The record
The Santana 2000 was Metalúrgica de Santa Ana's two-tonne forward-control truck, presented in February 1979 as the successor to the 1.3-tonne Santana 1300 of 1967. Both derived from the 109-inch Land Rover Santana, with the cab pushed forward over the front axle to free a long, low load bed. The 2000 used Santana's own 3,429 cc straight six — 104 CV and 241 Nm on petrol, 94 CV and 309 Nm on diesel — through a four-speed synchromesh gearbox and two-speed transfer case, with permanent four-wheel drive, 280 mm of ground clearance and a 4,600 kg gross weight.
Because it was supplied as a chassis-cab, the 2000 wore a great variety of bodies. Santana's own catalogue included an insulated van, and a closed box body of that kind is exactly the sort of structure a mobile radio or command post would need: a sealed working compartment with a bench, equipment racks, a generator, antenna mounts and blackout curtains. The Spanish Army did operate vehicles like this in quantity — but on the Land Rover 109. Under Programa OLIMPO, launched in 1980 as a stopgap while the RADITE digital network fell behind schedule, the army standardised its field signal centres around a family of stations named after gods (Hermes, Minerva, Centauro, Tritón, Plutón, Ceres and Mercurio), most of them carried in the hard-topped LR-109 ETRS, with S-280 shelters, BMR and TOA vehicles taking over in later years.
No published source consulted for this record places a Santana 2000 in that role, or in Spanish military service at all: Santana's documented military line ran through the 88 Ligero, the 109 Militar and later the Aníbal. This record comes from user-supplied reference photographs that could not be traced, so it is honestly recorded as a draft — a genuine chassis and a plausible body, with the military radio role unverified.
Research status: draft — identification, dates or figures could not all be pinned down; the summary says what is unresolved.
