SIMI VALLEY, Calif. — The U.S. Defense Department plans to conduct joint hypersonics experiments with the Australian military as soon as next 12 months, in response to the Pentagon’s chief technology officer.
Heidi Shyu, undersecretary of defense for research and engineering, told reporters Dec. 2 on the Reagan National Defense Forum here that the countries have been deepening their partnership on hypersonics during the last 12 months.
In May, Australia observed DoD’s Technology Readiness Experiment, or T-REX, which was held at Camp Atterbury in Indiana. Following that experiment, members of Shyu’s team traveled to Australia to look at the Autonomous Warrior exercise.
Conducting joint experiments, she said, is a transparent next step for the countries.
“We’re already within the means of working very closely with them to work out who will we integrate a few of our experimentations in Australia,” Shyu said.
Hypersonic vehicles can travel and maneuver at speeds of Mach 5 or higher. The technology is a spotlight of the second phase of the trilateral pact between the Australia, the U.S. and the UK, often called AUKUS. While Pillar I focused on nuclear submarine development, the second pillar is geared toward advanced technology efforts like hypersonics in addition to quantum computing, autonomy and electronic warfare.
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin convened an AUKUS technology summit Dec. 1, where he and leaders from Australia and the U.K. launched several technology collaboration initiatives.
Australia and the U.S. have been conducting hypersonic research together for greater than 15 years. In 2017, they culminated a secretive decade-long effort often called the Hypersonic International Flight Research Experimentation, or HiFiRE. Through this system, they explored future high-speed weapons and subsystem designs and conducted a series of flight tests.
In 2020, the 2 nations launched a follow-on effort called the Southern Cross Integrated Flight Research Experiment, or SCIFiRE. This system aimed to develop a Mach 5 precision strike missile powered by an air-breathing scramjet engine that will be carried by a tactical fighter aircraft.
That work has fed into the U.S. Air Force’s Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile program.
The Pentagon can also be discussing opportunities for the countries to integrate their air and missile defense capabilities. This summer, Shyu and Pentagon acquisition chief Bill Laplante traveled to Australia to debate potential collaboration, and in September Shyu met with Australian officials to debate the partnership further.
Shyu told reporters in August she’s had discussions with the U.S. Army and Missile Defense Agency about how the 2 countries might work together on the Integrated Battled Command System, which is able to play a crucial role in connecting sensors and shooters for air and missile defense in Guam.
The Army is the acquisition lead for the hassle and is working with MDA to get the primary wave of apparatus for the architecture to the island in 2024. Northrop Grumman is developing the system.
Australia is within the midst of its own effort to develop an integrated air and missile defense capability through its Joint Air Battle Management System. The agency on Aug. 28 chosen Lockheed Martin as its “strategic partner” on this system.
Courtney Albon is C4ISRNET’s space and emerging technology reporter. She has covered the U.S. military since 2012, with a concentrate on the Air Force and Space Force. She has reported on among the Defense Department’s most important acquisition, budget and policy challenges.