USAF Future Bomber

[buglerbilly]

Pentagon eyes range of weapons, not single bomber

Thu Jan 21, 2010 12:15pm EST

* Looking at portfolio of weapons, not a single new bomber

* More challenges to strike mission than ever before

By Andrea Shalal-Esa

WASHINGTON, Jan 21 (Reuters) - The Pentagon is looking at several different weapons rather than one iconic bomber to improve its long-range strike capability, Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn said on Thursday.

The Pentagon plans to spend about $4 billion during the next five years to maintain the U.S. industrial base, study plans for a new bomber and upgrade existing B-2 and B-52 bombers, budget documents obtained by Reuters show.

Northrop Grumman Corp (NOC.N), which built the B-2 bomber, Boeing Co (BA.N), which built the B-52 Stratofortress and Lockheed Martin Corp (LMT.N) are watching for any news on the bomber. They are keen to compete for new orders at a time when the Pentagon is developing fewer new weapons.

Lynn declined to comment on the Pentagon's budget proposal for fiscal year 2011, which will be released on Feb. 1, but told military and industry officials that the United States' ability to confront threats deep in enemy territory was "more fraught with challenges that it has (been) in memory."

"It's a critical capability, particularly as we look at addressing anti-access strategies of potential adversaries," Lynn told Reuters after a speech to a military conference. "We need to make sure that we have the capabilities in place that will defend our interests and our allies."

Lynn said the department thinks that a single new bomber would not meet the military's needs.

"So we will be maturing a portfolio of capabilities, manned and unmanned, penetrating and standoff, ballistic and cruise missile," he told the conference hosted by the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis and Tufts University.

The Air Force had largely addressed questions raised by Defense Secretary Robert Gates about the proposed development program, Air Force Chief of Staff General Norton Schwartz told reporters at the conference.

Gates likely would establish "certain, very finite parameters on that program when and if it is ultimately endorsed by his team," Schwartz said.

The process likely would result in development of a new airplane over the next decade, but it would not be a platform capable of addressing the full mission, he said.

"It might not have all the capabilities that you would embed in a single platform to do that whole mission all by itself," Schwartz said.

"Part of this will involve a commitment to a family of systems that are more interdependent and mutually supportive than we have looked at ... previously," he said.

The new approach would require a formal analysis of alternatives, which could start shortly after fiscal year 2011, Schwartz said.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal-Esa. Editing by Robert MacMillan)

[buglerbilly]

Ares

A Defense Technology Blog

Real Money for a Next-Gen Bomber

Posted by Amy Butler at 2/1/2010 6:23 PM CST

The Fiscal 2011 budget request from the Pentagon certainly lacks detail on a direction to take for the USAF's next-generation bomber. But, it isn't lacking in money.

The budget request includes about $200 million for sustainment of the industrial base -- primarily for contractor work supporting low-observable technologies.

This will likely go to two teams -- Northrop Grumman and Boeing/Lockheed Martin. The two have been postured for a bomber competition, which has yet to materialize.

Pentagon Under Secretary for Policy Michele Flournoy says the "real money" will follow in Fiscal 2012. But, in the meantime, the Pentagon will continue with more studies of what is needed -- manned vs. unmanned/conventional vs. nuke/ range/payload. Apparently, all of the studies to date are silent on what is really needed.

[buglerbilly]

Danger Room What’s Next in National Security Air Force’s Zombie Bomber, Back from the Grave



By Nathan Hodge February 2, 2010 | 11:30 am

Last year, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates schwacked the Air Force’s plans to develop a new stealth bomber that would enter service in 2018. Now, it looks like the spirit of Gen. Curtis “bombs away” LeMay lives on: Over the next five years, the Pentagon will be pouring $4 billion into “long-range strike” options, including a next-generation bomber.

In a press conference yesterday, Gates said the newly unveiled Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) renewed emphasis on the military’s need to counter “disruptive, high-tech capabilities” developed by future adversaries. Nuclear weapons have long been the primary deterrent against such threats, but the Defense Department also wants non-nuclear options for reaching targets over long distances, and on very short notice.

Gates said investment in a next-gen bomber would be part of a $4 billion package that would also include the development of a conventional, global strike capability – perhaps based on land, or launched from submarines. Briefing reporters after the unveiling of the QDR, Pentagon policy chief Michele Flournoy said the whole thing would begin with a study of options, but cash might start flowing into development as early as Fiscal Year 2012.

“One of the insights that came out of this QDR was that we needed to take a much more in-depth look at the full range of capabilities for long-range ISR [intelligence surveillance reconnaissance] and precision-strike, and the whole question of a follow-on strategic bomber,” Flournoy said. “And so one of the things we decided in the QDR is that we weren’t ready to make definitive long-term programmatic decisions; that we wanted to make some investments that would keep technological opportunities going, but we wanted to take some time to get this right and to study it in much more depth. So you will see that study ongoing this coming year, with the aim of putting real dollars into the program in — starting in ‘12.”

Equipping submarines with new, longer-range conventional missiles might be part of the menu of options. Vice Adm. Steve Stanley, director, force structure, resources and assessment on the Joint Staff, said the department was “considering whether or not submarine-based, initial strike would be appropriate.”

Prompt global strike, Stanley said, was “principally about deterrence.” But nukes, he added, “play a role still. Our ability to defeat ballistic missiles, the ballistic-missile defense capabilities of this department, play a role in deterrence. So all of those things taken together give us a deterrent posture that we can deter an adversary.”

Of course, none of this should be particularly surprising to Danger Room readers. As we noted earlier, the Pentagon has plenty of what we called “zombie weapons projects“: Programs that get terminated, yet never really go away. Last year, for instance, Air Force thinkers forwarded a number of ideas for saving the next-gen bomber, including something called a nuclear-dedicated unmanned combat aerial vehicle, or ND-UCAV, a robotic plane that might be based on the Navy’s X-47B carrier-capable drone, pictured here.

Refitting subs with conventionally-armed Trident missiles for some hot global strike action is another one of those ideas that refuses to go away. Sounds like a nice, practical idea, right? Well, Noah has written extensively about the risks of modifying Tridents for the global strike mission — and the enormous controversy the idea has generated. As he noted, making it easier for the president to launch a (conventional) intercontinental ballistic missile attack is not necessarily a good thing. That’s why Congress has blocked or severely restricted the conventional Trident program, over and over again.

For starters, you had better be sure that no one mistakes it for a nuclear attack. And your intel needs to be rock-solid. “Our ability to nail down that kind of quality information is patchy, at best,” he wrote in Popular Mechanics. “On March 19, 2003, the United States launched 40 cruise missiles at three locations outside Baghdad in hopes of killing Saddam Hussein and other senior military officials. It turned out the former Iraqi leader wasn’t in any of the locations; the strikes killed at least a dozen people, although it’s not clear if they were civilians or leadership targets.”

[PHOTO: Guy Norris/ARES]

[buglerbilly]

Boeing, Lockheed Put Bomber Partnership on Ice

By JOHN REED

Published: 1 Mar 2010 16:53

Boeing today announced that the company's partnership with rival Lockheed Martin to develop a next-generation bomber has been suspended, with limited likelihood for revival.

