The American military has expressed concerns that the United States may be left behind in the arms race in the development of hypersonic missiles: Russia is on a par, China is catching up. The generals insist that it is necessary to get ahead, and then the United States will be able to destroy targets deep in Russian territory with impunity. Their Russian counterparts argue that this is unlikely in the short term.
American congressmen and experts are discussing the need for the early development of hypersonic missiles capable of five times the speed of sound. In their opinion, such missiles can overcome the powerful air defense system of potential adversaries.
Former head of the US Air Force Research Laboratory, Major General Curtis Bedke, said that the development of hypersonic weapons is not just an important, but an inevitable process: "It's time to take this seriously and try not to be left behind," Airforcetimes quoted him as saying.
The publication notes that high-speed missiles will enable the United States to threaten targets deep in enemy territory and protected by modern air defense and missile defense systems. The American military finds this feature especially important in confronting the states whose armies are considered next in power after the American - Russia and China.
"Hypersonic missiles would allow the United States to penetrate defenses to strike critical targets without putting pilots at risk of being shot down deep in enemy territory."
Bedke and the Mitchell Aerospace Research Institute prepared a report to members of Congress on the benefits that hypersonic missiles could bring to the United States.
The last known test of American sonic missiles to date dates back to 2013, when the Americans tested the X-51 Waverider - a weapon resembling a cruise missile and equipped with an engine capable of accelerating the device to hypersonic speeds.
The prototype was able to reach a speed of about 3,500 miles per hour (5.6 thousand kilometers per hour) in a little over three minutes. Although the launch was deemed a success, the next is not planned until 2019, Bedke said.
At the same time, some American experts express fears that Russia and China may be somewhat ahead of the United States in the development of hypersonic technologies.
"The way forward is not so thorny and expensive," Bedke said, expressing confidence that "the opportunities missed in the past will not be repeated." He explained that the United States developed hypersonic technology back in the 60s of the last century, but then did not conduct real tests for 30 years. In the second half of the 60s and until the end of the 70s, Moscow and Washington pursued a policy of detente, and hypersonic weapons did not really fit into the then concept of the massive use of ballistic missiles and the collision of huge armies in the fields of Europe.
Main front
In recent years, the United States has given increasing priority to the concept of a global lightning strike, which assumes that high-precision weapons should be capable of hitting targets anywhere in the world within an hour. The development of hypersonic missiles is one of its cornerstones: traditional intercontinental ballistic missiles are not very suitable for such an application.
“For the Americans, nuclear weapons are already yesterday’s weapons, since they have a huge superiority in conventional precision weapons,” Igor Korotchenko, editor-in-chief of the National Defense magazine, told the VZGLYAD newspaper. - Therefore, they are interested in reducing the arsenal of all nuclear states, first of all, of course, Russia. Russia has a different concept: we are building an aerospace defense system based on the S-500 in order to neutralize the US superiority in this area. The S-500 will also be designed to intercept the hypersonic attack aircraft that the Americans are testing today."
Hypersonic flight is indistinguishable for modern radar systems, and the creation of effective means of intercepting such missiles is not yet foreseen. Recently, hypersonic weapons have been called one of the priority areas of development in Russia and the United States. Russian developers promise to design the first air-launched hypersonic missiles within the next six years. “We have come to this. We are talking about speeds up to six - eight M. Achieving higher speeds is a task for a longer perspective, said Boris Obnosov, General Director of the Tactical Missile Armament Corporation (KTRV) in November.
He noted that airborne hypersonic missiles will be the first to appear, due to the fact that missiles of this class, being on a carrier aircraft, already have a certain initial speed before launch due to the carrier, and it is easier to accelerate them to the speed required to launch a ramjet sustainer engine.
Perspectives
In the United States, various departments are developing several promising projects at once: X-43A (NASA), X-51A (Air Force), AHW (Land Forces), ArcLight (DARPA, Navy), Falcon HTV-2 (DARPA, Air Force). Their appearance, according to experts, will make it possible to create long-range hypersonic aviation cruise missiles, a sea cruise missile in anti-ship and strike against ground targets by 2018-2020, and a reconnaissance aircraft by 2030.
“I would not say that the Americans are far ahead here,” Colonel-General Viktor Yesin, former chief of the Strategic Missile Forces General Staff, told the VZGLYAD newspaper. - It will hardly be possible to get this quickly, because there has not yet been a single fully successful test of these systems. Everything is at the stage of research and development work."
Despite the fact that some launches, such as the launch of 2013, were called successful, success here is very conditional. According to Esin, there are still no technologies that would ensure a long stay of the apparatus at speeds of about 10 swings in the dense layers of the atmosphere: “it is heating up, and after flying 2, 5–3 thousand kilometers, the structure collapses. And they want to make spacecraft of intercontinental range, so that the range reaches 10 thousand kilometers."
"Controllability is also questionable: the effect of plasma flow is formed, and the plasma makes it difficult to observe for comparison of the map of the area, if this method of guidance is used, it makes it difficult to use space navigation, etc.," he added.
According to the general's estimates, working samples may appear no earlier than the middle of the next decade, and, if the current pace of development continues, approximately simultaneously in Russia and in the United States.
