The Woracle

There is a connection, of course. DARPA's Falcon programme is developing technology for an unmanned hypersonic attacker able to strike anywhere in the world within 2 hours. But it has also sponsored work on small boosters - SpaceX's Falcon I and AirLaunch's QuickReach - that could launch the unpowered Falcon hypersonic technology demonstrators as well as the USAF's CAV...or form the basis of a prompt global strike weapon.

But the Falcon programme has had as many changes of direction as Britney Spears has had lapses of dress code. The initial HTV-1 demonstrator was dropped after it proved unproducible. Now Falcon prime contractor Lockheed Martin is working on the more advanced HTV-2, which is planned to fly in 2008. The expendable HTV-2 will be launched by a rocket (Orbital Sciences' Minotaur) to demonstrate aerodynamics and materials needed for sustained hypersonic cruise.

Meanwhile...Lockheed is designing the HTV-3X, a powered, reusable demonstrator that would be able to take off, accelerate to hypersonic speed, cruise at Mach 10, then return to a runway landing. The HTV-3X, to be renamed the Blackswift if DARPA secures funding for the demonstration in 2009, would be powered by turbojet/scramjet combined-cycle engines. To see how it's supposed to work, check out this cool video (and, yes, engineers didn't look like that when I was one...)

So, back to that Washington Post story. Rather than give the $100 million to Falcon, the Congressional conferees actually created a new conventional prompt global strike programme to look at things like propulsion and guidance systems, re-entry vehicles, command and control, intermediate-range missile concepts and advanced non-nuclear warheads. More realistic, maybe, but I'll keep my fingers crossed for Falcon.