"The teaming agreement now is on hold until we understand where the government is headed" with the next-generation bomber program, said Darryl Davis, president of Boeing's secretive Phantom Works division, during a March 1 telephone call with reporters to discuss the company's new Phantom Ray stealth drone.

Such a move would likely lead to competition between Boeing, Lockheed and Northrop Grumman if the Pentagon decides to move ahead with building a new bomber.

The two defense giants had pooled their resources to develop mission studies and a road map and share technologies that both were developing for a next-generation strike plane.

Now, "I'm not sure that the agreement will endure; at this point, the jury is still out as to what we're going to do" with long-range strike, Davis said. "The government, in the day and age we're in, probably wants more competition, not less."

Last year, Defense Secretary Robert Gates put the Next Generation Bomber program on indefinite hold so that the Defense Department could study the need for such an aircraft.

Davis said that he has not heard when or if the long-range bomber program will be restarted, nor who will receive the $200 million requested by the Pentagon in the 2011 budget to continue studies.

Phantom Ray is Boeing's internal effort to maintain the skills necessary to develop a high-end, stealthy UAV with relatively long range that can penetrate advanced air defenses and perform missions ranging from strike and electronic warfare to intelligence collection, Davis said.

"One of our big concerns is that, at some point in time, will we end up forgetting those things we've learned over many development programs and have to relearn them when a new program starts," he said. "From where I sit in Phantom Works today, there are no new start [strike] airplanes in development today."

Technologies developed for the fighter-sized Phantom Ray could easily be scaled up to fit a long-range bomber type aircraft, should the Pentagon decide to move forward with such a program, he said.

The plane, derived from Boeing's X-45 aircraft that was built for the now-canceled Joint Unmanned Combat Air System program, is being designed to have a combat radius of 1,000 nautical miles and be capable of carrying two 2,000-pound Joint Direct Attack Munitions or other weapons in its internal weapons bays, Davis said.

The jet could also carry synthetic aperture radars or electro optical-infrared cameras in the weapons bays. It would be able to autonomously refuel and execute its missions, he said.

Boeing plans to conduct taxi tests for the airplane this July, followed by a first flight from NASA's Dryden research facility at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., in December.

[buglerbilly]

Interesting counter-point to the USAF slowdown...........

With new fighter in hand, Putin wants modern bombers

MOSCOW

Mon Mar 1, 2010 2:56pm EST

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Once it has completed work on its own fifth-generation fighter, Russia must proceed with designing a brand-new nuclear-capable strategic bomber, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said on Monday.

"Certainly, we should not confine ourselves to developing just one new model. After the fifth-generation fighter jet, we must think and get down to work on a next-generation, long-range aviation complex -- our new strategic missile carrier," Putin told a cabinet meeting on Russia's military-industrial complex. After the demise of the Soviet Union, Russia inherited a fleet of the still formidable but fast-aging Tupolev Tu-95MS turbo-prop strategic bombers and missile platforms codenamed "Bears" by NATO.

It also has a much smaller fleet of the more modern, supersonic Tupolev Tu-160 "Blackjack" jet bombers, the world's biggest warplanes built so far.

Russia test-flew its long-awaited stealth fighter at the end of January, presenting it as Moscow's first all-new warplane since the 1991 Soviet collapse and a challenge to the technological supremacy of Cold War foe the United States which rolled out its fifth-generation fighter more than a decade ago.

Putin, then president, ordered in 2007 to resume Soviet-style patrols of Russian bombers around the globe, seeing it as a way of boosting Moscow's stature in the world.

(Reporting by Gleb Bryanski; Writing by Dmitry Solovyov; Editing by Charles Dick)

[buglerbilly]

Ares

A Defense Technology Blog

A Lockheed/Boeing Breakup Over Bomber?

Posted by Amy Butler at 3/1/2010 1:51 PM CST

Just over two years since Lockheed Martin and Boeing announced a marriage of convenience over the U.S. Air Force's nebulous plans for a next-generation bomber, there are signs of strife.

"The jury is still out on what we will do [and I'm] not sure the agreement will endure," said Darryl Davis, president of Boeing Phantom Works, which is the company's advanced systems powerhouse.

The agreement is in a "stasis mode," he said in a March 1 teleconference with reporters about the company's Phantom Ray demonstrator, which is slated for first flight in December.

The teaming was announced in January 2008, when the Air Force had an idea of what it wanted its bomber to look like -- likely manned, subsonic and penetrating with roughly 2,000 naut. mi. range. But, an acquisition program never got off the ground, making some wonder why the two companies so aggressively signed the agreement. At the time, it was thought Northrop Grumman was the leader with the Navy-funded X-47 in development under its belt. Now, however, we know that Lockheed Martin Skunk Works had the RQ-170, which has seen operations allegedly in Afghanistan and South Korea, up its secret sleeve.

But, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has since quashed the Air Force's bomber plans, and the clock has been reset in moving forward with a bomber. As a sign of some progress, after a lack of funding in Fiscal 2010, the Pentagon has at least requested $200 million for the industrial base in Fiscal 2011.

In the meantime, perhaps Boeing has gotten a hunger to prime for the next-gen bomber competition that is hopefully on the horizon. "Absolutely, we think we can prime and win," Davis said.

While actively contributing to the teaming agreement, Boeing and Lockheed collaborated on configuration studies, technology road maps and had crafted plans for joint investment if a program arose. But alas ... the holding pattern ensued.

On the subject of the RQ-170, Davis simply said he was "fascinated by that," adding that "We are a much cleaner airplane" in the X-45C.

[buglerbilly]

DoD: Next 'Bomber' May Be a Family of Systems

By JOHN T. BENNETT

Published: 29 Mar 2010 16:22

The U.S. Defense Department is examining how to fit "complementary" tools on the "family of systems" that would replace a long-range bomber concept terminated last year, Pentagon acquisition chief Ashton Carter said March 29.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates in April 2009 canceled a years-long effort to establish requirements and a formal development program for a new long-range bomber. Gates felt the department needed to stop that work, which was led by the Air Force, and begin a new look at how the U.S. military could best fulfill all the missions envisioned for a new deep-penetrating bomber.

After months of examining, Pentagon officials in recent months have said they expect to replace the former long-range strike aircraft concept with a "family of systems," each designed to conduct specific kinds of missions. Speaking to an industry audience in Arlington, Va., Carter said it is likely that the platforms will be designed to do tasks deemed "complementary" to one another.

Then-Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Michael Moseley in the mid-2000s used terms like long-range strike and persistent ISR when describing the service's mission requirements for a new bomber aircraft. Carter used the same phrases in his National Aeronautics Association presentation and added two more to things the "family of systems" will do: "prompt global strike and electronic attack."

The former refers to a next-generation weapon that can be launched quickly to take out fleeting targets anywhere around the globe; the latter refers to offensive and defense missions like jamming enemy signals.

Although Carter said officials "are still thinking through" what the family of platforms will have to look like, he said some of them likely will be "dual-use."

For instance, an aircraft designed for electronic attack missions also could be armed with complimentary jamming equipment, he said. And a long-range strike aircraft could be fitted with sophisticated ISR sensors.

Some of the family's platforms, Carter said, will be "stand-off systems" while others would be "stand-in." And some will be "reusable" where others "could be expendable."

