[Mariner]

They are like bullets with terminal guidance.

And much faster. But they slow rapidly in the atmosphere...in 10s of miles they are no longer hypersonic. Sometimes they even disintegrate.

That said, I don’t think anyone has developed a broadly deployable weapon system for fixed targets yet, much less so the Chinese brag on hitting moving ships with one.

[sparklite2]

If it’s true they are not ballistic, but powered all the way like a Mach 5 cruise missile, their propulsion system must be awesome.

[Tallguy]

“...much less so the Chinese brag on hitting moving ships with one.”

I’ve always been skeptical of using large ballistic missiles to target ships. leaving aside the difficulty in getting real-time targeting data (a pretty daunting task), the real problems are quickly calculating the trajectory and distinguishing that ballistic missile from a Nuke. IOW’s the Chinese take a shot at one of our CBG’s and quickly draw a salvo of Minuteman III’s in response. Even if ballistic carrier-killers make tactical sense, they are a strategic disaster.

[sparklite2]

the Chinese brag on hitting moving ships with one.

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At the Battle of Midway, the US tried bombing the Japanese attack fleet from altitude. Out of 621 bombs dropped the number of bombs to hit anything but water was ... zero.