United Defense is a United Statesdefense contractor with its corporate headquarters in Arlington, Virginia. It produces tracked vehicles and gun systems. The company started as a division of the agricultural machine business, Food Machinery Corporation (FMC), when they won a US government contract to build LVTs and became a weapon manufacturer during World War II. FMC later spun the defense buisness off as its own company. From 1997 until 2004 it was owned by the Carlyle Group.
