Reassessing the ‘Saint Javelin’: Exploding Anti-Tank Missile Numbers

‘Saint Javelin’, a cartoon of Madonna on an American rocket has become a popular Ukrainian meme. The Javelin anti-tank missile is a powerful symbol of American aid, and the war has cemented its reputation as a wonder weapon. But that’s not the whole story. The actual homicide rate seems much lower than this reputation suggests.

The actual effectiveness of such missiles is important for several reasons. The most immediate is stockpiling: the conflict in Ukraine has taken almost half of the existing US stockpile, suggesting America needs many more missiles. Other questions are how well these extremely expensive munitions – $200,348 per missile at the current budget – stack up against modern weapons.

Guided Missiles: Saints and Heroes of War

There is no doubt that the FGM-148 Javelin Weapon System has been one of the stars of the conflict, along with the UK’s NLAW and Ukraine’s Stugpa-P missile. The Javelin has proven capable of destroying every Russian tank in existence. Although safety considerations mean there are more videos of Javelins being fired than of them going down, there are plenty to demonstrate just how devastating it is.

This does not mean that smart, precision-guided missiles provide the intended one-shot-one-kill capability.

That was always the idea. In the 1980s, NATO faced a Soviet army with a vast numerical superiority in armor. Coincidentally, these are the exact same vehicles that are now being taken out of storage and shipped to Ukraine. Western tanks were individually superior, but costly. There was never any question about matching Russian numbers.

New microprocessor technology promised a solution. Instead of fighting the Russians with tanks and heavy artillery, Western forces could defeat them with precision-guided compact weapons that hit the target unerringly. A small supply of guided missiles would be enough to wipe out an entire invasion force.

The Javelin, launched by the US military in 1996, is the culmination of these developments. Small enough to be carried by a soldier but capable of knocking out armor more than two miles away, the Javelin is a ‘fire-and-forget’ missile, so-called because, unlike previous generations, it is automatically guided after being locked on a target.

Lockheed Martin’s makers say the Javelin has a 94% “engagement success rate,” meaning pulling the trigger virtually guarantees a hit. The massive 19-pound sequential head helps ensure every shot is killer. Early reports from Ukraine supported this, with one US official claiming that 300 Javelins had destroyed 280 Russian vehicles (93%).

The UK also supplied advanced anti-tank weapons, notably the Next Generation Light Anti-Tank Weapon (NLAW), the vehicle-mounted Brimstone and more Javelins. Again these proved to be hugely successful with a source in The Guardian claiming “a remarkable 90% hit rate” for NLAW.

Given these claims, the guided missiles supplied to Ukraine should have stopped the invasion in its tracks. But things didn’t happen like that at all.

…But the devil is in numbers

Since October, according to Pentagon figures, the US has delivered more than 10,000 Javelins, plus 9,000 older TOW guided missiles. The United Kingdom has supplied more than 12,000 anti-tank missiles, Ukraine also had around 7,000 locally produced Stugna-P guided anti-tank missiles, plus several thousand Cobras and Kombats, and produced perhaps another 3,000 Stugnas during the war. This gives a total of about 45,000 guided missiles.

Oryx data analysts, who record every visually confirmed kill in the conflict, have recorded nearly 8,000 Russian armored vehicles destroyed, plus more than 2,000 captured and 1,000 abandoned. It is likely that there were more kills than have been verified, but those marked by guided missiles are necessarily on the front lines and are likely to have been recorded.

If we count killed and abandoned vehicles, if each was a success for a guided missile, then 45,000 missiles have accounted for 9,000 killed, a 20% kill rate. But the real figure will be much lower.

PGMs have not been the big killers. A RUSSIA report on the first year of the conflict downplayed their impact, saying: “Despite the prominence of anti-tank guided weapons in the public narrative, Ukraine defeated Russia’s attempt to take Kiev using massive fire from two artillery brigades.” .

In the later stages of the war, FPV kamikazes took over as the main tank killers. Current estimates suggest that 65% or more of armored vehicle losses are caused by FPVs and other small drones, not guided missiles.

Many other systems are also destroying Russian armor. Anti-tank mines and Baba Yaga drone heavy bombers have made notable contributions; vehicles that are damaged by mines usually end up with smaller drones that throw grenades through open hatches.

Artillery continues to be a killer, and especially guided weapons like the BONUS, a 155mm artillery round that fires two submunitions that seek out the target over the target area.

There are also larger kamikaze drones. The US has supplied about 4,000 under the Phoenix Ghost program, most of which carry anti-armor warheads. At the beginning of the conflict, an official from Zelensky told Ukraine’s Defense Express that “580 of such units are equal to about 350 targets destroyed in the immediate rear.” This may be an exaggeration, but it shows that the Phoenix Ghosts have scored a significant number of kills.

The Pentagon has also supplied more than 120,000 unguided anti-armor weapons, Bazooka-type unguided rocket launchers. Even if the hit rate is much lower than guided weapons, and most were used against other targets, these must have accounted for some Russian armor.

Nor should we forget the Abrams, Leopard and Challenger tanks, or the armored forces of Ukraine, will also have been in action destroying Russian vehicles.

It would seem optimistic to claim that even a third of Russian vehicles were destroyed by PGM. This gives one success rate more than 7% – not so much “one shot, one kill” as “twelve shots, one kill”

It’s possible that not all of the anti-tank missiles have been expended, although regular deliveries and equally regular requests for more — early in the war, a Ukrainian official told CNN they needed 500 Javelin missiles a day — suggest that missiles to be launched soon. after they are supplied.

Some of the rockets supplied may have been destroyed by enemy fire, captured, used in training, or expended on low value targets. In Iraq and Afghanistan, Javelins were fired against bunkers and foxholes rather than vehicles. However, these missing rockets should be considered an overhead. They don’t change the basic equation of “how many PGMs do we need to stop X number of enemy tanks?”

How many rockets?

Before the war, the US had a stockpile of about 20-25,000 Javelins. About half of it has been consumed by the war in Ukraine, a war that has not yet ended. It can be argued that American soldiers are better trained and will use the missiles more efficiently. On the other hand, the Ukrainians now have more experience in destroying tanks with Javelins than anyone in the world.

Clearly, a major conflict in the US would require more ammunition. Otherwise, simply put, the army will run out of missiles before the enemy runs out of tanks.

The obvious solution would be to replenish with ever increasing numbers of Javelins. However, their staggering cost – about $2 billion to replace 10,000 spent missiles – gives pause as to whether this is value for money.

It appears that most Russian armor is now being destroyed at much longer ranges than the Javelin can reach from lower cost systems. Javelin was designed more than 30 years ago, modern electronics offer more capabilities much more affordable. FPV drones costing around $500 can take down a tank more than 10 miles away, while the Javelin’s maximum range is under 3 miles. And while the Javelin operator must see the target to jam the missile, FPVs can fly into an area of ​​known suspected targets from the other side of a hill. Smaller warheads mean it may take a few FPVs to destroy a target, but at that price it’s doable.

Of course, tactically, if a tank is going down, an instant weapon like the Javelin is needed. But other weapons can be added to the mix.

A mix of Javelins and wild small ammo can work better than Javelins alone. A team of ten Spears, to be optimistic, can hope to kill nine tanks. If American FPVs cost ten times as much as the Ukrainian version, then the same team can be armed with five Javelins and two hundred FPVs and probably do a lot more damage.

The spear remains a powerful weapon. And the supply of US spears to Ukraine has been an important part of the aid package. But future procurement plans should keep a close eye on actual combat performance and the potential of other weapons systems.