Marine_ A Guided Tour Of A Marine Expeditionary Unit Part 6

Fire Support Marine units are primarily infantry-based formations, which depend upon the fire of supporting units to achieve their objectives. Supporting fire must be both accurate and lethal to allow lightly laden Marines to stand up to everything they might have to face, from irregular forces (as encountered in Somalia and Liberia) to conventional military units like those in the Persian Gulf. Without firepower, Marines have to trade their lives to take objectives; and the American people simply will not accept excessive casualties. Thus, Marines have a great professional interest in fire support. Almost every Marine can read a map, use a radio, and call in fire from ships, aircraft, or artillery. A single rifle platoon might receive air support from AV-8B Harrier IIs or AH-1W Super Cobras, and artillery support from a battery of 155mm guns, or an offsh.o.r.e destroyer or cruiser. The Corps is currently suffering a severe shortfall of fire support. In the five years following Desert Storm, the Marines and the Navy lost over half of their total fire-support resources with the decommissioning of the lowa-cla.s.s (BB-61) battleships and retirement of many support aircraft and artillery units. This is a source of severe concern to Marine and Navy leaders.

A Marine mans an M2 Browning .50-caliber machine gun mounted on an HMMWV.

OFFICIAL U.S. MARINE CORPS PHOTO.

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Browning M2.50-Caliber Machine Gun To listen to an old Marine "Gunny," you would think it was the most beautiful of women. The M2 .50-caliber machine gun is a favorite heavy weapon of Marines and ground troops everywhere. This heavy machine gun provides a base of fire for the rifle platoon and company. It forces the enemy to keep his head down and confronts him with a threat he must neutralize. While he is trying to knock out the d.a.m.ned machine gun, Marines can maneuver onto his flanks or close with his position. A heavy machine gun can shred dry-wall or wooden buildings, or unarmored vehicles. At short ranges and favorable angles it can even penetrate the side or rear plating of armored vehicles. This makes it a very very dangerous piece of equipment to have in your pocket. dangerous piece of equipment to have in your pocket.

The "50 cal" first entered service with the U.S. Army in 1919, too late for service in World War I. During the Second World War it was standard armament on American fighter and bomber aircraft, and was widely employed as an anti-aircraft weapon on every kind of ship and ground vehicle. The M2 is an automatic recoil-operated, air-cooled machine gun that weighs 84 1b/38 kg. Recoil-operated means that it uses an ingenious arrangement of levers, cams, and springs to capture part of the recoil energy to extract and eject the spent cartridge case, feed the next round, load it, and fire it. This cycle repeats as long as the gunner holds down the V-shaped trigger located between two hand grips at the rear of the gun. Release the trigger and a latch secures the mechanism in the "open bolt" position, ready to fire again.

The .50-cal can be found in the turret of the AAV-7/LVTP-7 amphibious tractor, on the simple pintle mount on the HMMWV, and on the high-tech coaxial mount on the Avenger air-defense vehicle. The weapons platoon of a Marine rifle company fires it from a hefty 44-1b/20-kg tripod. It takes at least two Marines to carry the weapon, plus men to carry cans of ammunition. The ammunition is a.s.sembled into belts with reusable spring clips called "disintegrating links," which are stripped off by the gun's feeder mechanism. The rate of fire is 550 rounds per minute, and gunners are trained to fire short bursts to conserve ammunition. The theoretical maximum range is 4.22 mi/6.8 km, and the M2 has even been used for "indirect fire" at high angles of elevation to create a "fire-beaten zone" on the other side of a hill. In typical battlefield conditions the practical range is about 1.1 mi/1.8 km. The legendary lethality of the M2 derives from the heavy charge of propellant in the cartridge and the superb ballistic shape of the projectile, which has a distinctive "boat tail." There are several ammunition types. These include target-practice (TP), armor-piercing solid-shot, armor-piercing incendiary (API), and high-explosive (HE).

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An HMMWV on patrol with an Mkl9 40mm grenade launcher mounted on top. This weapon can fire all of the same rounds as the M203 grenade launcher.

