USS Stout Navy Destroyer Launches Tomahawk Cruise Missiles - Operation Odyssey Dawn Footage in Libya. A cruise missile is a guided missile that is able to fly at supersonic or high subsonic speeds and unlike larger ballistic missiles, can fly at below traditional radar heights. This combined with a self-navigating facility makes the modern cruise missile very hard to knock out. The early idea of a cruise missile stems from an "aerial torpedo" concept shown in the 1909 British movie - The Airship Destroyer, where flying torpedoes controlled wirelessly are used to bring down airships bombing London. However, the modern cruise missile design is based on the German V-1 flying bomb or Doodlebug from World War II. Developments in computer technology have greatly improved the control of the missiles during flight -- the V-1 could only be guided at launch. Various countries have constructed their own cruise missiles -- one example is the US Tomahawk, classified as a long-range, all-weather, subsonic cruise missile. It was designed by General Dynamics in the 1970s with the ability to fly a low altitude and launched from a surface launcher, although the current missile can is only launched at sea -- surface vessel or submarine. This video clip shows a Tomahawk Cruise Missile Launched from a US Naval destroyer USS Stout during Operation Odyssey Dawn Footage in Libya.
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