Kathmandu,

July 19,

The United States has successfully tested a Raytheon Technologies Corp air-breathing hypersonic weapon capable of speeds faster than five times the speed of sound, making it the third successful test of that class of weapon since 2013, the Pentagon said in a statement on Monday.

It would seem America’s hypersonic efforts are beginning to hit their stride.

There has been a lot of discussion about a hypersonic arms race between Russia, China, and the United States in recent years, with each nation devoting a great deal of money and effort toward fielding these high-speed weapons. While weapons that achieve hypersonic velocities (speeds above Mach 5) are nothing new, these modern hypersonic missiles couple extreme speeds with maneuverability, making them exceedingly difficult to intercept with existing technology.