Portal:Missiles
Portal maintenance status: (October 2018)
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Introduction
In modern language, a missile, also known as a guided missile, is a guided self-propelled system, as opposed to an unguided self-propelled munition, referred to as a rocket (although these too can also be guided). Missiles have four system components: targeting or missile guidance, flight system, engine, and warhead. Missiles come in types adapted for different purposes: surface-to-surface and air-to-surface missiles (ballistic, cruise, anti-ship, anti-tank, etc.), surface-to-air missiles (and anti-ballistic), air-to-air missiles, and anti-satellite weapons. All known existing missiles are designed to be propelled during powered flight by chemical reactions inside a rocket engine, jet engine, or other type of engine. Non-self-propelled airborne explosive devices are generally referred to as shells and usually have a shorter range than missiles.
In ordinary British-English usage predating guided weapons, a missile is such as objects thrown at players by rowdy spectators at a sporting event.
Selected general articles
The MGM-140 ATACMS tactical ballistic missile firing
A tactical ballistic missile (TBM) (or battlefield range ballistic missile (BRBM)) is a ballistic missile designed for short-range battlefield use. Typically, range is less than 300 kilometres (190 mi).[according to whom?] Tactical ballistic missiles are usually mobile to ensure survivability and quick deployment, as well as carrying a variety of warheads to target enemy facilities, assembly areas, artillery, and other targets behind the front lines. Warheads can include conventional high explosive, chemical, biological, or nuclear warheads. Typically tactical nuclear weapons are limited in their total yield compared to strategic rockets. Read more...
An intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) is a ballistic missile with a range of 3,000–5,500 km (1,864–3,418 miles), between a medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM) and an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). Classifying ballistic missiles by range is done mostly for convenience; in principle there is very little difference between a low-performance ICBM and a high-performance IRBM, because decreasing payload mass can increase range over ICBM threshold. The range definition used here is used within the U.S. Missile Defense Agency. Some other sources include an additional category, the long-range ballistic missile (LRBM), to describe missiles with a range between IRBMs and true ICBMs. The more modern term theater ballistic missile encompasses MRBMs and SRBMs, including any ballistic missile with a range under 3,500 km (2,175 mi).
IRBMs are currently operated by the People's Republic of China, India, Israel, and North Korea. The United States, USSR, United Kingdom, and France were former operators. Read more...- Semi-automatic command to line of sight (SACLOS) is a method of missile command guidance. In SACLOS, the operator has to continually point a sighting device at the target while the missile is in flight. Electronics in the sighting device and/or the missile then guide it to the target.
SACLOS devices commonly work using one of these methods: wire-guided, radio-guided, or beam-riding. Read more...
An air-to-surface missile (ASM) or air-to-ground missile (AGM or ATGM) is a missile designed to be launched from military aircraft at targets on land or sea. There are also unpowered guided glide bombs not considered missiles. The two most common propulsion systems for air-to-surface missiles are rocket motors, usually with shorter range, and slower, longer-range jet engines. Some Soviet-designed air-to-surface missiles are powered by ramjets, giving them both long range and high speed.
Guidance for air-to-surface missiles is typically via laser guidance, infrared guidance, optical guidance or via satellite guidance signals. The type of guidance depends on the type of target. Ships, for example, may be detected via passive radar or active radar homing, less effective against multiple, small, fast-moving land targets. Read more...
A Ground-Based Interceptor of the United States' Ground-Based Midcourse Defense system, loaded into a silo at Fort Greely, Alaska, in July 2004
An anti-ballistic missile (ABM) is a surface-to-air missile designed to counter ballistic missiles (see missile defense). Ballistic missiles are used to deliver nuclear, chemical, biological, or conventional warheads in a ballistic flight trajectory. The term "anti-ballistic missile" is a generic term conveying a system designed to intercept and destroy any type of ballistic threat, however it is commonly used for systems specifically designed to counter intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). Read more...
Katyusha rocket launcher, one of the earliest modern rocket artillery weapons
A rocket is a self-propelled, unguided weapon system powered by a rocket motor. Rockets are used primarily as medium and long-range artillery systems, although historically they have also seen considerable use as air-to-surface, some use as air-to-air weapons, and even a few examples of surface-to-air devices. Examples of modern surface-to-surface rocket systems include the BM-27 Uragan and M270 Multiple Launch Rocket System.
