[booi]

What's the defense against a hypersonic missile then? Current Aegis and CIWS defensive tech will not hit something traveling that fast. Surely the Pentagon doesn't even need to justify budget increases when we give them more budget than they ask for every year regardless.

[robonerd]

> Current Aegis and CIWS defensive tech will not hit something traveling that fast.

Aegis BDM is designed to hit hypersonic reentry vehicles. CIWS is irrelevant, why even bring it up?

[ramesh31]

>Aegis BDM is designed to hit hypersonic reentry vehicles

Ballistic hypersonic reentry vehicles. The entire point is that these new weapons are maneuverable in the atmosphere at mach 8+ all the way to the terminal phase.

[robonerd]

They don't maneuver for shit in the terminal phase. Boost-glide weapons avoid mid-course interception by staying relatively low in the upper atmosphere rather than following a high ballistic trajectory well into space. Once they're in the terminal phase their maneuvering capability is comparable to older maneuvering reentry vehicles (which are nothing new; the novel part is skipping the ballistic mid-course phase.)

[moron4hire]

They have to know what to hit and make sure the target they are tracking is actually a real target.