from an unexpected direction, such as the South Pole. The new weapon would be significant because it could attack the U.S. This hypersonic weapon launches briefly into orbit, 'and it glides back to Earth just like the space shuttle, except for when it gets where it's going, it goes boom.' 'The simplest way to imagine this new weapon system is to imagine the space shuttle, put a nuclear weapon in the cargo bay and then don't bother with the landing gear,' says Jeffrey Lewis, a professor at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey. 78?Īccording to an article in the Financial Times this past weekend, it was a secret test of a powerful new kind of hypersonic missile. In July, the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology announced the 77th launch of one of its Long March 2C rockets in late August it announced the 79th. It began with what appeared to be a missing rocket.
China's DF-17 missile is a medium-range hypersonic weapon capable of traveling over five times the speed of sound.
