DARPA (Project Falcon)

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and the United States Air Force (USAF) are seeking contractors to build an unmanned hypersonic aircraft capable of reaching any point on the world map in about two hours. Though initially a creature of war, such an aircraft could eventually serve as a springboard into space, developing technology that could lead to a single-stage-to-orbit spacecraft



www.space.com...

Roughly two years later, an update of sorts:

The Falcon technology would "free the US military from reliance on forward basing to enable it to react promptly and decisively to destabilising or threatening actions by hostile countries and terrorist organisations", according to the Darpa invitation for bids. The ultimate goal would be a "reusable hypersonic cruise vehicle (HCV) ... capable of taking off from a conventional military runway and striking targets 9,000 nautical miles distant in less than two hours".

The unmanned HCV would carry a payload of up to 12,000 lbs and could ultimately fly at speeds of up to 10 times the speed of sound, according to Daniel Goure, a military analyst at the Lexington Institute in Washington.

Propelling a warhead of that size at those speeds poses serious technological challenges and Darpa estimates it will take more than 20 years to develop.

US-based missiles to have global reach: Allies to become less important as new generation of weapons enables America to strike anywhere from its own territory





seekerof

The dude who created PayPal and then made millions selling it to eBay, started his own space agency and was responsible for Spaceship One, has also received a contact to develop a prototype [missile].
Funny, huh?
Read about this months ago.. I dont have any links so search if interested.
Pentagon wants the ability to destroy any target with any kind of warhead within 24 hours of receiving confirmation of a target, all from the continental US. I havent read the above articles just what I read a while back so sorry if repeat info. Fun stuff.

[edit on 26-4-2005 by apc]

Why dont they just get the guy from Virgin Airlines ??

Here's the article on that:

PayPal Missile Article

[edit on 5/8/2005 by darwinman1]