Several of the images coming to us from the Ukrainian fronts show the use of the M30A1 GMLRS guided missile by HIMARS launchers. This has the peculiarity of containing 180,000 small tungsten pellets (total weight 100 kg), which it releases over a wide area, erupting at a height above its target. In fact, such a missile is attributed to a recent destruction of a phalanx of Russian vehicles rushing to the Kursk region, to intercept the Ukrainian invasion taking place there.
In the hypocritical paradox of war jargon and corresponding “marketing”, the M30A1 is presented as an “alternative warhead missile, better for the civilian population” because it replaced the older M26/M30 scatter-type MLRS launchers, where the main projectile launched hundreds of smaller explosives. Which may not have all exploded and remained on the ground, as a constant threat to anyone who approached them (many times local civilians).
Of course 180,000 rounds sweeping an area of 20-25 acres with high velocity and penetration are also incredibly lethal and this has been seen in the Ukraine. But not only against personnel but also against “soft” material targets, such as wheeled vehicles without armor, temporary warehouses, camps and conventional buildings, command centers, open trenches, etc. Indicatively, in the following video, with several… “French”, a Russian records the damage a truck has suffered from such a shot, rendering it useless.
However, the M30A1s are equally destructive for “harder” targets, such as missile and rocket launchers, self-propelled guns, tanks and armored personnel carriers. Because if the pellets cannot penetrate the armor in its thickest parts, they destroy weapons, antennas, sensors, exposed points (open personnel or engine hatches) and thus render them inert.
The specificity of the impact of this ammunition can be seen in the following photos, from American tests. Where the targets are full of small diameter holes that cannot be seen from a distance.
Unfortunately in Ukraine the use of such munitions, as well as “classic” cluster bombs, large guided bombs (even 3,000 pounds on the Russian side), the many low accuracy drones, of course the massive artillery bombardment that “digs” huge open areas , continues on both sides. In a conflict whose lethality no one dares to confess.
