A group of former US Defense Department experts has called on the current Pentagon leadership to pay more attention to the development of hypersonic weapons. They say that the United States is already significantly behind Russia and China in this area due to road development.
Hypersonic weapons
Hypersonic weapons include aircraft capable of traveling at speeds of several thousand kilometers per hour, i.e., 6, 8, or even 10 times faster than the speed of sound. Only recently, experts who previously worked for the US Department of Defense stated that the country was moving too slowly in developing such systems and risked falling behind its competitors.
These specialists are now part of the so-called Task Force, i.e., they are consultants who conduct independent external assessments of the situation in the military department. Their latest report suggests that the US has significant problems in the field of hypersonic weapons, even though officials may not think so.
In the modern world, hypersonic aircraft are predominantly unmanned, because suborbital bombers have never been put into practical use. That is, these are missiles, but their development faces a number of problems.
Hypersonic missiles and drones are being fully developed by the United States’ main competitor, China, and have already reached the practical testing stage. Russia is also attempting to use them in its war against Ukraine. All of this could pose a direct threat to the United States.
Missiles that are too pricey
Experts note that, in general, military engineers in the United States are not sitting idly by. There are projects for hypersonic weapons, but they are progressing extremely slowly. And the main reason for this is the price. The cost of one such unit is estimated at several tens of millions of dollars. This means that even a rich country like the US can only order them in small batches.
At the same time, China and Russia are trying in every way to reduce the cost of their hypersonic missiles, while large American companies, which are the main partners of the Department of Defense, are not interested in this at all. No one is interested in bringing discipline to the organizational chaos that exists in this area.
The structure of enterprises and subcontractors in the missile industry is far from optimal for the mass production of hypersonic missiles. Experts suggest drawing on the experience of the space program, which partially overcame this problem by involving private companies. In addition, they believe that attention should be paid to missile defense.
According to spacenews.com