OFFICIAL U.S. MARINE CORPS PHOTO.

Over the years, many firms have produced the M2 on license from the holders of John M. Browning's original patent. The current contractor producing the M2 for the U.S. Department of Defense is Saco Defense, Inc., and the FY-1994 unit cost was $8,118.00. Its unique combination of range, lethality, durability, and simplicity guarantees that the M2 will soldier on well into the next century. In fact, the last Marine M2 gunner has probably not yet been born.

Mk 19 40mm Machine Gun, Mod 3 Back in the 1960s, deep in the swamps of the Mekong Delta where a well-concealed and heavily armed Viet Cong ambush might lurk around the next bend in the river, crews of U.S. Navy patrol craft discovered that .50-cal machine gun fire was often insufficient to break up an attack. They needed a weapon that could spew out a stream of explosive grenades to suppress enemy forces. To meet this need, the Navy developed the Mk 19, officially cla.s.sed as a "machine gun," but actually an automatic grenade launcher. The Mk 19 had a long and troubled development cycle, earning the nickname "Dover Dog," after the Delaware a.r.s.enal where it was designed. After a series of modifications, it has proven itself in service with the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps. The Mk 19 is an extremely simple weapon using the "blowback" principle. The barrel and receiver a.s.sembly recoil against a heavy spring, and as they rebound, the next round is loaded and fired. The weapon fires the same family of 40mm grenades as the M203 launcher attached to the M 16 rifle.

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An M 19 towed howitzer a.s.signed to BLT 2/6, b.u.t.toned up and ready for deployment.

JOHN D. GRESHAM.

By itself the weapon weighs 72.5 lb/33 kg. It was designed to use the same tripod as the M2 .50-cal. machine gun, but is also found in the turret of the AAV-7/LVTP-7 amphibious tractor. The cyclic rate of fire is from 325 to 375 rounds per minute, but the practical rate of fire is about 40 rounds per minute in short bursts. To achieve the maximum range of 2.2 km/1.37 mi, you have to elevate the weapon to loft the grenades and forget about real accuracy. Practical range for flat-trajectory fire is about 1,500 m/4920 ft. There are several types of ammunition, a.s.sembled into disintegrating link belts and transported in metal canisters. The HEDP (high-explosive, dual-purpose) grenade will pierce 2 in./51mm of armor, and spray metal fragments that can kill within 5 m/ 16.4 ft and wound within 15 m/49.2 ft. Other types of ammunition include incendiary, smoke, and tear gas rounds. The Mk 19 is usually found in the weapons platoon of a rifle company and the weapons company of a rifle battalion. One Marine can load and fire the weapon, but it requires a team of three to four to carry it, along with a supply of grenades. It is manufactured by Saco Defense, and the 1994 unit cost was $13,758.00.

Mortars Mortars are the company or battalion commander's own personal artillery. The mortar is a portable, cheap, and simple weapon: just a metal tube with a bipod elevating bracket and a heavy base plate. You a.s.semble the weapon, aim the mortar at the target, and drop the mortar round down the barrel. The round strikes a firing pin at the bottom of the tube, and off it goes. Limitations of the mortar are its relatively short range and inaccuracy. But this old weapon is now gaining new respect, thanks to the development of precision guided ammunition.

Marines employ two different kinds of mortars. The M224, used in the heavy weapons platoon of the rifle company, is a 60mm weapon weighing only 46.5 lb/21 kg. Maximum range is 2.2 mi/3.5 km. A good crew can sustain a rate of fire of around twenty rounds per minute. The other model, the M252, is used in the heavy weapons company of the infantry battalion. An 81mm weapon, it is based on a 1970s British design, weighs 89 lb/40 kg, and has a maximum range of 3.5 mi/5.6 km. The sustained rate of fire is sixteen rounds per minute. There is a wide variety of ammunition types in each caliber, including high-explosive, smoke, and incendiary rounds. High-explosive rounds can be fitted either with an impact fuse or a proximity fuse that detonates at a preset alt.i.tude, showering the target with fragments.

