Talk:Pershing II

1984 rollover image mismatch

The photograph which is supposed to show the 1984 rollover most likely has been taken after some other incident. There are three reasons for my assumption:

1. The truck shown on the picture does not look like a Pershing II MAN M1001 truck (please compare with File:Pershing2MAN.jpg)
2. There could have been snow in late September in southern Germany, but this would have been rather unusual. Historic weather data of September 1984 indicates approx. +5 to 10°C for the location of the incident.
3. As per a local newspaper article of Sept 25th 1984 (Waiblinger Kreiszeitung, headline: Pershing II-Rakete krachte in den Wald und brach mitten durch.) the incident happened in a forest. This does not match the situation of the photograph.

--Kjunix (talk) 20:19, 5 November 2016 (UTC)

This is based on:

"On the 24th of September, 1984, a MAN tractor and EL with mated PII missile from 1 /41 FA during an early morning training exercise slid off a dirt road and rolled over damaging both the TEL and the missile. The Platoon Leader directed the driver to park it near the edge. CW2 Walczak and SSG Pruitt were present from the PERFECT team. There were no injuries as the MAN vehicle was unmanned during the roll over. The missile and associated equipment were recovered by three military vehicles equipped with winches and cranes after a six hour operation." — Burns, Steven T. (2014). History of the Pershing Missile Systems. p. 157. ISBN 978-1-63318-129-8.

--21lima (talk) 02:30, 6 November 2016 (UTC)

Have not been able to find "Pershing II-Rakete krachte in den Wald und brach mitten durch" online. de:Sechselberg references it, but regarding a Pershing 1a incident. --21lima (talk) 09:15, 6 November 2016 (UTC)

Discussed this with a witness and he agrees that this is not the PII rollover, but an earlier incident with a P1a. Thanks for checking this! --21lima (talk) 14:11, 6 November 2016 (UTC)

MGM-31C

Any designation of P2 as MGM-31 anything is a fantasy. As best I can tell, this started with Andreas Parsch's site Designation Systems[1] and has propagated. I have sent emails to Parsch twice with no response. Parsch assigns MGM-31B to the Pershing 1a; this is incorrect, as the missile did not change, just the ground support equipment. MTM-31B was the designation for the training round for a time, thus 31B had already been used. I have no idea why the P2 missile never received a designation. But it would not have been MGM-31 as it was completely different from the P1/P1a missile, it would have been MGM-100 or some such. Parsch acknowledges the use of B and C to be speculation. Pershing missile bibliography has lots of references to check, and I am familiar with all. --21lima (talk) 03:16, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

basic geography issue

According to estimates by NATO, at the beginning of 1986, the Warsaw Pact had deployed 279 SS-20 mobile missile launchers with a total of 837 nuclear warheads based in the eastern U.S.S.R.

EASTERN USSR?? no shit? why is this planet not flat?

primary guidance

Article incorrectly states the Goodyear radar correlator system was the primary guidance. This system was only used during terminal mode guidance. The inertial measurement system guided the missile throughout the majority of the flight and could deliver the RV to the target area with an excellent CEP without the correlator. The correlator further reduced guidnce errors. The IMS was the primary guidance system. 68.100.100.234 (talk) 22:31, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Source please? BilCat (talk) 23:18, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

That bit does need clarification. --21lima (talk) 15:29, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

So, what was correct range?

In the article I see three numbers

• in the infobox: 1,500 miles (2,414 km)
• in section "Range":
  • 1,800 kilometres (1,100 mi)
  • Soviets estimate: 2,500 kilometres (1,600 mi)

Which value is correct? --Altenmann >talk 01:06, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

Previously top secret document stating 1,800 km trumps Lockheed puff piece. Kylesenior (talk) 02:53, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

You don't have to convince me, I dgaf for pershings, but if you know things, you have to fix the article. Do you think I posted this question out of idle curiosity? I know that Help Desk is for this. --Altenmann >talk 03:58, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

""The two-stage PI1 missile is capable of delivering a payload to any range between 60 statute miles (97 km) and 1,080 statute miles (1,738 km)." - Pershing II Weapon System TM 9-1425-386-10-1

That is the official description, I propose to used that and add a note that other documentation shows different ranges. 21lima (talk) 19:01, 16 September 2024 (UTC)