“HIMARS use is tightly-regulated, precisely because it’s so powerful. Sitting on the back of a 5-ton truck, HIMARS is capable of firing a single, 13-foot ATACMS surface-to-surface missile 100 miles or more away.

Or, it can pound up to half-dozen GPS-guided rockets in a matter of seconds at at a single target more than 40 miles in the distance; that’s more than double the range of a traditional howitzer.

“The advantage of HIMARS is that is can put a lot of firepower downrange very, very quickly,” an Army fire support officer told Danger Room in February.

It’s so much firepower, in fact, that, for a while in Afghanistan, air strikes were easier to authorize than HIMARS. (At least the air assaults had overhead intelligence to back ‘em up.)”

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