A top attack weapon is designed to attack armored vehicles from above, to take advantage of the fact that the armour is usually thinnest on the top of an armoured vehicle. The device may be delivered as a smart submunition or a primary munition by an anti-tank guided missile (ATGM), mortar bomb, artillery shell, or even an emplaced munition such as a mine. Top attack munitions use either a shaped charge warhead (often now tandem warheads in order to defeat ERA), or an explosively formed penetrator (EFP) warhead fired while over the target (usually by submunition).

The top attack concept was first put into service by the Swedish Armed Forces in 1988 with the Bofors RBS 56 BILL top-attack anti-tank missile.

Another method of top attack is the overfly top-attack (OTA or OFTA) where a missile with a vertically oriented shaped charge jet that fires downwards. A missile is directed to overfly the vehicle where a sensor detects the vehicle, and detonates the shape charge down into the top of the vehicle. This is system employed with the NLAW man-portable ATGM. __TOC__ Weapon systems using top attack

Notable weapon systems that utilize top attack include:

Weapon systemType Country of origin AGM-114 Hellfireair-to-ground ATGM AT-1K Rayboltman-portable ATGM BGM-71F/TOW-2BATGM Bofors/Nexter Bonusartillery shell submunition / BLU-108aerial bomb CBU-97 Sensor Fuzed Weaponaerial Cluster bomb FGM-148 Javelinman-portable ATGM Griffin LGBLaser-guided bomb (kit) HJ-12man-portable ATGM Kitolov-2MMortar & Artillery KM-8 Granmortar Krasnopolartillery / KSTAMgun-launched guided projectile LAHATsemi-active laser ATGM M93 Hornet mineanti-vehicle wide-area mine Mokopaair-to-ground ATGM MPATGMman-portable ATGM NagATGM NLAWoverfly top-attack ATGM / OMTASman-portable ATGM PARS 3 LRair-to-ground ATGM / RBS 56 BILL / RBS 56B BILL 2man-portable ATGM SADARMsubmunition SMArt 155artillery shell submunition SpikeATGM Strix mortar roundguided mortar bomb Toophan 3MSACLOS ATGM Type 01 LMATman-portable ATGM XM395 Precision Guided Mortar Munitionguided mortar bomb

See also

Plunging fire

References