The Pentagon's senior acquisition, technology and logistics official also said that, as Pentagon officials decide how to move forward with the family of systems concept, they will factor in industrial base implications.

Officials "have to keep in mind," he said, "that if certain capabilities [within U.S. defense firms are] allowed to whither, it will be hard to replicate them."

Carter added that the Pentagon "has a special responsibility to segments of industry," and promised DoD officials that, as part of the family of systems program, the department "will be looking at all the contributions each segment can make."

[buglerbilly]

“Next-Gen Bomber” Really Dead; New Long-Range Strike Aircraft Design by OSD



The 2006 QDR called for the Air Force to develop a next generation bomber to be ready by 2018; an initiative that promptly went nowhere. Now, the very term “next generation bomber” is “dead” in the halls of the Pentagon, reports John Tirpak, citing comments made yesterday by Air Force Lt. Gen. Philip Breedlove, deputy chief of staff for operations, plans, and requirements.

Breedlove says what is being discussed is something much smaller than the NGB would have been, and though stealthy, it will not be designed to penetrate dense SAM belts like the NGB. It will be more of a “utility infielder” for a family of strike platforms under consideration.

There is a “lively debate” going on at the Pentagon regarding long range strike and penetrating platform cost (very high) versus the cost of enemy guided missile defenses and battle networks (very low). Importantly, Breedlove said that for the first time, requirements for a major aircraft are not coming from Air Combat Command, but are coming down from OSD.

– Greg Grant

Read more: http://defensetech.org/#ixzz0rv4u66zE
Defense.org

[buglerbilly]

Leader says future bomber won’t go solo

By Bruce Rolfsen - Staff writer

Posted : Saturday Jul 10, 2010 9:29:44 EDT

The aircraft that replaces today’s bombers will be less expensive, more versatile and rely on a network of support that the stand-alone B-2s, B-52s and B-1s can get along without, the Air Force’s deputy chief of staff for operations and requirements said.

Air Force officials are steering the decade-long debate over the next-generation bomber away from the idea of upgrading the B-2 Spirit and more toward a network of aircraft working together to provide bombing, reconnaissance and electronic warfare.

“The next-generation bomber is a term that is dead in the Department of Defense and dead in the Air Force,” Lt. Gen. Philip Breedlove said at a June 24 briefing.

A long-range strike “family” would draw upon the stealthiness of the F-22 or the F-35 tactical fighters to help destroy a target. It also could use Air Force and Navy intercontinental ballistic missiles — such as the Minuteman and Trident — or equipped conventional warheads and long-range missiles launched from airplanes, Breedlove said.

The long-range strike aircraft must also be ready to fly conventional attack missions like those flown by the B-1B Lancer and B-52H Stratofortress over Iraq and Afghanistan.

“This aircraft will not be about a single mission to take out a single target,” Breedlove said.

Budget concerns drive much of the discussions.

During the Cold War, when money was less of an issue, the idea was to create a single model of plane able to penetrate enemy airspace, protect itself, perform its reconnaissance, finalize targeting, strike the target and fly to safety.

“Those systems tend to be big and tend to be expensive,” Breedlove said.

The price tag for the B-2 was about $1.2 billion each in 1998 dollars, according to the Air Force

Spending a billion-plus for a single plane no longer seems feasible.

“The real debate going on in the department now is ... how much can our nation afford?” Breedlove said. “How much of our nation’s wealth are we willing to put against those targets which our opponents are making very, very, very expensive to strike?”

Those targets include deeply buried bunkers and complexes far inside sophisticated anti-aircraft defense.

The cost savings for a long-range strike network would come from using capabilities already paid for in other aircraft, instead of building them into a new plane.

Building a smaller aircraft would also keep costs down, but that will depend on the size of the weapons the plane will carry, Breedlove said.

Only the B-2 bomber can carry today’s largest guided bomb — the 21-foot-long, 30,000-pound Massive Ordnance Penetrator. Two of the bombs fit on the B-2.

Breedlove said he hopes the Air Force will, 15 years from now, have a smaller deep-penetration bomb, a warhead that won’t have to be flown by a four-engine jet.

Breedlove said he envisions a manned aircraft, not one flown by remote control as suggested.

“My personal opinion is that, if we’re going to build a platform that carries a nuclear weapon, we’re going to have a man inside the platform,” the career fighter pilot said.

The main problem is fielding a reliable satellite communications system for the unmanned plane that could not be hacked.

“I don’t think our nation can afford that constellation of satellite,” Breedlove said.

Plans for a long-range strike aircraft are continually debated within the Air Force. A decade ago, a bomber “white paper” called for fielding a new bomber around 2024, about the time B-1Bs and B-2s would begin wearing out.

Air Force leaders considered a hypersonic plane that skirted the edge of space before arriving above its target, but that idea lost traction when the Air Force decided it needed a new bomber by 2018. Air Force officials agreed that to meet such a tight schedule the bomber would have to use existing technology.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates nixed the bomber plan in 2009 as part of a larger review of weapons projects. But concerns about being able to attack hard-to-reach targets prompted new discussions of long-range strike and development money in the proposed 2011 budget.

[buglerbilly]

Pentagon Bomber Evolution Underway

Sep 2, 2010



By Bill Sweetman
Washington

The latest analysis of future long-range strike needs by the Pentagon will be submitted in time for its recommendations to be reflected in the Fiscal 2012 budget.

Few people, least of all advocates of an active, nonvintage bomber fleet, expect exciting news. Service-centric politics, a joint-service construct under which ground forces heavily influence the study and pressure on procurement budgets (from overruns in the Joint Strike Fighter program) will result in modest recommendations.

The most likely include the endorsement of a long-range, nonnuclear ballistic missile capability, although the time*scale and budget remain uncertain. The conventional prompt global strike (CPGS) concept is a favorite of Marine Corps Gen. James Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs.

Expect some backing but little money for two other concepts: a joint-service, long-range cruise missile, launched from Virginia-class submarines and B-52s, and the Navy’s Unmanned Combat Air Vehicle (UCAV-N), which may be termed a means of extending the range of a carrier air group. Both systems may be linked to another joint-service study defining a future “air-sea battle” and focused on matching China’s growing power in the Western Pacific.

As for a future USAF bomber, conventional wisdom—i.e., views acceptable to Cartwright and Defense Secretary Robert Gates—is that the idea merits study, over and above several dozen studies carried out in the past decade. In June, Lt. Gen. Philip Breedlove, Air Force deputy chief of staff for operations, plans and requirements, was quoted as saying the word “bomber” can no longer be spoken in the Pentagon and requirements “trickling down from the highest levels” call for a much smaller aircraft. Some sources believe Cartwright is pushing the idea of a USAF variant of UCAV-N.

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz and Secretary Michael Donley have not taken up the cause of a new bomber. The only four-star to support the bomber has been Strategic Command leader Gen. Kevin Chilton.

With little high-level support, bomber advocates are doing what they have done before: changing the name to “reconnaissance-strike.” Lt. Gen. David Deptula, in his last press briefing before retirement, reiterated his view that intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and attack missions are no longer separate. A penetrating ISR platform that cannot be armed makes little sense.

Industry and service studies of a new ISR and strike platform appear to be converging, driven by technological developments, likely operational requirements and fiscal realism.

