this post was submitted on 13 Sep 2026
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I'm not talking about making missiles or mass produced missiles or AI guided missiles. Hypersonic has an exact definition (Mach 5+) and calling something a hypersonic missile should set off your bullshit detector. In ballistic missile terms usually there is only a short portion of its flight that is hypersonic, but that doesn't make it a hypersonic missile. The western definition of a hypersonic missile is sustained hypersonic flight in the atmosphere. Russia and China define hypersonic missiles as hypersonic at any point in their flight likely for propaganda purposes.
It's only the bit right before it hits where in needs to be hypersonic, isn't it? Fast enough to avoid interceptors. It's why if Taiwan ever turns hot, the plan is for all the US navy boats to do a strategic retreat.
No, that's the China, Russia definition.
Ballistic trajectories still have a long arc that makes it easier to detect and deploy countermeasures. It's how patriot, iron dome, and other systems are allowed to work.
In principle, sure. But in practice, its easier to spend a lot of cheep ballistics running the interceptors dry. After that, it doesn't really matter how long you can maintain hypersonic speeds.
Again, this conversation was about calling something a hypersonic missile when it really isn't by definition not the economics or viability of the war nor the actuall capabilities of their missiles (which I suspect are just run of the mill ballistic missiles that might be guided by AI). It really makes me think Tom's hardware made all this up for clicks or they are gullible enough to buy into propaganda. IF Tom's Hardware can't be truthful about something that's easily verifiable, how can we trust the rest of the article?
In all likelyhood there is some truth in the article, but someone calling anything hypersonic should really set off your bullshit detector, just like a company selling solid state batteries with fantastic claims or anything being revolutionized with carbon nanotubes.