US Navy

Named the railgun, the weapon in question represents a paradigm shift in ballistic technology.

Instead of using gunpowder and explosive charges to shoot a shell from its barrel, it employs vast amounts of electromagnetic energy to zoom a projectile along a set of copper-alloy rails.

Thanks to four small fins on its rear, the hefty round can then be guided toward a moving object — such as an enemy ship, drone or incoming ballistic missile — relying purely on the kinetic energy from its vast momentum to destroy the target.

And they must be operating more closely with the navy's Japan-based Seventh Fleet to focus on areas with the “greatest instability”.

In two recent speeches that received little media attention, US Pacific Fleet commander Admiral Scott Swift questioned the need for an administrative boundary running along the International Date Line to demarcate operations for the Seventh Fleet in the western Pacific and the Third Fleet to the east.