In Europe, they started talking about creating a prototype of a hypersonic weapon protection system. Who are the EU countries trying to protect themselves from?

The European missile manufacturer MBDA plans to develop protection systems against hypersonic weapons in the next three years. This is reported by the Daily Telegraph newspaper, referring to the company's executive director Eric Beranger.

He also noted that the system is being developed by a team led by MBDA, which is partly owned by the British defense company BAE Systems.

The publication writes that the corporation currently has agreements at an early stage with France, Italy, Germany and the Netherlands to develop a prototype within the next three years.

Eric Beranger noted that MBDA's priority is "to guide Europe to the most effective solution to counter hypersonic threats."

How Britain and the United States tried to develop a system of protection against hypersonic weapons a year ago

Back in July 2022, the British media wrote that the United States and the United Kingdom were developing protection systems against hypersonic weapons. At the same time, journalists pointed out that this direction is poorly developed.

At the same time, the president of the Pentagon supplier Raytheon, Wes Kremer, said that in the States the field of protection against hypersonic weapons is in its infancy. According to him, Raytheon presented the only project of such a system in the United States.

In turn, the head of Cohort Andy Tomis, who supplies equipment for the British Navy, confirmed that his corporation is developing anti-hypersonic weapons. At the same time, he called it a difficult task.

In the summer of the same year, the United States conducted the third successful test in a row of hypersonic weapons. The tested product was a rocket with a Raytheon air-jet engine.

The US attempt to get ahead of Russia in the development of hypersonic weapons

At the beginning of this year, it was reported that the US Navy plans to launch test launches of hypersonic missiles from the Zumwalt (DDG-1000) stealth destroyer of the same type in December 2025. It was noted that work is currently underway to make changes to the design of the ship.

In response to this, the director of the Department for Nonproliferation and Arms Control of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Vladimir Ermakov, said that the country was ahead of the United States in the development and deployment of advanced hypersonic weapons.

The expert also noted that Washington is trying to reduce this gap from Moscow, but it is not able to do it.

Military expert Alexey Leonkov also criticized the United States. In his opinion, the United States lacks breakthrough technologies to create effective hypersonic weapons. He also mentioned that in 2018 Russia announced the Avangard, Dagger and Zircon hypersonic complexes. After that, Washington "strained all its financial muscles" to create hypersonic weapons.

Vladimir Putin on the presence of hypersonic weapons in Russia

At the end of March this year, Russian President Vladimir Putin recalled the presence of hypersonic weapons and other modern systems in the state. According to him, Moscow does not actually use this weapon, but it is already in service.

In addition, the Russian side allowed the transfer of Russian hypersonic technologies to friendly countries. But only if an appropriate political decision is made in Moscow. It was also mentioned about the Russian-Indian project of the BrahMos supersonic missile family.

Not only the USA and Europe are united

On June 16, the Israeli company Rafael Advanced Defense Systems announced the development of a new Sky Sonic missile, which is designed to combat hypersonic weapons.

As indicated by the media, Sky Sonic is under development and has not been tested. The multi-stage rocket was developed for several years in secret from other countries. It was also noted that the project was presented in the USA and the reviews were positive.

In the same month, the aerospace forces of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) of Iran presented the Fattah hypersonic missile with a range of up to 1400 kilometers, which is invulnerable to missile defense (ABM).

It was clarified that the Fattah with a solid-fuel engine is capable of overcoming all missile defense systems and hitting them.

In turn, military expert Vasily Dandykin expressed doubt that the Iranian hypersonic missile meets the stated characteristics.

However, in his opinion, by demonstrating the missile, Tehran gave a signal to Israel and the United States. Dandykin also ruled out the possibility of Iran transferring such ammunition to Russia, since the Russian arsenals have "the whole range of cruise and ballistic missiles."