The Harpoon is an all-weather, over-the-horizon, anti-ship missile system, developed and manufactured by the McDonnell Douglas Corporation of the United States of America, with manufacturing now taken over by Boeing Integrated Defense Systems, the new owner of its factory in Missouri. In 2004, Boeing delivered the 7,000th Harpoon unit since the weapon's introduction in 1977. The missile system has also been further developed into a land-strike weapon, the Standoff Land Attack Missile (SLAM).

The regular Harpoon uses active radar homing, and a low-level, sea-skimming cruise trajectory to improve survivability and lethality. The missile's launch platforms include:

* Fixed-wing aircraft (the AGM-84, made without the solid-fueled booster)
* Surface ships (the RGM-84, fitted with a solid-fueled rocket booster that detaches when expended, to allow the missile's main turbojet to maintain flight)
* Submarines (the UGM-84, fitted with a solid-rocket launch booster and encapsulated in a container to enable submerged launch through a torpedo tube);
Coastal defense batteries, from which it would be fired with a solid-fueled booster.

In 1986, the United States Navy sank at least two Libyan patrol boats in the Gulf of Sidra. Two Harpoon missiles were launched from the USS Yorktown with no confirmed results and several others from A-6 Intruder aircraft that were said to have hit their targets. Initial reports claimed that the USS Yorktown scored hits on a patrol boat, but action reports indicated that the target may have been a false one and that no ships were hit by those missiles.

In 1988, Harpoon missiles were used to sink the Iranian frigate Sahand during Operation Praying Mantis. Another was fired at the Combattante II class missile boat Joshan, but failed to strike because the FAC had already been mostly sunk by RIM-66 Standard missiles. An Iranian Harpoon was also fired at the destroyer USS Wainwright. The missile was successfully lured away by chaff.

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