What the heck did China actually send up into orbit? That’s the cornerstone question raised by a Financial Times report that alleges China test-launched a hypersonic glide vehicle capable of delivering a nuclear warhead into “low-orbit space before cruising down towards its target.”
The Financial Times, an influential British newspaper of record founded in 1888, published its story, reported and written by Demetri Sevastopulo (see his tweets below) in Washington and Kathrin Hille in Taipei on Saturday, Oct. 16. The duo based their story on five sources, who claimed that China not only launched a technologically advanced weapon system into a low-earth-orbit, but that the development surprised the U.S. intelligence community.
What’s in this week’s podcast
While experts can agree that it was Colonel Mustard doing something that involved a Long March 2 C rocket launch in a late-July to mid-August time frame, but with what and to where are the Clue cards yet to be revealed.
Those who know or have the capability to definitively answer the central question - like China, the launching nation; and national defense and space agencies with space-based sensors, such as the United States, France or Russia; or some commercial space-traffic observation operators - have remained tight-lipped or employed obfuscation.
So for this week's podcast, I reached out to space policy, emerging technologies, and China military modernization expert Malcolm Davis, who is a senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute; and also to Todd Harrison, the Center for Security and International Studies Aerospace Security Project director.
Why it matters
In theory, such a weapon could reach the United States homeland and even if detected, would fly around current missile defense systems. If this allegation proves out, this development would be a great technological leap forward for China, and would dramatically exacerbate the already tense security dynamic in the Indo-Pacific region, most especially Taiwan - a subject I covered in Transmission #010.
It got tenser on Thursday evening, Oct. 21, during a CNN “town hall” program hosted by Anderson Cooper. In answering a question related to the Financial Times report, U.S. President Joe Biden said the United States would defend Taiwan if attacked by China.
MR. COOPER: So, are you saying that the United States would come to Taiwan’s defense if —
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
MR. COOPER: — China attacked?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, we have a commitment to do that.
And yes. While I realize the White House Spokesperson Jen Psaki tried to roll back that statement on Friday, Oct. 22, Chinese President Xi Jinping knows what he heard. Plus Biden’s words fit into his and the Chinese Communist Party’s world view: That to take Taiwan, China must nullify, or at least critically blunt the power of the U.S. and its allies in the Indo-Pacific region.
Some useful hypersonic factoids
Hypersonic means faster than Mach 5, or five times the speed of sound. Almost every vehicle or spacecraft in orbit, or re-entering or traveling through the upper reaches of the earth’s atmosphere is hypersonic. That includes the SpaceX Crew Dragon's latest all-civilian mission, which orbited the earth at Mach 22, as well as intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) of any design.
Because of the launch location, the need for speed, and a finite fuel supply, ICBMs have predictable ballistic arc trajectories that traverse through the upper atmosphere or just across the Karman Line and over the North Pole. ICBMs are akin to firearms because whilst guided, once shot, they are not really maneuverable.
LGM-30 Minuteman III ICBM is absolutely hypersonic. It can reach a speed of Mach 23, but it’s not a hypersonic weapons system per se. When the terms “hypersonic weapon” or “hypersonic weapons system” are used, that means that not only does the delivery vehicle travel at hypersonic speeds, it can also be maneuvered more like a drone.
To get the full analysis of this story and an idea of where we go from here from the experts, listen to The DownLink, a Defense and Aerospace Podcast above or from the Defense & Aerospace Report… Or use and subscribe through your favorite podcast player.
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If Michael Meyer’s latest appearance on the silver screen is not your taste in scary stories, the Congressional Research Service coincidently - maybe - released an update to its report on Tuesday, Oct. 19 titled “Hypersonic Weapons: Background and Issues for Congress.” It’s a good primer full of unsettling information.
The key takeaway is: “U.S. defense officials have stated that both terrestrial- and current space-based sensor architectures are insufficient to detect and track hypersonic weapons.” One physicist quoted near the top of the report said the current Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system, could possibly be adapted to intercept hypersonic missiles, but that it would only serve a small geographic area, and that the decision window would likely be too narrow to make an accurate identification of an incoming object and then decide what to do with confidence.
The U.S. Space Force on Wednesday, Oct. 27, will host invited top secret-cleared defense and space industry leaders for a virtual event that has been billed as a “business fair”. It’s not likely to be as dry as it sounds, especially with all the debate over what China may or may not be doing with hypersonics of whatever stripe in space.
In September Space Warfighting Analysis Center Director Andrew Cox said those in attendance would receive a detailed intelligence download on what the DoD sees as the current and future threat environment. He also said participants would also be asked for feedback on force design and space-based missile warning and tracking architecture, while being introduced to the SWAC’s digital development and acquisitions approach.
NASA is shopping for another human-rated rocket ferry to the International Space Station. The space agency made the announcement on Wednesday, Oct. 20, a week and a half after Boeing announced that a test of its human-rated Starliner launch system was pushed back to sometime in 2022. The announcement came in the form of a request for information to the U.S.-based commercial space industry about interest and current capabilities. It was the first step to issuing a future request for proposal under NASA’s Commercial Crew Program.
SpaceX and NASA are preparing to launch Crew-3, the space launch company’s fourth crewed Commercial Crew Program mission, which is scheduled to launch at 2:21 a.m. EDT Oct. 31 - weather permitting. So please check if you intend to stay up and watch. If the Crew Dragon launch is a “go”, Nasa will start its live video feed and coverage at 10 p.m. EDT Oct. 30.
