Al-Fao was a project for a

self-propelled artillery Self-propelled artillery (also called locomotive artillery) is artillery equipped with its own propulsion system to move toward its firing position. Within the terminology are the self-propelled gun, self-propelled howitzer, self-propelled mo ...

system designed for the former

Iraqi Army The Iraqi Ground Forces (Arabic: القوات البرية العراقية), also referred to as the Iraqi Army (Arabic: الجيش العراقي), is the ground force component of the Iraqi Armed Forces. It was formerly known as the Royal Iraq ...

by the

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

weapons engineer

Gerald Bull Gerald Vincent Bull (March 9, 1928 – March 22, 1990) was a Canadian engineer who developed long-range artillery. He moved from project to project in his quest to economically launch a satellite using a space gun, huge artillery piece, to which ...

. It would have been one of the world's most powerful artillery pieces, with a 53-caliber, gun firing 109-kilogram shells over a

range Range may refer to: Geography * Range (geographic), a chain of hills or mountains; a somewhat linear, complex mountainous or hilly area (cordillera, sierra) ** Mountain range, a group of mountains bordered by lowlands * Range, a term used to i ...

of . The Al-Fao system was to weigh 44 tonnes, and its 550 hp engine was to give it a top speed of on roads, and cross-country. The Al-Fao's

autoloader An autoloader or auto-loader is a mechanical aid or replacement for the personnel that load ammunition into crew-served weapons without being an integrated part of the gun itself. The term is generally only applied to larger weapons, such as na ...

was to provide it with a rate of fire of four rounds a minute. A self-propelled howitzer using the same 155 mm gun as the South African G6, similar to the Al-Fao and named Majnoon, was also designed by Gerald Bull on an Iraqi order.

History

The design of the Majnoon and Al-Fao started around 1988. That year, South Africa had tried to sell the

G6 howitzer The G6, sometimes denoted as the G6 ''Rhino'', is a South African self-propelled howitzer. It was developed as a turreted, self-propelled variant of the G5 howitzer series, mating the gun to a six-wheeled mine-protected armoured chassis. Des ...

to Iraq, but the Iraqis found it too expensive, and requested that Bull design two equivalents for them. Prototypes of each model had to be ready by May 1989, in time for the Baghdad International Arms Fair. Numerous French, German and Spanish companies were contracted to manufacture parts for the guns, while the design for the chassis was bought in Czechoslovakia and modified to South African specifications. The deadline was met, and the prototypes of both Majnoon and Al-Fao were presented at the Arms Fair, although these were far from complete. However, by early 1990, the Iraqis had imported all the know-how, equipment and machinery necessary to produce them, as well as ammunition. Subsequent events prevented the realisation of the Majnoon and Al-Fao projects.

References

Notes

Bibliography

* {{cite book , last1=Altobchi , first1=Ali , last2=Cooper , first2=Tom , last3=Fontanellaz , first3=Adrien , title=Al-Hussein: Iraqi indigenous conventional arms projects, 1980-2003 , date=2022 , publisher=Helion & Company Publishing , location=Warwick, UK , isbn=978-1-914377-18-1 210 mm artillery 155 mm artillery Wheeled self-propelled howitzers Artillery of Iraq Six-wheeled vehicles

History

See also

References

Notes

Bibliography