Close-in weapon system



A close-in weapon system (CIWS), often pronounced sea-whiz, is point-defense weapon for detecting and destroying short-range incoming missiles and enemy aircraft which have penetrated the outer defenses, typically mounted shipboard in a naval capacity.

Nearly all classes of modern warship are equipped with some kind of CIWS device.

Laser CIWS systems

 * TÜBİTAK LASER CIWS- The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TÜBİTAK) has publicly announced that it is in the process of developing a Laser CIWS system to be used against missiles and aircraft threats. The system is scheduled to enter service with the Turkish Navy within 5 years.

Gun systems
A gun-based CIWS usually consists of a combination of radars, computers, and multiple-barrel rapid-fire medium-calibre guns placed on a rotating gun mount. Examples of gun-based CIWS products in operation are:


 * AK-630
 * DARDO
 * Denel 35mm Dual Purpose Gun
 * Goalkeeper CIWS
 * Kashtan CIWS
 * Meroka CIWS
 * Myriad CIWS
 * Oerlikon Millennium 35 mm Naval Revolver Gun System
 * Phalanx CIWS
 * Sea Zenith
 * Type 730 CIWS

Limitations of gun systems

 * Short range: The maximum effective range of 20-mm gun systems is about 4500 m; systems with lighter projectiles have even shorter range. The expected real-world kill-distance of an incoming anti-ship missile is about 500 m or less, still close enough to possibly cause damage to the ship's sensor or communication arrays, or to wound or even kill exposed personnel. This also makes the timeframe for interception relatively short; for supersonic missiles moving at 1500 m/s it is approximately one-third of a second.
 * Limited kill probability: even if the missile is hit and damaged, this may not be enough to destroy it entirely or to alter its course enough to prevent the missile, or fragments from it, from hitting its intended target, particularly as the interception distance is short. This is especially true if the gun fires kinetic-energy-only projectiles.
 * Guns can only fire at one target at a time; switching targets may take up to one second to re-train the gun.
 * A gun must predict the target's course and aim at the predicted position. Modern anti-ship missiles make intentional erratic moves before impact, reducing the probability of being hit by unguided projectiles.

Missile systems


Missile systems do not have the same limitations as gun systems. Because of their greater range, a missile-CIWS can also be dual-used as a short-ranged area-defense anti-air weapon, eliminating the need for a second mount for this role.

After an inertial guidance phase, a CIWS missile relies on infra-red, passive radar/ESM or semi-active radar terminal guidance, or a combination of these. The ESM-mode is particularly useful since most long-range anti-ship missiles use radar to home in on their targets. Some systems allow the launch platform to send course-correction commands to the missile in the inertial guidance phase.

Examples include:
 * 9K33 Osa (SA-N-4 Gecko) missile, is used on various Russian ships.
 * 9K331 (SA-N-9 Gauntlet) missile, used by the Russian Navy, it is stored and fired from Vertical launching systems of various ships. It along with the Tor missile system is the first air-defense system designed from ground up to intercept precision guided munitions like the AGM-86 ALCM
 * 9M311 (SA-N-11 Grisom) missile, used by the Russian and Chinese navies as part of the Kashtan CIWS gun-missile system.
 * Barak 1, an Israeli point defence missile system also used by Indian Navy.
 * Crotale-NG
 * HQ-7 missile, a Chinese missile system, standard for all ships.
 * RIM-116 Rolling Airframe Missile - jointly developed by the US and Germany, it is used extensively on German warships and many American ones - SeaRam is a plan to mate the Phalanx sensor system with an 11-missile RAM launcher
 * Sadral, using a version of the Mistral missile
 * Sea-Sprint, using the ADATS missile
 * Modernized Sea Wolf
 * Sea Sparrow Block 1, Missile used by the Nimitz class carriers, and other USN ships, as a short- to medium-range anti-aircraft weapon.
 * Evolved Sea Sparrow missile, used aboard all Sea Sparrow-capable warships, plus other warships of the Netherlands, Canadian, Spanish, Japanese, Turkish and Australian navies.

Land-based CIWS
CIWS are also used in a land-based anti-mortar and missile defense role to protect fixed and temporary bases and other facilities.

On a smaller scale, active protection systems are used in some tanks, and several are in development. The Drozd system was deployed on Soviet Naval Infantry tanks in the early 1980s, but later replaced by explosive reactive armour. Other systems that are available or under development are the Russian (Arena), Israeli (Trophy), American (Quick Kill) and the South African-Swedish (LEDS-150).