The AGM-114 Hellfire is an American air-to-surface missile (ASM) first developed for anti-armor use, later developed for precision drone strikes against other target types, especially high-value targets. It was originally developed under the name "Heliborne laser, fire-and-forget missile", which led to the colloquial name "Hellfire" ultimately becoming the missile's formal name. It has a multi-mission, multi-target precision-strike ability and can be launched from multiple air, sea, and ground platforms, including the MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper. The Hellfire missile is the primary 100-pound (45 kg) class air-to-ground precision weapon for the armed forces of the United States and many other nations. It has also been fielded on surface platforms in the surface-to-surface and surface-to-air roles.
The M142 HIMARS – M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System – is a light multiple rocket launcher developed in the late 1990s for the United States Army and mounted on a standard U.S. Army Family of Medium Tactical Vehicles (FMTV) M1140 truck frame.
The MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile System is a tactical ballistic missile designed and manufactured by the US defense company Ling-Temco-Vought (LTV), and later Lockheed Martin through acquisitions. It uses solid propellant, is 13 feet (4.0 m) high and 24 inches (610 mm) in diameter, and the longest range variants can fly up to 190 miles (300 km). The missiles can be fired from the tracked M270 Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS) and the wheeled M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS).
The FGM-148 Javelin, or Advanced Anti-Tank Weapon System-Medium (AAWS-M), is an American-made man-portable anti-tank system in service since 1996, and continuously upgraded. It replaced the M47 Dragon anti-tank missile in US service. Its fire-and-forget design features automatic infrared guidance, allowing the user to seek cover immediately after launch, in contrast to wire-guided systems, like the system used by the Dragon, which require a user to guide the weapon throughout the engagement. The Javelin's high-explosive anti-tank (HEAT) warhead can defeat modern tanks by top-down attack, hitting them from above, where their armor is thinnest, and is also useful against fortifications in a direct attack flight.
The BGM-71 TOW is an American anti-tank missile. TOW replaced much smaller missiles like the SS.10 and ENTAC, offering roughly twice the effective range, a more powerful warhead, and a greatly improved semi-automatic command to line of sight (SACLOS) that could also be equipped with infrared cameras for night time use.
Shoulder-fired missile, shoulder-launched missile or man-portable missile, among other variants, are common slang-terms to describe high-caliber shoulder-mounted weapons systems – that is: weapons firing large heavy projectiles ("missiles"), typically using the backblast principle, which are 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 of a heavy projectile, and encompasses all shells and rockets, guided or unguided. A more formal variant is simply shoulder-fired weapons system and the like.
The Mk 153 Shoulder-Launched Multipurpose Assault Weapon (SMAW) is a smoothbore shoulder-fired rocket launcher. It is a portable assault weapon and has a secondary anti-armor ability. Developed from the B-300, it was introduced to United States Armed Forces in 1984. It has a maximum effective range of 500 metres (550 yd) against a tank-sized target.
The M47 Dragon, known as the FGM-77 during development, is an American shoulder-fired, man-portable anti-tank guided missile system. It was phased out of U.S. military service in 2001, in favor of the newer FGM-148 Javelin system.
The M270 Multiple Launch Rocket System is an American armored self-propelled multiple launch rocket system.
The Saab Bofors Dynamics NLAW, also known as the MBT LAW or RB 57, is a fire-and-forget, lightweight shoulder-fired, and disposable (single-use) line of sight (LOS) missile system, designed for infantry use. The missile uses a soft-launch system and is guided by predicted line of sight (PLOS). It can carry out an overfly top attack (OTA) on an armoured vehicle, or a direct attack (DA) on structures and non-armoured vehicles.
The MGM-166 LOSAT was a United States anti-tank missile system designed by Lockheed Martin to defeat tanks and other individual targets. Instead of using a high explosive anti-tank (HEAT) warhead like other anti-tank missiles, LOSAT employed a solid steel kinetic energy penetrator to punch through armor. The LOSAT is fairly light; it was designed to be mounted onto a Humvee light military vehicle while allowing the vehicle to remain air-portable. LOSAT eventually emerged on an extended-length heavy-duty Humvee with a hard-top containing four KEMs used by special operations. Although LOSAT never "officially" entered service, it was used for the smaller Compact Kinetic Energy Missile.
The RAC 112 APILAS is a portable one-shot 112 mm recoilless anti-tank weapon, designed in France by GIAT Industries. Over 120,000 of the APILAS launchers have been produced, and they are in service with many countries.
Alcotán-100 is a recoilless, one-man portable, single-use anti-tank rocket launcher system used by infantry, manufactured by Instalaza. The firing control unit predicts the future aiming point based on calculation before the rocket fire. It is being used as an infantry-type weapon and fireable from confined spaces. Instalaza claiming it to be, "the highest performance in unguided shoulder launched systems". It is in service with the Spanish Armed Forces and exported to other countries.
The M141 Bunker Defeat Munition (BDM) is a disposable single-shot, shoulder-fired rocket launcher designed to defeat hardened structures. It is a modification of the United States Marine Corps Mk 153 Shoulder-Launched Multipurpose Assault Weapon (SMAW) and is also called the SMAW-D. It was designed to fill the void in the United States Army inventory of a "bunker buster" weapon.
List of abbreviations, acronyms and initials related to military subjects such as modern armour, artillery, infantry, and weapons, along with their definitions.
The GBU-53/B StormBreaker, previously known as the Small Diameter Bomb II, is an American air-launched, precision-guided glide bomb.
The Akeron MP, formerly known as MMP is a French fifth generation man-portable anti-tank guided missile system. Featuring both fire-and-forget and command guidance operating modes, it also integrates third party target designation for indirect firing scenarios through its lock-on after launch capability for non-line-of-sight (NLOS) use.
The Kestrel is an individual shoulder-launched weapon system developed by Taiwan's National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology and currently in service with the Republic of China Armed Forces and Coast Guard Administration.
Predicted line of sight (PLOS) is a method of missile targeting. In PLOS, the operator tracks the target with the missile launcher's onboard sights for a short period of time. Software on the launcher extrapolates from the data gathered, producing a prediction of the route required to intercept the moving target. When fired the missile uses inertial navigation to fly this course and hopefully engage the target either by direct contact or via proximity fuse detonating the warhead. The method is used by the NLAW and FGM-172 SRAW anti-tank weapon.
