a third crewman . This design was rejected by the HTLD team and was never produced . The basic weapons on a DPV consist of a heavy . 50 caliber M2 Browning machine gun , two lighter 7 . 62x51 mm M60 machine gun s , and two M136 AT4 anti - armor weapons . In some cases , the driver ' s M60 or the gunner ' s M2 is replaced with a 40 mm Mk 19 grenade launcher . Other light machine gun s such as the M240 machine gun or 5 . 56x45 mm M249 SAW can also be mounted . Similar US equipment . The United States Marines Corps also fielded a Fast Attack Vehicle – a completely different piece of equipment based on the venerable M151 MUTT . This FAV stayed in use long after the fielding of the HMMWV because it could fit on Marine Corps helicopters while the wider HMMWV could not . In 1999 , this FAV began to be replaced with the Interim Fast Attack Vehicle ( IFAV ) a version of the Mercedes - Benz MB 290 GD 1 . 5 ton truck . In fiction . The DPV has appeared in many video games and movies .