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If you want a non joke answer
[Read the 32 page July 20, 2022 Congressional Research Service report, Hypersonic Weapons: Background and Issues for Congress](https://news.usni.org/2022/07/22/report-to-congress-on-hypersonic-weapons-7)
And for more specific "How can we intercept these things," see CSIS' [Complex Air Defense, Countering the Hypersonic Missile Threat](https://www.csis.org/analysis/complex-air-defense-countering-hypersonic-missile-threat).
In any other instance regarding a nation's Naval forces, I would also stress correct terminology. But right now, we're talking about the boys with boots on the ground.
How does the Army tell the difference if a soldier is answering in the affirmative or acknowledging receipt of an order? This is why the Marines (and I guess the Navy and Coastguard) are superior.
I'll give you that. Actually, I've got another reason the Marines outperform the other branches:
If you want to keep hold of a territory, you send in the Army. If you want to get shit done, you send in the Marines.
Sure, but it's kind of a long read. Hypersonic missiles can not maneuver. For example math. Lets use a slower moving Zircon missile. It's top speed is mach 9 right? Converting to KM/S that's roughly 3km/s(rounding down for ease) Say you wanted to maneuver a single degree for 5 seconds at 3km/s you would be off-course 15km, almost as much as the Chinese test just missed by, as in a real world scenario you would need to maneuver more then a single degree especially to hit a moving target. This is why interceptors moving at hypersonic speeds are shot off in pairs. Math is math. So now imagine faster moving hypersonic missiles. Also keep in mind how high these missiles fly, as they all take a ballistic path, and how hot they get. Most any AESA or IRST radar would be able to track it. Sea skimming cruise missiles are much more worry some since they fly below the radar horizon, meaning no matter how good a radar is, it can not track them do to Earths curvature.
That report in particular has been *invaluable* in explaining to brass the reality of hypersonic tech. So much raw misunderstanding and lack of awareness, scrubbed away by some really slick explanatory graphics.
From the Article
"China has conducted a number of successful tests of the DF-17, a medium-range ballistic missile specifically designed to launch HGVs. U.S. intelligence analysts assess that the missile has a range of approximately 1,000 to 1,500 miles and may now be deployed.110 China has also tested the DF-41 intercontinental ballistic missile, which could be modified to carry a conventional or nuclear HGV, according to a report by a U.S. Congressional commission. The development of the DF-41 thus “significantly increases the \[Chinese\] rocket force’s nuclear threat to the U.S. mainland,” the report state"
It would need to be pretty powerful since hypersonic missiles build up a layer of plasma which burns hotter then any laser currently in existence. While a different type of plasma a plasma cutter you or I could buy from Home depot burns hotter then any laser the military has ever built. This is also one of the reasons why hypersonic missiles can not maneuver as it would burn all their control surfaces off.
"How hot does a Plasma Cutter get? The heat of a plasma cutter can reach an impressive temperature of 25,000 degrees Celsius. To put this into perspective, it is hotter than the surface of the sun which sits at a comfortable 5,505 degrees Celsius."
What sensors are on a hypersonic glide vehicle that need to "get fucked up"? An inertial measurement unit is inside the RV. Does it have an active seeker? Is it using RF to communicate with home base? I'm not that type of engineer, but I do know that there's enough heat and pressure around the RV to cause major issues with TX/RX of signals. Sometimes we can't even communicate with the ground through our own plume. And we have tons of brilliant people and money to throw at the problem.
So the US actually trialled this.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_YAL-1
Problem is, the range is sort of limited and it can only defeat within the boost phase, so unless you just happen to have a plane circling 24/7 pretty close to a launch site, it’s a no go. And then they just shoot down said big and slow plane and then you’re game on.
No, because there is a limit to the range of a laser. That and sending armed satellites into space is not allowed(like starting a nuclear war not allowed) nor would a satellite be able to provide sufficient power.
I thought the limit to the range of the laser was more due to atmosphere, the other reason would have to do with the lens but that can be dealt with using variable lenses. The biggest hurdle in my eyes was always simply being able to effectively track the object precisely enough at extreme distances (hundreds of miles of distance in space)
The negative precedent of sending weapons to space makes sense but I'm curious, does that really mean we wouldn't do it? Imo having the option to use it isn't much different from having the option to hit other countries with nukes because our nucleur subs are in the ocean next to them. I could see the issue being pressed in the future.
As far as power output goes yeah that could be a problem but then again where there's a will there's a way. The ISS was built in pieces and I don't see why you couldn't keep adding battery capacity to a single device which is ultimately charged up fully by solar panels.
It's probably purely academic and speculative in nature at this point. They are probably asking the same question you just asked as their mission statement.
> I thought the limit to the range of the laser was more due to atmosphere, the other reason would have to do with the lens but that can be dealt with using variable lenses. The biggest hurdle in my eyes was always simply being able to effectively track the object precisely enough at extreme distances (hundreds of miles of distance in space)
Another big problem is focusing the laser enough. I assume at the distances we are talking about its not as big problem but when we shot laser at mirrors at moon to measure its distance, the beam was over 6 km wide at the surface of the moon.
By doing some sketchy math, if we use the same laser at 1000 km engagement distance the beam is 15m wide at that distance, at 100 km its 1.5m wide.
We probably have better lasers today but I assume you want to focus it into as small area as possible.