Technologically, one factor that has arisen in the past few years is the successful demonstration of extremely low-observable (ELO) technology, with wideband, all-aspect signature reductions of -40 to -50 dB. or more, under one or more covert test programs. One step in this process may have been Boeing’s Bird of Prey demonstrator, with a radar cross section (RCS) so small that visual signatures became dominant. A consultant on that project was stealth pioneer Denys Overholser, who has been involved with projects envisioning RCS levels to -70 dB.—the size of a mosquito.

ELO mandates an all-wing or blended-wing body and tailless, subsonic configuration with buried engines. Advances in the computational analysis of the complicated airflows over such shapes improve aerodynamic efficiency and permit simpler inlet and exhaust systems, putting unrefueled ranges of 5,000 nm. within reach for a “demi-B-2”-sized aircraft. Northrop Grumman mentions an unrefueled range of 5,600 nm. for UCAV-N, with new engines based on advanced commercial cores.

The demonstration of reliable, long-endurance, autonomous operations is important. Many bomber advocates agree that a new ISR/strike aircraft should be optionally piloted. If it acquires a nuclear mission, a crew is likely to be mandatory, and crewing would ease mixed-use airspace concerns. On the other hand, the aircraft would be inherently capable of operations beyond human endurance, and an unmanned mode could avoid sending crews beyond the reach of search-and-rescue assets.

Northrop Grumman concepts for an advanced unmanned ISR/strike system list a range of autonomous functions—threat awareness and avoidance, electronic and lethal countermeasures, and cooperative defense. Onboard sensor fusion and target recognition would be combined with the ability to match imagery with terrain, passing high-grade target information to other assets.

Bomber advocates are monitoring laser weapons in the 100-kw.-class, considered adequate to kill an incoming missile. Combined with ELO, this could give a bomber the ability to survive against current and projected threats.

A survivable aircraft with a large and diverse payload has advantages. It can prosecute targets of uncertain location, and its range is a hedge against antiaccess and area-denial strategies. Unlike the smaller UCAV, it carries a mix of weapons.

The biggest challenge to the bomber is price. Procurement cost in the $500-million range is likely, equivalent to 4-5 JSFs, but carrying 4-5 times the warload five times farther. The total investment in a force of 100 new bombers would be about the same as the cost of replacing Trident submarines. But, as enthusiasts suggest, the bombers would deliver similar or greater longevity and more flexibility.

Concept: Josef Gatial

[buglerbilly]

USAF Secretary: New Bomber Critical for the U.S.

By JOHN REED

Published: 13 Sep 2010 12:21

U.S. Air Force Secretary Michael Donley made the case September 13 for the service to buy its first new bomber in decades, calling a next-generation long-range strike jet a "critical national capability."

The secretary went on to say that any new bomber will be developed, at first, with a focus on the conventional long-range strike mission - where it is most likely to be needed - and will rely on existing technologies in order to help keep costs down.

He went on to hint that the airplane will likely be purchased in greater numbers that the roughly 20 B-2 stealth bombers bought in the 1990s and that the new jets will serve for 30 years or more.

Earlier this month, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz said the service hopes to finalize what it wants to see in the new stealth plane in time for the 2012 budget submission. Schwartz said that it will likely be "optionally manned," and will likely be focused first on conventional strike with the option to be certified later for nuclear missions.

[buglerbilly]

U.S. Needs New Long-Range Bomber: Analyst

By WILLIAM MATTHEWS

Published: 14 Sep 2010 16:55

The United States needs a new long-range bomber, concludes the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments in a study released Sept. 14.

The new plane should be "optionally manned," stealthy, able to fly at least 4,000 nautical miles before refueling, be hardened against nuclear blasts for nuclear strikes, and able to carry at least 20,000 pounds of munitions, the think tank asserts.

The findings aren't surprising. CSBA has long been pushing the idea that the U.S. needs a new long-range bomber - or at least some sort of new long-range strike capability.

The same day that CSBA senior fellow Mark Gunzinger was unveiling the study findings to a gathering of congressional staffers, the chief of the Air Force, Gen. Norton Schwartz, was also talking up the need for a new bomber at a nearby air power convention.

In its 2011 budget request, the Defense Department asked Congress for $200 million to begin a new begin planning for a new bomber and to maintain the industrial base so it can eventually be built.

Gunzinger said a new bomber is needed because the current fleet of bombers is aging - there are 20 B-2 whose average age is 16, the 50 B-1s average 23 years old and 54 B-52 are on average 48.

But the aging bomber fleet is only one problem that makes a new bomber necessary, Gunzinger said. Increasingly, potential enemies have learned how to counter current U.S. military capabilities.

Long-range weapons being developed by potential adversaries may deny the United States access to air and sea space. Targets are being made mobile, are being moved far into the interior of countries out of the range of short-range U.S. bombers, and are being substantially hardened to withstand U.S. weapons such as cruise missiles, Gunzinger said.

However, a key question is cost, Gunzinger concedes. Here are his estimates:

■ A 100,000-pound plane able to carry 20,000 pounds of bombs would cost $36 billion for 50 planes and $46 billion for 100. That includes development costs.

■ A larger 126,000-pound plane that could carry 40,000 pounds of munitions would cost $44 billion for 50 planes and $56 billion for 100.

Gunzinger's study comes a week after a CSBA budget analysis concluded that the U.S. defense budget, now about $726 billion a year, may shrink to $450 billion a year over the next decade or so.

[buglerbilly]

USAF Needs New Long-range Bomber: Schwartz

By JOHN REED

Published: 14 Sep 2010 16:07

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. - U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz made the case Sept. 14 for his service acquiring a new long-range bomber and increasing cooperation with the U.S. Navy, insisting that such steps are key to the Air Force's ability to find and destroy 21st-century threats.

"The future will call for at least as much if not more deterrence" capability than the service currently wields, said Schwartz, discussing the future of the service during a speech at an Air Force Association-sponsored conference here.

Speaking of the bomber, Schwartz called for a low-cost, flexible family of systems that can meet many possible needs, from precision strikes in an asymmetric environment to full-scale bombing campaigns against heavily defended airspace, centered on a "penetrating bomber." His speech marks the first time a service official has publicly said that a new bomber is at the core of the so-called "family of systems" the service has been discussing since Defense Secretary Robert Gates canceled the Air Force's Next Generation Bomber program in 2009.

Schwartz said the aircraft will be designed to be easily upgraded as technologies and threats evolve over its decades in service, even saying that it was being "preplanned" to receive modifications similar to the way the B-52 and B-1 strategic bombers have been equipped with targeting pods for performing precision-strike and ISR missions in Afghanistan.

He noted that the plane will not be a "lone wolf" that finds targets, performs electronic warfare, drops bombs and performs battle-damage assessments, but remained adamant that it will work with both current and new technologies, including those used by the U.S. Navy for long-range strikes.

Schwartz also pushed the Air Force to institutionalize the thinking of the Air-Sea Battle concept - from the way it buys weapons to how it develops tactics, techniques and procedures - that is being hashed out by the Air Force and Navy as a way to combine resources in a time of shrinking budgets to fight enemies equipped with sophisticated air defenses and area-denial systems designed to threaten forward U.S. air bases and even aircraft carriers. He described the Navy as the "other strategic service."

