Darpa, the US army's scientific wing, recently announced successful tests of what it called a HAWC missile (Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapon Concept)
AMERICA
The US military has a number of hypersonic weapons programs across the Navy, Army and Air Force but most are still in development phase and highly top secret.
However the known programs are all more conventional hypersonic weapons that strike from high altitude, rather than orbital bombardment systems that strike from space which the Chinese were revealed to have developed tis week.
The only US hypersonic weapon know to have been successfully tested is the Air Force's GM-183 ARRW which is designed to be launched from a large bomber aircraft.
It then accelerates to hypersonic speeds using of up to 15,345mph using a supersonic combustion ramjet to strike targets within 1,000 miles. Donald Trump refered to a 'super duper missile' while in office and this is believed to be the AGM-183 ARRW.
The Navy's submarine launched Long Range Hypersonic Weapon is expected to be operational by 2023 and will have a range of 1,725 miles.
Darpa, the US army's scientific wing, recently announced successful tests of what it called a HAWC missile (Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapon Concept) but kept details such as range, speed and payload secret.
The missile uses oxygen in the atmosphere as part of its fuel - marking the first successful test of that class of weapon since 2013.
The missile, which is built by Raytheon, was released from an aircraft just 'seconds' before the scramjet engine from Northrop Grumman kicked on, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) said.
The engine works by compressing incoming air with hydrocarbon fuel to create a fast airflow mixture, one capable of reaching over 1,700 meters per second, or five times the speed of sound.
Earlier this year, a test of a hypersonic missile from the U.S. Air Force was abandoned after it was unable to complete its launch sequence.
On March 19 last year, the Pentagon flight-tested a hypersonic glide vehicle at its Pacific Missile Range Facility in Kauai, Hawaii. It deemed the test a success and 'a major milestone towards the department's goal of fielding hypersonic warfighting capabilities in the early- to mid-2020s.'
Unlike Russia, the United States says it is not developing hypersonic weapons for use with a nuclear warhead. As a result, a U.S. hypersonic weapon will need to be more accurate, posing additional technical challenges.
In 2004, NASA's experimental unmanned hypersonic aircraft X-43 reached 7,366mph (Mach 9.6) using a scramjet engine, setting the current record.
In 2019, DailyMail.com reported that the Raytheon and Northrop Grumman-developed missile would use an engine made by a 3D printer.
Last year, DARPA said it was working with Aerojet Rocketdyne on a nearly $20 million project to develop a hypersonic rocket that could intercept enemy missiles mid-air.
Russia recently launched a hypersonic missile, the Zircon, from a submarine and has the hypersonic nuclear-capable Avangard missiles
RUSSIA
Russia recently launched a hypersonic missile, the Zircon, from a submarine, and since late 2019 has had the hypersonic nuclear-capable Avangard missiles in service. The Avangard can travel at up to Mach 27, changing course and altitude.
The range of Russia's hypersonic missile, the Zircon, is 621 miles with a speed of 9,800mph.
But the missile flies below the atmosphere and uses fuel to power itself to hypersonic speeds rather than the Earth's orbit.
Earlier this month, Russia announced it has successfully test-fired the Zircon from a nuclear submarine for the first time.
The 6,670mph weapon hit a target in the Barents Sea according to the Moscow defence ministry, who claims the missile is capable of Mach-9 speeds and able to evade all Western defences.
Russia said it had completed flight tests of the new-age missile from a frigate - the Admiral Gorshkov - and a coastal mount, but it had not previously been launched from a submarine.
The Zircon has been identified
