DAHLGREN, Va., March 31 (UPI) -- Initial U.S. tests of an Israeli system that protects military vehicles from rocket-propelled grenades proved successful Thursday.
The Trophy Active Protection System knocked out an inert RPG fired at a moving Stryker armored car using a small rocket automatically launched from the vehicle.
General Dynamics said the live-fire test at the Dahlgren, Va. range recreated similar tests conducted in Israel last month.
Thursday's results also advance the Pentagon's Project Sheriff, which develops new technologies and equipment for use by U.S. forces in Iraq who face roadside bombs and ambushes in tight quarters by insurgents armed with RPGs.
Project Sheriff is run by the Defense Department's Office of Force Transition.
"Currently, our only counter to the RPG threat is armor, more armor and more armor," Marine Col. Wade Hall of the OFT said in a General Dynamics news release. "As demonstrated today, the Department of Defense now has at its disposal technology that allows U.S. Forces to defeat both the archer and the arrow."
The Trophy system was brought to the United States by General Dynamics and Israel's Rafael Armament Development Authority as part of Project Sheriff's drive to improve the safety of U.S. vehicles operating in Iraq's mean streets.
The system is a miniaturized version of the anti-ballistic missile system that automatically detects an incoming threat and launches an interceptor rocket that homes in on the missile and destroys it at a safe distance.
Trophy is mounted on a vehicle and includes rockets that are launched vertically and knock down the RPG round as it streaks toward the vehicle.
Firm plans to deploy Trophy to Iraq have not been announced; however General Dynamics said the system would be mounted on Israeli Merkava 4 tanks sometime in the future.
