Palestinian Kassam Rockets

Posted by Bill S on a rocketry mailing list I belong to:

The links below contain pretty concise short articles on the "homebrew" Palestinian terrorist Kassam rockets being fired at Israel. A search of Google using the term "Kassam" illustrates its a pretty hot topic in that country.

Bill goes on to excerpt from the first link:

".....Based on technical assistance received from the Lebanese terror group Hezbollah, and what Palestinian technicians and engineers learned from books and the Internet, a workable design was developed.......There have been roughly three versions of the Kassam developed so far......The “Kassam I” is 31 inches long, 2.4 inches in diameter, weighs 12 pounds, has about a pound of explosives in the warhead and has a range of about three kilometers. “Kassam II” is 71 inches long, six inches in diameter, weighs 70 pounds, has about 11-15 pounds of explosives in the warhead and has a range of about eight kilometers. “Kassam III” is over 80 inches long, 6.7 inches in diameter, weighs about 200 pounds, has 22-44 pounds of explosives in the warhead and has a range of about ten kilometers....."

I highly recommend following both of these links for more information on the rockets, the attacks, and the tactics being used to counter them. Here's more from Bill:

From the photos in the IDF page (second link), these are made out of metal, with the motor and warhead casing also being the rocket body. The unguided rockets have welded metal fins.

As Stormin Normin said in the gulf war of Iraq Scud missiles, they are "militarily insignificant". But, they do keep the population stirred up and therefore the military engaged far more than should be necessary from a truly military perspective...... as is the terrorists intent. Unfortunately the bad guys have achieved 4 kills to date out of about 400 rounds fired.

Posted by Ted at October 12, 2004 05:44 AM | TrackBack