smart bomb

smart bomb, type of precision-guided munition. Like a regular bomb, a smart bomb falls to the target solely by the force of gravity, but its fins or wings have control surfaces that move in response to guidance commands, enabling adjustments to be made to the angle of the bomb’s descent or the direction of its fall. The bomb glides, rather than falls, to the target.

Guidance systems can be electro-optical, laser, or infrared, and are typically mounted in the nose of the bomb. The guidance system consists of sensors to detect the target and some means of adjusting the bomb’s fins or wings in order to control its descent. In an electro-optical system, a television camera in the nose of the bomb sends real-time pictures of the target area to the aircrew, who then lock the weapon onto the target or actively guide it all the way to impact. In bombs with the laser-guidance system, commonly called laser-guided bombs, the target is illuminated by a laser beam from the releasing aircraft, another target-control aircraft, or a ground force unit. Sensors in the bomb’s nose lock onto the reflections of the laser beam and follow them down to the target. Bombs equipped with infrared guidance systems respond to the heat generated by the target. More sophisticated versions of these weapons are called smart missiles.

Smart bombs and missiles allow smaller planes and smaller numbers of planes to make successful attacks on stationary targets such as buildings, fortifications, or bridges. These targets can be destroyed using fewer and larger explosive warheads than would be the case in the “scatter” or “carpet” bombing techniques of World War II. Also, launching aircraft are less vulnerable to anti-aircraft fire than they would be in low-altitude or dive-bombing runs, which would otherwise be necessary for sufficient accuracy. Typical U.S. smart bombs have included the three Walleye models equipped with television-guidance systems and the Paveway series of bombs equipped with laser-guidance systems. Smart bombs or missiles were used in the latter stages of the Vietnam War to give pinpoint bombing accuracy and were used with dramatic effect by Allied forces in the Persian Gulf War. See also missile.