In military parlance, a rocket differs from a missile primarily by lacking an active guidance system; early missiles were known as "guided rockets" or "guided missiles". Some rockets were developed as unguided systems and later upgraded to guided versions, like the GMLRS, and these generally retain the term "rocket" instead of becoming missiles. Rockets or missiles that travel underwater, like the VA-111 Shkval, are known as torpedoes no matter what their propulsion system is. Read more...- Q-guidance is a method of missile guidance used in some U.S. ballistic missiles and some civilian space flights. It was developed in the 1950s by J. Halcombe Laning and Richard Battin at the MIT Instrumentation Lab.
Q-guidance is used for missiles whose trajectory consists of a relatively short boost phase (or powered phase) during which the missile's propulsion system operates, followed by a ballistic phase during which the missile coasts to its target under the influence of gravity. (Cruise missiles use different guidance methods). The objective of Q-guidance is to hit a specified target at a specified time (if there is some flexibility as to the time the target should be hit then other types of guidance can be used). Read more...
An anti-tank guided missile (ATGM), anti-tank missile, anti-tank guided weapon (ATGW) or anti-armor guided weapon is a guided missile primarily designed to hit and destroy heavily armored military vehicles.
ATGMs range in size from shoulder-launched weapons, which can be transported by a single soldier, to larger tripod-mounted weapons, which require a squad or team to transport and fire, to vehicle and aircraft mounted missile systems. Read more...- This is a list of intercontinental ballistic missiles developed by various countries. Read more...
A wire-guided missile is a missile that is guided by signals sent to it via thin wires connected between the missile and its guidance mechanism, which is located somewhere near the launch site. As the missile flies, the wires are reeled out behind it (command guidance). This guidance system is most commonly used in anti-tank missiles, where its ability to be used in areas of limited line-of-sight make it useful, while the range limit imposed by the length of the wire is not a serious concern.
The longest range wire-guided missiles in current use are limited to about 4 km (2.5 mi). Read more...- In the field of weaponry, terminal guidance refers to any guidance system that is primarily or solely active during the "terminal phase", just before the weapon impacts its target. The term is generally used in reference to missile guidance systems, and specifically to missiles that use more than one guidance system through the missile's flight.
Common examples include long-range air-to-air missiles that use semi-active radar homing (SARH) during most of the missile's flight, and then use an infrared seeker or active radar homing once they approach their target. Similar examples include surface-to-air missiles, anti-ballistic missiles, and some anti-tank missiles. Read more... - This is a list of surface-to-air missiles (SAMs). Read more...
A UGM-96 Trident I clears the water after launch from a US Navy submarine in 1984
A submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) is a ballistic missile capable of being launched from submarines. Modern variants usually deliver multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRVs) each of which carries a nuclear warhead and allows a single launched missile to strike several targets. Submarine-launched ballistic missiles operate in a different way from submarine-launched cruise missiles.
Modern submarine-launched ballistic missiles are closely related to intercontinental ballistic missiles (range of over 5,500 kilometres (3,000 nmi)), and in many cases SLBMs and ICBMs may be part of the same family of weapons. Read more...- This list of missiles by country displays the names of missiles in order of the country where they originate (were developed), with the countries listed alphabetically and annotated with their continent (and defence alliance, if applicable). In cases where multiple nations have developed or produced a missile, it is listed under each significantly participating nation. Within the lists of each country, missiles are ordered by designation and/or calling name (the latter being especially relevant for Russian/Soviet missiles). In some cases multiple listings are used, in order to provide cross-references for easier navigation.
This is not a list of missiles in operational service by a particular country; nor a list of military rockets. Anti-tank missiles are listed elsewhere Read more... - Passive radar systems (also referred to as passive coherent location and passive covert radar) encompass a class of radar systems that detect and track objects by processing reflections from non-cooperative sources of illumination in the environment, such as commercial broadcast and communications signals. It is a specific case of bistatic radar, the latter also including the exploitation of cooperative and non-cooperative radar transmitters. Read more...
Active radar homing (ARH) is a missile guidance method in which a missile contains a radar transceiver (in contrast to semi-active radar homing, which uses only a receiver) and the electronics necessary for it to find and track its target autonomously. NATO brevity code for an air-to-air active radar homing missile launch is Fox Three. Read more...- Radar guidance or radar-guided may refer to: Read more...
Anti-satellite weapons (ASAT) are space weapons designed to incapacitate or destroy satellites for strategic military purposes. Several nations possess operational ASAT systems, with others in development or design. Although no ASAT system has yet been utilised in warfare, several nations have shot down their own (defunct) satellites to demonstrate their ASAT capabilities in a show of force. Read more...- Command guidance is a type of missile guidance in which a ground station or aircraft relay signals to a guided missile via radio control or through a wire connecting the missile to the launcher and tell the missile where to steer in order to intercept its target. This control may also command the missile to detonate, even if the missile itself has a fuze.
