An SA-7 in use

Man-portable air-defense systems (MANPADS or MPADS) are shoulder-launched surface-to-air missiles (SAMs). They are typically guided weapons and are a threat to low-flying aircraft, especially helicopters.

Overview[link]

MANPADS were originally developed in the 1940s to provide military ground forces protection from enemy aircraft. They have received a great deal of attention as potential terrorist weapons that might be used against commercial airliners. These missiles, affordable and widely available through a variety of sources, have been used successfully over the past three decades both in military conflicts, as well as by terrorist organizations.^[1]

Twenty-five countries, including the United States, produce man-portable air defense systems.^[2][3] Possession, export, and trafficking in such weapons is officially tightly controlled, due to the threat they pose to civil aviation, although such efforts have not always been successful.^[4][5]

The missiles are about 5 to 6 feet (180 cm) in length and weigh about 35 to 40 pounds (18 kg), depending on the model. Shoulder-fired SAMs generally have a target detection range of about 6 miles (10 km) and an engagement range of about 4 miles (6 km), so aircraft flying at 20,000 feet (6,100 m) (3.8 miles) or higher are relatively safe.^[6] The acronym MANPADS is commonly mistaken to have a singular form of "MANPAD"—this is incorrect, as even a singular unit is still a system and would have the final S in the acronym.

Missile types[link]

The German Fliegerfaust.

A FIM-43C Redeye missile just after launch, before the sustainer motor ignites.

Top: An SA-18 (Igla) missile with launch tube and grip stick. Bottom: An SA-16 (Igla-1) missile and launch tube.

Mistral in use by French soldiers.

Canadian troops wearing CBRN suits training with the Blowpipe missile.

Unguided[link]

Borrowing from the concept of the simple and effective anti-tank Panzerfaust, an unguided multibarreled 20mm rocket launcher, the Fliegerfaust, was developed by Nazi Germany in 1944. The weapon never reached mass production due to the end of World War II.

Following World War II, Soviet designers also experimented with unguided multibarreled rocket launchers but this design concept was abandoned in favor of guided missiles equipped with an infrared sensor.

Infrared[link]

Infrared shoulder-fired missiles are designed to home-in on a heat source on an aircraft, typically the engine exhaust plume, and detonate a warhead in or near the heat source to disable the aircraft. These missiles use passive guidance, meaning that they do not emit signals to detect a heat source, which makes them difficult to detect by targeted aircraft employing countermeasure systems.^[7]

First generation[link]

The first missiles deployed in the 1960s were infrared missiles. First generation shoulder-fired SAMs such as the U.S. Redeye, early versions of the Soviet SA-7, and the Chinese HN-5 are considered “tail-chase weapons” as their seekers can only acquire and engage a high performance aircraft after it has passed the missile’s firing position. In this flight profile, the aircraft’s engines are fully exposed to the missile’s seeker and provide a sufficient thermal signature for engagement. First generation IR missiles are also highly susceptible to interfering thermal signatures from background sources, including the sun, which many experts feel makes them somewhat unreliable.^[8]

Second generation[link]

Second generation infrared missiles such as early versions of the U.S. Stinger, the Soviet SA-14, and the Chinese FN-6 use improved coolants to cool the seeker head which enables the seeker to filter out most interfering background IR sources as well as permitting head-on and side engagement profiles. These missiles may also employ technologies to counter decoy flares that might be deployed by targeted aircraft and also have backup target detection modes such as the ultraviolet (UV) mode found on the Stinger missile.^[6][8]

Third generation[link]

Third generation infrared shoulder-fired SAMs such as the French Mistral, the Russian SA-18, and the U.S. Stinger B use single or multiple detectors to produce a quasi-image of the target and also have the ability to recognize and reject flares dispensed from aircraft.^[6][8]

Fourth generation[link]

Fourth generation missiles such as the U.S. Stinger Block 2, and missiles believed to be under development in Russia, Japan, France, and Israel could incorporate focal plane array guidance systems and other advanced sensor systems which will permit engagement at greater ranges.^[9]

