Hypersonic weapon

Hypersonic weapons are weapons travelling at hypersonic speed – at between 5 and 25 times the speed of sound, about 1 to 5 miles per second (1.6 to 8.0 km/s).[1]

"Hypersonic missile" redirects here. For other uses, see Hypersonic Missiles (disambiguation).
An Air-Launched Rapid Response Weapon (Arrow) carried by a B-52 bomber

Below such speeds, weapons would be characterized as subsonic or supersonic, while above such speeds, the molecules of the atmosphere disassociate into a plasma which makes control and communication difficult. Directed-energy weapons such as lasers may operate at higher speeds but are considered a different class of weaponry.

There are multiple types of hypersonic weapon:

  1. hypersonic glide vehicle : missiles which maneuver and glide through the atmosphere at high speeds after an initial ballistic launch phase[2][1]
  2. hypersonic cruise missiles: cruise missiles which use air-breathing engines such as scramjets to reach high speeds[2][1]
  3. hypersonic aircraft using air-breathing engines such as scramjets to reach high speeds[1]
  4. guns which fire guided projectiles. These may be developments of traditional artillery or novel technologies such as railguns.[1]
  5. ballistic missiles traveling at high speeds during its atmospheric reentry

History

The Silbervogel was the first design for a hypersonic weapon, made by German scientists in the 1930s.[3]

In the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russia was seen to have fielded operational weapons and used them for combat. The Kremlin presents new hypersonic weapons as capable of overcoming "any" foreign missile-defense systems, and the idea dovetails nicely with the "pre-nuclear deterrence" concept contained in its 2014 iteration of the official Russian Military Doctrine.[4]

List of hypersonic weapons

See also Hypersonic flight#Hypersonic weapons, National Defense Space Architecture

Plans, programs and projects for such weaponry include:

Collaborations

China

Brazil

India

Russia

France

Japan

South Korea
  • Hycore
  • Hyunmoo IV-4

United States

United Kingdom

Taiwan
  • Ching Tian Hypersonic Cruise Missile

See also

References
  1. John T. Watts; Christian Trotti; Mark J. Massa (August 2020), Primer on Hypersonic Weapons in the Indo-Pacific Region (PDF), Atlantic Council, ISBN 978-1-61977-111-6
  2. "'National pride is at stake.' Russia, China, United States race to build hypersonic weapons". www.science.org. Retrieved 2022-11-14.
  3. David Wright; Cameron Tracy (1 August 2021), "Overhyped: The Physics and Hype of Hypersonic Weapons", Scientific American, 325 (2): 64–71
  4. McDermott, Roger (4 February 2022). "The Role of Hypersonic Weapons in Russian Military Strategy". The Jamestown Foundation.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.