Future weapons: rivals push Pentagon to boost funding for hypersonics research.

• Author: Machi, Vivienne

The Defense Department is seeking more funding to invest in hypersonics programs as China and Russia make their own push to develop the game-changing technology.

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The proposed investments include funding for both offensive weapons, and the means to defeat them should these near-peer competitors succeed in creating missiles or aircraft capable of reaching speeds higher than Mach 5.

"We, the United States, do not want to be the second country to understand how to control hypersonics," then-Acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for research and engineering Alan Shaffer said in 2014.

The Air Force--joined by the Army, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and several defense contractors--has long been working to develop precision munitions and aircraft that can fly at or above Mach 5, or five times the speed of sound. Meanwhile, military leaders and analysts have warned that countries including China and Russia have beefed up spending on hypersonic development and testing in recent years.

Pentagon leadership has identified hypersonics as part of the "third offset," a list of leap-ahead technologies that will help the U.S. military maintain its edge against potential rivals. Hypersonic platforms have the potential to penetrate robust air defenses as their high rates of speed would make them difficult to stop. China and Russia are aware of this as well.

In one of her first public speeches as Air Force Secretary, Heather Wilson called for the need to "innovate faster and turn tighter" on emerging technologies including hypersonics.

"I think all of us are concerned about...the pace of innovation that's taking place in the countries of potential adversaries," she said at a recent Air Force Association event.

The Trump administration's 2018 budget proposal for the Missile Defense Agency included $75.3 million for "hypersonic defense activity" that would allow the MDA to increase hypersonic defense systems engineering activities, technology demonstrations and risk reduction, said Chris Johnson, the agency's director of public affairs.

"Activities will include completion of a defense against hypersonics [analysis of alternatives], capability roadmap development and initial investment in sensor technology demonstrations and weapon concepts to address the advanced threat," he said in an email.

The budget request came in response to a 2017 National Defense Authorization Act requirement to establish such a program. A 2016 report by the Air Force Studies Board titled, "A Threat to America's Global Vigilance, Reach and Power--High-Speed Maneuvering Weapons," found "no formal strategic operational concept or organizational sense of urgency" existed to respond to the challenges posed by hypersonic weapons and other emerging technologies.

Chinese researchers conducted three...