BEIJING/HONG KONG, July 30 (Reuters) - China's state media has hinted at the wider deployment of one of its most closely watched weapons, ‌the YJ-20 hypersonic anti-ship missile. The missile is known to have been deployed on its large Type-055 cruisers, but the footage marks the first time it has been seen on a Type 052 vessel, ‌the Global Times reported. The Global Times noted that the missile was "cold launched" vertically — ejected from its launcher before its engine ignited. A hypersonic weapon can travel at Mach 5, or ‌five times the speed of sound, ​a factor that makes ​it difficult for even advanced militaries to counter. "China has the world's leading hypersonic missile arsenal and continued to advance the development of conventional ​and nuclear-armed hypersonic missile ‌technologies during the past year," the Pentagon said in its annual assessment ​of China's military modernization, released in December.