M198 155mm Towed Howitzer This big gun is one of the more controversial weapons in the Marine a.r.s.enal. While it is the Marines' primary field artillery piece, the Corps leadership feels that the M 198 is simply too big and too heavy. Also, it takes up too much s.p.a.ce on amphibious lift ships, and in firing position it is too vulnerable, especially when a quant.i.ty of ammunition is stacked near the gun. In addition, the M198 has a high center of gravity, which makes it p.r.o.ne to tipping over and being difficult to handle. On the other hand, it uses standard, widely available 155mm ammunition with terrific lethality. Weighing 15,758 1b/7,154 kg, it requires a heavy (5-ton) truck to tow it, along with its eleven-man crew and a supply of ammunition. It can be lifted as a sling load by the CH-53E helicopter. The M198 can hurl a projectile up to 14 mi/22.4 km, and a special rocket-a.s.sisted projectile extends this range to 18.6 mi/30 km. The 566 guns in the Marine inventory will serve for at least another decade, until the introduction of a new lightweight howitzer which is under development.

Mk 45 5-in./54 Naval Gun Mount With the retirement of the Iowa- Iowa-cla.s.s (BB-61) battleships, the Navy's gunfire support capability is reduced to one or two of these rifled 5-in./ 127mm weapons on each major surface combatant (cruiser, destroyer, and a few amphibious ships). Built by United Defense's Great Northern Division, the Mk 45 5-in./54 turret has a high degree of automation, sustaining a rate of seventeen rounds per minute. The turret normally operates unmanned, with the six-man Navy crew working below decks. The Mk 45 can throw a 70-1b/31.75-kg projectile to a maximum range of 14 mi/23.6 km, though extended-range ammunition is under development. The main ammunition types are high-explosive and incendiary (white phosphorus). A ship generally carries several hundred rounds per gun in its magazines, and major task forces are accompanied by ammunition ships, which can rapidly replenish the supply, using a UH-46 helicopter.

The Future: The Lightweight Howitzer and a.r.s.enal Ship Solving the problem of replacing the fire-support a.s.sets lost since Desert Storm is a joint Navy/Marine Corps challenge. The most urgent fire-support upgrade is replacement of the M198 155mm howitzer. Six different industrial teams have produced competing designs for a new lightweight howitzer. These include United Defense, Lockheed Martin, Royal Ordnance, and VSEL. In addition to lighter weight, the Marines want a weapon with much longer range (which means a longer barrel) and smaller crew requirements, and a higher rate of fire (which means power-a.s.sisted ramming and loading.) Expect to see deliveries in the early years of the next century.

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An artist's concept of the proposed "a.r.s.enal Ship." The vessel would be packed with vertical launch cells for missiles that would provide bombardment and fire support for Marines ash.o.r.e.

OFFICIAL U.S. NAVY PHOTOFROM LOCKHEED MARTIN.

