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Recent American military interest in hypersonic missiles definitely feels like a case of "Russia and China are playing with these, we want to play with one too"

by khuey 6y ago

Recent American military interest in hypersonic missiles definitely feels like a case of "Russia and China are playing with these, we want to play with one too".

_jal 6y ago
There's logic to the idea that, if your adversaries are suddenly interested in something, it is probably worth your time to make sure you're not missing anything. Of course, there's also logic to generating red herrings to waste your adversaries' resources, and the US has done that to others.
- phkahler 6y ago
  >> Of course, there's also logic to generating red herrings to waste your adversaries' resources, and the US has done that to others. Or at least that's the story we tell when the budget it spent with nothing to show for it.
- SiempreViernes 6y ago
  Their logic is known though, and it's simply to deliver nukes in the face of American ballistic missile defence (BMD) systems. The US doesn't face any BMD to defeat, so they just want hypersonics because the others have them. And with the heating mentioned in the text being such that you can't put any good sensing into them, a hypersonic without a nuke is simply a very fast missile that almost always misses its target.
redis_mlc 6y ago
Russia and China can't compete with the US on airceaft carriers, so they're investing in cheaper hypersonic missiles. The fact that China is specifically targeting the US should be a wake-up call.
the_snooze 6y ago
>I think it would be extremely naive of us, Mr. President, to imagine that these new developments are going to cause any change in Soviet expansionist policy. I mean, we must be... increasingly on the alert to prevent them from taking over other mineshaft space, in order to breed more prodigiously than we do, thus, knocking us out in superior numbers when we emerge! Mr. President, we must not allow... a mine shaft gap!
PaulHoule 6y ago
Actually the US fielded this hypersonic glide vehicle in the late 1970s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pershing_II https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pershing_II This was a big upgrade on the original Pershing missile that kept the same launcher but was competitive with the Soviet SS-20 that weighed three times as much because it had an autonomous guidance that could directly impact a target even when the mobile launcher was at an unsurveyed location. This is not advanced or exotic technology for a missile with the P II's range, you don't need exotic materials (that little dome on the bottom is a radar antenna, not a heat shield) and it can get 25 g acceleration with those little fins that you might not notice if you don't look carefully. Thus it is something third-world countries can field if they want to. That kind of missile can break unpredictably two or more times on reentry and thus confound anti-missile defenses of all kinds. The Russians had a nuclear-armed ABM system in the Moscow area at that time (and still do) and they found it intimidating. That kind of nuclear-armed ABM might be able to fire a large number of shots and get lucky, but the kinetic kill systems that we use to protect our naval groups would be helpless against it. That's why China is developing an anti-ship weapon with similar capabilities; instead of soaking up the inaccuracy of the launch point, the missile can handle the uncertainty of where a ship is going to be when the missile arrives. With a nuclear warhead that kind of missile could obliterate an aircraft carrier -- but even with conventional warheads it could cause a lot of trouble, this is what a smaller ship looks like when it has been hit by 4 2000 lb conventional bombs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Direct_Attack_Munition#/media/File:Ex-Schenectady_(LST-1185)_sinking.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Direct_Attack_Munition#/... That won't sink a carrier but it could stop flight operations for a while and have them steaming back to San Diego.
- aerostable_slug 6y ago
  We also had the Mk.500 Evader and AMaRV programs, nuclear-armed SLBM and ICBM ballistic missile warheads designed specifically to evade missile defenses with nuclear warheads. We didn't produce them because they weren't needed at that time against their near-term target sets, not because they didn't work.
- khuey 6y ago
  That answers the question of how China benefits from a hypersonic missile program. It doesn't answer the question of how the US does. The US doesn't need to hold American aircraft carriers operating in East Asia at risk.

by khuey 6y ago

Recent American military interest in hypersonic missiles definitely feels like a case of "Russia and China are playing with these, we want to play with one too".

_jal 6y ago

There's logic to the idea that, if your adversaries are suddenly interested in something, it is probably worth your time to make sure you're not missing anything. Of course, there's also logic to generating red herrings to waste your adversaries' resources, and the US has done that to others.

phkahler 6y ago
>> Of course, there's also logic to generating red herrings to waste your adversaries' resources, and the US has done that to others. Or at least that's the story we tell when the budget it spent with nothing to show for it.
SiempreViernes 6y ago
Their logic is known though, and it's simply to deliver nukes in the face of American ballistic missile defence (BMD) systems. The US doesn't face any BMD to defeat, so they just want hypersonics because the others have them. And with the heating mentioned in the text being such that you can't put any good sensing into them, a hypersonic without a nuke is simply a very fast missile that almost always misses its target.

redis_mlc 6y ago

Russia and China can't compete with the US on airceaft carriers, so they're investing in cheaper hypersonic missiles. The fact that China is specifically targeting the US should be a wake-up call.

the_snooze 6y ago

>I think it would be extremely naive of us, Mr. President, to imagine that these new developments are going to cause any change in Soviet expansionist policy. I mean, we must be... increasingly on the alert to prevent them from taking over other mineshaft space, in order to breed more prodigiously than we do, thus, knocking us out in superior numbers when we emerge! Mr. President, we must not allow... a mine shaft gap!

PaulHoule 6y ago

Actually the US fielded this hypersonic glide vehicle in the late 1970s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pershing_II https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pershing_II This was a big upgrade on the original Pershing missile that kept the same launcher but was competitive with the Soviet SS-20 that weighed three times as much because it had an autonomous guidance that could directly impact a target even when the mobile launcher was at an unsurveyed location. This is not advanced or exotic technology for a missile with the P II's range, you don't need exotic materials (that little dome on the bottom is a radar antenna, not a heat shield) and it can get 25 g acceleration with those little fins that you might not notice if you don't look carefully. Thus it is something third-world countries can field if they want to. That kind of missile can break unpredictably two or more times on reentry and thus confound anti-missile defenses of all kinds. The Russians had a nuclear-armed ABM system in the Moscow area at that time (and still do) and they found it intimidating. That kind of nuclear-armed ABM might be able to fire a large number of shots and get lucky, but the kinetic kill systems that we use to protect our naval groups would be helpless against it. That's why China is developing an anti-ship weapon with similar capabilities; instead of soaking up the inaccuracy of the launch point, the missile can handle the uncertainty of where a ship is going to be when the missile arrives. With a nuclear warhead that kind of missile could obliterate an aircraft carrier -- but even with conventional warheads it could cause a lot of trouble, this is what a smaller ship looks like when it has been hit by 4 2000 lb conventional bombs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Direct_Attack_Munition#/media/File:Ex-Schenectady_(LST-1185)_sinking.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Direct_Attack_Munition#/... That won't sink a carrier but it could stop flight operations for a while and have them steaming back to San Diego.

aerostable_slug 6y ago
We also had the Mk.500 Evader and AMaRV programs, nuclear-armed SLBM and ICBM ballistic missile warheads designed specifically to evade missile defenses with nuclear warheads. We didn't produce them because they weren't needed at that time against their near-term target sets, not because they didn't work.
khuey 6y ago
That answers the question of how China benefits from a hypersonic missile program. It doesn't answer the question of how the US does. The US doesn't need to hold American aircraft carriers operating in East Asia at risk.