About Patriot Air Defence Missile System:
- The Patriot (MIM-104), which stands for Phased Array Tracking Radar for Intercept on Target, is an all-altitude, all-weather surface-to-air missile defense system.
- While initially designed as an antiaircraft system, newer variants of Patriot are capable of engaging ballistic and cruise missiles, loitering munitions, and aircraft.
- It is built by Raytheon Technologies Corp. (a US aerospace and defense company).
- It is the United States Army’s most advanced air defense system.
- It is a combat-proven air defence system operated by the US and a number of its allies, including Germany, Greece, Israel, Japan, Kuwait, the Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Poland, Sweden, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Romania, Spain, and Taiwan.
- The system was first used in combat during the 1991 Gulf War, with batteries protecting Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Israel, and later used during the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003.
- Features:
- A Patriot battery (i.e., the basic firing unit) consists of a phased array radar, an engagement control station, computers, power generating equipment, and up to eight launchers, each of which holds four ready-to-fire missiles.
- There are about 90 soldiers assigned to a battery, but three soldiers in the engagement control station are the only personnel required to operate the battery in combat.
- It is equipped with a track-via-missile (TVM) guidance system. Midcourse correction commands are transmitted to the guidance system from the mobile engagement control centre.
- The system has different capabilities depending on the type of interceptor used.
- The PAC-2 interceptor uses a blast-fragmentation warhead, while the newer PAC-3 missile uses more advanced hit-to-kill technology.
- Depending on the version in use, the interceptor missiles can reach an altitude of more than 24 kilometers and hit targets up to 160 kilometers away.
- The system’s radar has a range of over 150 km (93 miles).
