The superpower has announced the “Glide Breaker” program, a defence system to stop hypersonic weapons after they have been launched.
It comes in response to Russian president Vladimir Putin’s repeated threats that the country has developed weapons that can reach anywhere in the world without being tracked by anti-missile systems.
The aim of the research by the Defence Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) is to “develop and demonstrate technologies to enable defence against hypersonic systems”.
And the groundbreaking program would be a “powerful new capability” at a time when China and Russia are accelerating their development of high-speed weapons, a defence expert has claimed.
Speaking to Daily Star Online, Steve Trimble, defence editor of Aviation Week magazine, said: “If a hypersonic weapon can be successfully fielded, it would be a powerful new capability that should, in theory, be very difficult to intercept or defeat.”
Mr Trimble added: “China and Russia have been quite public about their rapid and rather unexpected progress in the area of developing and potentially fielding new hypersonic weapons.
“Since 2011, the US, Russia and China have each claimed to have staged multiple tests of hypersonic vehicles that could be used as weapons.”
The new program comes as Russia and China continue to develop hypersonic weapons.
Tensions soared last month as Russia joined forces with China to carry out its biggest military exercise since the Cold War, with about 300,000 troops taking part in Vostok-2018 in eastern Siberia.
Some 3,200 Chinese troops, as well as military vehicles and aircraft, were involved in the war games.
The exercises – the biggest Russia has staged since 1981 – further strained relations between Mr Putin and the west.
Dmitri Trenin, a former Russian army colonel and director of the Carnegie Moscow Center think tank, said: “With its Vostok 2018 exercise Russia sends a message that it regards the US as a potential enemy and China as a potential ally.
“China, by sending a PLA element to train with the Russians, is signalling that US pressure is pushing it towards much closer military cooperation with Moscow.”