The U.S. Army and Marine Corps have ordered 400 mine-sweeping plows designed and manufactured in Israel, and are expected to order 1,000 more in the near future.
The $30 million-plus contract went to Ramta Structures and Systems, a unit of Israel Aircraft Industries, which has been supplying the plow to the Israel Defense Force for years.
Ramta said it would fill the first order within 18 months and would increase production to one plow a day.
Known as the TWMP (Tread Width Mine Plow), the device is mounted on the front of tanks. It was designed after the Yom Kippur War in 1973.
The Israelis got the idea from mine plows on captured Soviet-made tanks, which they found to be primitive and inefficient.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