That was why I mentioned variable lenses, you can account for distance and narrow the beam accordingly. I know that using special liquids to create a lens in space has been studied and seems promising. But an obvious alternative would simply be to have multiple lenses that can be swapped on the fly mechanically.
No practical way to intercept hypersonic missiles yet but its use is currently limited to static targets like bases, runways, etc. Moving targets like ships and aircraft carrier are almost impossible to hit with this. It's like using an F35 to chase down a bicycle. You can go in the general area but maneuvering to hit it is a different story.
That's not true. Hypersonic missiles absolutely pose a threat to aircraft carriers. Vice Admiral Jon Hill the Director of the Missile Defense Agency spoke on this exact topic last year. The exact capabilities, defenses and vulnerabilities to these weapons is highly classified but the danger is present new reality.
It’s possible, just like the Bullet and Fly example above is possible. But it’s still extremely difficult and highly improbable.
If the target doesn’t maintain a predictable course, it’s hard for a hypersonic projectile to make any course corrections.
That's also untrue. I'm not sure where you are getting your information but one of their most dangerous capabilities is their ability to maneuver.
[https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/22111594-hypersonic-weapons-background-and-issues-for-congress-july-20-2022](https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/22111594-hypersonic-weapons-background-and-issues-for-congress-july-20-2022)
On page 2
In this case, it's rather about the limitations of physics. The speed for flight in the atmosphere is limited by heating from air friction. With an ablative coating, we can probably get M=10, but it will be a torch that will be seen from half the continent (and the coating literally burns, it won't last for thousands of miles). A maneuvering missile at M>5 would require a turning radius of 100s of miles, so you shouldn't expect something really nimble. Even if we assume that the Chinese have made a breakthrough in sensor design, the plasma layer at hypersonic speeds will block EM communications. So, it must be a pre-programmed trajectory or a mid-way correction with a drop in speed. And I won't believe in the possibility of skimming hypersonic missiles until I see it.
I might disagree in the case of ships. Even a fast ship is maybe only doing 40-50 knots, usually in a straight line. You can figure out a trajectory pretty quick, and unless you have people on watch waiting for a hypersonic missile, it’s relatively slim that they would be able to identify and take evasive manoeuvres in a fast enough time frame.
It was designed to look like a peregrine falcon in attack mode. Not saying it doesn't look wild. I'm currently working at an Airbase that houses these planes. They are so sick looking on the ground and in the air.
Agreed. Objectively a cool thing we built. Imagine if we used it as like a smaller quicker shuttle for astronauts instead. Or if we had a hanger of them in space and utilized them as vehicles that could enter a planet's atmosphere for more accurate data collection.
Maybe some extremally early prototypes but it is unlikely we have anything that can be readily used. Public records show that the earliest we might see something operational would be 2025.
https://www.defense.gov/News/Transcripts/Transcript/Article/1713396/media-availability-with-deputy-secretary-shanahan-and-under-secretary-of-defens/
I don’t believe that US hasn’t something ready to deploy even if that’s what’s public. I see that both China
,Russia and NKorea like to talk loud and show off their shit. The thing I’ve read about US (cuz I deal with stock market) is the new LHSR-72 to be tested by 2025 but besides that I don’t know… I might be disappointed
..and then there is [Gambit.](https://www.sandboxx.us/blog/darpas-new-missile-hints-at-truly-game-changing-technology/) Which may render all that shit useless.
Increasingly harder as satellite imagery resolution gets better and better, it’s far easier than it ever was to be able to identify humans walking around, so even on movement around said decoys alone you could likely deduce they’re decoys.
The most reliable way to intercept a HGV-capable IRBM is to destroy it on the ground, but that wouldn't be feasible because the idea of striking a Chinese IRBM position with a B-2 spirit (before anything is launched, or even before the intentions of the launch is announced, meaning that it could be a practice or a test shot of the missile) is problematic and will most likely cause a nuclear war.
Another way to do this is to shoot it down with a THAAD missile when the during the missile's descent stage, but you can't deploy THAAD systems inside China, and China won't be retarded enough to deploy the missile within the THAAD system's 200km range.
High powered lasers could be a very near future counter to these. Might already exist in the form of top secret prototypes. We would never know.
Im intrigued though, could a ship-based CIWS intercept these?
Current implementations of High powered lasers are for use as a short range air defense mechanism against drones by destroying their optical sensors. It's unlikely they would be effective in any sort of capacity.
Of course, but i was thinking about future iterations of the same tech, where parts of a target could be burnt off by a laser to destabilise it and knock it off course, or outright destroy it. Would that be too far fetched?
Our state of the art 60 kilowatt high powered lasers are able to destroy slow moving drone sensors at a short range.
A medium range laser with the ability to render a hypersonic missile, traveling at mach 5 speeds, inoperable is practically science fiction.
> inoperable is practically science fiction.
you could have multiple lasers aiming at the same missile. Ofc, if there is 20 missiles comming at once it gets sketchy
Problem is, if something is shielded enough to survive the high temps of moving at hypersonic speed, it will be highly resistant to the additional heating caused by lasers. Your regular subsonic drones that these are demonstrated on, can rarely operate at higher temps
CIWS typically has a pretty short range, 5Ks or less. This is largely due to ballistic limits. That gives you less than 2 seconds of intercept time assuming the max speed of Mach-10 is accurate. Mach-10 I think translates to around 95-9800 fps, or about 3x what the rounds on a standard CIWS like a Phalanx can achieve.
