Like a lot of journalist’s endeavours, the is irresponsible rubbish and only tells a small part of the story. Yes, the WE177 did have a key but it did not ‘ARM’ the bomb as this article suggests. Anyone who knows anything about air-dropped weapons knows that on some weapons it may be necessary to remove some safety interlocks and set up various release, arming and functioning parameters before take-off to ensure that the weapon does what you intend it to when you drop it. That is what is happening here. The key – which was under two-man principle control at all times – was only one part of the release sequence – like most air-dropped weapons, the bomb had to be released before arming commenced. To suggest that as soon as the key is turned, the bomb is armed is complete rubbish, as is the suggestion that the RAF ‘vetoed’ the designer’s inclusion of a fancy lock and that the security of the bombs could rest on some ‘gentleman’s agreement’. Whoever wrote this story obviously doesn’t know anything about the design approval procedure for weapon safety. This is just sensationalist rubbish.

Re dropping BL755 off a MiG23. The BL755 had provision for twin suspension lugs at 10 inches/250 mm (Russian spacing) and at 355 mm/14 inches (NATO spacing) – it also had provison for a single lug for pre-1970s vintage British aircraft, so the BL755 could easily be carried on a MiG23. The different spacing of lugs were fitted to suit the carriage aircraft. The only other thing required would be suitable fuzing/arming units/strongpoints on the aircraft for the two arming lanyards and the electrical connector.

Although technically feasible, it’s not a simple job to adapt either the aircraft pylon or the bomb for Russian or NATO weapons. As far as the bombs go they would have to be manufactured with both Russian and NATO suspension lug pockets and suitable arrangements would also have to be made for the various special-to-type interface connections between the bomb and the aircraft. The alternative would be a cumbersome adapter plate which would affect the ballistics of the bomb.

As far as adapting the aircraft pylons is concerned it would be a case of fitting a release unit that would interface with the various weapons. That could mean fitting a suitable release unit according to the bomb – e.g. Russian today, NATO tomorrow. That would mean that the different units would have to interface with the pylons for mounting and electrical connections. The alternative would be to fit one type of release unit that was capable of carrying both – i.e. it had suspension hooks at 250 and 355 mm. I only know of one example of that type of unit and it was used by the Indian AF for obvious reasons.

See http://www.designation-systems.net/usmilav/aerosupport.html#_ASETDS_Listings

WAH-64 Weapons

UK Apache has the following weapons: Hellfire K and L, CRV7 rockets with various warheads and 30mm M230 gun with various types of ammunition. There are no plans to carry Brimstone.

LONGSHOT

How is Longshot controlled? I don’t know for certain, but my guess is that the Longshot kit itself doesn’t have control surfaces as such. The Longsoht kit is just pair of folding wings and the one model I’ve seen didn’t have control surfaces. If you look at the candidate bomb bodies themselves, all of them have control enhancements available; the Mk 80 series has JDAM, SUU-64/65 Containers have the guided tail modification kits (CBU-103/105) and Paveway II has the EPW GPS guidance. My guess is that Longshot will merely enhance these capabilities by giving added glide range. In an ordinary unguided mode Longshot would also provide an extended glide range to a ballistic release of all of the candidiate bombs. One other aspect is that where electrically powered fuzes are used in the bombs, then they’d have to have extended life batteries fitted to cater for longer range/higher release altitude deliveries, otherwise the batteries would run down before the bombs hit the ground.

The UK Merlin does not carry rockets, nor is it likely to; neither does the current UK Lynx, although that could change when the Future Lynx comes along.

Guided Rockets

The thing about an unguided rocket is that it’s not that accurate, so you need quite a few pointed in the general direction of the target to have any chance of hitting it. A guided rocket is by definition, more accurate and therefore you don’t need to fire as many. Moreover, it’s cheaper than a Hellfire, which in itself would be a waste to fire at say a single truck.

I concur. It’s a BL755, some of which were sold to the Yugoslavian Air Force in the early ’80s.