Archie to SAM: A Short Operational History of Ground-Based Air ...

FROM GUNS TO MISSILES
American air defense took three directions in the late 1940s.
The most expensive of these, air defense aircraft, falls beyond
the scope of this study. The other two directions were antiaircraft
guns and missiles.
The postwar story of antiaircraft guns is primarily that of
phase out and false starts. At first, postwar budget cuts and
the existence of World War II equipment disguised the gun’s
fate. The Army did attempt to replace the .50-caliber machine
gun and develop an effective low-altitude weapon. In June
1948, the Ordnance Corps began development of the Stinger,
four .60-caliber guns (radar-directed and mounted on a vehicle).
In 1951, the Army terminated the project when the developer
conceded that the .60 guns could not satisfy the slant range
requirement of 14,000 feet (ft). 1 The Army did field two new
pieces of antiaircraft equipment. To upgrade its 40 mm antiaircraft
gun, the Army authorized a model in July 1951 and
named it Duster (fig. 35). Mounted on a light tank (M41) chassis,
the Army planned to link the guns to a second vehicle with
Figure 35. Duster. The Duster was one of a number of failed Army antiaircraft
projects. It mounted two 40 mm guns on a tracked vehicle.
(Reprinted from http://www.militaryhistorymuseum.org/gallery.html.)
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