{"id":52042,"date":"2021-10-27T18:14:29","date_gmt":"2021-10-27T18:14:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/uncategorized\/2021\/10\/27\/gen-milley-calls-chinese-weapon-test-very-concerning\/"},"modified":"2026-08-20T16:07:22","modified_gmt":"2026-08-20T16:07:22","slug":"gen-milley-calls-chinese-weapon-test-very-concerning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/pentagon\/2021\/10\/27\/gen-milley-calls-chinese-weapon-test-very-concerning\/","title":{"rendered":"Gen. Milley calls Chinese weapon test \u2018very concerning\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 China recently conducted a \u201cvery concerning\u201d test<\/a> of a hypersonic weapon system as part of its aggressive advance in space and military technologies, the top U.S. military officer says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was the first Pentagon official to confirm on the record the nature of a test this year by the Chinese military that the Financial Times had reported<\/a> was a nuclear-capable hypersonic weapon that was launched into space and orbited the Earth before re-entering the atmosphere and gliding toward its target in China.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Milley said he could not discuss details because aspects involved classified intelligence. He said the United States also is working on hypersonic weapons<\/a>, whose key features include flight trajectory, speed and maneuverability that make them capable of evading early warning systems that are part of U.S. missile defenses. The U.S. has not conducted a hypersonic weapon test of the sort Milley said China had achieved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat we saw was a very significant event of a test of a hypersonic weapon system, and it is very concerning,\u201d Milley said on \u201cThe David Rubenstein Show: Peer-to-Peer Conversations\u201d on Bloomberg Television.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think I saw in some of the newspapers, they used the term Sputnik moment,\u201d he added. \u201cI don\u2019t know if it\u2019s quite a Sputnik moment, but I think it\u2019s very close to that. So it\u2019s a very significant technological event that occurred, or test that occurred, by the Chinese. And it has all of our attention.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The launch of a Sputnik satellite by the Soviet Union in 1957 stunned the world and fed U.S. fears that it was falling behind technologically in an accelerating arms race in the early stages of the nuclear age.<\/p>\n\n\n\t