The Deadly Evolution of Anti-Tank Warfare

How does one man take on a tank or reduce a building to rubble? With one of these, the most infamous and widely used shoulder-mounted anti-tank weapon in the world. This Cold War rocket launcher is still blowing targets to smithereens. But there's new competition. Does it compare to the latest high-tech systems? Nice. I'm traveling around the world to find out. This is the RPG, and this is a weapon that changed the world. Nothing has shaped history more than the gun. I'm Will Willis, former Army Ranger and Air Force pararescueman. I've trained with modern weapons until firing them is second nature. Now, I'm out to master the greatest military firearms of all time. And see how these weapons change the world. They're long, they're loud, they're lethal. Rockets like the RPG are essential weapons on today's battlefield. They've been used in combat for almost 1,000 years. However, those early rocketeers never dreamt that their weapons could be harnessed, carried, and fired by a single mobile infantryman. First carried by Soviet troops in 1949, the RPG is known as the AK-47 of rockets. It's cheap, reliable, easy to use, and deadly. Over the last 60 years, more than 9 million have been produced, making RPGs the high-impact weapon of choice for militias, insurgents, and guerrillas all over the world. Like the AK-47, the threat of the RPG will not go away. But more modern designs, like the Swedish AT-4, are competing with it, sometimes head to head. April 2003, Saddam Hussein's reign of tyranny has officially ended. But pockets of resistance keep the war-torn country in a state of chaos. U.S. Marines patrolling Sadr City confront heavily armed remnants of Saddam's army. One of them pulls out an RPG. But the Marines are packing their own rocket launcher, an AT-4. The AT-4 is one of the most versatile weapons on the battlefield, designed, developed, and manufactured in a nation that hasn't gone to war for nearly 200 years. Though not widely known in the U.S., Saab Dynamic is one of the most prominent weapons companies in the world. And it's located here in Karlskoga, Sweden. The company's Bofors Arms Division dates back to a hammer mill founded in the 1600s. Its most famous owner was Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite and founder of the Nobel Prizes. Nobel played the key role in reshaping this iron and steel producer into a modern weapons manufacturer. I've come over 5,000 miles to fire the new AT-4 myself. It's the AT-4 CSTW, Combined Space Tandem Warhead. And it's the new disposable assault munition. It's designed with an anti-structure, anti-armor breaching capability, all in one munition. Around $3,000 a piece, the AT-4 launcher is 40 inches long and weighs 15 pounds. It's disposable. And because it can only be fired once, the AT-4 is classified as a single round of ammunition rather than an actual weapon. AT-4 product manager Andreas Andersson is developing the latest and most powerful version. I think that the most important thing with the AT-4 development right now is the multi-target capability, because this will help your commander to have one weapon that he could use for all of his different elements when conducting an assault. OK, Andreas, I recognize the original AT-4 configuration that I was trained with when I was in the Army. And right here, we have a front sight made out of plastic. We've got the rear sight right here. We've got our safety lever and trigger mechanism, our cocking lever, and also got a shipping safety pin. That's right. In what way has this weapon system changed? It has changed in quite a bit, particularly when you look inside the weapon. The projectile is a whole new projectile with a breaking charge and a main charge. So it's a tandem warhead, which comes from the name, too, for it. The anti-structure tandem warhead includes two separate explosive charges. In blast mode, the first charge punches a hole into an outer wall, while the second main charge detonates inside the structure. In breach mode, both charges explode on impact. So one weapon system, two different capabilities. Two different capabilities, only from flipping this mode selector. So in this way, on the brick wall, in the breach mode, creating a new point of entry, and in that mode, the blast mode, on the concrete target, getting behind the wall. The penetration. All right, Andreas, so what we're gonna do now is we're gonna fire this AT4 CSTW. We've got a double-layer brick wall that we're gonna fire at in breach mode. I'll be taking that shot. On most rocket launchers, the backblast is so strong, anyone within 60 to 70 yards to the rear is in danger, limiting your choice of firing positions. Saab's advances have led to a confined-space warhead. The reduced backblast means