Hypersonic missiles could be operational in 2020s, general says

Speaking at the Air Force Association Air Warfare Symposium in Orlando, Florida., Masiello described the efforts the service is undertaking to develop engines that could travel at or above the widely accepted hypersonic range of Mach 5.

Between 2010 and 2013, the Air Force conducted four flights of the X-51, an experimental hypersonic cruise missile. The first and fourth flights were considered a success, but the engine failed to ignite in the second test flight, and a stabilizing fin broke off during the third flight.

Masiello said that the failures were more informative than the successes in figuring out what to do next and how to advance the technology.

“You have to build an environment that allows failure, because if you don’t, you’re not going to be pushing the boundaries of technology,” he said.

America has already developed hypersonic technology, most famously in the X-15 experimental test plane that saw operation in the 1960s.

Maj. Gen. Curtis Bedke, ret., the former commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory, lamented the fact that hypersonic research largely came to a halt when the X-15 was retired.

“We dropped everything and moved to something else and we lost our momentum,” he said.

The Air Force should focus on developing hypersonic missiles to match those being researched by Russia and China, Bedke said. Though a hypersonic manned combat aircraft would grab headlines, it’s unlikely to happen anytime soon and could detrimentally take funds away from development of hypersonic missiles.

“It may not sound as cool as coming up with a grand vision and then throwing money at it, but it’s how were’ going to get there,” he said. “Hypersonic capabilities are inevitable, they are going to happen. If they don’t happen in the United States, they will happen in other countries first.”

Hypersonic munitions “hold much potential for addressing some of our key capabilities gaps,” said retired Lt. Gen. David Deptula, head of AFA’s Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies. He added that the current science suggests “it’s time to transition this capability into the operational realm.”