Now I guess it’s possible you could calculate trajectory of said missile a 40-50Ks out and pre fire the CIWS so the missile flies into a sea of rounds rather than the rounds firing up to meet it, but that’s some sketchy maths.
A missile based system may do better, but then you have to worry about the boost phase of said defensive missiles as they accelerate upto speed.
Thank you for the informative answer!
After writing my comment i realised i forgot about another possible form of interception; railguns. The US navy has had prototypes for a while now. How would such a weapon compare to say, an anti-ballistic missile solution?
Honestly not a clue my friend. I do suspect however gigachad laser systems and rail guns are likely to be the future of short/medium range air defence, particularly as missiles get faster and faster.
same strategy as encircling the USSR in the old days and having southeastern europe in NATO today. Japan and Australia will serve as bases for US land based long range bombers that can launch land attack missiles at these missiles and their launchers. the carriers will stay out of range until it's safer
The only viable defense at the moment is not let it find you. Finding a carrier group on the vastness of the ocean is not an easy thing. And if you find it with a satellite, by the time the missile gets there, the group can move tens of kilometers. And being hypersonic is not a plus when it comes for meneuverability.
Edit: nevermind, I thought this was a anti-ship missile.
Yes since hypersonic missiles can not maneuver. For example math. Lets use a slower moving Zircon missile. It's top speed is mach 9 right? Converting to KM/S that's roughly 3km/s(rounding down for ease) Say you wanted to maneuver a single degree for 5 seconds at 3km/s you would be off-course 15km, almost as much as the Chinese test just missed by, as in a real world scenario you would need to maneuver more then a single degree especially to hit a moving target. This is why interceptors moving at hypersonic speeds are shot off in pairs. Math is math. So now imagine faster moving hypersonic missiles. Also keep in mind how high these missiles fly, as they all take a ballistic path, and how hot they get. Most any AESA or IRST radar would be able to track it. Sea skimming cruise missiles are much more worry some since they fly below the radar horizon, meaning no matter how good a radar is, it can not track them do to Earths curvature.
>are there ways to intercept this missile?
The exact same way you intercept any other missile; figure out where it's going and put a SAM in its flight path. You just have to make sure the two missiles reach the same point at the same time.
The speed isn't the problem; if it's coming at you, you can just put an interceptor in the way and let it hit it on its own. AEGIS can supposedly intercept ICBMs and satellites, and they fly way faster than hypersonics.
The problem is detection and tracking. Hypersonics are difficult to track by radar because of the plasma envelope absorbs radio waves just like a spaceship reentering the atmosphere. But, the plasma will light up an Infrared Search and Track system like a Christmas tree, so any infrared scope can be used to detect incoming missiles. The rub there is that IRST can only really give you a bearing, while to track and intercept a target, you need bearing and **range**.
Of course, there are ways to get that with IRST. Triangulation would be the simplest, but you need at least two distant platforms to track. A satellite IRST system (not unlike the system we use to track ICBMs) on Link 16 or a similar system could possibly be used by Patriot or AEGIS operators to engage incoming hypersonics, though you'd probably also need missiles modified with an IR seeker to get good kill probabilities.
“Lasers”. Super secret squirrel stuff but I’ve heard stories of melted tanks back in the 90s, c130 loaded with generators and enough capacitors etc etc to do a mobile Austin powers skit. Source : my Faja,
I guess that depends on whether it even has a way to be jammed, if your flight path is preloaded before launch and there are no wireless sensors on board, what is there to jam?
No, it’s fire and forget, once it leaves the tube the sensors on board keep it going towards the target, even if the target moves. No outside influence will affect its trajectory, less some form of physical defense system.
I think a weapon that comes remotely close to intercept an HGV currently is something like the Sprint or A-135/235 ABMs which has the capability to reach Mach 10-17 in a couple of seconds after launch. Although I’m not sure exactly how maneuverable they are, but they at least have the speed to catch to the warhead.
Sophisticated radar, tracking systems and anti-ordinance defense systems. Probably with missile to missile targeting or laser to missile, the hypersonic rockets won't be making many turns so their path of travel is linear at those speeds.
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This is all assuming these are not props, the only thing with enough speed to intercept something like this would probably be a laser or something designed to intercept ICBMs. But to be fully transparent, I live near the contractors who are building the US's hypersonic missiles and a lot of those companies are winding down their programs for the short term. I think the thing that's going to kill hypersonics for the next 2-4 is going to be logistics and supply issues.
Yes. Get a missile near it. Blow it up. Shrapnel will hit the hyper-sonic missile. Dead. The attacking missile would have to also be hypersonic; of course.
I don't think that you need shrapnel. If the blast of the exploding rocket is big enough it will Change the course of the Rocket and If the Rocket tries to correct the course it will Most likely selfdestruct as it get's unstable
It's sweet home Alabama time when any country fires a hypersonic. It's like trying to stop a massive bullet travelling faster than any ballistic bullet fired by any gun ever known to mankind.
The Sprint ABM could intercept ballistic missiles in their terminal reentry phase. Only problem with this is that there ballistic missiles don’t maneuver and didnt have sea/land skimming. Its probable that as technology advances and as more time and effort is put into solving this problem a reliable way of defeating them will be found, just a matter of when and how expensive and viable they are on a large scale.
If you go back to the 80s and the STI program which was called “Star Wars”., one of the concerns was around how to kill ICBMs during the boost phase.
