For Sailors in the Fire Control Technician (FT), the overwhelmingly vast majority of the time they spend with combat-control systems is in testing and maintenance. But unlike their Missile Technician (MT) counterparts, who work on nuclear-tipped ICBMs that have never been launched during hostilities, FT Sailors are responsible for the Tactical Tomahawk Weapon Systems found on Fast Attack and Guided Missile Submarines—and those have been utilized both in combat scenarios and in preemptive strike situations.
During the 1991 Persian Gulf War, for example, 288 Tomahawks were fired; though only a dozen came from two submarines, the USS Pittsburgh and the USS Louisville, it was a reminder that the underwater vessels had powerful tactical striking capabilities against land-based targets. In 1996, more submarines took part in the launching of Tomahawks, this time against Iraq, but the number was not specified. Scores of Tomahawks were fired at Iraq during Operation Desert Fox (415) and the 2003 invasion (802), and it’s inconceivable that all emanated from surface vessels. And in 2011, a total of 159 UGM-109s—the designation of the submarine-launched version of the Tomahawk—were launched against targets in Libya, though that number includes missiles fired by British ships as well.
Depending on a vessel’s ordnance and configuration, an FT Sailor can launch a Tomahawk one of two ways: vertically or through the submarine’s torpedo tubes. In either case, the launch is undetectable until the “bird” breaks the surface.
Until now, Tomahawks have been deployed against stationary, land-based targets. But two recent tests of the new Block IV variant of the Tomahawk resulted in hits on moving ships. Even more impressively, one Tomahawk was able to change course from its pre-plotted path and hit a moving ship; the navigation change was based on real-time target data sent to the missile from a surveillance aircraft.
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