Typically, the system giving the guidance commands is tracking both the target and the missile or missiles via radar. It determines the position and velocity of the target and the position and velocity of the missile and calculates whether their paths will intersect. If not, the guidance system will relay commands to the missile(s), telling them to move their fins in such a way to steer themselves in the direction necessary for them to end up on an interception course with the target. If the target maneuvers, the guidance system can notice this and update the missiles' course continuously to counteract the maneuvering. If the missile passes close to the target, either its own proximity or contact fuze will detonate the warhead, or the guidance system can estimate when the missile will pass near the target and send a detonation signal. Read more... - A beyond-visual-range missile (BVR) is an air-to-air missile (BVRAAM) that is capable of engaging at ranges of 20 nmi (37 km) or beyond. This range has been achieved using dual pulse rocket motors or booster rocket motor and ramjet sustainer motor.
In addition to the range capability, the missile must also be capable of tracking its target at this range or of acquiring the target in flight. Systems in which a mid-course correction is transmitted to the missile have been used. Read more... - A radar altimeter, electronic altimeter, reflection altimeter, radio altimeter (RADALT), low range radio altimeter (LRRA) or simply RA, used on aircraft, measures altitude above the terrain presently beneath an aircraft or spacecraft by timing how long it takes a beam of radio waves to reflect from the ground and return to the plane. This type of altimeter provides the distance between the antenna and the ground directly below it, in contrast to a barometric altimeter which provides the distance above a defined datum, usually mean sea level. Read more...
- An anti-ship ballistic missile (ASBM) is a military quasiballistic missile system designed to hit a warship at sea.
The ASBM's conventional warhead and kinetic energy may be sufficient to cripple or outright destroy a supercarrier with a single hit. However, unlike a nuclear warhead, this will require a direct hit to be effective. Thus, and unlike a typical ballistic missile, which follows a ballistic flightpath after the relatively brief initial powered phase of flight, an ASBM would require a precise and high-performance terminal guidance system, with in-flight updates or advanced sensors in order to hit its moving target. Read more...
An inertial navigation system (INS) is a navigation aid that uses a computer, motion sensors (accelerometers), rotation sensors (gyroscopes), and occasionally magnetic sensors (magnetometers) to continuously calculate by dead reckoning the position, the orientation, and the velocity (direction and speed of movement) of a moving object without the need for external references. It is used on vehicles such as ships, aircraft, submarines, guided missiles, and spacecraft. Other terms used to refer to inertial navigation systems or closely related devices include inertial guidance system, inertial instrument, inertial measurement unit (IMU) and many other variations. Older INS systems generally used an inertial platform as their mounting point to the vehicle and the terms are sometimes considered synonymous. Read more...- Terrain Contour Matching, or TERCOM, is a navigation system used primarily by cruise missiles. It uses a pre-recorded contour map of the terrain that is compared with measurements made during flight by an on-board radar altimeter. A TERCOM system considerably increases the accuracy of a missile compared with inertial navigation systems (INS). The increased accuracy allows a TERCOM-equipped missile to fly closer to obstacles and generally lower altitudes, making it harder to detect by ground radar. Read more...
IAI Harop a loitering munition optimized for the Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses (SEAD) role, the initial use of loitering munitions
A loitering munition (also known as a suicide drone or kamikaze drone) is a weapon system category in which the munition loiters around the target area for some time, searches for targets, and attacks once a target is located. Loitering munitions enable faster reaction times against concealed or hidden targets that emerge for short periods without placing high-value platforms close to the target area, and also allow more selective targeting as the actual attack mission can be aborted.
Loitering munitions fit in the niche between cruise missiles and unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UCAVs) sharing characteristics with both. They differ from cruise missiles in that they are designed to loiter for a relatively long time around the target area, and from UCAVs in that a loitering munition is intended to be expended in an attack and has a built-in warhead. Read more...
The Walleye combined a contrast seeker with a data link to the launch aircraft that allowed manual override.
Optical contrast seekers, or simply contrast seekers, are a type of missile guidance system using a television camera as its primary input. The camera is initially pointed at a target and then locked on, allowing the missile to fly to its target by keeping the image stable within the camera's field of view.
The first production missile to use a contrast seeker was the AGM-65 Maverick, which began development in the 1960s and entered service in 1972. The system has not been widely used, as other guidance technologies like laser guidance and GPS have become more common, but the same basic concept is used in cameras to track objects, including the systems used to aim the laser designators. Read more...
