Comment by Jonas on April 19, 2010 at 6:09am

I believe that cruise missiles (old) also worked with terrain matching.

Comment by Martin Seven on April 19, 2010 at 10:54am

Old cruise missiles used timers, radio beam guides, altimeters and radars for guidance. Newer ones are using (among many other systems) TERCOM - Terrain Contour Matching. Basically a radar altimeter that's feeding a computer with altitude plots and using them to find its position in an onboard elevation map.

To my knowledge no deployed CM uses optical guidance. Besides, how hard it is for a terrorist to take out a landmark or two.

Comment by Hooks on April 19, 2010 at 12:59pm

I gess CM wasn't ment for terroists..

Comment by Ken on April 19, 2010 at 3:09pm

Yes, some deployed CM use optical guidance. Sea launch Tomahawks use DSMAC, but you are right that land based Tomahawks TERCOM.

What is an "old" CM? Shoot, the Navy was using optical scene matching in the late 80's or early 90's that I know of. Don't know how long the program existed before I learned of them. Ah, the good old days. The DSMAC guys loved to put on a good dog and pony show when the brass came to town. Hardware all over the lab benches.

Comment by Sgt Ric on April 19, 2010 at 3:22pm

I have an old volume on missile guidance that has a chapter on optical guidance.

It even mentions celestial navigation and it's relatively shortlived deployment.

Comment by Michael Zaffuto on April 19, 2010 at 10:20pm

Some ICBMs used celestial navigation just prior to reentry for dead reckoning,
SR-71 used AIS - Astro-Inertial Navigation system..pre gps

Comment by Lew Payne on April 19, 2010 at 10:28pm

That was pretty darn impressive. Thanks for sharing.

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