Command line-of-sight[link]

Command line-of-sight (CLOS) missiles do not home in on a particular aspect (heat source or radio or radar transmissions) of the targeted aircraft. Instead, the missile operator or gunner visually acquires the target using a magnified optical sight and then uses radio controls to “fly” the missile into the aircraft. One of the benefits of such a missile is that it is virtually immune to flares and other basic countermeasure systems which are designed primarily to defeat IR missiles. The major drawback of CLOS missiles is that they require highly trained and skilled operators. Numerous reports from the Soviet-Afghan War in the 1980s cite Afghan mujahedin as being disappointed with the British-supplied Blowpipe CLOS missile because it was too difficult to learn to use and highly inaccurate, particularly when employed against fast moving jet aircraft.^[10] Given these considerations, many experts believe that CLOS missiles are not as ideally suited for untrained personnel use as are IR missiles, which sometimes are referred to as “fire and forget” missiles.^[11]

Later versions of CLOS missiles, such as the British Javelin, use a solid state television camera in lieu of the optical tracker to make the gunner's task easier. The Javelin’s manufacturer, Thales Air Defence, claims that their missile is virtually impervious to countermeasures.^[12] Even more advanced CLOS versions, such as the British Starburst, use a laser data link in lieu of earlier radio guidance links to fly the missile to the target.^[13]

Laser guided[link]

Laser guided shoulder-fired SAMs use lasers to guide the missiles to the target. The missile flies along the laser beam and strikes the aircraft where the missile operator or gunner aims the laser. Missiles such as Sweden’s RBS-70 and Britain’s Starstreak can engage aircraft from all angles and only require the operator to continuously track the target using a joystick to keep the laser aim point on the target. Because there are no data links from the ground to the missile, the missile cannot be effectively jammed after it is launched. This technique is known as beam riding. Future laser guided SAMs may require the operator to designate the target only once and not manually keep a continuous laser aimpoint on the aircraft. Even though laser guided missiles require relatively extensive training and skill to operate, many experts consider these missiles particularly menacing due to the missiles’ resistance to most conventional countermeasures in use today.^[13][14]

Notable uses against military aircraft[link]

• During Operation Desert Storm on 17 February 1991 an F-16 was shot down by Strela-3.^[15] Russian sources also report about the loss of many military aircraft shot down by the Igla.
• On April 6, 1994, a surface-to-air missile struck one of the wings of the Dassault Falcon 50 carrying three French crew and nine passengers, including Rwandan president Juvénal Habyarimana and Burundian president Cyprien Ntaryamira, as it prepared to land in Kigali, Rwanda, before a second missile hit its tail. The plane erupted into flames in mid-air before crashing into the garden of the presidential palace, exploding on impact. This incident was the ignition spark of the Rwandan Genocide.
• On 27 May 1999, the Anza Mk-II was used to attack Indian aircraft during the Kargil conflict with India. A MiG-21 and a MiG-27 of the Indian Air Force were shot down by Pakistan Army Air Defence forces.^[16]
• 2002 Khankala Mi-26 crash: On August 19, 2002, a Russian-made Igla shoulder-fired surface-to-air missile hit an overloaded Mil Mi-26 helicopter, causing it to crash in a minefield and burn at the main military base at Khankala near the capital city of Grozny, Chechnya. 127 Russian troops and crew were killed.
• Early in the 2008 South Ossetia War a Polish made Grom MANPADS shot down a Russian Tu-22M strategic bomber. One of its crew members was captured (Major Vyacheslav Malkov), two others were killed and the crew commander is missing in action as of August 2009.^[17][18]

Notable uses against civilian aircraft[link]

