What makes a weapon anti-air or anti-tank? Would anti-air be effective against tanks? Could we create one weapon that covers both, or even all possible targets?

Question

What makes a weapon anti-air or anti-tank? Would anti-air be effective against tanks? Could we create one weapon that covers both, or even all possible targets?

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Answer 1

we do. the american ADATS stands for Air Defense Anti Tank System. it’s basically an anti tank missile with proxy fuze. the russian is also the same with the vikhr missile. though iirc, on the vikhr missile, you need to select what mode do you want to use prior to launching. so if it’s in aa mode, it wont work well for at role and vice versa

going back a bit, we had dual puprose guns. like the one on many warships. they are designed to be used against aircraft and surface targets

the also, everyone converted aa guns into anti tank role in ww2. german 88, soviet 85, american 90, etc

mostly, anti tank or anti air are defined by the ammunition that it fires. if it fires armor piercing, then it’s anti tank, if it fires air burst, with time fuze, it’s usually anti air.

making a missile that can do both is certainly doable. but it’s really complicated. because to kill aircraft, you want something fast and turns well. and to kill tank, you want to pack as much explosive as you can. these points contradicts each other. so we have separate missile for aa and at