More Money Anticipated for Hypersonics.

AuthorHarper, Jon
PositionBUDGET MATTERS

* Worried about falling behind in hypersonic weapons technology, the Pentagon is planning to pump more money into developing its offensive and defense capabilities.

In his recent state-of-the-nation speech, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that his country had developed new hypersonic weapons that can fly at speeds of Mach 10 or faster.

The Chinese have conducted 20 times as many hypersonic weapons tests as the United States over the last decade, Michael Griffin, the new undersecretary of defense for research and engineering, said at a recent conference.

Hypersonic missiles offer several operational advantages in addition to their extraordinarily high speed, officials have noted. They have long ranges and their flight paths pose a challenge for missile defense systems.

"The architecture that you need to respond to a ballistic missile threat is very different than one that you need to respond to a hypersonic threat," said Missile Defense Agency Director Lt. Gen. Samuel Greaves. The threat "is very troubling in that it comes back into the atmosphere at a lower altitude and maneuvers around," he noted.

If the Chinese are able to deploy tactical or regional hypersonic systems and the United States is unable to counter them, that would upend the balance of power, Griffin said.

"Without our ability to defend and without at least an equal response capability on the offensive side, then what we've done is we have allowed a situation to exist where our deployed forces are held at risk [and] we cannot do the same to them," he said.

Griffin said his highest technical priority is enhancing the nation's offensive and defensive hypersonic capabilities.

The president's fiscal year 2019 budget request calls for $257 million in spending for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's hypersonic weapons efforts, a 136...

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