• The 1978 Air Rhodesia Viscount Shootdown is the first example of a civilian airliner shot down by a man-portable surface to air missile. The pilot of the aircraft managed to make a controlled crash landing.
• Air Rhodesia Flight 827 was also shot down in February 1979 by ZIPRA armed with a Strela 2 missile. All 59 passengers and crew were killed.
• 1993 Transair Georgian Airline shootdowns involved two separate aircraft shot down a day apart in Sukhumi, Abkhazia, Georgia, killing 108 people.^[19]
• 1998 Lionair Flight LN 602 shootdown: On October 7, 1998, the Tamil Tigers shot down an aircraft off the coast of Sri Lanka.
• 2002 Mombasa airliner attack: On November 28, 2002, two shoulder-launched Strela 2 (SA-7) surface-to-air missiles were fired at a chartered Boeing 757 airliner as it took off from Moi International Airport. The missiles missed the aircraft which continued safely to Tel Aviv, carrying 271 vacationers from Mombasa back to Israel. In the photos, the missile systems were painted in light blue, the color used in the Soviet military for training material (a training SA-7 round would not have the guidance system).
• 2003 Baghdad DHL shootdown incident: On 22 November 2003, an Airbus A300B4-203F cargo plane, operating on behalf of DHL was hit by an SA-7 missile, which resulted in the loss of its hydraulic systems. The crew later landed the crippled aircraft safely by using only differential engine thrust by adjusting the individual throttle controls of each engine.
• 2007 Mogadishu TransAVIAexport Airlines Il-76 crash: On March 23, 2007, a TransAVIAexport Airlines Ilyushin Il-76 airplane crashed in outskirts of Mogadishu, Somalia, during the 2007 Battle of Mogadishu. Witnesses claim that a surface-to-air missile was fired immediately prior to the accident. However, Somali officials deny that the aircraft was shot down.

Countermeasures[link]

A 9K38 Igla (NATO reporting name: SA-18) dual missile launch platform mounted on a Mercedes-Benz Unimog of the Mexican Navy in a Mexican military parade.

Man-portable air defense systems are a popular black market item for insurgent forces.^[20] Their proliferation became the subject of the Wassenaar Arrangement's (WA)22 Elements for Export Controls of MANPADS, the G8 Action Plan of 2 June 2003,^[21] the October 2003 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit, Bangkok Declaration on Partnership for the Future and in July 2003 the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), Forum for Security Co-operation, Decision No. 7/03: Man-portable Air Defense Systems.^[22]

Understanding the problem in 2003, Colin Powell remarked that there was “no threat more serious to aviation” than the missiles,^[23] which can be used to shoot down helicopters and commercial airliners, and are sold illegally for as little as a few hundred dollars. The U.S. has led a global effort to dismantle these weapons, with over 30,000 voluntarily destroyed since 2003, but probably hundreds of thousands are still in the hands of insurgents, especially in Iraq, where they were looted from the military arsenals of the former dictator Saddam Hussein,^[24][25] and in Afghanistan as well. In August 2010, a report by the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) confirmed that “only a handful” of illicit MANPADS were recovered from national resistance caches in Iraq in 2009, according to media reports and interviews with military sources.^[26]

Military countermeasures[link]

With the growing number of MANPADS attacks on civilian airliners, a number of different countermeasure systems have been developed specifically to protect aircraft against the missiles.

• AN/ALQ-144, AN/ALQ-147 and AN/ALQ-157 are U.S.-produced systems, developed by Sanders Associates in the 1970s.
• AN/AAQ-24 Nemesis is a NATO system developed by Northrop Grumman and BAE Systems.

Civilian countermeasures[link]

• Civil Aircraft Missile Protection System (CAMPS)—Developed by Saab Avitronics, Chemring Countermeasures and Naturelink Aviation, using non-pyrotechnic infrared decoys.
• Flight Guard by Elta Systems Ltd.