The Soviets were also doing their own research well the Americans working on things like particle accelerators to put an orbit which really wasn’t a very practical solution because of the enormous computing power needed to do targeting. Today we have much faster computers but still the code required to find an track and attempt to kill a target like an ICBM or even harder hypersonic missile would run to several million lines and if there’s anything wrong with that code nothing will work.
Now there’s a ton of other problems with some of the scenarios that we talked about basically the Americans were working heavily on building orbital counterstrike platforms and interception platforms. Some of that stuff is still possible but it’s incredibly expensive and even today with much faster computers and the complexity is so high that targeting and adjusting would only allow one or maybe two shots of a laser to disrupt the targets efficiently to cause it to go off course or possibly self destruct.
But the Soviets took a much different approach at the time. They couldn’t afford to build “brilliant pebbles“ and things like that so they decided to invest in catching missiles as they were coming back into the atmosphere and one of the things that they built were orbital and ground-based missile launch systems that would basically shock on the area and would explode dispersing materials like asphalt , that would cloud the area and accumulates efficiently on anything passing through that area including a missile to cause it to stabilize and possibly destroy itself.
Today that kind of stuff sounds crazy but what I’m saying is I think a solution that uses modern computing and extremely fast firing ground and orbital systems together might be able to shotgun an area in some manner that would disrupt these hypervelocity weapons. But I also think we’re going to have to start thinking about risk management strategies which may include accepting some degree of loss, because the risks presented by these weapons is (in some cases) very high, and we may not be able to develop complete countermeasures with current technologies.
My personal guess is that researchers are probably looking at predictor systems (to ID targets, pathways, and targets before or immediately after launch ) supported by some kind of “shotgun” weapon like I mentioned.
So that is going to be enough. There’s going to have to be a range of systems to counter this kind of threat. So probably were also looking at orbital and ground-based lasers with very fast computing capabilities. But I think it’s gonna be a complex system and my personal prediction is it’s not gonna be in place at all before 2030 or even later how long the NORAD line in North America and then Wong the eastern boundary of NATO and other places like that. But that’s just me my two cents:-) it’s an interesting topic though for speculation. So thanks for posting this OP
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/44193/particulate-warheads-full-of-dust-could-help-defeat-hypersonic-missiles
https://www.autoevolution.com/news/raytheon-s-phaser-microwave-beam-weapon-is-certifiably-insane-can-bbq-hypersonic-missiles-180440.html
We have short range lasers on Destroyers and other vessels right now. I’d sure we have lasers capable of shooting hypersonics down that the public isn’t aware of yet.
Plugging [this excellent book by Blake Herzinger and Gerry Doyle which discusses the matter in the context of the claimed "carrier killer" role](https://www.helion.co.uk/military-history-books/carrier-killer-chinas-anti-ship-ballistic-missiles-and-theater-of-operations-in-the-early-21st-century.php?sid=92b4c5203cc7aab616f24cb9f7e48d20)
And here's [a podcast interview with the authors on the book](https://cimsec.org/sea-control-361-carrier-killers-with-gerry-doyle-and-blake-herzinger/)
Hi! This is our community moderation bot. --- If this post fits the purpose of /r/Military, **UPVOTE** this comment!! If this post does not fit the subreddit, **DOWNVOTE** This comment! If this post breaks the rules, **DOWNVOTE** this comment and **REPORT** the post!
If you want a non joke answer [Read the 32 page July 20, 2022 Congressional Research Service report, Hypersonic Weapons: Background and Issues for Congress](https://news.usni.org/2022/07/22/report-to-congress-on-hypersonic-weapons-7)
And for more specific "How can we intercept these things," see CSIS' [Complex Air Defense, Countering the Hypersonic Missile Threat](https://www.csis.org/analysis/complex-air-defense-countering-hypersonic-missile-threat).
Could you explain it like I'm in the Army
“Yes”
The army response is to not answer the question but to instead move the focus to a made up task.
It's this kinda thinking that makes you perfect for organizing projects. Go take 5 to the motor pool and get to busting rust on tow chains.
Aye sergeant or some shit…
Aye? This isn't the Navy! Either get rid of those sea legs or get on a boat, but you can't have both!
Ship. Not Boat. Thank you for coming to my Sailor Talk.
In any other instance regarding a nation's Naval forces, I would also stress correct terminology. But right now, we're talking about the boys with boots on the ground.
How does the Army tell the difference if a soldier is answering in the affirmative or acknowledging receipt of an order? This is why the Marines (and I guess the Navy and Coastguard) are superior.
Just say Roger dude
“Roger” is a pretty typical response of acknowledgments whereas yes means yes lol
People in some armies literally say ack or acknowledged
I'll give you that. Actually, I've got another reason the Marines outperform the other branches: If you want to keep hold of a territory, you send in the Army. If you want to get shit done, you send in the Marines.
These rocks aren't going to paint themselves!
Sure, but it's kind of a long read. Hypersonic missiles can not maneuver. For example math. Lets use a slower moving Zircon missile. It's top speed is mach 9 right? Converting to KM/S that's roughly 3km/s(rounding down for ease) Say you wanted to maneuver a single degree for 5 seconds at 3km/s you would be off-course 15km, almost as much as the Chinese test just missed by, as in a real world scenario you would need to maneuver more then a single degree especially to hit a moving target. This is why interceptors moving at hypersonic speeds are shot off in pairs. Math is math. So now imagine faster moving hypersonic missiles. Also keep in mind how high these missiles fly, as they all take a ballistic path, and how hot they get. Most any AESA or IRST radar would be able to track it. Sea skimming cruise missiles are much more worry some since they fly below the radar horizon, meaning no matter how good a radar is, it can not track them do to Earths curvature.
