Missile (weapon)

“ The native, from long practice, can do astonishing things with this weapon. He seems to determine with great certainty what its crooked and distant flight shall be, and how and where it is to end. Thus he frequently amuses himself in hurling the formidable weapon to astonishing heights and distances from one spot to which the missile returns to fall beside him. ”

“ The General nodded, and said, "We can put batteries of these new missile-launchers, completely-mobile and with atomic heads, anywhere in the world within twenty-four hours by plane. They have a reasonably effective range of small targets of just over two hundred miles—with air-guidance, of course, over target. Gentlemen, I think They are in for a surprise."
They got it two days later—in another special test of the new weapon. The General didn't even bother to watch it. ”

“ If you will imagine a sort of bomb shell being enclosed in an iron case, the whole being put in a gun and fired, you will better get the idea. The outer case is made in two or more pieces, and soon after it is shot out it falls away, leaving the smaller missile to travel on. But here is where the cunning of the invention comes in. The smaller missile has all the impetus given the larger one, but without its weight. In consequence it can travel through eighty miles of atmosphere, finally reaching Paris, where it explodes. ”

“ In the present day, the power of the missile has been developed with such astounding rapidity, that to be exposed to the fire of rifles or cannon is almost certain death. Indeed, the only safety of the defence lay in the fact that the smoke soon rendered very accurate shooting impossible at long ranges, and that at short ranges, if a man got a bullet through his body, it mattered little to him whether the missile were a spherical musket-ball or a conical rifle-bullet. ”

“ Here, then, we see that the explosive forces on one body of our system are amply tufficient, not alone to overcome the retardation due to she resistance of its atmosphere, but to allow the missile to depart from its precincts with a speed which is nearly a hundred times as great as that which would be required to expel a projectile from our earth. ”

“ It is this uncertainty which has led to a preference for a direct missile such as the bullet discharged from a machine gun. A stream of missiles, even of rifle calibre, maintained at the rate of some 400 shots per minute is certain to be more effective, provided range and aim are correct, than shrapnel. But the ordinary rifle-bullet, unless the objective is within very close range, is not likely to cause much harm, at least not to the mechanism of the aerial vessel. ”

“ The missile was about the size of an orange or a pomegranate, and it was filled with powder and slugs. A small fuse, which was ignited just before the device was thrown, was timed to explode the missile when it reached the enemy. Because of its size and shape, and because the slugs it contained corresponded, in a manner, to the pulp-covered seeds with which a pomegranate is filled, the missile was called a "grenade." ”

“ The fin-stabilized X-4 air-to-air missile was guided to its target by means of electrical impulses which passed through two wires connecting the rocket to the launch aircraft until detonation. Once the missile was on its way to the target bomber, the fighter pilot directed its course with a separate small control stick in his cockpit. ”

“ In the unavoidable hurry and confusion of the moment, when the attention of the operator is diverted by the reiterated play of missiles upon his person, possibly a prey at the very time to insufferable nausea, it is almost impossible to guarantee the missile from aberration. ”

“ By the metallic path of the missile it is known that its soft metal mass was not protected by a hard metal jacket; by the slight damage done to the bone, which lay directly in its path, its velocity and consequent energy are revealed as very slight; by the absence of larger metallic fragments it is shown that the missile was not deformed nor robbed of its energy through ricochet; and as only these conditions can be furnished by a lead ball, undeformed and traveling at low velocity, the missile was a shrapnel ball. ”

“ A projectile from a rifled gun in the fleet got to tumbling "end over end" in the air. It landed within six feet of me. The sand flew in every direction, nearly blinding some of the men. For a few seconds we all felt nervous. If it was a percussion fuse shell the danger was past; if a time fuse, it would explode, and the only means of safety was to lie flat on the ground. To attempt to run away would be very dangerous. For a few seconds we all remained quiet. No hissing sound could be heard, and then the missile was examined, and proved to be a solid shot ”

“ If it be simply a cannon-shot, you either toil on without heeding it, or having covered yourself as well as you can till the ball strike, you start up again and seize your tools. If it be a shell, you lie quite still till it burst. The unmilitary reader may perhaps question whether it be possible to tell the nature of the missile which is coming against you, when as yet it has barely escaped from the muzzle of the gun, and is still a mile or more distant ”

“ And what is true of the natural missile is just as true, of course, of the artificial missile; especially as it is a very much more ineffectual and therefore innocuous missile. A man could be really killed, like St. ”

“ If it was hoped that it would drop in a crowded spot and inflict the greatest amount of damage to human life and limb it would carry a bursting charge, shrapnel, and bits of iron, all of which on the impact of the missile upon the earth would be hurled in every direction to a radius exceeding forty yards. If damage to buildings, on the other hand, was desired, some high explosive such as picric acid would be used which would totally wreck any moderate-sized building upon which the shell might fall. ”

“ Even an eye untrained in photographic interpretation can clearly see the buildings in which the missiles are checked out and maintained ready to fire, a missile trailer, trucks to move missiles out to the launching pad, erectors to raise the missiles to launching position, tank trucks to provide fuel, vans from which the missile firing is controlled, in short, all of the requirements to maintain, load, and fire these terrible weapons. ”

“ The missile is the equivalent of a precise and immediate danger, the wooden club the natural instinct for defence with which all living creatures are endowed, so that when the peril is for the time driven away the opportunity is at hand for the display of virtuous amusements, the exchanging of hospitality, and the beating of professional drums as we would say. Thus, at the next attack the one sharing the enterprise with me struck the missile so proficiently that its recovery engaged the attention of all our adversaries, and then began to exhibit his powers by running and leaping towards me. ”