their weapon can be fired from tight, enclosed spaces found in urban combat zones. This locks down. There we go. Holy smokes, man. That's a nice hit there. On the target, man, but it definitely put a hole in there. Perfect, and it's perfect as a new point of entry for anyone to get in through. You know what's amazing is that the concussion was not that bad. We're in this confined room, and, you know, we're both fine. Yeah. The blast damage in breach mode is impressive. Now Andreas is going to show me what the warhead can do in blast mode on a much bigger, more reinforced target. How thick is that concrete? That is an 8-inch concrete wall with double layers of rebars, and each rebar is about half an inch thick. And then behind that concrete wall is also a large metal container. Yeah, it's a standard shipping container that we put there to capture what the main charge is capable of. My goodness. You hit that concrete wall center mass, and the concussion just exploded that entire container. And this wall is no joke. I mean, it's thick. It's reinforced with rebar. What I didn't realize is that this rebar is actually crisscrossed in here. You have vertical, and you have horizontal rebar. And I can put my fist all the way through that hole. The shape of this structure has totally changed. But stepping inside, one of the first things I noticed is kind of this halo, or this ring of shrapnel just inside of here. Deformed the entire structure. The concussion wave was magnificent. Look at the penetrations, though. Even these very, very small penetrations through this steel. That's metal moving at high velocity, a high enough velocity to exit this steel structure. I got to tell you, I'm really impressed. So let's take a look at the brick wall. Even from 150, 200 yards away, we could see that this breach was significant. You've got two different capabilities with the same weapon system. Over here, you've got the blast capability. Over here with the breach, that's definitely a classic breach. I can step right through here, just like you're supposed to be able to. I've got bricks that have been thrown all the way back. Those are hazardous. The entire structure has been compromised. Another round would totally drop this entire wall. The AT-4 is not the only Swedish weapon shaking up the battlefield. The M3 Carl Gustav recoilless rifle is also upping the stakes. Recoilless weapons have a rifle barrel and allow heavier shells to be fired with greater accuracy by eliminating the kick. The Carl Gustav is a highly advanced version. of the Band of Brothers to Operation Barbarossa and D-Day. Immerse yourself in the dramatic stories of this remarkable era by signing up via the link in the description. Jack Seymour, a retired member of US Army Parachute Infantry and Special Forces, is the leading American expert on its capabilities. I fully believe that the Carl Gustav is the number one system in the world. OK, Jack, this is a weapon that we used in the Ranger Battalion when I was there. Why don't you tell me a little bit about why you like the Carl Gustav? Any mission or any target set from anti-personnel, anti-tank, anti-structure can be built around this weapon system by simply mixing the ammunition types in the platoon or the company. From the front to the back, what are we looking at? From the front, we have the shock absorbers to protect the tube. Day sights underneath the scope itself. We have a 3 by 12 scope. We have these knobs here for each specific round that you interchange by the types of rounds that you want to use. OK, and of course, we've got our pistol grip over here. We actually have to cock the weapon system over here with our thumb. Is that correct? Yes, it's already cocked. It's already cocked. So in your position, you would just stay behind the gun. Your AG would move the handle forward and lift, remove the round, or place a round in the tube. None of that can be done unless, of course, the weapon system is cocked and obviously on something. OK, then close that up. We close it up. I check your backblast area. I let you know that we're good to fire, and you engage the target. OK, this is considered a recoilless rifle. What makes it a recoilless rifle? Essentially, there's generally a balance between propellant boost and launching the projectile out the tube. So the exhaust blows out the back, and the round blows out the front with no recoil observed by the fire, or much recoil observed by the fire. That's what makes it a recoilless system. OK, so all the energy is, rather than being absorbed by the body, is pushed out in the form of backblast, and then, of course, in the form of the projectile itself. All right, so tell me a little bit about the first target we're going to engage with the Carl Gustav. It's a simulated house or