US Navy Unveils Next-Generation Warship Plan With Hypersonic Missiles, Lasers - USNI

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 13th January, 2022) The US Navy has unveiled its proposed design for a next-generation destroyer-class - DDG(X) - warship deploying hypersonic missile and laser weapons, the US Naval Institute (USNI) reported.

The design is the largest and most ambitious one for any surface warship that the Navy has proposed in more than two decades, the report acknowledged, the report said. The previous Zumwalt DDG class was widely criticized and ultimately only three out of an original 32 planned were ever completed and put into service.

The new vessels will be equipped with combat systems developed from the existing Flight III Arleigh Burke-class missile destroyers that carry SPY-6 air search radar and the Baseline 10 Aegis combat system, the report said.

However, the new ships will replace the old gas-turbine propulsion systems of the Arleigh Burkes for the Integrated Power Systems on the troubled Zumwalt class of guided missile destroyers, the report added.

Ideally, they are supposed to generate up to 50 megawatts of power - to energize 600-kilowatt combat lasers and new sensors, according to the report.