A bigger problem is offsh.o.r.e fire support. Marines really miss those old Iowa- Iowa-cla.s.s (BB-61) battleships. Nothing will ever match the spectacular effect of 16-in./406mm sh.e.l.ls falling on a target within 25 mi/40 km of a coastline. Over a hundred ships with 5-in./ 127mm guns have left U.S. Navy service, gutting naval gunfire capability. To make up for this drawdown, the Chief of Navel Operations and former Deputy Chief of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Bill Owens conceived the idea of the a.r.s.enal Ship. The a.r.s.enal Ship would replace the lost firepower of the retired Iowa-cla.s.s Iowa-cla.s.s (BB-61) battleships by constructing a simple, relatively inexpensive ship packed with missile launch cells--as many as 732 tactical missiles, including Tomahawk and perhaps a version of the Army TACMS. In effect, the a.r.s.enal ship would win the war in one salvo, and then reload for the next war. The ship would rely entirely on off-board sensors for targeting. Covered with radar-absorbing coatings, an a.r.s.enal Ship would have virtually no superstructure. Some design studies envision ballast tanks that could be flooded to give the ship extremely low freeboard, making it a very difficult target for enemy anti-ship missiles. Unfortunately, all this thinking hasn't gone very far; and there are practical problems. Not the least of these: The Navy has done virtually nothing to integrate and procure the TACMS missile for naval service, perhaps because it's reluctant to use an Army missile aboard Navy ships (the "not-invented-here" syndrome). Only nuclear submariners have done substantive work on TACMS, since they are desperately looking for new missions for their subs in the post-Cold War period. Whatever happens, supporting fires will be the make-or-break item for continued forced-entry capabilities into the 21st century. (BB-61) battleships by constructing a simple, relatively inexpensive ship packed with missile launch cells--as many as 732 tactical missiles, including Tomahawk and perhaps a version of the Army TACMS. In effect, the a.r.s.enal ship would win the war in one salvo, and then reload for the next war. The ship would rely entirely on off-board sensors for targeting. Covered with radar-absorbing coatings, an a.r.s.enal Ship would have virtually no superstructure. Some design studies envision ballast tanks that could be flooded to give the ship extremely low freeboard, making it a very difficult target for enemy anti-ship missiles. Unfortunately, all this thinking hasn't gone very far; and there are practical problems. Not the least of these: The Navy has done virtually nothing to integrate and procure the TACMS missile for naval service, perhaps because it's reluctant to use an Army missile aboard Navy ships (the "not-invented-here" syndrome). Only nuclear submariners have done substantive work on TACMS, since they are desperately looking for new missions for their subs in the post-Cold War period. Whatever happens, supporting fires will be the make-or-break item for continued forced-entry capabilities into the 21st century.

Anti-Armor/Aircraft Systems Cambrai, Northern France. 0620 hours on November 20th, 1917. In the misty dawn, the soldiers of the Kaiser's 2nd Army looked out over "No-Man's-Land" and saw over two hundred primitive British tanks lumbering toward them. The Germans opened fire with the Mauser rifles and Maxim machine guns that had made them nearly invincible during three long years in the trenches, and watched in horror as the bullets bounced off of the armor plate. Then, surprisingly, and most uncharacteristically for German infantry, they ran away.

Almost thirty-five years later, near Osan, Korea, on July 5th, 1950, soldiers of the 24th Infantry Division's Task Force Smith had held their roadblock stubbornly for almost five hours against a superior force of invading North Koreans. They were mostly young draftees, but their sergeants were tough World War II combat veterans who knew their business. Then they heard a low rumble that grew to a roar as thirty Russian T-34/85 tanks came down the road. The bazooka teams fired, and watched in horror as the 2.75-in./70mm armor-piercing rockets bounced off the tanks' sharply angled armor plates. Then they did something surprising and uncharacteristic of American infantry. They ran away.

There is a common lesson in these two stories. Tanks scare the c.r.a.p out of infantrymen who have no way to fight back effectively. To stand up against tanks, foot soldiers need two things: courage and an anti-tank weapon they trust. Good leadership and training will supply the courage. Good ordnance engineers and technicians can supply the weapons. Early tanks were practically blind on the battlefield, and even the best modern tank designs (like the M1A1 Abrams) are visually handicapped. Men on foot can exploit this weakness with great effect. During the Hungarian Revolution in Budapest (1956), Russian T-34s were knocked out by Hungarian freedom fighters, who immobilized the tanks by jamming steel pipes between the tracks and the road wheels, then bombarded them with firebombs made from bottles and gasoline.

Modern portable anti-tank weapons fall into two categories: those light enough for one soldier to carry, and specialist weapons that require a crew and possibly a motor vehicle to haul them around. The Marine Corps has usually followed U.S. Army doctrine, equipment, and tactics for anti-armor combat, but has a few ideas of its own. Let's take a quick look at the portable anti-armor systems used by the Corps.

AT-4.