“ Indians long ago stuck feathers obliquely into arrows so as to keep flight true to its aim by giving shafts a spiral motion; an attendant advantage being to lengthen flight. The same principle appears in rifling, that is, in cutting spiral grooves in the barrels of firearms large and small, a missile receiving a spinning motion through its base, a thin protruding disk of soft metal, forced into the grooves by the explosive. ”

“ The airplane bombs were seldom more than sixty pounds in weight, although in the larger British machines a record of ninety-five pounds has been attained. The most common form of bomb used in the heavier-than-air machines was pear-shaped, with a whirling tail to keep the missile upright as it falls. Steel balls within, a little larger than ordinary shrapnel, are held in place by a device which releases them during the fall. On striking the ground they fall on the explosive charge within and the shell bursts, scattering the two or three hundred steel bullets which it carries over a wide radius. ”

“ It did not fit on Earth at all. This monstrous, man-made metal mountain belonged to another world.
Around it as far as he could see were launching-pads for a species of missile that looked more deadly than any of the ICBM'S they had been dreaming up in his own day. ”

“ This curious-looking half-house on wheels was moved forward by its defenders to within fifty feet of the rock, and after some little time had elapsed the engine correctly pitched its first missile right upon the plateau, where, to the horror and consternation of our friends, it revealed itself fuming and hissing, in the shape of an explosive shell. “Where ignorance is bliss, ’tis folly to be wise;” ”

“ The precision with which they hurl spears, clubs, and other rude weapons is as remarkable as their cunning in circumventing the alertest and wiliest game. Although ignorant of the use of bows and arrows, they have devised an excellent and exceedingly original substitute for them in the boomerang, a missile whose peculiar form and functions would seem to imply considerable knowledge of the science of projectiles and of the action of the atmosphere on the surface of spiral curves, but which, like most great inventions, was unquestionably discovered by accident. ”

“ The trail of the metallic fragments of the missile from behind forward and their location near the anterior surface of the arm indicate the course of the missile, either a rifle bullet or a shrapnel ball—most probably the latter, as the lead core of the rifle ball, protected by the jacket, does not break up into as many small particles as does the shrapnel ball. ”

“ When any missile, such as a bullet, sword or lance, approaches your person, its rush through the air will arouse the repellent force of which I speak, and this force, being more powerful than the projective force, will arrest the flight of the missile and throw it back again. ”

“ Missiles have peculiar characteristics, and differ in their capacity for deadliness. For instance, bullets of the most harmless kind are those having a high velocity, those that hit apex-first and do not “keyhole,” and those possessing a hard, smooth sheath with a smooth, rounded surface. After these come missiles of more death-dealing or mutilating nature—the Dum-Dum bullets, with the nickel sheaths around the apex removed in order to expose the lead nucleus, Remington lead or brass bullets, shrapnel bullets, and fragments of shell. ”

“ A new way of thinking reflecting that the fact that the Cold War is over and that the threat to peace comes mostly from rogue nation missile launches or accidental missile launches -- which is very different from what the threat was in the 1980s, when conversation about a missile defense was about a much broader defense that could protect the United States from a launch of multiple warheads, for example. This is much more focused on protecting the United States and our allies from accidental or principally rogue missile launches. ”

“ Of course, then, the larger the bore of the rifle, the greater will be its range, supposing always the best form of missile and a proportionate weight of gun. As the result of these two laws, we see that of two guns throwing the same weight and description of missile, the heavier will throw its missile the farther; while of two guns of the same weight, that one which throws the smaller missile will give it the greater initial velocity,—supposing the gun free to recoil, as it must, fired from the shoulder. ”

“ Its noiseless discharge sends the missile with great force, conveying the powerful explosive within it, which is itself discharged internally upon contact with the deck of a vessel or other object upon which it strikes, through the explosion of a percussion fuse in the point of the projectile. A great degree of accuracy has been obtained by the peculiar form of the projectile. ”

“ Meanwhile the rocketeers had placed a little iron triangle in the road with a rocket lying on it. The order to fire is given, portfire applied; the fidgety missile begins to sputter out sparks and wriggle its tail for a second or so, and then darts forth straight up the chaussée. A gun stands right in its way, between the wheels of which the shell in the head of the rocket bursts; the gunners fall right and left; and those of the other guns, taking to their heels, the battery is deserted in an instant. ”

“ The business of the gunner in an army assuming the offensive is to open the attack. The fuse of the shrapnel shell is so timed that the missile, which contains a quantity of bullets and a bursting charge of powder, shall explode immediately over the position held by the enemy. ”

“ During the past year, our long-range striking power, unmatched today in manned bombers, has taken on new strength as the Atlas intercontinental ballistic missile has entered the operational inventory. ”

“ The dum-dum bullet is a soft-nosed missile which, when it strikes a bone, flattens out and splatters, creating a jagged wound which it is almost impossible to treat or heal. The Germans, in ordinary, use a steel jacketed bullet which possesses high penetrative powers, while the French at the beginning of the war were using the ordinary lead bullet. ”

“ I thought, “that the saucers belong to Russia.”
“If it turns out to be a Soviet missile, count me out,” I said. “We’d have the Pentagon and the F.B.I. on our necks.”
“All right, if that’s the answer.” He chuckled. “But you may be in for a jolt.”
CHAPTER III
Just the idea of gigantic flying disks was incredible enough. It was almost as hard to believe that such missiles could have been developed without something leaking out. Yet we had produced the A-bomb in comparative secrecy, and I knew we were working on long-range guided missiles. ”