fortified structure. It's constructed of wood, walls approximately 8 inches. OK, and there's some targets on the inside of that structure that we need to engage. Yes, sir. Well, I'm excited to shoot this thing. Let's have at it. Before firing the full 84-millimeter warhead, I'll test out the system using a smaller 20-millimeter round. This sub-caliber munition allows operators to practice their marksmanship with a less expensive alternative. Backblast area clear. Permission to fire. It leaves an incandescent trail, allowing trainers to see where the gunner is shooting. I'm ready for the full-size round, a high-explosive dual-purpose warhead known as an HEDP. It uses its kinetic force to penetrate the outer wall, and the charge explodes a millisecond later inside the structure, eliminating any occupants. At $1,800 a round, it's important that I get this first shot on target. That was awesome. Awesome. I can see from here that that target is just totally annihilated. I saw pieces flying through my scope. Yes, that was a great shot. Oh, look, this is the fins. The fins from the projectile just perfectly lodged inside of here. I don't know where the other one is, but these four fins ended up staying on the outside of this wood structure. They're lodged in there pretty good. Yeah, I was going to say. So on the backside. And there's the exit route. It splintered all this, but it also explodes inside of the room. Look at the size of the hole that's up over here on the backside. And then, of course, our target. This target's hit in several spots. Right here, here, down here. The explosion is devastating. No one on the inside of that wall could have survived. Both the Carl Gustav and the AT-4 provide the solitary soldier unprecedented firepower. But shoulder-mounted rockets have been used in warfare for decades. Their creation was essential to overcome a new threat on the battlefield. During World War I, the first armored tanks roll across no man's land in an attempt to break the stalemate of trench warfare. German troops have no answer to this British war machine. By 1939, Germany improves on the enemy's technology. The Nazis' Panzer tank divisions are used to advance with devastating effect during their Blitzkrieg campaigns. The tank sparks a race to design a new infantry weapon, powerful enough to penetrate steel armor. And by 1942, America has an answer. The bazooka. Here to help me test the first shoulder-mounted tank killer is Jeff Warner, expert on World War II rockets. The bazooka was the first of its kind at that time. It was very revolutionary. This was a shoulder-fired rocket, and it was space-age technology at the time. So Jeff, this is the famous bazooka. And most people will still call any shoulder-mounted rocket a bazooka. The M1 bazooka and its variants was actually designed by Lieutenant Edward Uhl of the US Army. He was given the task of finding out a way to have one guy deliver some kind of an explosive charge to vehicles, more specifically armored vehicles, with a shoulder-fired weapon to just be able to pop up behind some kind of cover and knock out a tank single-handedly. And you know, today, we see RPGs, we see law rockets, and they're a pretty common weapon on the battlefield. But this is the granddaddy of them all. Nothing like that existed before this right here. Before we fire the bazooka, it's time for a little rocket science. The destructive power of the bazooka's warhead and of most shoulder-launched rockets comes from something called a shape charge. Like a lens focusing light, a shape charge concentrates the force of the exploding warhead, creating a jet of superheated gas that can easily slice through steel. This phenomenon is known as the Monroe Effect, after American chemist Charles Monroe, who first noted the power of shape charges in 1888. We've set up a test so we can see the Monroe Effect for ourselves. Bomb experts are placing a small length of det cord filled with PET and high explosive on a steel plate and wiring it for remote detonation. Then they form the same amount of explosive into a shape charge, placing it in a wooden holder and set it a few inches above a second steel plate of the same size. Now it's time to compare the differences. All right. Well, look at that. Look at the difference here. Yeah. So right here where we laid the charge on top of the steel, it just made a little mark. All that energy from that round moves up and away from this plate in all directions. When you put a shape charge on top of that energy, it captures the energy and sends it back towards the steel plate. And that's how these warheads penetrate armor. They use a projectile shape charge. That's exactly right. Bazookas, RPGs, and similar weapons have a distinctive design, the telltale sign of a shape charge