Pride of America - The Tomahawk Missile

The United States of America has seen a lot of military action during the last fifteen years. Every time the United States of America goes to war, the word Tomahawk missile is heard. The Tomahawk is one of the crown jewels of the American missile program. It is named after the equipment that the Native Americans carry. The Tomahawk's versatility and destructive capabilities puts it a few notches above its contemporaries. The Tomahawk missile is the Navy's weapon of choice for critical, long-range precision strike missions against high value, heavily defended targets. During the critical early days of a regional conflict, Tomahawk, in conjunction with other land attack systems and tactical aircraft, denies or delays forward movement of enemy forces, neutralizes the enemy's ability to conduct air operations, and suppress enemy air defenses. In addition, Tomahawk attacks high value targets such as electrical generating facilities, command and control nodes, and weapons assembly/storage facilities.

Raytheon Company, with 2003 sales of $18.1 billion, is an industry leader in defense and government electronics, space, information technology, technical services, and business and special mission aircraft. They are the builders of the Tomahawk missile. The Tomahawk Land Attack Missile (TLAM) is a long-range cruise missile designed by the General Dynamics in the 1970s. It was designed as a medium to long range, low altitude aircraft that could be launched from a submerged submarine. One of its biggest advantages is that it can be launched from almost anything - a submarine to a truck. The submarine version is launched from torpedo or vertical tubes. Surface ships employ a vertical launching system (VLS). The Fire Control Systems (FCS) on both ships and submarines perform communications management, database management, engagement planning, and launch control functions. These systems provide the interface between the missile and FCS for missile initialization and launch as well as environmental protection. A solid fuel booster with steering vanes in its exhaust is used for launch and to provide steering during the initial few seconds of flight while the wings and control surfaces are deployed.

The Tomahawk Weapon System (TWS) consists of four major components: Tomahawk Missile, Theater Mission Planning Center (TMPC)/Afloat Planning System (APS), Tomahawk Weapon Control System (TWCS) for surface ships, and Combat Control System (CCS) for submarines. The Tomahawk is an all-weather submarine or ship-launched land-attack cruise missile. After launch, a solid propellant propels the missile until a small turbofan engine takes over for the cruise portion of flight. It is difficult for the enemy to destroy the Tomahawk mid-flight because radar detection is difficult because of the missile's small cross-section, low altitude flight. Infrared detection is difficult because the turbofan engine emits little heat. It is an all weather sub-sonic piece of art. The land attack version of Tomahawk has inertial and terrain contour matching (TERCOM) radar guidance. The TERCOM radar uses a stored map reference to compare with the actual terrain to determine the missile's position. This is the reason for the missile's pinpoint accuracy.

Tomahawk was used extensively during Iraq (Desert Storm) in 1991, in Bosnia (Deliberate Force) in 1995 and in Iraq (Desert Strike) in 1996. Four hundred Block II and Block III missiles were fired on five separate occasions. In the 1991 Persian Gulf conflict, Tomahawks were launched at tactical targets. Two attack submarines launched twelve of the Tomahawks. U.S. Navy reports that out of a 297 attempted missile launches 290 missiles fired and 242 Tomahawks hit their targets. It this is true then the Tomahawk is undoubtedly one of the most accurate war weapons ever invented. The Tomahawk can be used against surface ships, as the Tomahawk Anti-Ship Missile (TASM), or land targets, employing several different types of warheads. Three primary variants are currently operational: nuclear land attack (TLAM-N), conventional land attack (TLAM-C, unitary warhead), and conventional land attack submunition (TLAM-D, dispense bomblets).

The average cost of a Tomahawk missile is close to $1.5 million. But this takes into account the initial research and development costs. As a pure production cost it costs less than $500,000. Tomahawk Weapon System (TWS) capability is evolving into major systems with expanding capabilities. Today, Tomahawk is able to respond to rapidly developing scenarios and attack emerging land-based targets. A more diverse threat coupled with a smaller U.S. force structure place an absolute premium on system flexibility and responsiveness.