[Dan Day]

The Joint Standoff Weapon (Jsow) is known as a “launch-and-leave” system, fired from an aircraft at a range of about 40 miles and at high altitude.

There's a jaw-dropping depiction of the use of JSOW's in Tom Clancy's book, "The Bear and the Dragon". I'm not sure how acccurate the portrayal is (knowing Clancy, it's probably pretty good), but if the real weapons can perform anywhere near as well as the description in the book, the Iraqis are in for a rude awakening.

Imagine a short-range (if you can call 40 miles "short") cruise missile full of armor-piercing cluster bombs. What's unique about this is that *each* cluster bomblet has its *own* independent guidance system which it can use to autonomously spot a useful target and home in on it. *One* JSOW can conceivably take out a *dozen* or more tanks.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Looks like a great weapon!

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

That "Finger of God" destroying a Tank was taken at Camp Edwards, MA in 1980! (I think the tank is an M5A3, Patton Tank). It appeared on the cover of Aviation and Space Week about that time! It was designed by the old AVCO (now part of Textron) "Assault Breaker". Still a pretty cute trick.