[buglerbilly]

Ares

A Defense Technology Blog

New USAF Strike Command Out of the Loop on LRS?

Posted by Amy Butler at 11/9/2010 10:59 AM CST

Lt. Gen. Frank Klotz, who oversees the new U.S. Air Force Global Strike Command, says his new organization is not involved in the day-to-day management of the requirements and operational concepts for a new bomber.

This is unusual. Typically, major commands (MAJCOMS) provide
inputs on requirements to the Air Staff at the Pentagon, whcih then hands vets them through the leadership process and hands them off to the acquisition corps. For example, Air Combat Command drove requirements for the F-22.

"Most of the work on Long-Range Strike and the follow-on is taking place within this city," Klotz told reporters during a Nov. 9 Defense Writers' Group in Washington. ""I'm down there in Barksdale AFB, Louisiana, and i'm just not in the planning that is going on in the Pentagon."

Klotz says the command's near-term focus is on managing the nuclear stockpile and sustaining the B-52 fleet until 2040 and the B-2 fleet until 2060. "We are a brand new command. A year ago we had 47 people in that headquarters," Klotz said. "Now we are a full up headquarters and we have a full up programming and requirements [function], and I suspect we will be more involved in this process as time goes on."

Air Force headquarters officials at headquarters in the Pentagon were unable to say following the Klotz breakfast who there is heading up the effort for requierments and concept development.

These comments d potentially point out that this program is really coming out of Washington. Perhaps this is because Pentagon leadership doesn't trust the USAF to handle procuring an aircraft of this type after the runaway cost of the F-22 and procurement missteps with KC-X. Perhaps it is a personality quirk of Gates to have the bomber under close watch.

But, clearly the way ahead for the bomber is thorny at best and could face as many or more future political hurdles than technical ones.

[buglerbilly]

Industry Looks To New Bomber For Design Work

Jan 28, 2011

By Graham Warwick
Washington



Where is the next combat aircraft? Domestic and export orders will keep U.S. and European production lines running through the middle of the decade. But development work is diminishing and design teams dissipating, and the gap between new programs stretches out.

The U.S. Air Force and Navy have begun requirements definition and technology development for “sixth-generation” air dominance aircraft, notionally aimed at service entry in 2025-30. But despite Russia, and now China, unveiling F-22-class stealth fighters, U.S. budget pressures are likely rule out any significant funding before 2015.

Russia’s Sukhoi T-50 entered flight testing in December 2009 and is targeted for entry into service around 2015. The Chengdu J-20 made its first flight on Jan. 11 and China has talked of a fighter becoming operational in 2017-19, so it is clear that U.S. stealth aircraft could face peer threats by 2020.

But even if the U.S. launches a next-generation *fighter program soon after 2015, the 15-year spans from flying competitive prototypes to initial operational capability for both the F-22 and F-35 make a 2030 in-service date look doubtful.

Meanwhile, F-22 production is wrapping up and while the F-15E and F/A-18E/F (and possibly F-16) lines will continue through 2015 and the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program still plans production beyond 2030, the growing issue for industry is the lack of design and development work. The only near-term prospect is the family of long-range strike systems the U.S. Air Force is looking at to replace its planned next-generation bomber program, which was suspended in 2009. While the system is likely to include new strike weapons for existing platforms, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates this month said the Air Force will invest in a new long-range, nuclear-capable penetrating bomber.

Funding to begin the program is expected in the Pentagon’s Fiscal 2012 budget request, to be unveiled in February. Gates says the aircraft, which will have the option of being remotely piloted, will be designed and developed using proven technologies to ensure it can be delivered on schedule and in the quantity required.

Since the original next-generation bomber plan was shelved, the long-range strike program has been undergoing an intensive cost scrub within the Pentagon. This critical look at the design requirements driving cost is similar to the process that is en route to reducing the price tag on the Navy’s SSBN(X) next-generation ballistic missile by 35% from initial estimates.

The result could be a platform optimized for extremely low observability, potentially with optionally manned capability, but using technology from aircraft like the F-35 where it makes sense and saves money. This could include avionics and engines. For industry, that could mean a scaled-back design and development effort compared to previous bomber programs.

Aside from a new bomber, potential platform design and development opportunities are limited to possible next-generation unmanned aircraft, including the Air Force’s planned MQ-X Predator/Reaper replacement and a carrier-based UAV for the Navy. The scope and timing of these programs is far from clear, but more detail may come with the 2012 budget request.

Photo: Boeing

[buglerbilly]

DSB Chief: Block Buys Best for Bombers

By John Reed Wednesday, February 9th, 2011 1:42 pm



In an age where threats are evolving extremely rapidly while defense budgets are shrinking, something must be done about the 20 year development cycle for high-end weapons systems, according to Defense Science Board Chairman and CEO of Technovation, Inc., Paul Kaminsky. One of the best ways to do this, is by pursuing the block approach to weapons buying, said Kaminsky.

“We just can’t afford cycle times of 20 years for new systems,” said Kaminsky during a breakfast with reporters in Washington.“We have to look much harder, I believe, at block buys of equipment with planned upgrades for those blocks, and the cycle times for those blocks and the block upgrades is going to be dependant on the missions; it’s going to be different for strategic bombers than it would be for equipment that’s used to defeat IEDs. Or, even more extreme, it’s going to be different than what we have to do to work in the cyber environment. So, we have to have a system where the [upgrade] cycle times are compatible with that kind of an arrangement.”

Kaminsky served as the Pentagon’s top weapons buyer in the 1990s.

A block approach would not only dramatically lower costs and reduce risk by spreading out development times for the most gee-whiz tech intended for a weapon system while making sure it gets fielded on time, it would also offer acquisition staff badly needed management experience on each of the block upgrade programs.

“To do this well though, requires a lot of discipline, because the first tendency is, ‘we want to put everything in the first block’,” said Kaminsky. “You have to resist that. You have to reserve what goes into the first block to what has earned its way on to the system and what is sufficiently mature to be able to be integrated.”

He also defended the block approach from attacks that say that it inhibits competition, saying that there can be numerous competitions for the various subsystems required for block upgrade approaches.

Kaminsky highlighted the Air Force’s effort to field a new long range stealth bomber as a perfect example of a weapon system that can be built with block upgrades, an approach he said will allow it to remain relevant in the face of a changing threat environment.

Even simpler than a block approach, Kaminsky suggested that the aircraft be designed from the outset to accommodate changing missions. For example, the jet could be designed with the ability to accept changing hardpoints, giving it the ability to carry additional weapons, sensors or electronic warfare gear during unforseen future missions where stealthiness isn’t critical.

The former weapons czar also called for a dramatic increase in the amount of time the Pentagon spends preparing to fight in so-called, degraded combat environments. (Meaning, combat situations where cyber, communications, navigations, logistics or any other critical capabilities have been taken away from U.S. troops.)

While the Marines and some special operations forces are well prepared for this at the small unit level, the larger military is not as well prepared as it needs to be at the strategic and operational level to fight in a degraded environment, said Kaminsky.

Read more: http://www.dodbuzz.com/2011/02/09/dsb-chief-block-buys-best-for-bombers/#ixzz1DVY0AYrn

[buglerbilly]

Ares

A Defense Technology Blog

New Bomber In New Budget Still A Long-Shot

Posted by David A. Fulghum at 2/11/2011 12:47 PM CST

It appears that planning for an advanced long-range strike and reconnaissance aircraft will remain rudimentary for a while.

