Hypersonic Weapons-Part 1: Background and Vulnerability to Missile Defenses

TL;DR

This paper reviews hypersonic glide vehicles' motivations, development status, and their vulnerability to missile defenses, highlighting the need for speeds above Mach 5 to evade current defenses and discussing implications for weapon design.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive analysis of hypersonic glide vehicles' development, vulnerabilities, and the technical challenges in achieving high speeds for defense evasion.

Findings

BGVs must exceed Mach 5 to evade defenses

High speeds impact weapon size and range

Current development programs are progressing in US, Russia, and China

Abstract

Assessing the desirability of hypersonic glide vehicles (HGVs) requires understanding what capabilities they may provide compared to alternative systems that could carry out the same missions, particularly given the technical difficulties and additional costs of developing hypersonic gliders compared to more established technologies. Part 1 of this paper considers the primary motivations given for developing HGVs and summarizes the current development programs of the United States, Russia, and China. It then analyzes the vulnerability of hypersonic boost-glide vehicles (BGVs) to missile defenses and finds that evading the most capable current endo-atmospheric defenses requires that BGVs maintain speeds significantly higher than Mach 5 throughout their glide phase. Achieving these high speeds has important implications for the mass and range of these weapons, which in turn affect what delivery vehicles can carry them and how their performance compares to other means of delivery, as is discussed in Part 2.