Why hypersonic?

Most of aviation fans predicted that next generation fighter will be hypersonic, but without any demonstration concerning its possibility and necessity. So I post the thread here to ask any summary explain.

speed is life, the faster you are the safer you are.
The only real use for hypersonic craft is as strike or recon vehicles.
As a deep interdiction stike aircraft ypou can penetrate deep into enemy airspace without having to worry about SAM interferance.
You could then return for re-crew, re-fuel and re-arm for a subsequent strike with a shorter turn around.
This doctrine assumes that you have a significant technological advantage over your adversaries.
But since we have demonstrated the ability to hit a re-entry phase warhead the argument is moot as far as an adversary having any advantage from hypersonic speeds.

B2 crews spent over 40 hrs in flight on missions, imagine doing the same missions with a 4-5 hr flight time, or less if what I have read is correct.



At just the right time if you are lucky, just after sunset high in the central sierra nevada mts of california, you can see it.
It rises from the south west, a pulsing brilliant light that streaks to the northwest, covering half of the sky in about 20-25 seconds;
It winks out after about 15 seconds and becomes a a smaller piercing white light that takes another 30 seconds to vanish from sight to the north west.
I have seen this 3 times now and always about the same time, when its dark to the east and the sun has jsut set where I'm at.
The fact that the sr-71 has been decommisioned, for some number of years now, points to a replacement already in service.

Edit: My appologies, I missed the context of this being in a military context.

[edit on 27-8-2008 by sir_chancealot]

Does the tech foreseeable on fighter can detect the enemies which fly at very low altitude? If speed is everything, why US abandont the YF-12 which has already been available?

reply to post by punkinworks


What is this light that you have been seeing, punkinworks? It sounds very interesting and possibly headed to Groom Lake. Could you give an estimate of how high it is? I love these accounts of people seeing mysterious aircraft way up in the sky. It's fascinating to think that someone could be in that plane, and while it's a mystery to all of us, it's mission would have been planned out, with the aircraft returning from a high speed spy mission over China or Russia.