Finding the necessary “funding needed to get to a meaningful down-select is still an open question,” says Paul Kaminski, former Pentagon acquisition chief and current chairman of the Defense Science Board. “That’s one of the things I’m looking for in the [new defense] budget. From what I know about the technology so far, I don’t see the supersonic requirement and capability in the early block.”

The U.S. Air Force is faced with rationalizing its investment in a new, long-range, bomber-reconnaissance aircraft while struggling under the burdens of tightening defense spending and a high-priority F-35 strike-fighter program that continues to drop behind schedule and add costs. Moreover, there are an number of major uncertainties about the new bomber program. Will it be supersonic, optionally manned or hardened against nuclear-weapon-generated, electro-magnetic pulses?

Kaminski is an advocate of breaking large, complicated programs into pieces -- block upgrades. That strategy allows an elemental version of a new aircraft – the F-117, for example – to fly earlier that with a monolithic program structure that demands everything be in place before an operational debut. The F-117 operated and finally retired without a radar that was initially considered imperative. The block upgrade strategy pays benefits in managing risk by letting immature technologies wait for a later block.

“There also has to be confidence that there will be a block two so you can reserve judgment about what [technologies are] ready to be integrated,” Kaminski says. “If the requirements are generated by an operator that doesn’t have that confidence, the developers will try to put everything into block 1. [Instead,] you can look at different subsystem approaches and decide later, based on performance and maturity, the best way to the next block.”

Kaminski identifies several important issues for the next bomber.

“One has to do with open systems that have the capability to handle block upgrades,” he says. “You have to develop architectures with lots of flexibility. Something else that will help will be very aggressive red and blue teaming [looking for flaws and problem areas] and strategies for hedging and reacting to changes in the environment and the threat. You want diversity of systems so you need to think about families [of technology].”

Another key will be leaving room for enhancements.

“There may be some extensive useful things that can be done with an open hardware architecture to add, update or modify features,” Kaminski says. In building a stealthy aircraft, for example, “you would want to look seriously at the inclusion of hard points that would provide not only suitable structural properties to hold external stores – weapons, electronic warfare, surveillance devices – but recognize the [the need to avoid permanent] compromises in signature and to retain operational flexibility [when those less-stealthy components are removed].

“Also, [these external payloads] may require some communications, power and cooling provisions,” he says. “Building those things in after the fact is sometimes pretty hard to do. Making provisions for them early on is important so that you can decide later on whether to add them when the operational advantages become clear.”

Electronic hardening of the bomber for a nuclear mission is another problem for planners.

“How can you test that hardening?” Kaminski asks. “We have lost some of the country’s testing capabilities. That’s something you need to think about in advance.”

[buglerbilly]

Why So Long for New Bomber?

By John Reed Monday, February 14th, 2011 5:29 pm



The Pentagon said today it will take until the mid 202os to field a new fleet of 80 to 100 bombers built using existing technology. If the Air Force is not going to use dramatically improved technologies, which usually take a decade or so to perfect, why will it take so long?

Well, it all comes down to money and making really fancy existing technology all work together, according to several experts.

Teal Group aviation analyst Richard Aboulafia says: “Finding the resources to create a new airframe, or series of airframes, is tough given competing priorities [such as the F-35 and the Air Force’s new Long Range Bomber] and the overall budget environment.”

“Technical maturation is also an issue,” said Aboulafia who pointed out the amount of time it has taken to develop the F-35 even though it has been in development since the mid-1990s. “Just because we have the building blocks today doesn’t mean that we can create the fortress overnight,” said Aboulafia.

Former Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne, who was a champion of the new bomber program before Defense Secretary Robert Gates put it on hold in 2009, added that the main challenge to fielding such a jet won’t be developing the technology. The real challenge will be integrating it onto the jet. In other words, making sure today’s most high tech engines, avionics and sensors all work well together.

Perhaps most challenging will be hardening the plane for nuclear missions, “we haven’t nuclear hardened an airplane in a while,” said Wynne. All of this means that it will likely take until the middle of this decade to get a test plane flying, noted Wynne. This means it will take several more years of flight testing which means the first production variants will start to be built toward the end of the decade.

Most importantly, the Pentagon must stick to the idea to gradually improve the new bomber in a block or spiral manner, said the former secretary. Sticking to such plans “has been a little bit of an issue,” said Wynne referring to the Air Force’s move to cap the F-22 Raptor and B-2 bomber buys at numbers far lower than originally planned. If the Pentagon fails to stick with a plan to flied the plane in technology blocks, our next bomber will be based on technology that exists today rather than technology that gets developed in the coming years, he said.

But the Lexington Institute’s Loren Thompson isn’t convinced that building a new bomber using existing technologies (regardless of whether you’re using a block approach) is the best idea.

“This is just the latest evidence that the Pentagon takes way too long to field new equipment,” said Thompson. “If the technologies are mature today, they will be outdated by the time they reach the field using our baroque acquisition process.” Perhaps that will make the Chinese happy?

Read more: http://www.dodbuzz.com/2011/02/14/why-so-long-for-new-bomber/#ixzz1DyhruNNw

[buglerbilly]

USAF to Industry: Bomber Must Be Affordable

By DAVE MAJUMDAR

Published: 16 Feb 2011 22:15

The U.S Air Force will not purchase the Long Range Strike family of systems, which includes a new optionally manned penetrating stealth bomber, if it is not affordable, a senior service official warned industry on Feb. 16.

"If it is not affordable, we're not going to buy it, and it's going to just fall off the wayside like it has at a different time two years ago," Maj. Gen. David Scott, director of operational capability requirements, told an aerospace and defense conference hosted by Aviation Week.

What the Air Force is not looking for is a "Battlestar Galactica," of which the service can afford only one, he said. The Air Force needs a plane it can buy in numbers, Scott emphasized.

"We can not price ourselves out of a next generation penetrating bomber," he said. The service hopes to purchase between 80 and 100 planes.

Further, he added that the service would not explain many of the details of the new program. Those details would remain "highly classified," he said.

However, Scott said the aircraft would have "trade space" for future upgrades. Over the course of the production run, the bomber would be incrementally upgraded to keep it on par technologically to defeat emerging threats. Despite this, the aircraft would not be built in Blocks, Scott said......................EDITED.................. .

Read more: http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?i=5731145&c=AME&s=TOP

[buglerbilly]

Ares

A Defense Technology Blog

A Quick Look At The USAF's New Bomber Requirements

Posted by David A. Fulghum at 2/18/2011 1:32 PM CST

The Pentagon’s next bomber will protect itself against enemy aircraft and air- or ground-launched missiles with an electronic attack weapon, probably based on an active, electronically scanned array (AESA) that can produce effects at the speed of light around the battlespace.

Moreover, that device or a supplemental AESA will also likely serve as a long-range, anti-electronic weapon and possibly as a network invasion weapon to disable or spook air defense surveillance, network integration and communications systems.

Or the bomber could coordinate the use of these capabilities installed on supporting aircraft, unmanned systems or missiles.