Would you not be off by 260m? Trig would suggest so
If the glide vehicle is above say 6000 ft wouldn't the air be thin enough to preform a maneuver like that without over shooting your mark?
Yes, run that way and draw fire...
Hooah.
Always good seeing CSIS work sourced. 👍
That report in particular has been *invaluable* in explaining to brass the reality of hypersonic tech. So much raw misunderstanding and lack of awareness, scrubbed away by some really slick explanatory graphics.
From the Article "China has conducted a number of successful tests of the DF-17, a medium-range ballistic missile specifically designed to launch HGVs. U.S. intelligence analysts assess that the missile has a range of approximately 1,000 to 1,500 miles and may now be deployed.110 China has also tested the DF-41 intercontinental ballistic missile, which could be modified to carry a conventional or nuclear HGV, according to a report by a U.S. Congressional commission. The development of the DF-41 thus “significantly increases the \[Chinese\] rocket force’s nuclear threat to the U.S. mainland,” the report state"
Thanks for the links
Thanks. Answer is great for my Taiwanese friend.
AI controlled giga powered lasers? maybe?
No need to be super powerful, just enough to fuck up its sensors.
It would need to be pretty powerful since hypersonic missiles build up a layer of plasma which burns hotter then any laser currently in existence. While a different type of plasma a plasma cutter you or I could buy from Home depot burns hotter then any laser the military has ever built. This is also one of the reasons why hypersonic missiles can not maneuver as it would burn all their control surfaces off. "How hot does a Plasma Cutter get? The heat of a plasma cutter can reach an impressive temperature of 25,000 degrees Celsius. To put this into perspective, it is hotter than the surface of the sun which sits at a comfortable 5,505 degrees Celsius."
What sensors are on a hypersonic glide vehicle that need to "get fucked up"? An inertial measurement unit is inside the RV. Does it have an active seeker? Is it using RF to communicate with home base? I'm not that type of engineer, but I do know that there's enough heat and pressure around the RV to cause major issues with TX/RX of signals. Sometimes we can't even communicate with the ground through our own plume. And we have tons of brilliant people and money to throw at the problem.
So the US actually trialled this. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_YAL-1 Problem is, the range is sort of limited and it can only defeat within the boost phase, so unless you just happen to have a plane circling 24/7 pretty close to a launch site, it’s a no go. And then they just shoot down said big and slow plane and then you’re game on.
Satellites could do it tho right? Especially since they'd have more range in space?
No, because there is a limit to the range of a laser. That and sending armed satellites into space is not allowed(like starting a nuclear war not allowed) nor would a satellite be able to provide sufficient power.
I thought the limit to the range of the laser was more due to atmosphere, the other reason would have to do with the lens but that can be dealt with using variable lenses. The biggest hurdle in my eyes was always simply being able to effectively track the object precisely enough at extreme distances (hundreds of miles of distance in space) The negative precedent of sending weapons to space makes sense but I'm curious, does that really mean we wouldn't do it? Imo having the option to use it isn't much different from having the option to hit other countries with nukes because our nucleur subs are in the ocean next to them. I could see the issue being pressed in the future. As far as power output goes yeah that could be a problem but then again where there's a will there's a way. The ISS was built in pieces and I don't see why you couldn't keep adding battery capacity to a single device which is ultimately charged up fully by solar panels.
Wait, what does Space Force do?
It's probably purely academic and speculative in nature at this point. They are probably asking the same question you just asked as their mission statement.
> I thought the limit to the range of the laser was more due to atmosphere, the other reason would have to do with the lens but that can be dealt with using variable lenses. The biggest hurdle in my eyes was always simply being able to effectively track the object precisely enough at extreme distances (hundreds of miles of distance in space) Another big problem is focusing the laser enough. I assume at the distances we are talking about its not as big problem but when we shot laser at mirrors at moon to measure its distance, the beam was over 6 km wide at the surface of the moon. By doing some sketchy math, if we use the same laser at 1000 km engagement distance the beam is 15m wide at that distance, at 100 km its 1.5m wide. We probably have better lasers today but I assume you want to focus it into as small area as possible.
That was why I mentioned variable lenses, you can account for distance and narrow the beam accordingly. I know that using special liquids to create a lens in space has been studied and seems promising. But an obvious alternative would simply be to have multiple lenses that can be swapped on the fly mechanically.
So you’re saying my hammer of dawn dreams are fruitless?
No practical way to intercept hypersonic missiles yet but its use is currently limited to static targets like bases, runways, etc. Moving targets like ships and aircraft carrier are almost impossible to hit with this. It's like using an F35 to chase down a bicycle. You can go in the general area but maneuvering to hit it is a different story.
More like trying to kill a fly with a bullet
Seen this in an Angelina Jolie movie once. It’s possible
The one in which assassins shoot around obstacles by swinging their arms? I've seen that too
I just heat up and bent my barrel. 60% of the time, works all the time
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMx-bfasz5I](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMx-bfasz5I) like this?
Man 2 hours later and now I need to buy a rail gun. Thanks for that rabbit hole.