Anti-ship missiles are guided missiles that are designed for use against ships and large boats. Most anti-ship missiles are of the sea skimming variety, and many use a combination of inertial guidance and active radar homing. A good number of other anti-ship missiles use infrared homing to follow the heat that is emitted by a ship; it is also possible for anti-ship missiles to be guided by radio command all the way.
The first anti-ship missiles, which were developed and built by Nazi Germany, used radio command guidance. These saw some success in the Mediterranean Theater in 1943–44, sinking or heavily damaging at least 31 ships with the Henschel Hs 293 and more than seven with the Fritz X, such as the Italian battleship Roma or the cruiser USS Savannah. A variant of the HS 293 had a TV transmitter on board. The bomber carrying it could then fly outside the range of naval AA guns and use TV guidance to lead the missile to its target by radio control. Read more...
Shoulder-launched weapons avoid the problem of recoil by directing all exhaust out of the rear of the launch tube.
A shoulder-fired missile, shoulder-launched missile or man-portable missile is an explosive-carrying, self-propelled projectile fired at a target, while being small enough to be carried by a single person and fired while held on one's shoulder. The word "missile" in this context is used in its original broad sense which encompasses all guided missiles and unguided rockets. In many instances, although not technically defining all shoulder-fired missiles, the name bazooka is used as an informal name regularly, although the actual Bazooka is a type of shoulder-fired unguided rocket launcher in its own right. Read more...- A surface-to-surface missile (SSM) or ground-to-ground missile (GGM) is a missile designed to be launched from the ground or the sea and strike targets on land or at sea. They may be fired from hand-held or vehicle mounted devices, from fixed installations, or from a ship. They are often powered by a rocket engine or sometimes fired by an explosive charge, since the launching platform is typically stationary or moving slowly. They usually have fins and/or wings for lift and stability, although hyper-velocity or short-ranged missiles may use body lift or fly a ballistic trajectory. The V-1 flying bomb was the first operational surface-to-surface missile.
Contemporary surface-to-surface missiles are usually guided. An unguided surface-to-surface missile is usually referred to as a rocket (for example, an RPG-7 or M72 LAW is an anti-tank rocket whereas a BGM-71 TOW or AT-2 Swatter is an anti-tank guided missile). Read more... - Manual command to line of sight (MCLOS) is a method for guiding guided missiles.
With an MCLOS missile, the operator must track the missile and the target simultaneously and guide the missile to the target. Typically the missile is steered with a joystick, and its path is observed through a periscope-type telescopic sight. The missiles are usually equipped with a magnesium flare in the base that automatically ignites upon launch and allows the gunner to visually track the fast-moving missile in a manner similar in concept to a tracer bullet. Read more...
Fire-and-forget is a type of missile guidance which does not require further guidance after launch such as illumination of the target or wire guidance, and can hit its target without the launcher being in line-of-sight of the target. This is an important property for a guided weapon to have, since a person or vehicle that lingers near the target to guide the missile (using, for instance, a laser designator) is vulnerable to attack and unable to carry out other tasks.
Generally, information about the target is programmed into the missile just prior to launch. This can include coordinates, radar measurements (including velocity), or an infrared image of the target. After it is fired, the missile guides itself by some combination of gyroscopes and accelerometers, GPS, organic active radar homing, and infrared homing optics. Some systems offer the option of either continued input from the launch platform or fire-and-forget. Read more...- Infrared homing is a passive system that homes in on the heat generated by the target. Typically used in the anti-aircraft role to track the heat of jet engines, it has also been used in the anti-vehicle role with some success. This means of guidance is sometimes also referred to as "heat seeking".
Contrast seekers use a television camera, typically black and white, to image a field of view in front of the missile, which is presented to the operator. When launched, the electronics in the missile look for the spot on the image where the contrast changes the fastest, both vertically and horizontally, and then attempts to keep that spot at a constant location in its view. Contrast seekers have been used for air-to-ground missiles, including the AGM-65 Maverick, because most ground targets can be distinguished only by visual means. However they rely on there being strong contrast changes to track, and even traditional camouflage can render them unable to "lock on". Read more...
This radio controlled airplane is carrying a scale model of Lockheed Martin X-33 and is taking part in NASA research.
Radio control (often abbreviated to R/C or simply RC) is the use of radio signals to remotely control a device. Radio control is used for control of model vehicles from a hand-held radio transmitter. Industrial, military, and scientific research organizations make use of radio-controlled vehicles as well. Read more...
