I ran accross an article that caused me to sit back completely stunned in light of the number of deaths caused during the war in Lebanon as a result of RPG attacks.
Last month while I was up North I saw that mid-war, Israel began to put steel cages around the turrets of armored personnel carriers to try to deflect the initial impact of RPGs, causing them to explode away from the tank’s armor. This would eliminate the armor-piercing capability, providing it hit the bar of the cage and didn’t slip through the gaps. Rather interesting improvisation, but it seems not entirely effective…and was it even needed?
Israel’s Raphael has developed a system called Trophy that claims to provide full 360-degree protection against airborne threats to armored vehicles, ie: RPGs.
It uses radar to detect inbound threats and then uses some counter-measure to neutralize the warhead. According to the articles, it’s been found over 90% effective in field tests and they’re currently trying to sell it to the US military for use in Iraq.
Great! But what about the IDF?
Sure, maybe it’s not 100% ready for Prime Time, but it’s no longer top secret. Heck, there’s even a promotional video and a story on FOX News. So why didn’t we hear that there was a big rush to install Trophy systems on Israel’s tanks fighting in Lebanon????
I would be very interested to hear the enquiry deal with this question.
There are some more articles here, here and here.
[tags]Israel, war, Lebanon, Raphael, RPG, defense, Iraq[/tags]
