During the U.S. President Donald Trump’s visit to the Fort Bragg, a containerised artillery rocket system was spotted with two GMLRS guided rocket pods.
Following the Typhon weapon system, which can be described as four Mk41 VLS cells packed in a 40-ft container, the U.S. Army seems to be exploring containerised artillery rockets as something that can be deployed on a tactical level.
The image shows two GMLRS pods in the prototype launcher system, each of which holds up to six GMLRS or GMLRS-ER GPS-guided artillery rockets. However, it would not be limited to GMLRS as the pods can also carry two PrSM SRBMs as well.
While Typhon allows the use of highly capable land attack weaponry like the BGM-109 Tomahawk cruise missile, it is expensive and somewhat escalative by nature due to the strategic aspect of Tomahawk missiles.
Thus, it is natural that the Army is looking for alternative weapon systems to containerise that are more tactical and cheaper than Typhon.
Exploring New Ways of Deploying GMLRS
The long-serving GMLRS is being considered for not only containerisation but also new ground platforms. Recently, Oshkosh Defence unveiled a ROUGE Fires UGV variant with six GMLRS rockets, while Lockheed Martin tested an unmanned configuration of M142 HIMARS. Another new platform work of Lockheed Martin is a 10x10 truck that can carry up to four GMLRS pods (Totalling 24 rockets).
Rise of Containerised Weaponry
Containerised weapons are becoming popular mainly due to logistical simplicity and plug-and-play usage, making them platform-agnostic provided carriage capacity is sufficient and concealment factor.
Containerisation is not only limited to missiles/rockets but also UAVs. The recent attack on a Russian airbase by Ukraine using civilian trucks carrying a large number of FPVs is a fresh example of how dangerous the concealment factor and the plug-and-play characteristic can be.
World navies are as eager as armies to fit their platforms with these easy-mount weapon systems, primarily to improve the magazine depths or provide additional capabilities like land attack or air defence for ships lacking them.
However, the uncertainty and the proven danger of this new generation of weaponry have the potential to start a wave of targeting civilian trucks or infrastructure in the event of a war with prejudice. After all, using un-designated containers to fire the weapons could be compared to soldiers getting in a firefight while wearing civilian uniforms as deception (which counts as perfidy) in a way.
Author: Özgür Ekşi
