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AllAfrica
6 days ago
- Politics
- AllAfrica
Dark Eagle: US hypersonic deployment has China squawking
US deployment of its Dark Eagle hypersonic missile system to Australia's Northern Territory for the 2025 Talisman Sabre joint military drills has reshaped deterrence dynamics vis-à-vis China in the Indo-Pacific. Capable of striking targets up to 2,700 kilometers away, Dark Eagle is operated via a battery of four launchers and command vehicles, allowing precision strikes at hypersonic speeds. The deployment, conducted by the Hawaii-based 3rd Multi-Domain Task Force (MDTF) represented the weapon's first operational use west of the International Date Line, USNI reported. Admiral Samuel Paparo, commander of US Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM), stated that the military exercise, held from July 13 to August 4 with over 30,000 personnel from 19 nations, validated the US Army's ability to deploy and operate the system in forward environments. Prior to this, the weapon had only been tested in Florida and integrated into Navy-led command drills. During Talisman Sabre, the MDTF also launched an SM-6 missile from its Mid-Range Capability (MRC) platform against a maritime target—a shot that provoked strong protests from Beijing, which warned that such moves risk destabilizing the region and triggering a new arms race. The US Navy plans to field a variant of the hypersonic missile aboard Virginia-class submarines and Zumwalt-class destroyers by fiscal year 2028, reinforcing the Pentagon's long-range strike architecture aimed at penetrating Chinese and Russian anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) networks. As noted by Ankit Panda in an October 2023 report for the Carnegie Endowment, the US strategy increasingly favors mobile, land-based missile systems whose ability to reposition rapidly complicates adversary targeting and enhances survivability in contested environments. These wheeled launchers, employed in shoot-and-scoot tactics, are seen as effective tools for bolstering deterrence without incurring the diplomatic costs of permanent basing. Panda notes that such systems enable a sustained forward presence while adapting to the demands of a more fragmented and escalation-prone Indo-Pacific theater. This evolving doctrine is embedded within the MDTF concept, which integrates capabilities across land, air, sea, space and cyber to counter enemy A2/AD strategies. According to Wilson Beaver and Anna Gustafson in an April 2025 article for the Heritage Foundation, MDTFs are uniquely designed to deliver tailored, theater-specific strikes that degrade adversary capabilities while restoring US freedom of maneuver. Their agility and domain integration make them ideal for operating long-range precision fires in environments where fixed installations are highly vulnerable. At the operational level, forward-deployed missile forces also serve broader strategic goals. In testimony before the US Senate in April 2025, Admiral Paparo stressed that defending Taiwan and preserving Indo-Pacific stability demands forward-deployed missile, sensor and command systems across allied territories, including Japan, the Philippines, Guam and Palau. He described this posture as essential to denying adversaries their strategic objectives, emphasizing that geographic dispersion, allied interoperability and resilient early warning and precision-strike capabilities form the backbone of a combat-credible deterrent embedded across the region's front-line archipelagos. These capabilities have triggered deeper strategic concerns. Aaron Shiffler, writing for the Joint Air Power Competence Center in an October 2023 article, notes that hypersonic weapons compress decision timelines and complicate traditional defense postures. Their extreme speed and maneuverability reduce early-warning windows, increasing the risk of miscalculation. Shiffler argues that these systems could undermine mutual vulnerability—the bedrock of nuclear deterrence—by enabling rapid, precise strikes against high-value targets. In his view, this shift raises the prospect of crisis instability if adversaries perceive a first-strike advantage. While advocates tout the deterrent value of hypersonic weapons, Shiffler warns that without arms control frameworks, proliferation of these weapons may erode both nuclear and conventional strategic balances. But the growing momentum behind hypersonics has met stiff resistance from skeptics, such as David Wright and Cameron Tracy, who argue in a March 2024 article for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists that the systems offer little advantage over legacy missiles. They cite intense heating and aerodynamic drag during low-altitude flight as limiting factors that degrade speed, range and survivability. Unlike ballistic missiles, which briefly heat during reentry, boost-glide vehicles face sustained thermal stress during their glide phase—up to 30 minutes—making faster, longer-range designs difficult. They need large rocket boosters and emit bright infrared signatures, making them visible to early-warning satellites despite claims of stealth. Wright and Tracy contend that the technology suffers from fundamental design compromises and may be more about optics than operational advantage. Shawn Rostker echoes this skepticism in a February 2025 RealClear Defense article, where he critiques the growing political pressure in the US to match Chinese and Russian hypersonic deployments. Rostker argues that recent calls for expanded hypersonic funding rest on inflated threat assessments and that many technical hurdles remain unresolved. He states that both glide vehicles and cruise-type hypersonics lack a compelling strategic rationale beyond symbolic parity. Despite the limited operational success of China's DF-ZF or Russia's Tsirkon, Avangard and Kinzhal, their existence fuels anxiety in Washington, creating a momentum that may not be justified by battlefield utility. Rostker warns that absent clear strategic value, hypersonics risk becoming expensive distractions rather than game-changing deterrents. Yet China's response indicates that it takes these developments seriously. Veerle Nouwens and others, in a January 2024 report for the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), state that Chinese analysts view US plans to deploy land-based missiles across the First and Second Island Chains as a direct threat to China's strategic mobility and posture. According to Nouwens and others, Beijing sees these forward deployments as a deliberate effort to undermine its A2/AD systems and target inland facilities. In response, Chinese strategists anticipate a surge in their land-based missile deployments—including conventional and nuclear systems—to break out of perceived encirclement. Nouwens and others caution that such dynamics risk spiraling into a full-blown arms competition and destabilizing the region's already fragile security architecture. That concern has deepened with a June 2025 report by Kyle Balzer and Dan Blumenthal for the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) think tank showing that Chinese strategists now view these long-range precision missile deployments as existential threats to China's regional deterrence and national survival. They say Chinese analysts believe these systems could enable decapitation strikes on the PLA Rocket Force (PLARF) in a crisis, prompting accelerated efforts to modernize the force. This line of effort includes expanding mobile and silo-based platforms to ensure mission survivability and retaliatory capability. Balzer and Blumenthal argue that this shift reflects a broader consensus in China that survivable, land-based nuclear forces are vital to counter US denial strategies and preserve credible deterrence. The US bet on forward-deployed hypersonics aims to fracture China's A2/AD bubbles before they harden—but the payoff hinges on credibility, not just capability. As China accelerates countermeasures, the strategic equation is shifting toward a high-stakes contest of precision, survivability and political will.