inside. All right. Well, that's enough of the rocket science. So let's get down to the nitty gritty. Show me how to load and fire this thing. Right. Well, it's a pretty simple procedure, really. This is basically just a hollow tube. And you've got a rocket that gets connected into the back of it and clips in here. And it's fired electrically with a trigger here. So it's an electronic ignition system. Absolutely. To arm the rocket, it goes in the back here. There's an arming switch here. You switch that to red. That means that the tube and the rocket is ready to fire. And then over here, this screen, what's the purpose of this screen on the front? Well, as the rocket leaves the tube, it's trailing fire and smoke. It's pretty intense. And the intent of the screen is to just protect the fire from a little bit of the back blast. OK. But there's also a rudimentary sight here. It's a peep here with two posts in the front, one for 100 yards and one for 200 yards. And that's about it. All right, man. Let's do it. All right. Jeff has set up a target for me, a machine gun nest located 150 yards away. Assuming my aim is good, shock watch patches will measure the g-force of the rocket's impact. The blast did some serious damage, that's for sure. The bazooka's rocket is designed to penetrate a tank, so these targets had no chance. This thing does a good job. Hell, yeah, it does. Look at that. Wow. Holy smokes. It blew this all to hell. Oh, my god. Look at these guys. This is what we call in the medical world multi-system mutilating trauma. Oh, we've got our shock watch patches here. This measures the concussive blast forces. This one has actually gone off. So that means that this guy absorbed 25 g's of force. Right here, we've got another one. And again, this one's turned red, 25 g's of force. So if you did roll into this as, like, a medical personnel, it's pretty traumatic. I mean, these guys are done for. Pretty exciting. I mean, it's nice to do something that guys were doing back in World War II. You know, the warriors that came before and experienced something that they experienced. In response to the American bazooka, Germany produces two of their own shape-charge anti-tank weapons during World War II. More powerful than the American original, they terrorize Allied forces across Europe. To explain their significance, I'm meeting Mark Turner, who restores these mighty weapons. The Panzerschreck is basically a very large bazooka, bazooka on steroids. The projectile, it actually is a rocket with rocket fuel and propels itself out of the tube. How did the Germans in World War II improve on the American-designed bazooka? First of all, they named it Panzerschreck, which means tank terror. It truly is terrifying. They increased the size. American bazooka is approximately 60 millimeters. They improved it, made it larger, up to 88 millimeters. The rocket is twice the weight and destructive power compared to the bazooka. Does this thing load in fire in the same manner as the bazooka? It does, indeed. It has many of the same features that you find on the bazooka, the clip that holds the back of the rocket when it's inserted into the tube. There were some other improvements. It doesn't have a battery for the electric ignition. They have actually a magnetic rod and a coil, which produces a spark when the magnet is inserted into the coil. The Panzerschreck is just the first response to the American bazooka. That Panzerschreck is a really powerful weapon. I can see why they call it a tank terror. Now, what are we looking at here? It looks like an RPG. Well, it does look like an RPG. This is the Panzerfaust. This is the fist on the head. It actually doesn't function like an RPG in that the projectile does not have a rocket motor in it. It has an explosive packet on the inside that when you fire it, it launches the projectile more like a mortar. OK. And after you fire this, I can grab another one of these, shove it back down the tube, and re-engage? Well, actually, these are meant to be disposable. So it would be shoot and scoop, drop the tube, and run away. It was the first disposable rocket launcher. To fire it, you would, first of all, you remove a safety wire from the front sight. That allows you to raise the front sight, which is also blocking the trigger mechanism here. It's just another safety device. You would then sight through the hole here. There's a little tab on the front here. So you get your angle for 60 meters, in this case, through this particular hole. And then by squeezing down on this trigger mechanism, that would ignite the powder charge. OK. It was cheap and crude, but it was easy to produce. It was very easy to train people how to use it. The Panzerfaust shaped charge warhead is packed with TNT and trihexygen. It travels at a