China Developing Hypersonic Swarms To Overwhelm Missile Defenses

Chinese researchers are working to network hypersonic weapons into a smart swarm for coordinated attacks. Such swarms would be far more dangerous than the individual missiles that comprise them, multiplying the power of the high-speed weapons.

Hypersonic missiles, cruise missiles that travel inside the atmosphere at more than five times the speed of sound (over 4,000 mph) are shaping up as the next wave of military innovation. While they may be slower than ballistic missiles, their comparatively low-level flight means there is much less warning of hypersonic missiles’ arrival, and they are far more challenging to intercept. They could deliver nuclear warheads, or deliver devastating surprise attacks against aircraft carriers or airbases.

China Developing Hypersonic Swarms To Overwhelm Missile Defenses

I have often wondered how military defenses could stack up to a Swarm such as what is being discussed here.

Surely there would be some type of retaliatory measures that could fry the electronics in a swarm attack. But would it affect nearby electronics too?

And to add a little icing in the article it says:

Significantly, the report repeatedly quotes American work rather than Chinese as its inspiration, giving the impression that China is simply responding to U.S. projects already under way.

“The U.S. army recently announced it was working toward autonomous coordination capabilities. In 2017, the missile multiple simultaneous engagement technologies (MSET) program was initiated, which was envisioned as a suite of technologies providing supervised autonomous terminal engagement of multiple missiles against various targets and inter-group communication for shared situational awareness.”

This glosses over the detail that MSET is a small-scale tactical system, not a strategic weapon with hypersonic missiles. The Chinese researchers are essentially trying something similar, but on a gigantic scale.

Kind of scary to think that a threat can fly low enough to avoid radar detection, think on it's own and make corrective and deadly decisions. Who would've thought that it would be drones we needed to fear and not some Futuristic "Terminator" (which I guess could still happen).

a reply to: JohnnyAnonymous

Yet one more reason to stop this combative foreign policy. China dies not need to be an enemy. Most of what it does is a reaction to pressure put on it by the west. Like that huge great carrier battle group.

China's proposed hypersonic swarms cannot reach speed of 55,000mph.... Sorry

a reply to: JohnnyAnonymous

Its actually not hard to shoot them down not much different then an icbm. The problem is the time you have to respond, Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) and perhaps even the Patriot PAC-3 missile system should theoretically be able to knock them down. The problem is detecting a fast-moving threat before it hits you. Meaning you need to know where it is launched from and know immediately when it is launched. This means you would need launch detection os a sattelite that can relay that information to the target. Even a swarm could be handled as lomg as you know where they are launching from.

They must have a hyper efficient way to power all them buggers. I wonder what the "swarms" proximity from one another would be traveling at them speeds that they are controllable too. I would imagine a counter measure would be making a blast of some sort that distributes really dense metal flakes or something to that nature the grinds down their ability to maneuver, like making them fly through a cloud of metallic gorilla glue or something like that.

a reply to: Brotherman

emp CIWS shells.

Swarming missiles? A strong force multiplier? I still sleep well, as long as our missile subs are at sea. It’s the dirtiest game in town, mutually assured destruction. The nuclear triad is still working.

a reply to: JohnnyAnonymous

The "terminator" thing is still a concept- it just gets scarier when skynet has control of yet another "thinking" weapon.

a reply to: JohnnyAnonymous

Building a hypersonic UCAV is going to be extremely difficult at best. The US ran into some very interesting problems with materials in their last hypersonic program tests. It's going to be a while before China, or anyone else for that matter, will be flying anything like this around. Building a hypersonic missile is one thing, building a hypersonic UCAV is another.

a reply to: JohnnyAnonymous

I don't know much about weapons of destruction, but you guys are scaring me.

The world is going crazy and one of these days...we will destroy ourselves. Wish we could just evolve and be more peaceful.

The future will be battles of AI controlled swarms underpinned by massive cyberattacks to undermine the enemy swarms.

Not even Orwell could dream this nightmare up. Say hello to Agent Smith.

a reply to: Zaphod58

I have a felling the best solution will be to craft a unibody design that is more expensive to grow than is feasible economically

originally posted by: AaarghZombies
a reply to: JohnnyAnonymous
Yet one more reason to stop this combative foreign policy. China dies not need to be an enemy. Most of what it does is a reaction to pressure put on it by the west. Like that huge great carrier battle group.

Ignorance much?

China - or rather the CCP - has a stated goal of world domination.

They are an enemy as long as this is their long term goal.

originally posted by: AaarghZombies
a reply to: JohnnyAnonymous

Yet one more reason to stop this combative foreign policy. China dies not need to be an enemy. Most of what it does is a reaction to pressure put on it by the west. Like that huge great carrier battle group.

None of that is true.

Look at their 2049 plan

originally posted by: AaarghZombies
a reply to: JohnnyAnonymous

Yet one more reason to stop this combative foreign policy. China dies not need to be an enemy. Most of what it does is a reaction to pressure put on it by the west. Like that huge great carrier battle group.

Twenty years ago I would have agreed with you.

Fast forward to now and I think it's quite clear that China aren't interested in defense only capabilities.

The technology they are trying to develop is to conquer, not defend.

But yeah, blame the west like the suicidal leftist that you are...

a reply to: Wide-Eyes

I agree at this point ignoring them is a fatal mistake. China removes anything it sees as a threat. For example Muslims they currently hold millions in forced labor camps. If China percieves something as a threat it works to iliminate the threat. Currently that puts the US on their radar as the only word power that can stand up against them. People dont realize China is not all that different From Germany during ww2.

a reply to: bigfatfurrytexan

Until the material science catches up, and the TBCC barrier is finally broken, hypersonics are going to be expensive for much beyond missiles. You're right that it's going to be expensive. The X-43, which flew two flights under power for approximately 11 seconds, and had one failure, cost $230M for three aircraft and boosters for Phase I in 2001. The X-51, which flew for 6 minutes on its fourth and final flight, cost $300M for four aircraft in 2004. By 2010, it was estimated they had spent $200M on the program.

a reply to: Zaphod58

www.flightglobal.com...

"Kelley Aerospace has officially launched its supersonic unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV) concept, and says it has recieved 100 “pre-orders” for the vehicle. " Flightglobal 25th Feb. 2021.

I would think even the smallest nations would be think along the lines of developing a swarm strategy.

This is supersonic and real. Are the Chinese playing 'Paper Tiger' in response with the hypersonic buzz word.

Protoss Carrier? That you?