A year after China unveiled the world’s first operational air-breathing hypersonic missiles, the United States is launching a programme to double down on developing similar weapons.
The US Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) will bring contractors together later this month to lay out what it wants from the Next Generation Hypersonic Cruise Missile, with air-breathing propulsion at the heart of the project, according to the agency’s website.
Unlike rocket-powered missiles, air-breathing weapons draw oxygen from the atmosphere instead of carrying all they need on board, freeing up weight for fuel or payload.
China put that technology on public display at a massive military parade in Beijing last year, when it unveiled the YJ-19 anti-ship missile and the much larger, road-mobile CJ-1000. Both are believed to use air-breathing scramjet engines and were presented as operational weapons in service with the People’s Liberation Army.
The YJ-19’s distinctive air intake was visible during the parade, while the CJ-1000 is designed for much longer-range strikes against targets on land, at sea or in the air, according to Chinese state media reports.
Darpa has made clear it is looking for more than an upgrade to existing technology. In an industry request issued last month, the agency called for radically new propulsion, fuels, boosters and systems to cope with the extreme heat of hypersonic flight.
The new missile could come in varied sizes, from weapons carried by tactical aircraft to much larger systems launched from bombers or the ground.
Darpa has asked contractors to consider flight tests over distances ranging from about 250 to 2,000 nautical miles (460 to 3,700km).
Hypersonic weapons travel at least five times the speed of sound, but air-breathing cruise missiles work very differently from boost-glide weapons such as China’s DF-17.
Both need a rocket to get up to speed. But a glide weapon is then released and coasts towards its target without an engine, while a hypersonic cruise missile switches to an air-breathing engine that continues to propel it through the atmosphere.
That combination of extreme speed, sustained propulsion and the ability to manoeuvre can make such missiles particularly difficult to detect and intercept, according to Darpa.
The US has already proved that the technology can work in flight.
The Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapon Concept, a joint Darpa and US Air Force project, flew experimental scramjet-powered vehicles above Mach 5 and for more than 300 nautical miles, but the programme ended in 2023 without producing an operational weapon.
Russia has also claimed its Zircon missile, in service since 2023, is a scramjet-powered hypersonic cruise missile.
However, analysis of debris recovered after its use in Ukraine has cast doubt on that description, suggesting Zircon may instead use solid-fuel rockets and operate more like a quasi-ballistic missile. -- SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST
