We explain how they work, and where they would be most effective
. “We have taken the decision to supply Ukraine with light anti-armour defensive weapons systems,” announced Ben Wallace, Britain’s defence minister, later that day. Photographs from Ukraine showed the planes stuffed full of Next-generation Light Anti-tank Weapons , an Anglo-Swedish anti-tank guided missile .A daily newsletter with the best of our journalismAccording to Mr Wallace’s deputy, Britain had dispatched “thousands” of these.
The latest requires no steering at all. “Fire-and-forget” missiles, like the NLAW and Javelin, have a small sensor in the nose—like a camera or thermal imager—that can spot a tank. Just as important is that many are “top-attack” weapons. The Javelin arcs into the sky and plunges down; the NLAW flies a metre or so above the tank with a warhead pointing down . Either way, the point is to strike where the armour is thinnest.
The missile can also be bamboozled. All modern armoured vehicles can release obscuring smoke, some containing hot white phosphorus smoke, which confuses thermal sensors. In November, some Russian tanks near Ukraine were spotted with “slat” armour on top of the turret, perhaps to misdirect smaller explosives. Others seemed to have heat-emitting decoys on their snorkels to lead warheads astray—though some Javelins cleverly have two warheads to foil such a trick.
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