A few weeks before the invasion of Iraq, a serious skirmish erupted in America between the Chief of Staff of the US Army and his civilian boss (in America, the country's defense minister is a civilian). At the heart of the scandal was the decision on the number of troops needed to overthrow Saddam Hussein. General Eric Shinseki told the Senate Armed Services Committee that "on the order of several hundred thousand men." But US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfield believed that half of that number would cope with the matter. The Ministry of Defense, based on information that it believed to be quite reliable, believed that the Iraqi divisions would surrender at full strength. Shinseki looked deeper - he understood that without sufficient protection, the Iraqi arsenals would be plundered. And both were right. The Americans established control over Iraq with the help of a group of 130 thousand people, mostly American soldiers. But by the time the first statue of Hussein was overthrown from the pedestal, a gigantic arsenal of rocket-propelled grenade launchers and anti-aircraft missiles had already fallen into the hands of implacable Islamists. In the months that followed, half of all Americans killed in Iraq were killed by shots from one type of weapon - the RPG-7 anti-tank rocket launcher.
RPG-7 is everywhere
George Mordica II, who works at the US Army Military Operations Analysis Center, told Popular Mechanics that the RPG-7 is indeed the most popular weapon in Iraq today. RPG-7 is sure to be found among the found and seized weapons. This inexpensive, simple and easy-to-use grenade launcher has received a rebirth in the hands of the guerrillas. It was developed in the 1960s in the USSR, at the state enterprise "Basalt". The simplicity of the design immediately gained the popularity of the grenade launcher in all armies of the Warsaw Pact, in China and North Korea. By the end of the Cold War, RPG-7s could already be found in the arsenals of more than 40 armies of the world, most of them hostile to the United States.
Nobody knows how many RPG-7 grenade launchers are scattered around the hot spots of the planet. There is not even a more or less clear idea of the number of "legal" RPG-7s. Mordica and a number of other experts believe that Basalt and its direct licensees have produced at least a million pieces. But it is reliably known that with the fall of the USSR, the trickle of RPG-7 stolen from warehouses turned into a real stream. There are so many of them that such a toy is cheaper than a laptop.
In the age of night vision devices and "smart" bombs, which are aimed at the target by satellites, the RPG-7 may seem like a primitive weapon, not far from the bow and arrow. Mordica says that the RPG-7 originates from the German Panzerfaust anti-tank weapon, which the Germans developed for defensive purposes towards the end of World War II.
And according to military historians, the principle of this weapon was borrowed from the confiscated bazookas used by the allies.
The RPG-7, which caused so much trouble to the Americans, weighs about 8.5 kg (of which 2 kg is the grenade itself). To shoot, the weapon is taken by two handles, pointed with a simple telescopic sight and the trigger is pulled. Depending on the type of ammunition, a single shot from an RPG-7 can destroy an infantry platoon in an open area, stop a tank from a distance of three football fields, or shoot down a helicopter. In a melee situation where the sides are pouring fire on each other, the RPG-7 is unmatched. This became clear even in clashes with the Mujahideen during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, in 1979-1989.
At the beginning of the conflict, the Soviets usually equipped a motorized rifle platoon with one RPG-7. Gaining the experience of war in the mountains, Soviet soldiers appreciated the advantages of the RPG-7, and their number began to increase. The mujahideen liked the grenade launcher even more. They began to form groups of hunters for enemy armored vehicles. Analysts claim that from 50
up to 80 percent of the personnel were armed with RPG-7. Thus, one platoon could have up to fifteen grenade launchers. When normal artillery was not at hand, RPG-7s were used instead of cannons. And although the grenade launcher was not conceived as an air defense weapon, it has become one of the most effective helicopter killers in history. In October 1994, in Mogadishu (Somalia), two American helicopters were shot down with just such grenade launchers. And in Afghanistan, the Mujahideen used them to ambush helicopters. For the same purpose, they are used by the irreconcilable in Iraq.
New warheads
One of the reasons for the long-term success of the RPG-7 was Basalt's willingness to invent new warheads for the venerable weapon. Anatoly Obukhov, general director of the Russian research and production enterprise Basalt, wrote in the Military Parade magazine that the new ammunition TBG-7V (thermobaric), PG-7VR (with a tandem warhead) and OG-7V (fragmentation) allow a soldier to perform an unprecedented the number of different tasks on the battlefield.
The TBG-7V thermobaric charge is comparable in destructive power to a shot from a 120-mm gun. It simultaneously creates a high-temperature cloud and a powerful blast wave, tearing and burning all life within a radius of 10 meters from the point of detonation. When hitting the armor, a gap of 15–45 cm appears, through which heat penetrates into the vehicle, as a result of which the crew dies.
One of the methods of protection against such weapons is active armor, which is actually a "skin" of explosives. When the charge hits the tank, the active armor explodes, repelling the incoming charge. This helps prevent the molten metal from burning through the armor. But the PG-7VR ammunition also copes with active armor. It has two parts called a tandem warhead. Such a charge hits the tank twice, at strictly calculated intervals. The first part neutralizes active armor. The second breaks through normal metal.