The Marines have always been willing to acquire foreign-made weapons when they are the best of their breed. The AT-4 was acquired to replace the very light and inexpensive 70mm M72 LAW (Light Anti-tank Weapon), which is increasingly becoming ineffective against modern battle tanks. The AT-4 is a lightweight, single-shot, disposable version of the "Karl Gustav" 84 mm anti-tank launcher manufactured by FFV in Sweden. The AT-4 can be carried and shoulder-fired by one Marine, but is typically employed in the heavy weapons platoon of a rifle company with a two-man fire team. The second Marine serves as a spotter and carries additional AT-4s for the team. Weighing 14.75 lb/6.7 kg, the 40 -in./1.01-m.-long rocket launcher has a nasty back-blast. Maximum effective range is 300 m/984 ft, and the shaped-charge projectile can penetrate 400mm/15.75 in. of armor plate. The FY-96 unit cost is about $1,100 per AT-4 rocket.

Marines of the 26th MEU (SOC) prepare to fire an SMAW rocket launcher. This Israeli-made weapon is used for bunker-busting and demolitions.

OFFICIAL U.S. MARINE CORPS PHOTO.

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An HMMWV of BLT 2/6 mounting a TOW anti-tank missile launcher on maneuvers in Israel in 1995.

OFFICIAL U.S. MARINE CORPS PHOTO MARINE CORPS PHOTO.

SMAW.

The Shoulder Launched Multipurpose a.s.sault Weapon (SMAW) is a high-tech descendant of the World War II bazooka--a portable rocket launcher that can disable a tank or knock out a bunker. It was introduced in 1984 as a unique Marine Corps item, because the Army's M72 LAW lacked the accuracy and punch the Marines wanted, and other anti-tank rockets were too heavy. The SMAW is based on an Israeli weapon called the B-300. The 16.6-1b/7.54-kg fibergla.s.s launch tube is 30 in./76 cm long when carried. For firing, you snap a rocket in its disposable sealed canister into the breech end, which extends the total length of the weapon to 54 in./137 cm. The Marines carry 1,364 of these unusual weapons in inventory, and they cost about $14,000.00 each. The SMAW fires two kinds of 83mm rockets--HEDP for use against lightly armored vehicles or buildings, and High-Explosive Anti-tank (HEAT) for use against heavily armored vehicles. Maximum range against a tank is 500 m/1,640 ft, but the SMAW is intended for use at close ranges. Accuracy is ensured by a "spotting rifle" attached to the side of the launcher. This is a British-made 9mm semi-automatic weapon that fires a special tracer round that is ballistically matched to the flight characteristics of the rocket. You hoist the weapon to your shoulder, look through the sight, and fire a spotting round. When you see the spotting round impact on the target, you fire the rocket, with a very high probability of a hit. SMAW works so well that during Desert Storm the Army "borrowed" 150 launchers and five thousand rockets from the Marines.

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ABOVE The Hughes Missile Systems TOW-2A anti-tank missile. The precursor warhead on the extensible probe helps defeat reactive armor. The Hughes Missile Systems TOW-2A anti-tank missile. The precursor warhead on the extensible probe helps defeat reactive armor. JACK RYAN ENTERPRISES L.T.D., BY LAURA ALPHER JACK RYAN ENTERPRISES L.T.D., BY LAURA ALPHER [image]

LEFT: TOW-2B Anti-Tank Missile. TOW-2B Anti-Tank Missile. JACK RYAN ENTERPRISES, LTD., BY LAURA ALPHER JACK RYAN ENTERPRISES, LTD., BY LAURA ALPHER

Hughes MGM-71 TOW-2 Anti-Tank Missile "TOW" stands for "Tube-launched, Optically-tracked, Wire-guided." This famous family of missiles originally entered service in 1970, and has been continuously improved and upgraded through a series of modifications. TOW first saw combat in 1972 in Vietnam, where it was successfully fired by U.S. Army helicopters against North Vietnamese tanks. In the Marine Corps, TOW is mainly used by specialist anti-tank platoons of heavy weapons companies, mounted on HMMWVs (which carry six missiles), or by anti-tank variants of the eight-wheeled Light Armored Vehicle (LAV-AT, carrying two missiles ready to fire with ten stowed).

