A few days ago, the United States Army (U.S. Army) accidentally released new images of one of its new Dark Eagle hypersonic missile systems. In the series of photographs—later deleted from the DVIDS platform, though not before going viral on social media—the unloading and stowage of the system from a Roll-on/Roll-off (Ro-Ro) type vessel could be seen, as well as its subsequent transport and deployment in a wooded location that has not yet been confirmed by Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) sources.
Known as Dark Eagle, and also referred to as the Long-Range Hypersonic Weapon (LRHW), it is a hypersonic missile launch system capable of reaching speeds of up to Mach 5 and striking targets at distances of up to 1,725 miles (2,776 kilometers). It also has the ability to maneuver along an erratic trajectory in order to complicate the work of enemy air defenses, after achieving optimal speed and altitude thanks to the two-stage booster rocket that propels the All-Up-Round (AUR) missiles carried in the launcher’s containers.
However, the Dark Eagle hypersonic missile system has been involved in a series of controversies for some time. In February 2025, the Pentagon expressed doubts about the lethality of the U.S. Army’s new system, following a report published in 2024 by the Office of the Director, Operational Test and Evaluation (DOT&E).
Nevertheless, beyond the concerns raised by official auditing and oversight bodies, in December of last year the U.S. Army announced that it had activated its second unit specialized in the use and employment of the Dark Eagle system: Bravo Battery, 1st Battalion, 17th Field Artillery Regiment, which is part of the 3rd Multi-Domain Task Force.
This development was added to a series of activities carried out throughout 2025 aimed at advancing its introduction into service, as well as deepening personnel familiarization with the operation and employment of the hypersonic missile system. This was demonstrated during Exercise Talisman Sabre 2025, which marked the first operational deployment of Dark Eagle in Australian territory, seeking to become a strategically valuable asset for United States Armed Forces deployed in the Indo-Pacific and a deterrent tool for foreign policy aimed at containing China’s military expansion into new regions, particularly that of China.
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