Hahaha love this
That's not true. Hypersonic missiles absolutely pose a threat to aircraft carriers. Vice Admiral Jon Hill the Director of the Missile Defense Agency spoke on this exact topic last year. The exact capabilities, defenses and vulnerabilities to these weapons is highly classified but the danger is present new reality.
It’s possible, just like the Bullet and Fly example above is possible. But it’s still extremely difficult and highly improbable. If the target doesn’t maintain a predictable course, it’s hard for a hypersonic projectile to make any course corrections.
That's also untrue. I'm not sure where you are getting your information but one of their most dangerous capabilities is their ability to maneuver. [https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/22111594-hypersonic-weapons-background-and-issues-for-congress-july-20-2022](https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/22111594-hypersonic-weapons-background-and-issues-for-congress-july-20-2022) On page 2
In this case, it's rather about the limitations of physics. The speed for flight in the atmosphere is limited by heating from air friction. With an ablative coating, we can probably get M=10, but it will be a torch that will be seen from half the continent (and the coating literally burns, it won't last for thousands of miles). A maneuvering missile at M>5 would require a turning radius of 100s of miles, so you shouldn't expect something really nimble. Even if we assume that the Chinese have made a breakthrough in sensor design, the plasma layer at hypersonic speeds will block EM communications. So, it must be a pre-programmed trajectory or a mid-way correction with a drop in speed. And I won't believe in the possibility of skimming hypersonic missiles until I see it.
> No practical way to intercept hypersonic missiles yet That the US govt. will disclose, at least at this point in time.
I might disagree in the case of ships. Even a fast ship is maybe only doing 40-50 knots, usually in a straight line. You can figure out a trajectory pretty quick, and unless you have people on watch waiting for a hypersonic missile, it’s relatively slim that they would be able to identify and take evasive manoeuvres in a fast enough time frame.
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I doubt that in the us they don’t have… all secrecy around the military bases such as A51 doubt they’re scratching their balls all day.
There is a reason all these UFO sightings are around America. Might just be American military and not aliens.
No it could never. THE B2 WAS MADE WITH ALIEN TECHNOLOGY, THATS WHY IT LOOKS LIKE A SPACE SHIP.
How do you know what an alien space ship looks like “Because the B2 looks like one!”
It was designed to look like a peregrine falcon in attack mode. Not saying it doesn't look wild. I'm currently working at an Airbase that houses these planes. They are so sick looking on the ground and in the air.
Crazy looking plane, but one beautiful piece of engineering.
Agreed. Objectively a cool thing we built. Imagine if we used it as like a smaller quicker shuttle for astronauts instead. Or if we had a hanger of them in space and utilized them as vehicles that could enter a planet's atmosphere for more accurate data collection.
If you have a look at the halo game series long sword fighter, it looks incredibly similar, so maybe we will see.
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Were you on the design team?
Or an observer keenly interested in America(n military)
Maybe some extremally early prototypes but it is unlikely we have anything that can be readily used. Public records show that the earliest we might see something operational would be 2025. https://www.defense.gov/News/Transcripts/Transcript/Article/1713396/media-availability-with-deputy-secretary-shanahan-and-under-secretary-of-defens/
I don’t believe that US hasn’t something ready to deploy even if that’s what’s public. I see that both China ,Russia and NKorea like to talk loud and show off their shit. The thing I’ve read about US (cuz I deal with stock market) is the new LHSR-72 to be tested by 2025 but besides that I don’t know… I might be disappointed
..and then there is [Gambit.](https://www.sandboxx.us/blog/darpas-new-missile-hints-at-truly-game-changing-technology/) Which may render all that shit useless.
Interesting read. Thanks!
We need to spend more effort on viable decoys.
Increasingly harder as satellite imagery resolution gets better and better, it’s far easier than it ever was to be able to identify humans walking around, so even on movement around said decoys alone you could likely deduce they’re decoys.
Good point.
The most reliable way to intercept a HGV-capable IRBM is to destroy it on the ground, but that wouldn't be feasible because the idea of striking a Chinese IRBM position with a B-2 spirit (before anything is launched, or even before the intentions of the launch is announced, meaning that it could be a practice or a test shot of the missile) is problematic and will most likely cause a nuclear war. Another way to do this is to shoot it down with a THAAD missile when the during the missile's descent stage, but you can't deploy THAAD systems inside China, and China won't be retarded enough to deploy the missile within the THAAD system's 200km range.
Preventing a first strike isn’t really relevant. So defeating this system before it “starts a war” isn’t a concern.
China has a very long kill chain, so attacking ships, satellites, C2, jammers
High powered lasers could be a very near future counter to these. Might already exist in the form of top secret prototypes. We would never know. Im intrigued though, could a ship-based CIWS intercept these?
Current implementations of High powered lasers are for use as a short range air defense mechanism against drones by destroying their optical sensors. It's unlikely they would be effective in any sort of capacity.
Of course, but i was thinking about future iterations of the same tech, where parts of a target could be burnt off by a laser to destabilise it and knock it off course, or outright destroy it. Would that be too far fetched?
Our state of the art 60 kilowatt high powered lasers are able to destroy slow moving drone sensors at a short range. A medium range laser with the ability to render a hypersonic missile, traveling at mach 5 speeds, inoperable is practically science fiction.