relatively slow 100 feet per second, with an effective range of only 66 yards. This enables the Panzerfaust to penetrate any tank on the World War II battlefield. It's even more effective against bunkers, machine gun nests, and sandbag positions. To test the power of the Panzerfaust, we've set up a machine gun tower in the distance. All right. Now it's my turn to fire the tank fist. I'm pretty excited about it, I got to tell you. Let's blow it up. I'm going to fire from right here. Front sight comes up. Ready to fire. Would you say to 60 about that? 60. A direct hit. I guess this devastating weapon really can be fired by anyone. Ah, you nailed it. That was pretty awesome. Unbelievable. I was not expecting an explosion like that. The Panzerfaust, it's meant to penetrate 200 millimeters of steel. So this guy right here, he's showing all of the classic injuries that one would see with any kind of blast trauma. He's got the broken bones and the shrapnel wounds moving all up him. The concussive blast actually launched him from his tower there and down onto the ground. You can expect to see a lot of internal organ rupture, especially in the lungs, the bowels, any hollow spaces in the body from that concussion. And of course, his outpost, totally annihilated. We've got debris all over the area. I mean, very impressive weapon system. I can see why it was such an effective weapon and feared weapon in the battlefield at the time. Well, the fact that the Panzerfaust was designed to take out tanks, this tower didn't stand a chance. Both the reloadable Panzerschreck and the one-shot Panzerfaust are highly effective. They're fearsome weapon systems that are perfectly designed for quickly knocking out tanks or machine gun posts. They also paved the way for a new rocket system developed in the Soviet Union shortly after World War II. The RPG is the most successful rocket system in history. Some see it as a symbol of terrorism, others as a symbol of freedom. It's been used in dozens of wars for multiple decades and is used by over 50 countries. It is undoubtedly a weapon that has changed the world. To explain the RPG's impact, I've brought in former Russian Spetsnaz operative, Sonny Pouzikas. The success of RPG is first, reliability of the weapon in any conditions. Two, it's very simple to learn. And probably the last reason is it's a lot of bang for the buck. It's cheap. So Sonny, we've been talking about US and German rocket systems from World War II. What did the Soviets bring to the table during that time? In the time of World War II, there was no really equivalent man-portable anti-tank weapon in Soviet Army. They were relying on heavier-wield versions of anti-tank weapons and lighter rifle-fired grenades. But in 1949, RPG-2 was introduced. And it's a pretty simple operation overall. That's correct? It is very basic, as basic as AK-47. The RPG-2 is a simple, 40-inch-long, 6-pound steel tube with a pistol grip and trigger. Its wooden side protects the shooter's face from heat generated by the blast or freezing metal during winter warfare. It fires a PG-2 80-millimeter high-explosive anti-tank round at 275 feet per second. It has an effective range of 150 yards and can penetrate steel armor up to 7 inches thick. Trained soldiers can fire off up to six rounds a minute. Now, the acronym RPG, we always say rocket-propelled grenade. That's what it stands for. Is that true? The actual designation in Russian language is ruchnoy prototankovoy granatomet, which in direct translation is a handheld anti-tank grenade launcher. And what was the most successful version of the RPG? RPG-7 was the most successful version and remains so. The RPG-7 is introduced to Soviet soldiers in 1961. It has a simple pistol grip and trigger, weighs 15 pounds, and measures 34 inches in length. It can fire warheads between 40-millimeter and 105-millimeter in caliber. And the effective range doubles from the RPG-2 to approximately 300 yards for a moving target. The grenade is propelled by a rocket, exiting the weapon at just over 100 yards per second. A set of fins on the warhead open up, helping to guide it. After 10 yards, a sustainer motor fires up, boosting the rocket to over 300 yards per second. If the warhead doesn't hit a target, it self-detonates after 1,000 yards. But an RPG hit is not guaranteed. In the war on terror, US forces are often ambushed entering enemy-held towns and provinces. Taliban forces move in close for an effective hit with an RPG. Whoever pulls the trigger must account for any crosswind that can throw off their aim. Because if they miss, it takes 14 seconds to reload, opening them up to return fire. The RPG-7 has a fierce reputation, and I'm going to put it to the test. I'm going to engage that target. I got to move through this wooded terrain