The Europa Jeep was an abandoned, multinational military vehicle project.

During the 1960s, several Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

an governments began cooperating on development of a vehicle known as the Europa Jeep, a lightweight, amphibious four wheel drive vehicle that could be mass produced for use by various national military and government groups. Development of the vehicle proved time consuming, however, and by 1979 the project had been abandoned.

The German government was in need of a limited number of light, inexpensive, durable transport vehicles that could fulfill their basic needs while the Europa Jeep was being developed and put into production. Volkswagen was instead instructed by the German government to create the Volkswagen 181

Volkswagen 181

The Volkswagen Type 181 "Kurierwagen", popularly known in the United Kingdom as the Trekker , in the United States as the Thing, and in Mexico as the Safari, was a small military vehicle produced by Volkswagen from 1969 to 1983, although civilian sales stopped in 1980...

. After the abandonment of the Europa Jeep a number of NATO countries also adopted the 181.