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Weapon System
US military designation scheme

Legend for Numeric Designations CL: Lockheed Corporation D: Douglas Aircraft Company NA: North American Aviation WS (Weapon System)

Weapon System was a United States Armed Forces military designation scheme for experimental weapons (e.g., WS-220) before they received an official name — e.g., under a military aircraft designation system. The new designator reflected the increasing complexity of weapons that required separate development of auxiliary systems or components.

In November 1949, the Air Force decided to build the Convair F-102 Delta Dagger around a fire-control system. This was "the real beginning of the weapon system approach [and the] aircraft would be integrated into the weapon system "as a whole from the beginning, so the characteristics of each component were compatible with the others".

Around February 1950, an Air Research and Development Command "study prepared by Maj Gen Gordon P. Saville...recommended that a 'systems approach' to new weapons be adopted [whereby] development of a weapon "system" required development of support equipment as well as the actual hardware itself."

The first WS designation was WS-100A.

US weapon programs were often begun as numbered government specifications such as an Advanced Development Objective (e.g., ADO-40) or a General Operational Requirement (e.g., GOR.80), although some programs were initially identified by contractor numbers (e.g., CL-282).

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List of Weapon Systems

List of weapon system programs for US military systems
NumberProject
WS-104A8SM-64 Navaho
WS-107ASM-65 Atlas
WS-110North American XB-70 Valkyrie
WS-117L (GOR.80)9Advanced Reconnaissance System (originally Project 1115);10 recoverable capsule - Pied Piper/Sentry/SAMOS; television transmission - unfeasible;11 Subsystem G: MiDAS
WS-119B (USAF 7795)12Bold Orion ASAT
WS-119LProject Moby Dick (originally Project Genetrix)13
WS-120ABGM-75 AICBM
WS-124AWS-124A Flying Cloud Project14
WS-125(B-72)
WS-133AAN/DRC-8 Emergency Rocket Communications System (Program 494L) LGM-30 Minuteman
WS-199Anti-satellite weapon
WS-199BBold Orion
WS-199CHigh Virgo
WS-199DAlpha Draco
WS-201A1954 interceptor
WS-224APhase I: BMEWS, Phase II: Wizard missile system15
WS-306ARepublic F-105 Thunderchief (misidentified as WS-306116)
WS315APGM-17 Thor missile17
WS-324A18General Dynamics F-111

Notes

  • Burroughs, William E. (1988) [1986]. Deep Black (paperback ed.). New York: Berkley Publishing Group. ISBN 0-425-10879-1.
  • Daso, Dik (Major, USAF) (September 1997). Architects of American Air Supremacy: General Hap Arnold and Dr Theodore von Kármán. Air University Press. pp. 76, 166.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  • Stares, Paul B. (1985), The Militarization of Space, Ithaca: Cornell University Press

References

  1. "North American SM-64 Navaho". www.designation-systems.net. http://www.designation-systems.net/dusrm/app1/sm-64.html ↩

  2. "MX - Military and Government". www.acronymfinder.com. https://www.acronymfinder.com/Military-and-Government/MX.html ↩

  3. Donald 2003, pp. 68–69 ↩

  4. Grant Historical Study No. 126 p. 53 ↩

  5. Daso 1997, p. 166. - Daso, Dik (Major, USAF) (September 1997). Architects of American Air Supremacy: General Hap Arnold and Dr Theodore von Kármán. Air University Press. pp. 76, 166. ↩

  6. Parsch, Andreas. "Designations Of U.S. Air Force Projects". Retrieved 2020-01-18. http://designation-systems.net/usmilav/projects.html ↩

  7. When a government program number is not available, a contractor number (if available) is used in the table, e.g., Lockheed CL-282 for the U-2. ↩

  8. "North American SM-64 Navaho". www.designation-systems.net. http://www.designation-systems.net/dusrm/app1/sm-64.html ↩

  9. Burroughs 1988, p. 80–87. - Burroughs, William E. (1988) [1986]. Deep Black (paperback ed.). New York: Berkley Publishing Group. ISBN 0-425-10879-1. ↩

  10. Stares 1985, p. 30. - Stares, Paul B. (1985), The Militarization of Space, Ithaca: Cornell University Press ↩

  11. Burroughs 1988, p. 87. - Burroughs, William E. (1988) [1986]. Deep Black (paperback ed.). New York: Berkley Publishing Group. ISBN 0-425-10879-1. ↩

  12. Burroughs 1988, p. 139. - Burroughs, William E. (1988) [1986]. Deep Black (paperback ed.). New York: Berkley Publishing Group. ISBN 0-425-10879-1. ↩

  13. Stares 1985, p. 31–32. - Stares, Paul B. (1985), The Militarization of Space, Ithaca: Cornell University Press ↩

  14. Parsch, Andreas (21 March 2006). "WS-124A Flying Cloud". Directory of U.S. Military Rockets and Missiles, Appendix 4: Undesignated Vehicles. Designation-Systems. Retrieved 2017-12-10. http://www.designation-systems.net/dusrm/app4/ws-124a.html ↩

  15. NORAD Historical Summary 1958 January–June, p. 106 ↩

  16. "Research Report - Index to Air Force Personnel and Training Research Center" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2010-12-16. Retrieved 2023-10-29. https://web.archive.org/web/20101216063833/http://www.icodap.org/papers/AFHRL-Index/1956-1956.pdf ↩

  17. "Correspondence: Weapon System". Flight. 6 February 1959. Retrieved 2011-09-13 – via Flightglobal Archive. http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1959/1959%20-%200401.html ↩

  18. "F-111 Aadvark". Archived from the original on 2012-03-03. Retrieved 2023-10-29. https://web.archive.org/web/20120303183658/http://tig.ludost.net/plane_f111.html ↩