The TOW-2 missile is 3.8 ft/1.2m long, about 6 in./150 mm in diameter, and weighs 65 lb/29.5 kg. There are four spring-loaded, pop-out guidance fins at the tail and four wings at mid-body. Like most anti-tank missiles, TOW has two rocket motors, a small kick motor that ejects the missile from the launch tube, and a sustainer that ignites at a safe distance. An unusual feature on TOW is that the rocket exhaust nozzles are on either side of the missile body, to avoid interference with the fine steel guidance wires that stream out from the tail. TOW launchers can interface with a variety of different sighting and control units, and the Marines are currently acquiring an Improved Target Acquisition System (ITAS) from Texas Instruments, which combines a laser range finder, FLIR (Forward Looking Infrared), modular software, and a rechargeable ten-hour battery. TOW-2A uses a tandem warhead for direct attack, and TOW-2B uses a pair of explosively forged projectile warheads from a top-attack flight profile. Otherwise the two versions are identical. Maximum effective range is 3,75 km/2.3 mi.

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Rockwell International AGM-114 h.e.l.lfire h.e.l.lfire is a long-range high-speed laser-guided missile and it is used exclusively by Marine Cobra attack helicopters, although the U.S. Army and Navy have experimented with firing it from ground vehicles and ships, and Sweden has acquired a coast-defense version fired from a portable tripod mount. h.e.l.lfire is primarily an anti-tank missile, with a 20-1b/9-kg dual shaped-charge warhead that can essentially defeat any imaginable tank from any angle. It can also be used successfully against other targets. For example, the opening shots of the 1991 Persian Gulf War were h.e.l.lfire missiles fired by Army AH-64 Apache helicopters against Iraqi air defense radar sites.

h.e.l.lfire is a big brute of a missile, measuring over 5 ft/1.625 m long, 7 in./178 mm in diameter, and weighing almost 100 lb/45.3 kg. Maximum range depends on the speed and alt.i.tude of the firing aircraft, but 5 mi/8 km is claimed. The solid-propellant rocket motor rapidly accelerates the missile to supersonic speed. The seeker in h.e.l.lfire's nose is similar to the seeker of a laser-guided bomb. It is programmed to home on a spot of laser light, pulsing with a particular pre-set code. As far as the missile is concerned, it does not matter who or what is lasing the target. The missile can be programmed to "lock on after launch," enabling the designator to remain hidden until the last few seconds of missile flight. The missile can fly a straight-line (direct-attack), or a "lofted" flight path, which provides extended range and an advantageous "top down" impact angle against an armored target.

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A Marine Stinger SAM team of the 26th MEU (SOC) stands alert on the USS Wasp Wasp (LHD-1). Such teams frequently stand watch on U.S. Navy ships to help catch any "leakers" through the ship's air defenses. (LHD-1). Such teams frequently stand watch on U.S. Navy ships to help catch any "leakers" through the ship's air defenses.

JOHN D. GRESHAM.

The Army's Apaches can "self-designate," but Marine AH-1W Cobras do not presently carry a laser designator. In 1996, though, a Night Targeting System will start entering service with the Cobras. But until these system are installed, the Cobras face a tricky tactical coordination problem. They have to rely on "buddy-lasing," which can be performed by a ground-based forward observer, or a Marine UH-1N helicopter equipped with one of the three surviving Nite Eagle laser-designator packages salvaged from the Army's failed Aquila RPV program. During Desert Storm, Marine Cobras, teamed in tank killing units with these few UH-INs, successfully fired 159 h.e.l.lfires. Each Cobra can carry up to eight h.e.l.lfires on launch rails attached to its stub wings. In FY-1994, h.e.l.lfire had a unit cost of abut $35,000.00

