Faster, more precise and much cheaper than a cruise missile: this is the challenge that the US Army wants to take on with the help of a hypersonic shell, intended to equip its 155 mm tubes.
The war in Ukraine has shown the decisive role of medium and long-range ground-to-surface artillery, while the concept of air superiority seems increasingly inaccessible to air forces, including the most advanced.
It is in this context that the US Army has launched several programs to catch up in this area traditionally entrusted to combat aviation, by equipping itself with Tomahawk and SM-6 cruise missiles integrated into the MRC system in 2022, and the new precision ballistic missile Strike Missile PrSM in 2023, as well as the hypersonic missile Long Range Hypersonic Weapon from 2025.
However, after the failure of the XM1299 ERCA artillery program, the US Army found itself without a high-performance solution to deal with medium-sized targets in the range from 50 to 150 km. This is where the new hypersonic shell currently under development must come into play.
In this section:
The US Navy's AGS, LRLAP and HPV programs
After almost 20 years of asymmetrical engagements in Afghanistan and Iraq, the US Army has seen its medium-range artillery and strike resources heavily eroded, while at the same time, Russia, and especially China, have developed new, high-performance systems, such as the Chinese DF-17 surface-to-surface hypersonic missile.
There is therefore an urgent need for the US Army to catch up in this area, and perhaps regain the operational and technological advantage over the Russian and Chinese armies in this regard. Several programs have been launched for this in recent years, including the PrSM missile, successor to the ATACMS, the MRC system for launching cruise missiles, and the LRHW hypersonic missile.
In the case of the hypersonic artillery shell, the US Army can rely on several previous programs, including the Advanced Gun System, or AGS, and its Long Range Land Attack Projectile shell, or LRLAP, and the Hyper-Velocity Projectile shell, or HPV, developed as part of the Rail Gun program, all developed for the US Navy.
The AGS is a 155mm artillery system designed from 2007 to 2016 to arm Zumwalt-class destroyers. Each of the two artillery pieces was to fire an LRLAP shell every two seconds at a distance of nearly 150 km, to support the dismounted troops with great precision.
The HPV shell was developed as part of the US Navy's electric cannon, or rail gun, program. The shell had to support a muzzle exit speed greater than Mach 7, and maintain a hypersonic speed during a gliding phase taking it up to 150 km.
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