CaptJosh: Your correction is slightly incorrect =) Yes, this is a scooter. Scooters may or may not be mopeds. My -96 Vespa PK50XL2 is in fact both a scooter and a moped, but has no pedals. Pedals are not required for a motorbike to be a moped, though the source of the term is "motor-pedal". Nowadays (that is, the last 30 years or so...) the term moped simply implies that the speed is restricted to approximately 50 km/h form an engine of no larger displacement than 50 cubic centimeters. In the European Union that is 45 km/h, and the power output has to be >5hp. Some mopeds are scooters, some look like speedway bikes, others like enduro/cross motorbikes, classic "naked" motorbikes or even choppers. Vespa even made a very small three-wheel cargovan called Ape wich, in the 50cc version, is actually a moped.

This scooter, however, is unlikely to be a moped. It may be a smallframe Vespa, but i gather that, with the load it is meant to carry, it would be based on a 125cc model. It may be a largeframe, I can´t tell from the picture since I am not very familiar with Vespas before 1990, and if so it may have a 125, 150, 160 180 or 200 cc engine. Or, it could have been custom built for the army with any old engine setup.

Either way it is one of the craziest Scooters I´ve seen, and I´d love to do a replica - all though I very much doubt that I could get it road legal here in Norway...