The OG-7V fragmentation charge is designed specifically for urban combat, where the targets are usually brick and reinforced concrete structures. Therefore, it is necessary to get into a relatively small hole from which the enemy shoots. The accuracy of the OG-7V is very close to that of small arms.
It is believed that the Iraqi army had all three types of new ammunition along with other anti-personnel and anti-tank charges.
Experts believe that the RPG-7 will be in demand for many years to come. This is a proven, cheap weapon against tanks and helicopters, and it will surely find use - especially in situations of confrontation between regular units and partisans.
Rockets
The approximately one million RPG-7 anti-tank rocket launchers scattered across 40 countries around the world are the main threat to American troops. But not the only one. Hussein's ransacked arsenals were bursting with SA-7 Grail anti-aircraft missiles. Over the past 25 years, these missiles and their subsequent modification "Strela-3" have fired at 35 aircraft, most of them civilian. In 24 cases, this led to plane crashes, as a result of which more than 500 people died. Experts believe that in Iraq alone, about five thousand Arrows could have fallen into the hands of the irreconcilable.
From May to November 2003 alone, 19 cases of firing at planes were recorded near Baghdad International Airport. The main problem with the RPG-7 is that the shooter should aim it at the target. Arrows, on the other hand, find their own target. Each missile is equipped with an infrared sensor that “senses” the invisible heat trail from an aircraft jet engine, like a beacon light. The electronic guidance system receives data from the sensor and adjusts the position of the rocket stabilizers. Thus, the "Arrow", following the target at supersonic speeds, never loses sight of it. Once close to the engine, a warhead weighing a little over a kilogram detonates.
Despite the huge number of downed aircraft and casualties, there are two technical reasons for hoping that in the near future missiles of this type will no longer pose such a serious danger. First, their age. The key elements of the Arrow are an infrared sensor and heat-powered batteries. Both cannot be kept forever. Therefore, according to some estimates, most of these missiles that have fallen into the wrong hands are unlikely to ever fire. The second problem is the way Arrow detects a target. It must be launched after the plane, otherwise it will not be able to catch the thermal radiation of the nozzles. The distance between the gunner and the aircraft (and this can be 10 km) gives the crew enough time to respond to the threat. Protection techniques can be different. For example, shoot off heat traps, which are "brighter" than the nozzles of aircraft engines. The aircraft of the President of the United States, military aircraft, as well as civil aircraft of the Israeli company El Al are equipped with various protection systems. Efforts are being made to install similar systems on American aircraft.
The best defense
Today, the most promising method of protecting troops from irreconcilable missiles is the FCLAS technology (active multi-layer wide-spectrum and short-range protection). The principle of its action is obvious from the name: it is an anti-missile in a tube. Such devices are placed around a vehicle, ship, building or helicopter, creating an invisible shield that autonomously detects and destroys incoming missiles. The FCLAS concept is simple, but its implementation presents certain difficulties. The nose of the missile contains two radar installations. The radar in the head looks for objects whose speed matches the charge speed of the RPG-7 grenade launcher. Once such an object is detected, a charge of black powder (similar to the one used in smoke grenades) ignites and ejects the FCLAS from the tube where it was stored. The second radar monitors what is happening above, below and to the sides. The FCLAS launch is synchronized so that it and the enemy projectile meet about five meters from the protected object. It is at this moment that the second radar, which monitors the situation, undermines the released charge. The explosive filling blows the metal sheathing to pieces.
Due to the corrugation of the skin, it breaks into very small square fragments that fly towards the enemy projectile. Anything that falls into the cloud of these particles turns into confetti.
Associated losses
A cold wind is blowing at a training ground near Salt Lake City, Utah, and it is about to snow. Popular Mechanics magazine was invited to the first test of the FCLAS system. Since all the efforts of the developers are aimed at saving vehicles and saving lives, it is very important for researchers to understand how much people and equipment will be affected by a protective explosion. The capabilities to detect and destroy flying enemy charges have already been demonstrated to army inspectors during previous tests held in June 2002 at the New Mexico Institute of Technology.
To destroy the RPG-7 charge requires significant energy. Don Walton, one of the developers of the FCLAS radar subsystem, notes that this is the main problem: you cannot throw a pillow into such a charge, you need a powerful explosion. The question of the amount of collateral losses when using FCLAS remained open. An abandoned car, a damaged jeep and dummies in body armor were located at the test site. There is a short countdown in the trailer, protected from the explosion by a natural barrier in the form of a hill. The air crackles and the floor bounces - lightning explodes nearby. Through the window, we observe a column of gray and black smoke that rises from the hill and drifts from the site of the explosion. All windows of both vehicles have been broken. Some tires are perforated. But the mannequins stand still. These destruction are ridiculous to compare with the damage that a charge from an RPG-7 or "Arrow" would inflict. Maury Mayfield, president of one of the contractor companies, is at the epicenter of the explosion. Almost nothing has changed there. Only small dents are visible in the ground - where, for a hundredth of a second, a cloud of tiny particles moving at supersonic speed swept through. Mayfield says that nothing could fly through such a cloud. If a shot had been fired from a real RPG-7 grenade launcher, the charge would still not have reached the target.
The developers plan to release a prototype FCLAS in about a year. Well, wait and see.
