Rifts Up Close: LAWS-3 Missile System, Rapid Fire

By Tim Willard

The USMC are shock troops, trained to break enemy strongholds and crush the enemy on the battlefield. With the arrival of hardened body armor, robotic vehicles, and power armor, the USMC wanted to upgrade the old missile systems to something lightweight and easy for Marines to carry into battle to give them an edge over their opponents.

The LAWS system (66m Magazine Fed Light Anti-Armor Weapon System) had been a shelved project during the late 20th Century as too bulky and fragile to see combat use, and the USMC contacted Madson-Lenski Missile Armament LLC and asked them to reverse engineer the system, bring it up to modern standards, and make it into a feasible weapon in 2024. In 2026 the LAWS system was unvieled and the USMC and US Army ordered thousands of them.

The entire weapon system was manufactured at the Black Hills Munitions Center in South Dakota, with the missiles being manufactured at the Denton OH facility. When told by the US Department of Defense that the grant for the weapon was contingent on Madson-Lenski producing not only eight micro-fabricators for the weapon itself, but twenty missile fabrication units, Madson-Lenski (Who had produced weaponry and equipment for the US Military since the Civil War) provided them without any concern.

The LAWS fires a 66mm rocket, capable of terminal guidance, top down attack profile, anti-armor capability, and the ability to be used against hardened enemy structures. The missiles are highly complex weapons with both flight and terminal guidance performance, internal inertial mapping hardware, visual profile recognition, and usually programmed for top-down attacks (making this weapon very effective against foes with a head, as the missile detonates above the head and fires an explosively forged penetrator straight through the top of the skull), and able to be controlled by the launcher for minimal flight adjustments. The missile contains a new, multi-effect warhead which can penetrate 1,000mm Explosive Reactive Armour or Rolled Homogeneous Armour, up to 75mm of neo-tungsten carbide polyceramic hyper-alloy, or more than 3m of reinforced ferrocrete. A direct attack mode has been added as well as improved anti-jamming capability.

The LAWS possessed excellent ECCM, as well as offering the user the ability to control the missile via "optical sighting tracking" offered by the scope, or being able to lock onto the target with the laser designator. The weapon could also access the battlefield data network and utilize another launcher's laser designator to home in on the target with. This enabled a firer even out of sight of the target to be able to take part in the assault on a critical armor unit or structure.

In 2033 the weapon was upgraded to the LAWS-I system. This enhancement contained better ECCM hardware, lightened the weapon by 2.5 lbs, gave it increased structural capability, and fixed the problem with the original series of magazines failing to lock into the weapon if the weapon had fired more than 8 missiles in a row by adding in additional heat shielding.

In 2065 the weapon was upgraded to the LAWS-II system. This enhanced the scope, as well as the endurance of the rocket (extended range), as well as making the missiles an order of magnitude smaller and lighter. (From 66mm to 52mm, 1 lb each to .75 lbs each) however the smaller missiles proved not to have desired penetration or terminal guidance performance, as well as missing the intertial mapping system, and so the LAWS-IIA upgrade moved the missiles back up to 66mm in 2067. In addition the detachable "spider-scope" was added to the weapon as well as a battlefield tactical net interface was added. (This is not shown in the illustration)

The spider scope was a small, robotized scope with 6 legs that the user could guide with the BaTNI (Battlefield Tactical Network Interface) to the disired position and watch for or search out targets. The spider-scope (M-81 mobile scope) had a range of 900m, possessed a VIR laser designator, thermographic, IR, VIR, and UV sighting, as well as up to 5X magnification.

The BaTNI screen/keyboard system contained an internal firmware smarthframe allowing the weapon to be set up and fire autonomously at pre-identified targets or targets painted by the spider scope or a designated lazing beam (Marines would often set the weapon up and use the laser designator on their rifle to guide in the missiles from a distance) and the "fire" control activated. Additionally, it can be used to set up the battlefield network, remote view through different weapons or detachable sights, as well as download satellite maps, area maps, or used to designate targets to the missiles inertial mapping software for precision strikes at a distance.

In 2084 the LAWS-III was unvieled. This system was much the same as the LAWS-IIA system, however the user could patch into the system via his armor's datacord, the weight was reduced by another half pound, and the problem with the power contacts for both the spider scope and the BaTNI were fixed. The spider scope and the missile launcher had both recieved stealth materials in their construction, the launcher possessed a powerful ECM system to spoof enemy targeting computers, and the spider possessed not only light ECM systems, but was able to jump and attack unarmored soldiers, chase vehicles, and it's range was extended to 14 hours/5 miles. The spider was able to tear a normal man apart in less than 3 seconds, or tear through a non-hardened vehicle in under a minute to get at the occupants. However, the spider's size remained that of a golf-ball when curled up. (The spider-scope has two vibro-scaples for it's front legs, allowing it to cut through jungle, wire, light structures, which probed totally devestating to an unarmored enemy. It also posseses only a single lens. It is, in effect, a remote controlled micro-bot and cannot operate on its own)

In 2087 the LAWS-IIIA upgrade was put into effect, which put another spider charging bay on the side of the weapon, as well as 4 additional spiders attached to the length of the barrel. The BaTNI was hardened against enemy EMP bursts, as well as advances in encryption and directional burst communication included.

In 2091 the burst fire feature was added, although it soon became apparent that it had been initially built into the LAWS and never activated. Bringing the legacy versions up to burst fire mode capability required about 20 minutes of work.

In every upgrade, Madson-Lenski provided the required micro-fabricators to the DoD, and although they were curious as to where the fabricators went, they chose (wisely) not to investigate it.

During the Cataclysm the spider scopes were primarily used up, but this weapon helped carry the day more than once. However there weren't very many of them out there for NEMA forces to use.

During the Second Dark Ages, most of the bells and whistles were forgotten or discarded when they were no longer useful. The BaTNI was the first to go, since there was no battlefield network to link into, and most of the spider-scopes were long gone. Eventually these systems appeared much like the illustration.

During Rifts Earth, these weapons are extremely rare. However, the USMC logo causes this to be a acknowledged artifact, and are usually just confiscated from those in burbs. Travellers are usually allowed to keep it, but it must remain unloaded. However, a fully functional one of these, with all the bells and whistles, will have every CS officer and soldier trying to bargain for it.

In 75 PA an explorer group found 30 of these launchers, with holographic image projection above the BaNTI for total 3D battlefield planning, along with several thousand missiles. However, the Native Americans whose land it was took a dim view of the explorer's testing the weapon by firing at a herd of mustangs, killed all the explorers, and left the weapons sitting there.

In 99 PA a group of explorers sold the CS military a damaged missile micro-fabricator for the paltry price of 25,000 credits, unaware of what they really possessed. CS survey teams found that the underground facility that the micro-fabrication unit was in was totally flooded/destroyed, and the other micro-fabrication unit was complete junk.

Weight: 9 lbs
Length: 41"
Caliber: 66mm
Maximum Range: 2000m (6000 ft) Beyond this range, the missile crashes into the ground, as its fuel is depleted.
Maximum Effective Range: 1500m (4500 ft) Beyond this range, the weapon has no terminal or in flight guidance
Typical Combat Range: 1000m (3000 ft)
Magazine Capacity: 6. Many soldiers remove the eclip that is built into the bottom of the magazine to power the clip and recharge the spider-scope, rather than risk enemy insurgents doing the same thing. After that, the magazine is usually stomped on to break it. Only during large scale engagements is the magazine left intact, however a lot of soldiers stomp on it out of habit.