Missile models[link]

HS M09 hybrid air-defense system on BOV-3 vehicle with 8 × Strela 2

• China
  • HN-5A/B
  • QW-1
  • QW-2
  • FN-6
• France
  • Mistral
• United Kingdom
  • Blowpipe
  • Javelin
  • Starburst
  • Starstreak
• Iran
  • Misagh-1
  • Misagh-2
• Japan
  • Type 91
  • Type 93
• Republic of Korea
  • KP-SAM Shingung
• Pakistan
  • Anza
• Poland
  • Grom
• Soviet Union/Russian Federation
  • 9K32M 'Strela-2' (SA-7)
  • 9K36 'Strela-3' (SA-14)
  • 9K38 'Igla' (SA-18)
  • 9K310 'Igla-M' (SA-16)
• Sweden
  • RBS 70
• United States
  • FIM-43 'Redeye'
  • FIM-92 'Stinger'

See also[link]

• Anti-aircraft warfare
• Infrared countermeasures
• Aerial countermeasures
• CAMPS
• Flight Guard
• Northrop Grumman Guardian

References[link]

Portions of this article were taken from Homeland Security: Protecting Airliners from Terrorist Missiles, CRS Report for Congress RL31741, February 16, 2006 by the Congressional Research Service, division of The Library of Congress which as a work of the Federal Government exists in the public domain.

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Man-portable air-defense systems

• MANPADS Proliferation—links to hundreds of documents on MANPADS, their proliferation, and control efforts
• Man-Portable Air Defence Systems (MANPADS) Small Arms Survey Research Note
• Man Portable Missiles vs Airliners
• Are Helicopters Vulnerable?—Analysis of MANPADS effectivness.
• Man Portable AIr Defense System—GlobalSecurity.Org article covering period until 1999.

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (November 2008)

Michael Chertoff
2nd Secretary of Homeland Security
In office February 15, 2005 – January 21, 2009
President	George W. Bush
Preceded by	Tom Ridge
Succeeded by	Janet Napolitano
Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit
In office June 10, 2003 – February 15, 2005
Appointed by	George W. Bush
Preceded by	Morton Greenberg
Succeeded by	Michael Chagares
United States Attorney for the District of New Jersey
In office 1990–1994
Appointed by	George H. W. Bush
Preceded by	Samuel Alito
Succeeded by	Faith Hochberg
Personal details
Born	(1953-11-28) November 28, 1953 (age 58) Elizabeth, New Jersey, U.S.
Political party	Republican
Spouse(s)	Meryl Chertoff
Children	2
Alma mater	Harvard University

Michael Chertoff (born November 28, 1953) was the second United States Secretary of Homeland Security under President George W. Bush and co-author of the USA PATRIOT Act. He previously served as a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, as a federal prosecutor, and as assistant U.S. Attorney General. He succeeded Tom Ridge as United States Secretary of Homeland Security on February 15, 2005.

Since leaving government service, Chertoff has worked as Senior Of Counsel at the Washington, D.C. law firm of Covington & Burling.^[1] He also co-founded the Chertoff Group, a risk management and security consulting company, which employs several senior officials from his time as Secretary of Homeland Security as well as Michael Hayden, a former Director of the National Security Agency and the Central Intelligence Agency.^[2]

Chertoff is a member of the Advisory Board of the Institute for Cultural Diplomacy. ^[3]

Early life[link]

Chertoff was born in Elizabeth, New Jersey to Rabbi Gershon Baruch Chertoff (1915–1996), the former leader of the Congregation B'nai Israel in Elizabeth and Talmud scholar, and Livia Chertoff (née Eisen), El Al flight attendant. His paternal grandfather, Rabbi Paul Chertoff (emigrated with his parents from czarist Russia, present day Belarus) was a noted Talmud scholar.^[4]

Chertoff went to the Jewish Educational Center in Elizabeth as well as the Pingry School. He later attended Harvard College, where he was a research assistant on John Hart Ely's book Democracy and Distrust, graduating in 1975 and then spending one year at the London School of Economics and Political Science in the United Kingdom. He then graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1978, going on to clerk for appellate judge Murray Gurfein for a year before clerking for United States Supreme Court Justice William Brennan from 1979 to 1980. He worked in private practice with Latham & Watkins from 1980 to 1983 before being hired as a prosecutor by Rudolph Giuliani, then the U.S. attorney for Manhattan, working on Mafia and political corruption-related cases. In the mid 1990s, Chertoff returned to Latham & Watkins for a brief period, founding the firm's office in Newark, New Jersey.