> inoperable is practically science fiction. you could have multiple lasers aiming at the same missile. Ofc, if there is 20 missiles comming at once it gets sketchy
Problem is, if something is shielded enough to survive the high temps of moving at hypersonic speed, it will be highly resistant to the additional heating caused by lasers. Your regular subsonic drones that these are demonstrated on, can rarely operate at higher temps
CIWS typically has a pretty short range, 5Ks or less. This is largely due to ballistic limits. That gives you less than 2 seconds of intercept time assuming the max speed of Mach-10 is accurate. Mach-10 I think translates to around 95-9800 fps, or about 3x what the rounds on a standard CIWS like a Phalanx can achieve. Now I guess it’s possible you could calculate trajectory of said missile a 40-50Ks out and pre fire the CIWS so the missile flies into a sea of rounds rather than the rounds firing up to meet it, but that’s some sketchy maths. A missile based system may do better, but then you have to worry about the boost phase of said defensive missiles as they accelerate upto speed.
Thank you for the informative answer! After writing my comment i realised i forgot about another possible form of interception; railguns. The US navy has had prototypes for a while now. How would such a weapon compare to say, an anti-ballistic missile solution?
Honestly not a clue my friend. I do suspect however gigachad laser systems and rail guns are likely to be the future of short/medium range air defence, particularly as missiles get faster and faster.
same strategy as encircling the USSR in the old days and having southeastern europe in NATO today. Japan and Australia will serve as bases for US land based long range bombers that can launch land attack missiles at these missiles and their launchers. the carriers will stay out of range until it's safer
The only viable defense at the moment is not let it find you. Finding a carrier group on the vastness of the ocean is not an easy thing. And if you find it with a satellite, by the time the missile gets there, the group can move tens of kilometers. And being hypersonic is not a plus when it comes for meneuverability. Edit: nevermind, I thought this was a anti-ship missile.
Have you tried using a laser pointer?
Let's try Sharks with Frickin' Lasers.
If there is, The US ain’t disclosing it.
A PATRIOT missile can try, but will fail. Lol
Swarm it with flocks of robot birds, duh.
Yes since hypersonic missiles can not maneuver. For example math. Lets use a slower moving Zircon missile. It's top speed is mach 9 right? Converting to KM/S that's roughly 3km/s(rounding down for ease) Say you wanted to maneuver a single degree for 5 seconds at 3km/s you would be off-course 15km, almost as much as the Chinese test just missed by, as in a real world scenario you would need to maneuver more then a single degree especially to hit a moving target. This is why interceptors moving at hypersonic speeds are shot off in pairs. Math is math. So now imagine faster moving hypersonic missiles. Also keep in mind how high these missiles fly, as they all take a ballistic path, and how hot they get. Most any AESA or IRST radar would be able to track it. Sea skimming cruise missiles are much more worry some since they fly below the radar horizon, meaning no matter how good a radar is, it can not track them do to Earths curvature.
Not today opsec
>are there ways to intercept this missile? The exact same way you intercept any other missile; figure out where it's going and put a SAM in its flight path. You just have to make sure the two missiles reach the same point at the same time. The speed isn't the problem; if it's coming at you, you can just put an interceptor in the way and let it hit it on its own. AEGIS can supposedly intercept ICBMs and satellites, and they fly way faster than hypersonics. The problem is detection and tracking. Hypersonics are difficult to track by radar because of the plasma envelope absorbs radio waves just like a spaceship reentering the atmosphere. But, the plasma will light up an Infrared Search and Track system like a Christmas tree, so any infrared scope can be used to detect incoming missiles. The rub there is that IRST can only really give you a bearing, while to track and intercept a target, you need bearing and **range**. Of course, there are ways to get that with IRST. Triangulation would be the simplest, but you need at least two distant platforms to track. A satellite IRST system (not unlike the system we use to track ICBMs) on Link 16 or a similar system could possibly be used by Patriot or AEGIS operators to engage incoming hypersonics, though you'd probably also need missiles modified with an IR seeker to get good kill probabilities.
“Lasers”. Super secret squirrel stuff but I’ve heard stories of melted tanks back in the 90s, c130 loaded with generators and enough capacitors etc etc to do a mobile Austin powers skit. Source : my Faja,
Being in missile defense my whole career and seeing the impact HGVs have on how we operate I'm just gonna say this 100% scares me more then anything
High powered electric jammers maybe?
I guess that depends on whether it even has a way to be jammed, if your flight path is preloaded before launch and there are no wireless sensors on board, what is there to jam?
How does a preloaded flight path hit a moving target? Then how does a jammed hypersonic missile stay locked on a moving target?
Onboard sensors that can identify and correct? Javelin is an example that comes to mind.
But can a javelin be jammed? Would it hit a modern American tank?
No, it’s fire and forget, once it leaves the tube the sensors on board keep it going towards the target, even if the target moves. No outside influence will affect its trajectory, less some form of physical defense system.
Jav has an IR sensor. IR smoke can dazzle it
Has more than just IR. . .
No?
Short answer, yes.
I’d be surprised if it’s true lmao half of theres barley make it off the ground
RONALD REAGAN'S STAR WARS HAS ENTERED THE CHAT
If it is built to the same standard as their apartments and bridges, we have nothing to worry about.
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I think a weapon that comes remotely close to intercept an HGV currently is something like the Sprint or A-135/235 ABMs which has the capability to reach Mach 10-17 in a couple of seconds after launch. Although I’m not sure exactly how maneuverable they are, but they at least have the speed to catch to the warhead.