to a final firing position about 100 yards away. To destroy that vehicle, I have to account for any crosswind as I dial in my sights. How's that for firepower? No wonder it was quickly adopted throughout the world. The RPG-7 was first employed against US troops in Vietnam in 1967. It was used effectively against M48 tanks to penetrate masonry buildings and bunkers. How did the US respond to the RPG-7? They brought in the law. In this case, law means light anti-tank weapon, and the M72 law is a one-shot terminator. It fires a pre-packed 66 millimeter high-explosive anti-tank warhead known as a heat round. The law can be fired by one man and then thrown away. One aspect making it special is its two telescoping tubes. The outer tube contains the trigger, arming handle, front and rear sights, and the rear cover. Extending it cocks and arms the weapon. In 1963, the law replaces the bazooka as the standard issue anti-tank weapon for US infantry. But because it can only be used once, the operators left open to return fire. During the Ia Drang Valley campaign, the North Vietnamese Army launches a major assault surrounding the US 1st Cavalry Division. Lieutenant Walter Marm's 2nd Platoon Bravo Company moves through the tall grass toward the surrounding enemy, when suddenly, the platoon is halted by gunfire coming from a 5-foot anthill 30 yards to their front. Risking his own life, Lieutenant Marm fires his M-72 Law from an exposed position. This stuns the machine gunner long enough to allow Marm to pick up a grenade and destroy the enemy. For his heroism, Walter J. Marm receives the Congressional Medal of Honor. The law is made famous during the Vietnam War, but is withdrawn from service in 1984 in favor of the AT-4. However, its retirement doesn't last long. The law is reissued for combat in Afghanistan due to its ease of use, lightweight, and relatively low cost at only $4,000 a piece. The Marines have another rocket launcher for bigger jobs. I've come to the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Training Center in 29 Palms, California. I'm working with 3rd Battalion, 3rd Marines, and the small. The small is the standard issue shoulder-mounted assault weapon used by US forces. The small, or shoulder-launched multipurpose assault weapon, is a reusable, portable missile system designed for the US Marines in 1984. One small feature enhancing its effectiveness is a built-in rifle. This allows the operator to sight in a target before firing the actual rocket. At $1 a shot, these 9-millimeter tracer rounds are an inexpensive way to increase the gunner's first-round hit probability. The small has been a critical weapon in operations by Marines and their Afghan and Iraqi allies. We mainly use the small against machine gun bunkers in Afghanistan. We like to call them murder holes, little holes drilled out in the sides of compounds or houses that they just shoot out of. Walls are about two feet thick over there, so you need some pretty good high explosive to take it down. One small rocket will bring that wall down. The small fires warheads designed to take on bunkers, armored tanks, and even caves. What we use in country a lot is the HEDP round. It's a high explosive dual-purpose round. And then there's the HEA anti-armor rocket. Go through any modern tank, pretty much. And then there's the NE rocket. They built it specifically for Afghanistan and Iraq, taking down buildings and caves. It builds on the principle of overpressure. So when it explodes, it's full of aluminum powder, explosive. So it just keeps on exploding and builds that overpressure, and it'll collapse a two-story building. But in combat, how does the small compare to the RPG? You've been engaged with the RPG-7. Yes, I have. So how would you compare that RPG-7 to this small? RPG-7 is a very simple weapon to operate, but downfalls with that, you do not have the ability to mark your target. With the small, you have your ability to see where your round's potentially gonna impact. One of the RPG's deadliest capabilities is its ability to shoot down aircraft. Do you think that the small could be used effectively against aircraft in the same ways that the RPG is? I don't see why not. The one problem you might have is the backblast on it. If shooting off, that backblast might really hurt your feet. Yeah, kick up rocks and dirt. But I've seen RPGs take down helicopters before, and I don't see why a small wouldn't if you had the right angle. But how do you stop an aerial target that's more than a mile high, well beyond the range of an RPG? Only one weapon in America's arsenal of man-portable rocket launchers has a solid track record against high-flying aerial targets. I've come to Fort Sill, Oklahoma for my next test. We're gonna be utilizing the Army's latest missile