Government Employment[link]

In September 1986, together with U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Rudolph Giuliani, Chertoff was instrumental in the crackdown on organized crime in the Mafia Commission Trial.

In 1990, Chertoff was appointed by President George H. W. Bush as U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey.^[5] Among his most important cases, in 1992 Chertoff put second-term Jersey City Mayor Gerald McCann in federal prison for over two years on charges of defrauding money from a savings and loan scam. Chertoff was asked to stay in his position when the Clinton administration took office in 1993, at the request of Democratic Senator Bill Bradley.^[6] He was the only U.S. attorney not replaced and stayed with the U.S. Attorney's office until 1994, when he entered private practice, returning to Latham & Watkins as a partner.^[6]

Despite his friendly relationship with some Democrats, Chertoff took an active role in the Whitewater investigation against Bill and Hillary Clinton, serving as the special counsel for the Senate Whitewater Committee studying allegations against the Clintons.

In 2000, Chertoff worked as special counsel to the New Jersey State Senate Judiciary Committee, investigating racial profiling in New Jersey. He also did some fundraising for George W. Bush^{[citation needed]} and other Republicans^{[citation needed]} during the 2000 election cycle and advised Bush's presidential campaign on criminal justice issues. From 2001 to 2003, he headed the criminal division of the Department of Justice, leading the prosecution's case against terrorist suspect Zacarias Moussaoui.

Chertoff also led the prosecution's case against accounting firm Arthur Andersen for destroying documents relating to the Enron collapse. The prosecution of Arthur Andersen was controversial, as the firm was effectively dissolved, resulting in the loss of 26,000 jobs. The Supreme Court overturned the conviction and the case has not been retried. At the Department of Justice, he also came under fire as one of the chief architects of the Bush administration's legal strategies in the War on Terror,^{[citation needed]} particularly regarding the detention of thousands of Middle Eastern immigrants.^{[citation needed]}

On March 5, 2003, Chertoff was nominated by President Bush to a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit vacated by Morton I. Greenberg. Hillary Clinton (then a Senator from New York) cast the lone dissenting vote against Chertoff's confirmation. He was confirmed by the Senate 88-1 on June 9, 2003, and received his commission the following day. Mrs. Clinton explained that her vote was in protest of the way junior White House staffers were "very badly treated" by Chertoff's staff during the Whitewater investigation.^[7]

Secretary of Homeland Security[link]

In late 2004, Bernard Kerik was forced to decline President Bush's offer to replace Tom Ridge, the outgoing Secretary of Homeland Security. After a lengthy search to find a suitable replacement, Bush nominated Chertoff to the post in January 2005, citing his experience with post-9/11 terror legislation. He was unanimously approved for the position by the United States Senate on February 15, 2005.^[8]

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, most of the criticism was directed toward the Federal Emergency Management Agency, but DHS was criticized as well for its lack of preparation.^[9]

Chertoff was the Bush administration's point man for pushing the comprehensive immigration reform bill, a measure that stalled in the Senate in June 2007.^[10]

Chertoff was asked by the Obama administration to stay in his post until 9 a.m. on January 21, 2009 (one day after President Obama's inauguration), "to ensure a smooth transition".^[11]

Views[link]

Construction of border fence[link]

In April 2008, Chertoff was criticized in a New York Times editorial for waiving the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act, and other environmental protection legislation to construct a 700-mile (1,100 km) fence along the Mexico–United States border. The Times wrote: "To the long list of things the Bush administration is willing to trash in its rush to appease immigration hard-liners, you can now add dozens of important environmental laws and hundreds of thousands of acres of fragile habitat on the southern border."^[12]

