[3] It remains one of the smallest nuclear weapon systems ever built, incorporating a warhead with yields of 10 to 20 tons of TNT (42 to 84 GJ).

By 1957, the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) declared that it had created a small fission warhead that could be deployed for frontline use by infantrymen.

[5] In August 1958, the Army began to officially refer to the BGADS as the Davy Crockett, after the American folk hero, who died at the Battle of the Alamo in 1836.

[citation needed] During alerts to the Inner German border in the Fulda Gap the Davy Crocketts accompanied their battalions.

All Seventh Army's V Corps (including 3rd Armored Division) combat maneuver battalions had preassigned positions in the Fulda Gap.

[citation needed] In addition to the Davy Crocketts (e.g., assigned to the 3rd Armored Division), Seventh Army's V Corps had nuclear artillery rounds and atomic demolition munitions, and these were also for potential use in the Fulda Gap.

On the Korean peninsula, Eighth Army units assigned the Davy Crockett weapons primarily planned to use the passes that funneled armor as killing grounds, creating temporarily deadly radioactive zones roadblocked by destroyed tanks and other vehicles.

[citation needed] Production of the Davy Crockett began at Picatinny Arsenal following the August 15, 1958, approval of the design.

[citation needed] The Davy Crockett's nuclear warhead, the M388, was removed from US Army Europe (in West Germany) in August 1967.

[11] Brigadier General Alvin Cowan, Assistant Division Commander of 3rd Armored Division, while stating the weapon was a "significant advance" in technical terms and that the laboratory responsible deserved "a great deal of credit", further stated that the Army retired the weapon due to the personnel costs associated with it as well as apparent "great fear that some sergeant would start a nuclear war".

[5] In 2005 the Army announced that it uncovered 600 pounds (270 kg) of depleted uranium from the training sites used for the Davy Crockett's inert rounds to be practice fired.

The warhead had a yield equivalent to 20 tonnes of TNT (84 GJ) and contained 26 pounds (12 kg) of high explosives.

Once the propellant was discharged, the spigot became the launching piston for the M388 atomic projectile; this was necessary because the fission round was unable to tolerate the stress of heavy acceleration, something which the spigot/piston, acting as a "pusher tube", was able to facilitate.

[24] The launcher systems were muzzle loading weapons; a breechloading mechanism was unnecessary as they were intended for a very low rate of fire.

[26] The M28 launcher was also equipped with a 20 mm spotting rifle – a single-shot weapon that fired depleted uranium[8] rounds using a high–low system.

These rounds flew a similar trajectory to the nuclear projectiles and produced white smoke when they landed, helping determine range.

The shell's greatest effect would have been its extreme prompt neutron radiation which would have killed most of the enemy troops inside that circle within minutes.

The Army created a standard for the crew to follow when firing the M388; they advised that the soldiers shelter their bodies behind a sloped hill and lie in prone position on the ground with their necks and heads covered.

[3] One of the most fervent supporters of the Davy Crockett was West Germany's defense minister Franz Josef Strauss, in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

[35] The Davy Crockett Weapon System's use of depleted uranium in the spotting round led to concerns about troop exposure to the material.