U.S. defence contracts $756m with Lockheed for untested missile

The U.S. Department of Defense announced signing a contract worth $756 million with Lockheed Martin, reports the Defense Express portal. The company has already received the first funds for the Dark Eagle hypersonic missile, but there is one issue: This weapon has never been successfully launched during tests.

Lockheed Martin has already received the first instalment of funds from the U.S. authorities, amounting to $275.3 million. He will continue working on the modern Long-Range Hypersonic Weapon (LRHW) Dark Eagle until the end of February 2028. Along with the LRHW, Americans will receive engineering and logistical support.

Defense Express, however, points out one "paradoxical point" of this purchase. The U.S. military has ordered the long-range hypersonic weapon Dark Eagle, which has never been successfully launched. Deployment of the LRHW into service has been postponed indefinitely precisely because the equipment has never passed tests with a positive result.

The most recent test of Dark Eagle was supposed to take place in November at the end of last year, but exercises were terminated at the preparation stage, so the missile was not launched. However, the launcher itself was reportedly fully operational, which allowed the Pentagon to purchase the LRHW as a “reserve,” improving the missile during production so that the entire complex would be operational in the coming years.

Defense Express explains that the LRHW Dark Eagle, a weapon that no other country besides the U.S. possesses, is a mysterious system. At this time, it is known that the producer of Dark Eagle claims a maximum missile speed of 4.9 Ma, or over 5,955 km/h (rounded), and its range exceeds 2,995 km (rounded). The weight of the fired ammunition is 7,394 kg (rounded), and its reported diameter is just under 0.9 metres (rounded), although this has not been officially confirmed. The weight of the warhead carried by Dark Eagle is also unknown.