AsiaOne
18-05-2025
- AsiaOne
Mexican security forces kill 12, arrest 9 in raid on alleged gang site, World News
MEXICO CITY - Mexican security forces detained nine alleged members of a criminal group and killed 12 others in an operation in a rural part of southwestern Mexico on Saturday (May 17), Mexico's Security Ministry said. In a post on social media, Security Minister Omar Harfuch confirmed three members of the Navy were injured in the Navy-led operation in Huitzontla, Michoacan. The detained individuals are linked to crimes such as homicide, extortion, and kidnapping, Harfuch said. Criminal groups in the area are tied to maritime drug trafficking and naval personnel found weapons and tactical equipment at the site, the Security Ministry said in a statement. Security forces came up against "strong aggression" which "necessitated the use of force in compliance with current regulations," the ministry said. Mexican newspapers El Universal and La Jornada reported that the group was part of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel gang, one of Mexico's two major drug cartels. The US government designated the cartel a terrorist organisation in February. ALSO READ: In Mexico, first outrage, then victim blaming over murdered TikTok influencer
Straits Times
17-05-2025
- Straits Times
Mexican security forces kill 12, arrest 9 in raid on alleged gang site
MEXICO CITY - Mexican security forces detained nine alleged members of a criminal group and killed 12 others in an operation in a rural part of southwestern Mexico on Saturday, Mexico's Security Ministry said. In a post on social media, Security Minister Omar Harfuch confirmed three members of the Navy were injured in the Navy-led operation in Huitzontla, Michoacan. The detained individuals are linked to crimes such as homicide, extortion, and kidnapping, Harfuch said. Criminal groups in the area are tied to maritime drug trafficking and naval personnel found weapons and tactical equipment at the site, the Security Ministry said in a statement. Security forces came up against "strong aggression" which "necessitated the use of force in compliance with current regulations," the ministry said. Mexican newspapers El Universal and La Jornada reported that the group was part of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel gang, one of Mexico's two major drug cartels. The U.S. government designated the cartel a terrorist organization in February. REUTERS Join ST's Telegram channel and get the latest breaking news delivered to you.
The Star
17-05-2025
- The Star
Mexican security forces kill 12, arrest 9 in raid on alleged gang site
MEXICO CITY (Reuters) -Mexican security forces detained nine alleged members of a criminal group and killed 12 others in an operation in a rural part of southwestern Mexico on Saturday, Mexico's Security Ministry said. In a post on social media, Security Minister Omar Harfuch confirmed three members of the Navy were injured in the Navy-led operation in Huitzontla, Michoacan. The detained individuals are linked to crimes such as homicide, extortion, and kidnapping, Harfuch said. Criminal groups in the area are tied to maritime drug trafficking and naval personnel found weapons and tactical equipment at the site, the Security Ministry said in a statement. Security forces came up against "strong aggression" which "necessitated the use of force in compliance with current regulations," the ministry said. Mexican newspapers El Universal and La Jornada reported that the group was part of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel gang, one of Mexico's two major drug cartels. The U.S. government designated the cartel a terrorist organization in February. (Reporting by Brendan O'Boyle and Jose Gonzalez; Editing by Sandra Maler)
Telegraph
21-02-2025
- Politics
- Telegraph
Germany takes the fight to Russia in undersea cable war
It was once considered a joke army, so poorly equipped that its soldiers turned up for Nato training exercises with broomsticks for machine guns. But Stephan Haisch, a rear admiral in the Bundeswehr, Germany's armed forces, says those days are over. As Germany prepares for an election on Sunday, with defence a hot-button issue, it is also taking the lead in a new Nato mission to defend the Baltic Sea from Russian sabotage. Rear-Adml Haisch is the commander of Task Force Baltic (CTF), a German Navy-led Nato headquarters that opened last October in Rostock, on the country's northern Baltic coast. His task: to survey and, if necessary, board suspicious ships which may be involved in Russian attempts to cut critical cables on the Baltic seabed. 'Germany is ready and willing to take on responsibility for the Baltic Sea, and is establishing itself as a strong partner,' Rear-Adml Haisch told The Telegraph. He batted-away suggestions that Germany has been reluctant to take on a bigger role in defending Europe since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