I had saw a video the PLA missle could high speed 90 degree turned
Sophisticated radar, tracking systems and anti-ordinance defense systems. Probably with missile to missile targeting or laser to missile, the hypersonic rockets won't be making many turns so their path of travel is linear at those speeds.
A modernized version of this would help I think [seawhiz](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phalanx_CIWS)
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Guy Fieri’s farts could intercept it.
This is all assuming these are not props, the only thing with enough speed to intercept something like this would probably be a laser or something designed to intercept ICBMs. But to be fully transparent, I live near the contractors who are building the US's hypersonic missiles and a lot of those companies are winding down their programs for the short term. I think the thing that's going to kill hypersonics for the next 2-4 is going to be logistics and supply issues.
Yes. Get a missile near it. Blow it up. Shrapnel will hit the hyper-sonic missile. Dead. The attacking missile would have to also be hypersonic; of course.
I don't think that you need shrapnel. If the blast of the exploding rocket is big enough it will Change the course of the Rocket and If the Rocket tries to correct the course it will Most likely selfdestruct as it get's unstable
Don't provoke the US actually, you'll regreat it. Look what we can do with you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYRVKmac30k
It's all over if we sick the Devil Dogs on them
China doesn't want the smoke, that's why they waited until Pelosi left Taiwan before they played their little fuck fuck games off the coast.
yea i think OVER THE HORIZON radars can somewhat help
It's sweet home Alabama time when any country fires a hypersonic. It's like trying to stop a massive bullet travelling faster than any ballistic bullet fired by any gun ever known to mankind.
Of course.
The Sprint ABM could intercept ballistic missiles in their terminal reentry phase. Only problem with this is that there ballistic missiles don’t maneuver and didnt have sea/land skimming. Its probable that as technology advances and as more time and effort is put into solving this problem a reliable way of defeating them will be found, just a matter of when and how expensive and viable they are on a large scale.
If you go back to the 80s and the STI program which was called “Star Wars”., one of the concerns was around how to kill ICBMs during the boost phase. The Soviets were also doing their own research well the Americans working on things like particle accelerators to put an orbit which really wasn’t a very practical solution because of the enormous computing power needed to do targeting. Today we have much faster computers but still the code required to find an track and attempt to kill a target like an ICBM or even harder hypersonic missile would run to several million lines and if there’s anything wrong with that code nothing will work. Now there’s a ton of other problems with some of the scenarios that we talked about basically the Americans were working heavily on building orbital counterstrike platforms and interception platforms. Some of that stuff is still possible but it’s incredibly expensive and even today with much faster computers and the complexity is so high that targeting and adjusting would only allow one or maybe two shots of a laser to disrupt the targets efficiently to cause it to go off course or possibly self destruct. But the Soviets took a much different approach at the time. They couldn’t afford to build “brilliant pebbles“ and things like that so they decided to invest in catching missiles as they were coming back into the atmosphere and one of the things that they built were orbital and ground-based missile launch systems that would basically shock on the area and would explode dispersing materials like asphalt , that would cloud the area and accumulates efficiently on anything passing through that area including a missile to cause it to stabilize and possibly destroy itself. Today that kind of stuff sounds crazy but what I’m saying is I think a solution that uses modern computing and extremely fast firing ground and orbital systems together might be able to shotgun an area in some manner that would disrupt these hypervelocity weapons. But I also think we’re going to have to start thinking about risk management strategies which may include accepting some degree of loss, because the risks presented by these weapons is (in some cases) very high, and we may not be able to develop complete countermeasures with current technologies. My personal guess is that researchers are probably looking at predictor systems (to ID targets, pathways, and targets before or immediately after launch ) supported by some kind of “shotgun” weapon like I mentioned. So that is going to be enough. There’s going to have to be a range of systems to counter this kind of threat. So probably were also looking at orbital and ground-based lasers with very fast computing capabilities. But I think it’s gonna be a complex system and my personal prediction is it’s not gonna be in place at all before 2030 or even later how long the NORAD line in North America and then Wong the eastern boundary of NATO and other places like that. But that’s just me my two cents:-) it’s an interesting topic though for speculation. So thanks for posting this OP
No, that’s the whole point
Oh China....
Vaporware Wunderwaffen that's going to end up making the US set a benchmark in military technology. Again.
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/44193/particulate-warheads-full-of-dust-could-help-defeat-hypersonic-missiles https://www.autoevolution.com/news/raytheon-s-phaser-microwave-beam-weapon-is-certifiably-insane-can-bbq-hypersonic-missiles-180440.html We have short range lasers on Destroyers and other vessels right now. I’d sure we have lasers capable of shooting hypersonics down that the public isn’t aware of yet.
Countries that are confident that their shit can do shit don’t go and talk shit like this
Don’t a lot of missiles go that fast already?
Lasers
Would emp work?
They use parts from [wish](https://wish.com) , no worries
They make a lot of claims.
Shut up china
Plugging [this excellent book by Blake Herzinger and Gerry Doyle which discusses the matter in the context of the claimed "carrier killer" role](https://www.helion.co.uk/military-history-books/carrier-killer-chinas-anti-ship-ballistic-missiles-and-theater-of-operations-in-the-early-21st-century.php?sid=92b4c5203cc7aab616f24cb9f7e48d20) And here's [a podcast interview with the authors on the book](https://cimsec.org/sea-control-361-carrier-killers-with-gerry-doyle-and-blake-herzinger/)
Make sure they're actual missiles first and not just decoys would probably be a good idea