U.S. Navy’s New Tomahawk Missile is More Deadliest Ship-Killer

U.S. Navy’s New Tomahawk Missile is More Deadliest Ship-Killer

Currently, the most advanced Tomahawk in U.S. service is the Block IV variant. This Tomahawk is equipped with a data link that allows for on-the-fly retargeting. It also has a long loiter capability, which allows the missile to wait for an opportune time to hit a target. It can also change course on command, keeping a human operator in the loop.

A new version of the missile, known as the Tomahawk Block V, is being fitted with a maritime target-seeking system to track and hit enemy warships from more than 1,000 miles away.

The combination of the SM-6, which has a surface strike mode, the new 100-plus-mile ranged anti-ship Naval Strike Missile bound for the littoral combat ships and next-generation frigate, and the Block V upgrades on Tomahawk, will give the Navy’s venerable birds a place in the service’s vertical launch system cells for some time to come, Clark said.

“Between Tomahawk Block V, the SM-6 and the NSM, the Navy has a collection of attack weapons that they are happy with,” he said, adding that a long-running effort to develop a next-generation land-attack weapon has lost some of its urgency.

The development of hypersonic missiles could, however, push out the Tomahawk down the road as the technology gets more advanced and of a size compatible with the Navy’s ubiquitous Mark 41 VLS launcher.

“What’s happening in parallel is in the development of hypersonic missile that are a smaller form factor than the boost-glide weapons that are coming to maturity now,” Clark said. “And if they can get it down to being able to fit in [the Mark 41], then that could provide the Navy a next-generation capability that is more survivable and has a shorter time of flight.

“So I think this combination of missiles the Navy has now, combined with the fact that the hypersonic weapons are coming along a little further out, means the Navy is going to stick with what it has potentially even longer than it had originally anticipated.”
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