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Originally Posted by Whacker
Thus proving the effectiveness of guided or "smart" weapons vs spray 'n pray.
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Not to nitpick too much.. but the term 'smart' weapon is usally reserved for weapons that are of the 'fire and forget' type.. As in they have enough 'smarts' of their own that they don't require any human interaction/control after they are launched.
With that said the Fritz X was not a 'smart' bomb in that it was controled/guided to the target by a human, in the form of radio contorls.
One of the first, or maybe even the first, true 'smart' bombs used to shink ships in WWII was the USN Bat bomb. It was a true 'smart' bomb in that it used onboard radar to guide 'itself' to the target. Here is a neat vidoe of the BAT from WWII
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The antiship variant of the Bat (SWOD Mark 9 Model 0) eventually saw combat service beginning in April 1945 off Borneo, dropped by PB4Y Privateers (one bomb mounted under each wing) at altitudes of 15,000 to 25,000 feet (4,6007,600 m) at airspeeds of 140 to 210 knots (260-390 km/h). Several Japanese ships were sunk, including a destroyer at a range of 20 nmi (37 km). Several Bats were also fitted with modified radar systems (SWOD Mark 9 Model 1) and dropped on Japanese-held bridges in Burma and other land-based targets.
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