According to New York Times columnist Adam Liptak, Chertoff had excluded the Department of Homeland Security from having to follow laws "protecting the environment, endangered species, migratory birds, the bald eagle, antiquities, farms, deserts, forests, Native American graves and religious freedom."^[13]

A report issued by the Congressional Research Service, the non-partisan research division of the Library of Congress, said that the unchecked delegation of powers to Chertoff was unprecedented: "After a review of federal law, primarily through electronic database searches and consultations with various CRS experts, we were unable to locate a waiver provision identical to that of §102 of H.R. 418—i.e., a provision that contains 'notwithstanding' language, provides a secretary of an executive agency the authority to waive all laws such secretary determines necessary, and directs the secretary to waive such laws."^[14]

Actions regarding illegal immigration[link]

In September 2007, Chertoff told a House committee that the DHS would not tolerate interference by sanctuary cities that would block the "Basic Pilot Program", which requires some types of employers to validate the legal status of their workers.^[15] He said that the DHS is exploring its legal options and intends to take action to prevent any interference with the law.^[16]

In 2008 it became public that the housekeeping company Chertoff had hired to clean his house employed illegal immigrants.^[17][18][19]

Globalization[link]

At the Global Creative Leadership Summit in 2009, Chertoff described globalization as a double-edged sword. Although globalization may help raise the standard of living for people around the world, Chertoff claims that it can also enable terrorists and transnational criminals.^[20]

Body Scanners[link]

Michael Chertoff has been an advocate of enhanced technologies, such as full body scanners.^[21] His consulting firm Chertoff Group (founded 2009) represents manufacturers of the scanners. ^{[22] [23]}

References[link]

• Michael Chertoff at the Biographical Directory of Federal Judges, a public domain publication of the Federal Judicial Center.

v t e United States Secretaries of Homeland Security Ridge Chertoff Napolitano

v t e Cabinet of President George W. Bush (2001–2009)   Cabinet Secretary of State Colin Powell (2001–2005) Condoleezza Rice (2005–2009) Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill (2001–2002) John W. Snow (2003–2006) Henry Paulson (2006–2009) Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld (2001–2006) Robert Gates (2006–2009) Attorney General John Ashcroft (2001–2005) Alberto Gonzales (2005–2007) Michael Mukasey (2007–2009) Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton (2001–2006) Dirk Kempthorne (2006–2009) Secretary of Agriculture Ann Veneman (2001–2005) Mike Johanns (2005–2007) Ed Schafer (2008–2009) Secretary of Commerce Donald Evans (2001–2005) Carlos Gutierrez (2005–2009) Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao (2001–2009) Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson (2001–2005) Mike Leavitt (2005–2009) Secretary of Education Rod Paige (2001–2005) Margaret Spellings (2005–2009) Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Mel Martinez (2001–2003) Alphonso Jackson (2003–2008) Steve Preston (2008–2009) Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta (2001–2006) Mary Peters (2006–2009) Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham (2001–2005) Samuel Bodman (2005–2009) Secretary of Veterans Affairs Anthony Principi (2001–2005) Jim Nicholson (2005–2007) James Peake (2007–2009) Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge (2003–2005) Michael Chertoff (2005–2009)   Cabinet-level Vice President Dick Cheney (2001–2009) White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card (2001–2006) Joshua Bolten (2006–2009) Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency Christine Todd Whitman (2001–2003) Mike Leavitt (2003–2005) Stephen L. Johnson (2005–2009) Director of the Office of Management and Budget Mitch Daniels (2001–2003) Joshua Bolten (2003–2006) Rob Portman (2006–2007) Jim Nussle (2007–2009) Director of National Drug Control Policy John P. Walters (2001–2009) Trade Representative Robert Zoellick (2001–2005) Rob Portman (2005–2006) Susan Schwab (2006–2009)