jackehammond
Active member
Folks,
According to who you talk to, it is either the US TOW or the Russian Sagger wire guided antitank missile that is the most numerous ever made. Personally I believe that the Sagger has that title.
TOW stands for "Tube-fired, Optical-tracked, Wire-guided. While the French had a optional package for their famous SS-11 (ie the one that made wire-guided antitank missiles popular) called Harpoon which greatly helped the gunner hit target where all he had to do was keep the cross-hairs on the target which today is called SACLOS (Semi-Automatic Command Line Of Sight) and is a great step over the older method where the gunner had to keep the target on his sights cross hairs and then with a joy stick line both the missile and target in the cross hairs (called CLOS for Command to Line of Sight), it was the TOW that was actually the first wide spread 2nd generation antitank missile that used SACLOS.
The TOW was developed in the late 1960s to replace the 106mm recoiless rifle. While the 106mm had the ability to defeat tanks and other armor its effective range was inadequate. The TOW enter operational service with the US military in the early 1970. The price of the first TOW missile because of the huge volume of production was $3,500.00 (Today it is around $10,000 per missile). In 1972 the TOW saw its first combat around An Loc, South Vietnam when the only two UH-1s that could fire TOW missiles was rushed to South Vietnam. The effect of those two TOW armed UH-1 was dramatic stopping the NVA armored thrust in its tracks. The US Army became and an immediate beliver in the TOW. Later the TOW ground launcher saw combat with the Israeli Army when some ground launchers were rushed to Israel when both the Egyptian and Syrians were almost overwhelming the Israeli armored forces (ie this was only revealed about 10 years ago and reports were it was mounted on Israeli half tracks).
Finally, I have a huge library of the TOW. My first article was a report on the jeep mounted TOW with the Indiana National Guard which was put on display at Ft Harrison, Indiana in 1978. I am going to try and post those photos I can. To keep from using much space I am posting the jpegs at 25%. I would appreciate it if the member who was with a US Army TOW unit to post some comments so I can post a reply with more photos and avoid a back to back reply.
Jack E. Hammond
According to who you talk to, it is either the US TOW or the Russian Sagger wire guided antitank missile that is the most numerous ever made. Personally I believe that the Sagger has that title.
TOW stands for "Tube-fired, Optical-tracked, Wire-guided. While the French had a optional package for their famous SS-11 (ie the one that made wire-guided antitank missiles popular) called Harpoon which greatly helped the gunner hit target where all he had to do was keep the cross-hairs on the target which today is called SACLOS (Semi-Automatic Command Line Of Sight) and is a great step over the older method where the gunner had to keep the target on his sights cross hairs and then with a joy stick line both the missile and target in the cross hairs (called CLOS for Command to Line of Sight), it was the TOW that was actually the first wide spread 2nd generation antitank missile that used SACLOS.
The TOW was developed in the late 1960s to replace the 106mm recoiless rifle. While the 106mm had the ability to defeat tanks and other armor its effective range was inadequate. The TOW enter operational service with the US military in the early 1970. The price of the first TOW missile because of the huge volume of production was $3,500.00 (Today it is around $10,000 per missile). In 1972 the TOW saw its first combat around An Loc, South Vietnam when the only two UH-1s that could fire TOW missiles was rushed to South Vietnam. The effect of those two TOW armed UH-1 was dramatic stopping the NVA armored thrust in its tracks. The US Army became and an immediate beliver in the TOW. Later the TOW ground launcher saw combat with the Israeli Army when some ground launchers were rushed to Israel when both the Egyptian and Syrians were almost overwhelming the Israeli armored forces (ie this was only revealed about 10 years ago and reports were it was mounted on Israeli half tracks).
Finally, I have a huge library of the TOW. My first article was a report on the jeep mounted TOW with the Indiana National Guard which was put on display at Ft Harrison, Indiana in 1978. I am going to try and post those photos I can. To keep from using much space I am posting the jpegs at 25%. I would appreciate it if the member who was with a US Army TOW unit to post some comments so I can post a reply with more photos and avoid a back to back reply.
Jack E. Hammond
