WASHINGTON — A new study released Dec. 18 sheds light on potential challenges in the Pentagon’s ambitious effort to deploy a network of space sensors for detecting and tracking hypersonic missiles.
Based on internal modeling and simulation efforts, the study by the Center for Strategic and International Studies identifies areas for improvement in the planned network and raises questions intended to inform the conversation on what it takes to defeat these highly maneuverable missile threats.
“There is no such thing as a perfect sensor architecture design,” said the report titled “Getting on Track: Space and Airborne Sensors for Hypersonic Missile Defense.”
Hypersonic weapons fly at more than five times the speed of sound. Their speed and unpredictable flight paths make them difficult to detect and track.
The study highlights Defense Department initiatives to build a multi-layer system of missile-tracking sensors and warns that more effort needs to be put into the technology used to stitch together sensor data — known as sensor fusion. This is critical to build accurate “tracks” and avoid confusion, the report said, as one missile traveling fast can look like several other objects.
DoD is investing billions of dollars in space sensors as the linchpin of a hypersonic defense architecture, and has “a lot of really smart people that are working on this problem,” said Thomas Karako, director of the CSIS Missile Defense Project. The report, he said, is an effort to broaden the conversation and warn of potential pitfalls.
Technical challenges
While infrared and electro-optical sensing technologies are mature, hypersonic missile tracking is far more difficult than traditional ballistic missile warning, the report said. “Distinguishing a hypersonic heat signature against the Earth’s background has been likened to tracking a slightly brighter candle in a sea of candles, requiring extensive testing to…
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