Hughes MIM-92 Stinger Surface-to-Air Missile (SAM) The last time American fighting men had to face an enemy who held air superiority was in 1942 in Tunisia against the German n.a.z.i Luftwaffe and the Fascist Italian Regia Aeronautica. Indeed, the main "air threat" to our ground troops in Vietnam and the 1991 Gulf War were mistaken attacks by "friendly" pilots. Yet, even the most obsolete Third World air force could inflict serious damage on a Marine landing force during the first few critical hours of an operation. While the ground-pounding Marines have great confidence that their brother and sister Marines who fly will be there to help in a pinch, they have always taken the problem of short-range anti-aircraft defense seriously. Each expeditionary Marine unit will normally have an a.s.signed air defense platoon, equipped with the MIM-92 Stinger SAM, which began to replace the much less effective 1960s-vintage Redeye missile in 1982. The platoon includes three HMMWVs, each carrying three-man Stinger teams. The Stinger is sealed in its disposable launch tube at the factory and has a long shelf life. The launch tube clips onto a reusable gripstock a.s.sembly, an IFF antenna (this is optional) is attached to the front of the a.s.sembly, and the gunner hoists the entire 34-1b/15.4-kg a.s.sembly to his shoulder. The gripstock incorporates an audio cueing system, to tell the gunner when the missile seeker is "locked" onto a target. Normally the team will be alerted to the approach of hostile aircraft via radio from a ground-, air-, or ship-based surveillance radar.

An Avenger SAM vehicle a.s.signed to the 26th MEU (SOC) in Tunisia during 1995. Based on an HMMWV cha.s.sis, it is armed with eight Stinger SAMS and a .50-caliber machine gun.

OFFICIAL U.S. MARINE CORPS PHOTO.

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Stinger is 5 ft/1.5 m long, 2.75 in./7 cm in diameter, and weighs 12.5 1b/5.7 kg at launch. Range is highly dependent on the speed and direction of the enemy aircraft, but the official specs are 1 km/.6 mi minimum to 8 km/5 mi maximum. Stinger's seeker has an "all-aspect" engagement capability. This means that it does not need a direct line of sight to the hot metal of the engine exhaust; it is sensitive enough to sense that the aircraft is warmer than the sky behind it. Developed by Hughes Missile Systems, the seeker also incorporate a reprogrammable microprocessor, so that software changes can be rapidly implemented to cope with ever-changing enemy countermeasures.

In FY-94, the unit cost of a Stinger missile was $38,000.00, and there were 13,431 in the U.S. Marine inventory. Stinger's first taste of combat was with the British Special Air Service Regiment in the 1982 British-Argentine war. A large number of Stingers were also supplied to Afghan freedom fighters during their long war against Soviet occupation; and they proved incredibly effective in the hands of uneducated but highly motivated gunners. Stinger has an impact fuse for direct hits and a proximity fuse that can turn a near miss into a kill by showering the target with fragments. There is also a timed self-destruct, so that live missiles do not come down on the heads of friendly troops.

The most exciting new Stinger development for the Marines is the Avenger air-defense vehicle. This is integrated by Boeing using the cha.s.sis of an HMMWV with a rotating turret that incorporates a FLIR, a laser range finder, an M2 .50-cal. machine gun, and reloadable canisters for eight missiles. A pair of Avengers will be normally be a.s.signed to the Stinger platoon of a MEU (SOC). Combined with the three man-pack teams, it gives the MEU (SOC) a rudimentary air-defense capability. When combined with an offsh.o.r.e SAM umbrella from escorting surface ships, and perhaps the air-to-air capabilities of the MEU (SOC)'s embarked Harrier detachment, it gives the Marines a fighting chance against air attack until follow-on forces arrive to take over the job.

The Future: Texas Instruments (TI)/Martin Javelin Javelin represents a new generation of precision-guided fire-and-forget ant.i.tank weapons. The joint Army/Marine Corps program, now in production, began in 1989 under the acronym AAWS-M (Advanced Anti-tank Weapon System--Medium). The Marines will receive a small initial batch (140 missiles) in 1997, and expect to field a full operational capability in the heavy weapons platoon of the rifle company and the heavy weapons company of the battalion by 1999. The joint Army/Marine requirement is 31,269 missiles and 3,541 Command Launch Units through the year 2004, but in the absence of a war, procurement targets rarely survive successive rounds of budget cuts.

