Textron Systems Awarded $354 Million for XM204 Anti-tank Top Attack Munition

  • Our Bureau
  • 10:41 AM, July 22, 2022
  • 1918
Textron Systems Awarded $354 Million for XM204 Anti-tank Top Attack Munition
US Army soldiers with the XM204 top attack munition

Textron Systems was awarded a $353,980,000 contract for the production and delivery of the Munition, Wide Area: Top Attack, XM204, Trainer; the Munition, Wide Area: XM98; and spare parts.
The XM204 is part of a new generation of terrain shaping obstacles able to target and deter tracked vehicles operated by a near-peer adversary in open terrain. This eliminates the old method of hand emplacing land mines.
Bids were solicited via the internet with one received. Work locations and funding will be determined with each order, with an estimated completion date of July 20, 2027, a Pentagon contract announcemet said Thursday.
According to a 2021 U.S. Army press release quoting Lt. Col. Isaac Cuthbertson, Product Manager for Terrain-Shaping Obstacles. “The XM204 is in support of an operational needs statement directly from U.S. Army Europe."
The size of a large suitcase, the launcher module bears four top attack munitions that, when triggered, launches a top attack submunition into the air. The submunition tracks and identifies threat vehicles and then fires an armor-piercing slug at the target.

Textron Systems Awarded $354 Million for XM204 Anti-tank Top Attack Munition
M93 top munitions concept
“It (XM204) can ‘hear’ tracked vehicles and feel them coming,” Steve Patane, YPG test officer was quoted in the relese as saying, “When it does, it uses a mechanism that starts tracking the vehicle. When the threat-tracked vehicle is a certain distance away, the XM204 will shoot a submunition into the air to fire the warhead down at the target within its zone of authority.”
The ruggedized launcher module has a mechanism to indicate whether the system is armed or not. It also has a self-destruct switch with different timed settings to prevent the possibility of the system lying dormant and dangerous years or decades after the end of a conflict, as happened with previous US and foreign land mines.
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