training facility to explore the tactical capabilities of the Stinger weapon system. This state-of-the-art Stinger missile simulator takes high-tech to new heights. Rotor wing. Hostile engaged. Climate tone. Tone verified. Missile away. Target destroyed. To train soldiers to fire the Stinger, the simulator allows instructors to see exactly what the soldier sees in his viewfinder. Tone verified. The Stinger is equipped with an IFF antenna. It interrogates coded signals from the aircraft and translates them into different tones identifying the craft. Verified tone. Tone verified. As a true friend, possible friend, or unknown. Missile away. Target destroyed. We can put friendly aircraft in there so they know the difference between the identification for inter-foe tones and any aircraft and any aspect that they might engage the aircraft in a combat environment, we can simulate in this environment. Target. Engage. Tone verified. Super elevate. Target destroyed. The Stinger launch tube fires an infrared homing surface-to-air missile known simply as the SAM. It can destroy aircraft at altitudes up to 12,500 feet. When launched, a small ejection motor pushes the missile a safe distance from the operator before a two-stage solid fuel booster accelerates it to a maximum speed of around 1,000 miles an hour. This right here, this is your- This is the IFF antenna, which is reusable. So you've got an IFF antenna. The rocket itself is inside the tube. Now, when I acquire a target, you said this was a vibrating cheekbone indicator? Yes, sir. So this thing will vibrate against my cheek just in case I can't hear it. That is correct. Because combat is very loud. So I see that you guys have a very cool urban scenario set up on the walls. How many different environments can you project? Well, we have five environments that we can choose from. Like you said, we have the urban, we have the jungle, and also we have the Arctic. Okay. Nice. What do you say we take this thing and we run a few scenarios? I trained with the Stinger when I was an Army Ranger. Now, that was a few years ago, so my skills may be a bit rusty. Target. Identify friend or foe. There we go. Hostile engaged. Okay. Activate the missile. Requiring tone. Tone verified. Okay. Uncage. Oh. No, gotta get locked back on him. Get that tone, steady tone. Uncage. Super elevate. Super elevation is raising the barrel up so that when that eject motor kicks off, that round doesn't skip across the ground. Center reticle. Okay. Missile away. Oh. Oh, damn. Let's try that again. Recycle BCU. Okay. Super elevate. Center reticle. Just missed its tail. Maybe a change of environment will help. Hostile engaged. Tone, good tone, good tone. Super elevate, center reticle. Take it to track, take it to track. Missile away, target destroyed. There we go. I got him. Target, there you go. Having time in the Stinger dome to get your firing technique down right has a big payoff. The Stinger missile costs $135,000. This is the closest experience they'll get before they fire the missile down range. Each time they go down range to fire Stinger missiles, it's costing us money. So they can come into this IMTS dome and be able to shoot four out of five targets to get their real life training. A simulator would save thousands of dollars. And they're in here for probably three, four days and they're pulling the trigger 30, 40 times. So that's just, you know, saving money in the long run. Missile away, target destroyed. Nice. That's what I'm talking about. You know, that's a lot harder than it looks. I mean, you know, trying to keep that thing steady, get the right tone back, you know, do everything in sequence, hold the trigger. The biggest thing for me is holding that trigger down long enough for that rock at the launch because you're so used to with rifles and so on, you know, squeezing the trigger and then letting that thing reset to squeeze off another round rapidly. So holding that trigger down, man, it was really getting me. How does this differ from actually firing a real Stinger missile? The main difference from the real Stinger missile and the simulator, of course, the real Stinger missile have argon gas will come out the real blow at this. That's the main difference. Other than that, the simulators is just like the real thing down range. So it does, there's not a lot of kickback. You don't, you're not absorbing any recoil or anything like that. Not at all, Will. All right. Well, this is very cool. I really enjoyed, you know, trying to shoot something out of this guy. And thank you again for your time. I'm taking aim with some of the most powerful man-portable rocket launchers in the world. Ranging from a World War II bazooka to the high-tech Stinger. But thanks to its rock bottom price and simplicity, the RPG