Seems Like We Did This Once Before?

I recently came across a few photographs of Regulus II,  XRSSM-N-9 GM2001, being loaded into C-124C 52-1067 at Hensley Field/NAS Dallas. 

This was the first flight test missile (FTM). The date is February 6, 1956, the previous year the first XF8U-1 was also transported by Globemaster II also to Muroc for first flight and initial flight testing.

Being the first of class this example was powered by the Wright J65-W-6 engine. Regulus II GM2008 and subsequent were powered by the General Electric J79-GE-3A engine.

GM2001 first flew on May 29, 1956 and was lost in a landing accident on August 16, 1956.

YBGM-110 Tomahawk

LTV was selected with General Dynamics to compete in a fly-off of their competing submarine launched cruise missile designs. The LTV version was designated YBGM-110 with the GD missile designated YBGM-109.

There is an excellent article here: Vought Org Website  so I won't republish all that information in this post. The LTV missile failed on it's first two test flights, the first attributed to the Navy, the second to a programming error. The GD design did not suffer a similar fate. The engine that the Navy selected for the LTV missile was not as a mature, nor successful program as the William offering was at competition time.

Here are a few publicity images of the ALCM version mounted on the right wing of a factory fresh A-7E aircraft. Images from VAHF collection.