The spacecraft will also be used to monitor possible natural disasters, the newspaper notes
TOKYO, November 22. /tass/. The Japanese government plans to launch three small satellites in the middle of this decade that will be able to track the enemy's hypersonic gliding warheads. This was reported by the Yomiuri newspaper on Monday, citing sources.
It is noted that the spacecraft will also be used to monitor possible natural disasters. In case of successful tests on data transmission between satellites, their number is planned to be increased in the future to increase Japan's defense capabilities in this area. The cost of launching three satellites is estimated at 60 billion yen (about $525 million).
On October 16, the British newspaper Financial Times reported that in August, China launched a hypersonic gliding aircraft capable of carrying nuclear weapons using a launch vehicle. According to sources in government circles of the United States and a number of Asian countries, this device flew around the Earth in a low orbit, but could not hit the target, passing several tens of kilometers from it.
The head of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, compared the hypersonic weapons tests conducted by China in terms of importance for the military sphere with the first launch of the Soviet artificial Earth satellite.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said on October 18 that in August China tested not a new type of weapons, but a spacecraft.
