Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!bellcore!att!cbnews!military
From: budden@manta.nosc.mil (Rex A. Buddenberg)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: A-10 Thunderbolt -- Who /really/ flys them?
Message-ID: <10225@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Date: 14 Oct 89 01:56:08 GMT
References: <10017@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Sender: military@cbnews.ATT.COM
Organization: Naval Ocean Systems Center, San Diego
Lines: 28
Approved: military@att.att.com



From: budden@manta.nosc.mil (Rex A. Buddenberg)
Probably at least partly because the Army can't fly their own close
air support with manned planes, they found a better way.  Development
is on the road for the Fiber Optic Guided Missile.  Which in
Pentagonese is called...FOG-M (singularly appropriate -- there's
enough of it around here).  

Consider this a rough cross between a video game and an A-10
kamikaze.  As the missile flies, it unrolls a bobbin of fiber
which is hitched up to a TV-set/joystick affair with a human who
remotely flies the missile around until he finds a target.  Then
he simply flies it into the tank (or whatever).  All the
while, the human is in a hole or behind some hill.  There were some
concerns about the fiber breaking as it spools out across the countryside
and there is an engineering tradeoff between that concern and loiter
time.  But the reports I've seen (sketchy) indicate that there is no
remaining technological risk, the program is sexy enough to get
Congress' attention, and they are off.  

Can't jam this.  Missile is small enough that it'd be very hard to
intercept.  And the guidance system is simple enough that it's tough
to deceive in a mobile environment where camoflage isn't practical.

Bring your own air support.

Rex Buddenberg