MGM-13 Mace

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CGM/MGM-13 Mace
CGM-13 test launch at Cape Canaveral
General information
Type	Cruise missile
Manufacturer	Glenn L. Martin Company
Status	Retired
Primary user	United States Air Force
History
Introduction date	1959
First flight	1956
Retired	Early 1970s
Developed from	MGM-1 Matador

The Martin Mace was a ground-launched cruise missile developed from the earlier Martin TM-61 Matador. It used a new self-contained navigation system that eliminated the need to get updates from ground-based radio stations, and thereby allowed it to fly further beyond the front lines. To take advantage of this longer practical range, Mace was larger than Matador and could travel a longer total distance.

The original A model used a ground-mapping radar system which required the missile to fly at low to medium altitudes. In 1959 a new inertial navigation system was introduced that offered similar accuracy but had no altitude limitation. By flying at higher altitudes the missile's range almost doubled with no other changes. This led to the B model of 1961, which was limited to fixed launching sites, unlike the A model's mobile trailers.

Mace was replaced by the MGM-31 Pershing missile by then Secretary of Defence Robert McNamara, and later in its role as a cruise missile for West Germany, by the BGM-109G Ground Launched Cruise Missile.^[1]

Introduced during a period of changing nomenclature, they were originally designated TM-76A and TM-76B for "tactical missile" until 1963, then as MGM-13A for Mobile Ground-launched Missile and CGM-13 for Coffin Ground-launched Missile.