“The purpose of this aircraft is to survive in an Anti-Access Area Denial [A2AD] environment,” says Maj. Gen. David Scott, U.S. Air Force deputy chief of staff for operations, plans and requirements. “ Part of the requirements will be self defense. Do I think AESA is a valid technology that the Air Force will look at on all offensive platforms? I do. Do I think that airborne electronic attack is a valid defensive system that we will need on all future A2AD platforms? You bet.”

The bomber segment of the Long Range Strike family of systems has yet to be defined, much less designed, but clues are accumulating about what the U.S. Air Force is asking for.

It needs less than a day’s endurance, it has to be stealthy, it must be able to carry weapons both internally and externally, it will likely have a large active electronically scanned array for radar surveillance and some sort of associated capability for defensive electronic attack of enemy aircraft and air- or ground-launched missiles.

There will eventually be 80-100 of them as part of the total of 150 bombers operated by the U.S. Air Force. Of these, 90 will be combat coded. Initial operations of the first unit are slated for 2024-26. The aircraft will be expected to operate for about 50 years. It’s missions will include electronic attack (which means a long-range weapons capability against electronic systems) strike and command and control.

Under the Long Range Strike (LRS) program, “You have a platform – the next bomber we’re going to build, a stand off missile that we’re working on right now and Conventional Prompt Global Strike that we’re still trying to figure out,” says Maj. Gen. David Scott, deputy chief of staff for operations, planning and requirements. “It includes the [Navy’s] conventional Trident missile and things that the Air Force is working very closely with such as the hypersonic test vehicle.

A major component of LRS is “some kind of penetrating airborne electronic attack, persistent surveillance and reconnaissance and command and control that works all [those pieces] in an Anti-Access Area Denied [A2AD] environment,” Scott says. “What that gives those of us in the joint world is a national asset to hold any target in the world at risk.”

A key part of the bomber's design – that also is expected to keep cost down – is an “open hardware architecture” that will let payloads be slipped in and out of the aircraft to tailor it for various missions.

Moreover, “as technology enables it, we will work the maturity level of the bomber,” he says. “F-35 has some outstanding capability that we can leverage with this system [including AESA, electronic attack and infrared or electronic surveillance]. We will have trade space available to let us mature this aircraft because its going to be around for 50 years.

The electronic attack and jamming capability being developed for the new bomber will not be the Navy’s Next Generation Jammer [NGJ], but it will be related to and compatible with it.

“We are working with the Navy on NJG,” Scott says. “That doesn’t mean we’re going to employ it on our aircraft.”

The services will work together to ensure the electro-magnetic spectrum is covered from the high to low ends. So far, the EC-130 Compass Call and some of the pods on the Predators operate in low-end conflict environments and counter-IED operations. The next generation pods will tackle the mid-level to contested regimes.

“The F-22 and F-35 have AESA capability on board [that can be used for electronic attack],” he says. “The miniature air-launched decoy (Mald) and Mald-Jammer are the kind of things that we look at for the high-end [conflict].

“We do some pretty neat [defensive electronic attack] things with the B-2, and we’ll try to improve that as we work it through [new] survivability issues,” Scott says. “We will work distributed electronic attack on this aircraft and Mald and Mald-J are prime examples of that. We’re [already] working through what increment two of Mald-J will be.”

The bomber is supposed to use existing technologies so odds are that the aircraft will be subsonic. It also is supposed to be optionally manned.

“Today we have remotely manned – Predator and Reaper – and autonomous – Global Hawk,” he says. “ We’re very good in the unmanned world. What we have to figure out is the concept of operations. This is not an aircraft that is going to be persistent for days. We would like it to persist like we currently do with other platforms. It’s going to go in, do the mission and come back out.”

The Air Force bomber will be air-refuelable and there is the possibility that the Navy’s planned carrier-capable, unmanned strike aircraft will be as well.

[buglerbilly]

New Stealth Bomber Could Control Drones, Fire Lasers, Bust Bunkers

By David Axe February 22, 2011 | 1:00 pm



The Air Force’s new stealth bomber might do more than just drop bombs, top generals said in recent days. The so-called “Long-Range Strike” plane — likely to be designated B-3 — could also carry bunker-busting, rocket-boosted munitions, high-powered lasers for self-defense and datalinks, and consoles for controlling radar-evading drones.

These add-ons, described by Air Force generals Philip Breedlove, William Fraser and David Scott, are meant to make the new bomber more lethal and harder to shoot down, even in the face of rapidly-modernizing air defenses such as China’s. “The purpose of this aircraft is to survive in an Anti-Access Area Denial environment,”Scott said, using the latest Pentagon term for defended airspace.

To that end, the bomber’s lasers might zap incoming missiles and fighters; the drones could fly ahead to scout and disable air-defense radars; the bunker-busters should ensure the bomber can actually destroy the enemy’s facilities once it breaks through the defenses.

With just $3.7 billion budgeted over the next five years to develop the bomber, lasers, bunker-busters, and drone-controls might seem unaffordable. And risky, considering the Air Force has said it must stick with “proven” technologies to keep the new bomber on-budget.

In fact, the bomber and its enhancements could be surprisingly far along the development process. The airframe itself might already be flying in prototype form, according to an investigation by ace reporter Bill Sweetman. Each of the add-on capabilities already exists, too, though not all in the same aircraft.

For years, the Air Force has been working on a chemical laser installed in the fuselage of a 747 freighter and fired from a turret mounted to the airliner’s nose. The Airborne Laser was originally meant for a combat role intercepting ballistic missiles, but in 2009 Secretary of Defense Robert Gates downgraded it to a strictly test asset, citing its high cost, short firing range and vulnerability. Future military lasers will dispense with the chemicals in favor of solid crystals, potentially making them much smaller, safer and more reliable. That’s the kind of laser we can expect to see on the new bomber.

Bunker-busting bombs have been around since World War II. In their modern form, they date back to the 1991 Gulf War. Today’s 5,000-pound GBU-28 bunker-buster can be carried by the F-15E and by bombers. For more deeply-buried targets, the Pentagon is working on the 30,000-pound Massive Ordnance Penetrator, which is so big only the B-2 and B-52 can haul it.

To save on cost, the new bomber will be smaller and therefore carry less ordnance than the B-2. MOP probably won’t fit. Noting that penetrating-capability is a function of mass and velocity, the Air Force Research Laboratories is working on a rocket-boosted bunker-buster that would be a fraction of the MOP’s size while being just as lethal against underground targets.

Drone controls might seem the most futuristic of the new bomber’s enhancements, but in many ways they’re the farthest along in development. Boeing is installing datalinks and consoles for robot-control in its new “Block III” Apache helicopters. Last fall, the Air Force demonstrated it could control Scan Eagle drones from inside an airborne E-3 radar plane.

And in 2009, the Air Force started fitting B-52s and F-16s with the Raytheon-built Miniature Air-Launched Decoy, a missile-size drone that can spoof or jam enemy radars. The current decoy model is autonomous — you fire it and forget about it — but Raytheon has offered to install a datalink allowing the decoy to “talk” to the launching plane. Refined a bit further, the same technology could be applied to the new bomber’s scout drones.

