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Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-Colo.) on Tuesday raised concerns that the United States is falling behind adversaries China and Russia in manufacturing and testing hypersonic missiles.
“As a country, we are behind China, and even Russia for that matter, and this is not a good situation,” Lamborn said, adding hypersonics are “a whole new type of offensive capability, and we are behind, no doubt about it.”
Lamborn’s concerns were echoed by academics and weapons experts who joined The Hill’s Tuesday event, “National Security at the Speed of Sound: Hypersonics in American Defense,” sponsored by Raytheon Industries.
Hypersonic missiles are weapons that have the capability to travel at five times the speed of sound, roughly 4,000 miles per hour. They are designed to be so fast that other defense technology cannot react in time to prevent strikes.
Lamborn, the ranking member on the Strategic Forces Subcommittee, said the U.S. must expedite its testing capabilities in order to catch up to other nations. He pointed specifically to HBTSS satellites, which could track hypersonic weapons from China and elsewhere.
