The State Research Institute of Aviation Systems analyzed the position of the United States in missile technologies. Experts have come to the conclusion that today, for the first time, Americans are lagging behind since the end of the Cold War. This is due to hypersonic missiles, which, along with the Americans, are made by Russia and China. There is no effective weapon against such missiles yet, and huge funds are needed to create it.
The US military power is now based on its ability to project overwhelming force over long distances, i.e. deliver troops, ships, planes and missiles to any area of the world in a short period of time. This is partly possible due to the presence of military bases scattered around the world. In particular, thanks to the allies in the NATO bloc.
Russia and China do not have such an “expeditionary” force projection. Hypersonic weapons, which are being developed in these countries, can help achieve parity. It presents their armed forces with a powerful tool for strengthening access-blocking or invasion-blocking zones that deter the deployment of US forces and even threaten them with a decapitating first strike.
Hypersonic weapons systems are designed to defeat existing missile defenses due to the speed exceeding the speed of sound up to 27 times, and high maneuverability (the ability to change the trajectory in flight). Effective countermeasures against these weapons currently do not exist.
Therefore, Russia, China and a number of other countries (India, Iran, North Korea) are actively implementing hypersonic technologies.
Russia is developing its own hypersonic arsenal. In 2019, the deployment of the country’s first hypersonic intercontinental ballistic missile “Avangard” was announced. During the tests in 2018, the rocket successfully hit the target at a distance of about 6,000 km, moving along a zigzag trajectory with a speed of 27 Mach.
In 2019, the Chinese army demonstrated the DF-ZF medium-range hypersonic gliding aircraft mounted on the DF-17 standard medium-range ballistic missile. The system has a range of 2 & nbsp; 500 & nbsp; km, a maximum speed of 10 Mach and extreme maneuverability in flight, designed specifically for the breakthrough of the US missile defense, including the ship-based Aegis air defense systems, high-altitude THAAD air defense systems, Patriot air defense systems. Although the system is officially armed with a conventional warhead, experts believe that it can be equipped with a nuclear warhead.
According to experts, the DF-ZF UAV demonstrated a high degree of accuracy during tests, and the warheads landed “within a few meters” of the target. More importantly, the prototype DF-ZF is able to escape from under attack in flight, leaving the enemy little time to react.
At the International Conference on Aerospace Aircraft, Hypersonic Systems and Technologies in 2017, Chinese scientists presented more than 250 articles on the topic of hypersonic weapons, almost ten times more than American ones. It is known that in the 2008-2018’s, China conducted about 20 times more tests of hypersonic weapons than the United States.
As you can see, the US opponents correspond to their technological level in this area, and in some cases even surpass them. Therefore, the Pentagon is forced to give priority to both research and development of the hypersonic weapons themselves, and protection against them.
Therefore, the Pentagon has requested $ 2.865 billion from the Congress.& nbsp;on & nbsp; financing of hypersonic weapons projects in & nbsp; 2021 & nbsp;year, which is 13% more compared to the amount in 2020 fin.& nbsp;G. ($2.508 billion). Traditional US defense systems, for example, ground-based missile defense systems on the marching sectionthe flight of the “Aegis” BMD and “THAAD” are not adapted to protect against the “hypersonic threat”. Traditional missile defense is a complex task in itself, requiring target tracking, high-speed data transmission and interception. The speed and maneuverability of hypersonic missiles greatly complicate it.