President Donald Trump has claimed that the US is developing a "super-duper missile" capable
of reaching speeds far greater than any system available to rivals including Russia & China.
During an unveiling ceremony for the new Space Force flag at the White House Trump compared
the US's military capabilities with that of adversaries and stated the US was working
on a missile capable of reaching a speed that would be the "fastest in the world by a factor
of almost three.”
Trump said, "I call it the 'super-duper missile,' and I heard the other night 17 times faster
than what they have right now, when you take the fastest missile we have right now,"
Chief Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman seemed to confirm the president was referring
to hypersonic weapons in a reply to a Tweet and stated "The Department of Defense is working
on developing a range of hypersonic missiles to counter our adversaries.”
In this video Defense Updates analyzes what U.S President Trump actually means when referring
to ’Super Duper missile’?
Let’s get started.
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An object is said to be hypersonic once they exceed speeds of Mach 5 that is 5 times the
speed of sound.
This is about 1,715 meters per second or 3,836mph or 6,174 km/h.
There are currently 3 methods being applied to make hypersonic weapons.
The first is using a Scramjet engine.
The scramjet is an innovation on the Ramjet.
Ramjet engine can power flight to supersonic speeds but scramjet can enable the missiles
to reach hypersonic speeds.
The scramjet engine can power a hypersonic cruise missile.
The second is through the use of ALBM or Air-Launched Ballistic missile.
As the name suggests, this kind of missile is ballistic in nature but is launched from
air, unlike traditional ballistic missiles which are launched from land or sea-based
platforms.
The third is using HGV or Hypersonic Glide Vehicle.
In this method, the system is launched to extremely high altitudes using Ballistic Missile
or an aircraft where it skips across the Earth’s upper atmosphere.
The vehicle then separates from the carrier and glides back to the earth towards its intended
target attaining hypersonic speed.
The U.S is known to be working on 2 approaches - Scramjet missile and HGV.
The weapon U.S President is talking about is most probably ARRW or AGM-183A Air-launched
Rapid Response Weapon.
Viktor Murakhovsky, editor-in-chief of the Russian periodical Arsenal of the Fatherland,
theorized that the Super-Duper Missile is, in fact, the AGM-183A Air-Launched Rapid Response
Weapon.
Journalist Nick Schifrin has advanced a similar contention, as has the China Times.
ARRW uses the HGV approach and is actually an evolution of the Defense Advanced Research
Project's Agency's (DARPA) Tactical Boost Glide (TBG) effort.
As per DARPA, the system is expected to reach speeds of Mach 17 to 20 when it glides back
to the target.
Countries like Russia, China has been developing sophisticated layered air defense.
These systems are difficult for traditional aircraft & missiles to penetrate.
This is where hypersonic weapons come in.
Their extreme speed and ability to fly in unpredictable paths give them a high probability
of penetrating the air defenses.
They will be very hard to track, let alone intercept.
It is to be noted that traditional ballistic missiles like LGM-30 Minuteman III also reach
hypersonic speed of more than Mach 20 when it descends down on the target but it follows
a predictable predefined parabolic path which could lead to possible interception by modern
anti-ballistic missile defense systems.
Hypersonic weapons don’t have that constraint and hence will be suitable for neutralizing
well-defended strategic military assets.
Russia has claimed that it has already fielded an Air-Launched Ballistic Missile named Kinzhal
and has claimed that it has operationally deployed hypersonic boost-glide vehicle named
Avangard.
China is thought to be pursuing hypersonic weapons as well.
It had shown off mockups of its road-mobile DF-17 as part of the October 2019 celebrations
commemorating the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China.
On June 12, 2019, India claimed to have test-fired a hypersonic weapon.
In 2017, Lockheed Martin won the contract to begin Air-launched Rapid Response Weapon
or ARRW development.
The company had stated it wanted to meet the desired production targets within three years.
The U.S. Air Force had announced that it has conducted the first captive carry flight test
of the AGM-183A Air-launched Rapid Response Weapon, or ARRW.
The test was conducted from a B-52H bomber in June of last year.
Testing and optimization of the weapon is expected to carry on till 2021
Will Roper, the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition, Technology, and
Logistics, said in a statement about the flight test,
“We set out an aggressive schedule with ARRW.
Getting to this flight test on time highlights the amazing work of our acquisition workforce
and our partnership with Lockheed Martin and other industry partners.”
He added, "We’re using the rapid prototyping authorities
provided by Congress to quickly bring hypersonic weapon capabilities to the warfighter.
This type of speed in our acquisition system is essential – it allows us to field capabilities
rapidly to compete against the threats we face."
According to Popular Mechanics, the U.S. Air Force is considering using the remaining fleet
of B-1B bombers as AGM-183A firing platforms,.
B-1B has an excellent range of 5,900 mi or 9,400 km and a service ceiling of 60,000 ft.
The engine performance makes B-1B capable of hauling a lot of weapons.
B-1B has a massive payload of 125,000 lb (56,700 kg) internal and external ordnance combined.
It has 8 external hardpoints for 50,000 pounds (23,000 kg) of ordnance and 3 internal bomb
bays for 75,000 pounds (34,000 kg) of ordnance.
As per mission requirements, B1B can carry a variety of ammunitions like Mk- 84 general-purpose
bombs, CBU-87/89/CBU-97 Cluster Bomb Units, GBU-38 JDAM, AGM-158 Joint Air to Surface
Standoff Missile (JASSM) to name a few.
Depending on the exact size & profile of the ARRW, the B1B could theoretically carry 31
of these.
The U.S. defense department is clear about the aim with which it is pursuing Hypersonic
Weapons.
Mark Lewis is the department’s director of defense research and engineering for modernization
had told reporters, “Our … goal is, simply, we want to dominate future battlefields.”
President Trump had told reporters, “We have no choice, we have to do it, with the
adversaries we have out there,” naming China and Russia.
In 2017, the Pentagon was spending about $800 million on hypersonic weapon programs.
That nearly doubled the following year, then rose to $2.4 billion a year later and hit
$3.4 billion this year.
U.S military has been criticized for failing behind Russia & china when it comes to Hypersonic
weapons.
It is now getting its act together and is accelerating the efforts.
The 3 services of the U.S military are targeting a very aggressive timeline.
The U.S Army wants a mobile land-based capability fielded around 2023, the U.S Navy wants its
ship-launched capability fielded in 2023 followed by a submarine-launched missile in 2024, and
the U.S Air Force is looking to field its air-launched version in 2022.
It remains to be seen how things pan out in the coming days.