A submarine-launched cruise missile (SLCM) is a cruise missile that is launched from a submarine (especially a SSG or SSGN). Current versions are typically standoff weapons known as land-attack cruise missiles (LACMs), which are used to attack predetermined land targets with conventional or nuclear payloads. Anti-ship cruise missiles (ASCMs) are also used, and some submarine-launched cruise missiles have variants for both functions. Read more...- Semi-active radar homing (SARH) is a common type of missile guidance system, perhaps the most common type for longer-range air-to-air and surface-to-air missile systems. The name refers to the fact that the missile itself is only a passive detector of a radar signal – provided by an external (“offboard”) source — as it reflects off the target(in contrast to active radar homing, which uses an active radar: transceiver). Semi-active missile systems use bistatic continuous-wave radar.
The NATO brevity code for a semi-active radar homing missile launch is Fox One. Read more...
An anti-radiation missile (ARM) is a missile designed to detect and home in on an enemy radio emission source. Typically, these are designed for use against an enemy radar, although jammers and even radios used for communications can also be targeted in this manner. Read more...- Automatic target recognition (ATR) is the ability for an algorithm or device to recognize targets or other objects based on data obtained from sensors.
Target recognition was initially done by using an audible representation of the received signal, where a trained operator who would decipher that sound to classify the target illuminated by the radar. While these trained operators had success, automated methods have been developed and continue to be developed that allow for more accuracy and speed in classification. ATR can be used to identify man made objects such as ground and air vehicles as well as for biological targets such as animals, humans, and vegetative clutter. This can be useful for everything from recognizing an object on a battlefield to filtering out interference caused by large flocks of birds on Doppler weather radar. Read more...
A Soviet SA-7 in use.
Man-portable air-defense systems (MANPADS or MPADS) are shoulder-launched surface-to-air missiles (SLSAMs). They are typically guided weapons and are a threat to low-flying aircraft, especially helicopters. Read more...- Beam-riding, also known as Line-Of-Sight Beam Riding (LOSBR) or beam guidance, is a technique of directing a missile to its target by means of radar or a laser beam. The name refers to the way the missile flies down the guidance beam, which is aimed at the target. It is one of the simplest guidance systems and was widely used on early missile systems, however it had a number of disadvantages and is now found typically only in short-range roles. Read more...
An air-launched ballistic missile or ALBM is a ballistic missile launched from an aircraft. An ALBM allows the launch aircraft to stand off at long distances from its target, keeping it well outside the range of defensive weapons like anti-aircraft missiles and interceptor aircraft. Once launched, the missile is essentially immune to interception. This combination of features allowed a strategic bomber to present a credible deterrent second-strike option in an era when improving anti-aircraft defences appeared to be rendering conventional bombers obsolete.
The ALBM concept was studied in the US as a way to ensure the usefulness and survivability of their large bomber fleet. After testing several experimental designs as part of the WS-199 efforts, the USAF began development of the GAM-87 Skybolt missile with range on the order of 1,150 miles (1,850 km). The only other major force relying on strategic bombers was the Royal Air Force, who also selected the Skybolt to arm their V bomber fleet. The Soviet Union moved their strategic force directly to ICBMs. Read more...
Infrared homing is a passive weapon guidance system which uses the infrared (IR) light emission from a target to track and follow it. Missiles which use infrared seeking are often referred to as "heat-seekers", since infrared is radiated strongly by hot bodies. Many objects such as people, vehicle engines and aircraft generate and emit heat, and as such, are especially visible in the infrared wavelengths of light compared to objects in the background.
Infrared seekers are passive devices, which, unlike radar, provide no indication that they are tracking a target. This makes them suitable for sneak attacks during visual encounters, or over longer ranges when used with a forward looking infrared system or similar cuing system. This makes heat-seekers extremely deadly; 90% of all United States air combat losses over the past 25 years have been due to infrared-homing missiles. They are, however, subject to a number of simple countermeasures, most notably dropping flares behind the target to provide false heat sources. This only works if the pilot is aware of the missile and deploys the countermeasures, and modern seekers have rendered these increasingly ineffective even in that case. Read more...
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Selected images
Missile Maintainer inspects missile guidance system of the LGM-30G Minuteman ICBM
Indian Supersonic cruise missile BrahMos.
U.S. Army soldiers firing an FGM-148 Javelin
United States Tomahawk cruise missile
HNLMS De Zeven Provinciën (F802) firing a Harpoon
ASM-135 ASAT missile launch in 1985
A V-2 rocket launch by the British during Operation Backfire
MIM-104 Patriot missile being launched
A F-22 Raptor fires an AIM-120 AMRAAM
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