The Army of the United States has procured a batch of computer-assisted sighting systems called SMASH 2000L and made by Israeli Smart Shooter company, The War Zone reports.
In fact, the SMASH 2000L is based on the previous SMASH 2000 version but the new system has a separately mentioned anti-drone capability: it can be used against small unmanned aerial systems.
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It is noted that these "smart" sights will be delivered specially under the U.S. Army’s strategic program on countering small UAVs that was under test since last year.
In addition, Smart Shooter has also been awarded a contract with the U.S. Navy to test how the SMASH system works in marine environments.
The SMASH sight can be installed on any type of assault rifle, and the system’s internal algorithms of target locking and targeting will ensure the effective elimination of targets.
This way a soldier equipped with this sight can "lock a target", and the system will calculate the most effective aiming point. Also, the SMASH 2000L can "follow" the target till the shot is fired. This function will come in handy when the recognition of the target is complicated (e.g. in the crowd).
And in the "Drone Mode", SMASH 2000L can recognize small UAS targets, automatically track their flight paths, provide aiming cues, and thereby make the drone hunting easier for a soldier and even help him shoot unmanned systems on his own.
The sight’s battery allows up to 72 hours of working time. The design company says a rifle can shoot up to 3600 rounds over a full charge. With ground targets, the system can recognize them at a distance of up to 300 meters, and for aerial targets it’s 200 m, but the manufacturer doesn’t specify whether those are figures of effective or maximum range.
On the part of Defense Express, we should note that such sighting systems would be a good addition to the anti-drone arsenal donated to Ukraine so far. As a reminder, this includes air defense radars, jammers, Counter-Unmanned Aerial Systems (C-UAS) from the United States as well as various air defense weapons from all over the world ranging from Martlet MANPADS to Flakpanzer Gepard anti-aircraft guns.
Especially it is important since Ukrainian soldiers have repeatedly attempted and successfully downed Shahed-136 systems – loitering munitions of Iranian origin used by the russian forces – with small arms fire. The reason is that these Iranian UAVs fly at low altitudes which makes them less visible to radars but easily detectable by noise they produce. Smart sights would significantly increase the chances to spot and destroy a drone before it reaches its target and explodes.
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