At first glance, what Javelin does seems impossible. "Precision guidance" usually requires a human being in the loop to control the flight of the weapon up to the moment of impact. A good example is the Marines' current portable anti-tank missile, the hated McDonnell Douglas M-47 Dragon, which entered service in the early 1970s. The Dragon gunner, crouched in a awkward and uncomfortable position, must keep the target centered in his telescopic sight during the missile's entire time of flight, as long as twelve seconds out to 1,000 m/1,094 yd. Steering commands travel down twin steel wires that uncoil from bobbins on the missile and the launch tube. If the enemy detects the smoke and flash of the missile launch, he will quickly fire back in the general direction with everything he's got. If the Dragon gunner ducks, or even flinches, the missile will probably fly into the ground or pa.s.s harmlessly over the target.

Javelin does things differently. Because it uses an intelligent imaging-infrared seeker, the new missile combines precision guidance with fire-and-forget operation. In effect, the missile software "remembers" the thermal signature of the target it locked onto when it was launched. It also "knows" how to follow a moving target, and how to perform tricky maneuvers during its last few milliseconds of "life." The missile performs a climb and dive to strike the top of the target, where the armor is thinnest. If the target is inside a building, or under some kind of top-cover, the gunner can select a direct flight path.

The Javelin system has two components: the missile round in a disposable launch tube, and the reusable 14-lb/6.4-kg Command Launch Unit (CLU), which looks rather like a big box camera with trigger-grip handles. The CLU snaps into a connector on the launch tube, and the gunner hoists the entire 49-lb/22.4-kg weapon up onto either shoulder, activates the replaceable battery (which powers the system for up to four hours), and looks through the eyepiece. In daylight, this functions as a four-power telescopic sight; and at night, or in blowing sand, smoke, fog, or other obscured conditions, it functions as a Forward Looking Infrared (FLIR) viewer, presenting a green-and-black thermal image of the battlefield, with a 4-power wide field of view or a 9-power narrow field.

A pair of infantry men launch a "fire-and-forget" Texas Instruments/Lockheed Martin Javelin anti-tank missile. This man-portable system will come into service with the Marines in several years.

TEXAS INSTRUMENTS.

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Javelin can be fired safely inside an enclosure, since there is no back-blast per se. A small kick motor, which burns for only a 1/10 of a second, ejects the missile from the launch tube to a safe distance before the main rocket motor ignites. Maximum range is over 2,000 m/1.25 mi. Javelin uses a "tandem warhead" to defeat s.p.a.ced armor or explosive-reactive protection systems. A small shaped charge detonates first to strip away any outer layers; then, microseconds later, the main shaped charge detonates to penetrate and destroy the target. It is effective and deadly, as well as being the first of a new generation of "brilliant" guided weapons to enter U.S. service. So excited is the Marine Corps about this system that even before it is fielded, the Corps is thinking about using it as the primary anti-armor system on the new AAAV amphibious tractor. Keep your eye on this one, folks. It's going to be a winner!

The Future: Lockheed Marine Loral Aeronutronic Predator For all of its shortcomings, the Marines generally miss the old M72 LAW. Light and compact, it gave them the ability to hit and destroy, albeit at short ranges, almost anything short of a heavy tank. In addition, it could be (and was) carried by every Marine in a rifle squad, meaning that a unit had a bunch of them to use in combat. Unfortunately, by the late 1970s the LAW was going out of service and was being replaced by heavier and more specialized systems like the AT-4. Nevertheless, the Marines have always wanted another "wooden round" heavy weapon like LAW, and they began a program to give them a 21st century version. Originally known as SRAW (Short-Range a.s.sault Weapon), Predator has been under development since the 1980s, and will enter service around the year 2000. Weighing only 19 1b/8.6 kg, and measuring 35 in./89 cm in length, the missile and its disposable launch tube will be issued like a round of ammunition that any rifleman can carry and fire. Like Javelin, Predator has a "soft launch" motor that allows it to be fired safely from inside an enclosure.

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A cutaway view of the new Predator anti-tank missile being developed for the Marine Corps by Lockheed Martin Loral Missile Systems. The launcher is shown to the right.

JACK RYAN ENTREPRISES, LTD., BY LAURA ALPHER.