Designing Hypersonics for Scale

The introduction of ballistic missiles fundamentally altered warfare by expanding the geography of the battlefield. Today hypersonic glide units—unpowered warheads launched by rocket boosters to speeds exceeding Mach 5—are extending existing geographical boundaries with enhanced predictability and maneuverability.  

According to Johnathon Caldwell, Lockheed Martin vice president and general manager of strategic and missile defense systems, understanding how a hypersonic glide body (HGB) functions is essential to appreciating the military advantages it can deliver. 

A traditional ballistic missile follows an unalterable arching path through space, and because its trajectory is predictable, it is increasingly targetable by modern defense systems, he explained. But a hypersonic glide vehicle, launched via rocket booster into the high atmosphere, relies on unpowered, aerodynamically guided, high-speed atmospheric flight to evade conventional ballistic missile defense systems, skipping along the upper atmosphere and maneuvering midflight, making interception significantly more difficult and providing extended system range. 

“An HGB is an offensive strike weapon designed to penetrate enemy air defenses, rather than a system used to defend U.S. air space,” Caldwell said, noting that the next generation glide body (NxGB) design introduced by Lockheed Martin improves performance, maneuverability, and survivability due to its shape, which he attributed to his company’s many decades of experience in hypersonic system design.  

The NxGB overcomes the thermal structural degradation, signal attenuation, radar signature, and integration limits of older designs by integrating advanced, proprietary high-temperature and low-observable composite materials, adaptive control surfaces, and a modular payload bay to sustain superior maneuverability at extreme Mach numbers, he explained.  

The NxGB expands precision strike options in highly contested environments by combining multi-domain launch flexibility with superior range and velocity. Because it can be launched via multiple land and sea platforms—specifically naval surface vessels, submarines, and mobile land launchers—it provides an adaptable defense architecture that allows the military to field the same core technology across different services to meet diverse operational needs. 

“This cross-platform flexibility means our forces can rapidly project power from whichever domain offers the greatest tactical advantage, ensuring seamless cross-service interoperability without requiring platform-specific logistical supply chains,” Caldwell said. In addition to the ability to launch from dispersed platforms with greater standoff decreases the likelihood of enemy detection and platform loss. “This is critically important because it significantly reduces risk to deployed U.S. forces,” he said. 
 

Ensuring cost-effective manufacturability 

The new design not only overcomes technical hurdles related to hypersonic strikes, Caldwell said, its modular structure allows for seamless insertion of advanced technologies/capabilities as more come online in the future.  

“One of the critical design considerations was high-volume affordability,” he explained. “NxGB was designed affordability and producibility as well as performance, following a comprehensive Design for X (cost, producibility, manufacturability, etc.) approach embedded in the investment.”  

According to Caldwell, the NxGB represents a paradigm shift because it employed a “manufacturing-first” approach and a modular open systems approach from its inception, which transitions the program away from slow, hand-built prototypes toward a standardized architecture optimized for mass production.  

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“While specific production timelines and acceleration percentages remain proprietary, this manufacturing strategy is vital to moving from highly customized, limited annual outputs to the rapid, large-scale weapon inventories needed to sustain long-range deterrence,” he said. 

To meet strict quality standards, all core engineering, component integration, and mass-production scaling for NxGB are performed entirely within the United States in purpose-built manufacturing hubs, advanced digital factories, and approved suppliers. 
 

Qualifying the design 

The design has undergone preliminary review, which Caldwell described as “a rigorous technical assessment where independent Lockheed Martin subject matter experts and engineering fellows from across the entire enterprise evaluate the complete design package—including structures, avionics, manufacturability, and cost—to objectively verify that the underlying architecture and manufacturing plans mitigate risk before certifying a go/no-go status to proceed to detailed design.” 

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While exact operational schedules are classified, Caldwell said the company is systematically advancing toward a highly anticipated flight-validation demonstration targeted for late 2027. 

These flight tests are vitally important because they make it possible to gather real-world aerodynamic, thermal, structural, and guidance data. “This includes critical empirical insights on boundary-layer transition, real-time thermal protection wear, actual aerodynamic coefficients, guidance algorithms and avionics performance, which in-house design teams use to directly validate computational fluid dynamics and performance models and refine scalable, high-volume production processes,” Caldwell explained. 
 

Laying the foundation for new designs 

The development approach for NxGB demonstrates how cost and performance can be achieved and new technologies can move from concept to production.  

Lockheed Martin is advancing technologies within its digital factories and leveraging modularity in its designs to facilitate rapid, large-scale production. Caldwell shared that the company has the flexibility to adapt its architecture to increased quantities, new launch configurations, alternative booster stacks, and the incorporation of AI and other autonomy-driven technologies to support mission flexibility.

“We are committed to an American-made Arsenal of Freedom vision, and we also stand ready to support future government-led international transfers and allied modernization,” Caldwell said. 

Judy Murray is an independent writer in Houston.