has been the dominant handheld system for more than 60 years. Surprisingly, its head of the class competition comes from a nation better known for luxury cars than combat. Here at the Saab Beaufort's testing center, I fired the AT4 at 150 yards and used the Carl Gustav's superior range to blow through the walls of a wooden structure, clearing out everything inside. But the Carl Gustav is made even more versatile by its choice of rounds. Jack Seymour is back to tell me more about the HEDP or High Explosive Dual Purpose Round. You have little notches here on the back of the rounds. Yes. And the gunner will actually just index that notch as he's loading it into the tube. And as he's looking at the round, he sees the eye, so he's loading it for impact. Okay. And he rolls it over. You insert that into the weapon with the Ds facing up, and that means that thing's gonna explode on a delay. That's correct. The delay setting is designed for clearing out a structure. The impact setting is perfect against vehicles and buildings. But the Carl Gustav has another powerful choice, the HE round that features a counter defilade or air burst option. You can actually program it to fly 1,250 meters or less, aim above the target, and it blows up above the intended target. Okay, so if I wanted this to explode in the air at 500 meters, I could just take this, dial it in to 500, and at 500 meters, this thing automatically ignites. The delayed air burst setting makes this a real threat to troops on the ground and behind obstacles because it literally showers everything below with a shotgun-like blast of 800 ball bearings. Easily be trained within a couple of hours how to use this system. And the munitions are very simplistic, as they should be. Easy is always better. To see for myself, I take a turn firing the HE round in air burst mode. It's off. Awesome, I mean, you can actually see after you shoot it, the dispersion that happens. I mean, it's really, it's great. Absolutely perfect, and that's what we're talking about. Set the range on the round. And if that was a trench, there would be no way to get anything down in there. You would have to lob stuff in. So if that was a trench, that air burst just hits targets down in that trench. You can't get away. Yeah. This weapon is tailor-made for all combat conditions, including counterinsurgency. And that's the basis for our final test. The challenge, we need to take out a minivan occupied by a suicide bomber. But there's a group of armed fighters between me and the target, sheltered from direct fire. We'll have only 45 seconds to suppress those gunmen with an air burst, then scramble fast to take out the van. You're on the site. All right, I'm set. Set. The air burst's rain of hot shrapnel wipes out the fighters. Just a few seconds left to take out the main target. White minivan, 260 meters. 260. Set. Good to go? Backblast area clear. On the way. The HE rounds impact mode delivers a devastating punch to the minivan. But I wouldn't have gotten within range if the first targets hadn't been suppressed. Let's check out the effects of that air burst. There's a pretty good fragmentation on the backside of this target. Low here. Here. On the uniform itself. Up here. There's a really good one here on the front side. Came right through the pocket. And the main target? So basically, this guy's gone. The concussive blast alone would have just annihilated any target inside of there. This engine compartment completely dropped down, pushed back into here. We've peeled back the front end. That essentially stopped this vehicle. There's no way. That's the desired effect for a vehicle running a checkpoint for the guys that are out there on the cops. The tactic is blow past the checkpoint, but the bottom line is that once the vehicle gets past a certain point, machine gun bullets and things like that, this is a true anti-structure weapon system. And extremely accurate. Right through the front end, drops the engine block, severs the transmission. Done deal. It stops in its track. And the occupants in the vehicle are obviously not okay also. I might have struck a little bit low on this, but at the end of the day, the vehicle stopped. I mean, the blast alone is gonna nullify any threat that would have been inside of that vehicle. Formidable rounds like these provide a soldier with a dramatic upgrade in firepower and flexibility. The power of these rockets is breathtaking and unsettling if you're the target. In the hands of a single man, shoulder-mounted rockets like the RPG and its rivals can turn a battle against insurmountable odds. More modern guns, vehicles, armor, and even aircraft remain vulnerable to this weapon system that is over 50 years old. I'm Will Willis, locked and cleared. I'll see you next time on The Range.