China’s hypersonic missile test represents one of the most significant militaristic global shifts in decades, according to Gen. Mark Milley.
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who previously said the test nearly amounted to another “Sputnik moment,” expanded on his concern for what the test means for the military alignment during the Aspen Security Forum on Wednesday.
“We’re witnessing one of the largest shifts in global geostrategic power that the world has witnessed. It only happens once in a while, and it’s not stand-alone. It’s happening within what I would call an operating environment,” he explained.
The test in itself is one thing, but the “much broader picture” of China’s growing military capabilities is “very, very significant,” the chairman continued. “In terms of a fundamental change in the character of work, what we’re seeing today is a fundamental change and that only happens — the last time that happened was between the World Wars with the introduction of the airplane.”
The Financial Times reported last month that China had “tested a nuclear-capable hypersonic missile” that “circled the globe before speeding towards its target, demonstrating an advanced space capabilities that caught U.S. intelligence by surprise,” citing unnamed sources “briefed on the intelligence.”
While the Pentagon has remained tight-lipped about the test, speaking only in general terms about the military race with China, Milley referred to it last week as “a very significant event of a test of a hypersonic weapon system. And it is very concerning.”
China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Zhao Lijian rejected the report days later, saying that the test, which occurred in August, was “a spacecraft, not a missile.
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“This test was a routine spacecraft experiment to verify the reusable technology of spacecraft, which is of great significance for reducing the cost of spacecraft use,” the Chinese spokesman claimed.