It’s not clear if these scout drone will be new designs or something already in service. Our money’s on an existing drone. In any event, there will be two different scout bots associated with the new bomber, according to Breedlove. These “utility infielders,” as Breedlove called them, must be “very stealthy” and capable of a range of missions, from radar-jamming to network-hacking and spying.

In an event, the add-ons don’t all have to be ready before the bomber’s scheduled debut in the mid-2020s. The Air Force wants to field the 100-or-so bombers in “spirals” — that is, small batches of increasing sophistication. The first models might not have bunker-busters, lasers or drone controls. Those systems would be inserted as soon as they’re ready — and as soon as the Air Force can afford them.

Art: Northrop Grumman

[ARH v.3.1]

...according to an investigation by ace reporter Bill Sweetman.

I have obviously missed something once again...:shrug

[buglerbilly]

I have obviously missed something once again...:shrug

You tell people, repeatedly and often, what a grand chappie you are and how stupid the Plebs are, and enough arrogant, ignorant cun#s will believe you.

Easy really............

[buglerbilly]

Air Force Hopes to Buy 80 to 100 Next Gen Bombers

By John Reed Wednesday, March 30th, 2011 1:58 pm



The Air Force will buy between 80 to 100 of its future stealth bombers that are expected to come online in the mid 2020s, Air Force Secretary Michael Donley told lawmakers today.

“Between 80 and 100 is the target, this program is very much focused on affordability and poised for technical success,” said Donley during a Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee hearing this morning. This is a significant reduction from reports earlier this year that hinted at a 175-plane buy.

He then gave a little more insight into how the airplane will develop when he revealed that the tech used in the plane will come largely from other programs. We already knew this was likely true for the aircraft’s engines but there had been speculation as to how much of the existing technology was already developed for a future bomber versus how much had been developed for programs like the F-35 or the various stealthy UAVs that are out there.

“We plan on taking advantage of existing technologies on other programs that are mature, a streamlined management process and a strict limitation on requirements for the system going forward as ways to control cost growth and to keep it on schedule,” said Donley.

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz then jumped in and reaffirmed many of the known attributes of the plane: that it will be nuclear-capable (at some point), it will be optionally manned and will work as part of the family of strike and ISR systems rather than being a “lone wolf” capable of doing almost every conceivable high-risk strike mission.

The question that now remains is; will early versions of the jet be built with the ability to deliver nuclear weapons and be flown remotely? All of this will likely depend on technology availability and cost.

Read more: http://www.dodbuzz.com/2011/03/30/air-force-to-buy-80-to-100-next-gen-bombers/#ixzz1I8KcDla4

[Unicorn]

I would like to know where the money is coming from. The US military budget is under real strain.

.

.

[Unicorn]

You tell people, repeatedly and often, what a grand chappie you are and how stupid the Plebs are, and enough arrogant, ignorant cun#s will believe you.

Easy really............

Look at APA for a prime example.

The Prosecution rests, m'lord.

[buglerbilly]

Q: Why So Long For a New Bomber? A: Money, Honey

By John Reed Thursday, March 31st, 2011 3:02 pm

Continuing our midweek focus on stealthy jets, Air Force brass today said budget pressures are the reason that it will take until the mid-2020s for the next generation stealth bomber to be operational, despite the fact that it is being developed with existing and “mature” technologies.

“It’s an issue of affordability and fitting this program in with all those other Air Force priorities we’ve outlined today; building the [KC-46] tanker, building the Joint Strike Fighter … funding satellites on a schedule that we need to make sure we don’t reach the point of mission failure,” Air Force Secretary Michael Donley told the House Appropriations defense subcommittee today.

Donley was answering a question from New Jersey Democrat Rep. Steve Rothman, as to why it will take so long to field an aircraft built using “proven” technologies. DoDBuzz asked this very question on the day the Pentagon rolled out its fiscal year 2012 budget.

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz then added a bit of clarity as t the weapons the bomber will carry, confirming that in addition to normal guided bombs and nuclear munitions, the jet will carry “stand-off” weapons, aka cruise missiles.

Yesterday, Donley and Schwartz told Senators that the service hopes to buy 80 to 100 of the new bombers, which are expected to reach initial operating capability in the “mid 2020s.” The Air Force included $197 million for the bomber in its FY-12 budget request and has slated $3.7 billion for the plane over the next five years.

Read more: http://www.dodbuzz.com/2011/03/31/why-so-long-for-a-new-bomber-money-honey/#ixzz1IE2FTOBy

[buglerbilly]

USAF To Use Rapid Process to Buy Bombers

By DAVE MUJUMDAR

Published: 8 Apr 2011 17:00

The U.S. Air Force will bypass the regular acquisitions channels when it buys its next bomber, relying instead on the same process used by urgent procurements such as the MC-12 Project Liberty surveillance aircraft, Air Force Secretary Michael Donley told reporters April 5.

The effort to buy between 80 and 100 stealthy penetrating bombers by the mid-2020s will use "a more streamlined management process going forward, where we are using the Rapid Capabilities Office to help manage this project," Donley said at a Defense Writers' Group breakfast.

Paul Kaminski, who chairs the Pentagon's Defense Science Board (DSB), applauded the decision. Kaminski noted that last summer's DSB study called for an incremental approach to buying new weapons, instead of attempting to build something that has every capability from the start. Yet some capabilities, like nuclear hardening and upgrade potential must be built in from the beginning, he said.

[buglerbilly]

USAF Bomber Gets Tight Numbers

Apr 11, 2011

By Bill Sweetman



Secret and slow could be watchwords for the U.S. Air Force’s new bomber program. Although major spending is getting under way, the service does not expect to see the aircraft in service before the mid-2020s—a longer timescale than the “2018 bomber” discussed in 2008. In addition, Maj. Gen. Dave Scott, USAF director of operations capability requirements, confirmed in February that the aircraft will be “highly classified—we are not going to talk about any of its attributes.” Beyond stating that the aircraft will be optionally piloted and nuclear-capable, the Pentagon has said little.

The magic numbers for the bomber are a fleet size of 80-100 and a flyaway cost of $500 million, both numbers set by Defense Secretary Robert Gates. “The secretary doesn’t want another B-2,” one Air Force leader remarked recently.

The extended schedule reduces risk and avoids overlap in funding with the delayed Joint Strike Fighter (JSF). Reports suggest that funding will average under $1 billion a year through fiscal 2016, when JSF funding should tail off.

One key capability is almost certainly under development: the combination of extreme low-observable (ELO) technology and unprecedented aerodynamic efficiency. This will not only appear on the bomber but on one of two critical “enablers” for the long-range-strike family of systems: unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) designed for stand-in airborne electronic attack (AEA), and for penetrating, persistent intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR). Both were identified by Scott in a briefing last October.

Stand-in AEA, with jamming effects delivered by an ELO platform, is an important adjunct to stealth. Although networked radar systems are improving their ability to detect stealthy targets in the Lockheed Martin F-22/F-35 class, moderate-power jamming is likely to degrade that capability. It is also expected to defeat efforts to detect ELO targets in the foreseeable future. Lockheed Martin’s RQ-170 Sentinel UAV could be the interim solution to this requirement.

Penetrating ISR demands a combination of endurance and ELO, and such a system is probably the goal of the large special access program (SAP) awarded in 2007-08 to Northrop Grumman. One key technology, the subject of a good deal of open-source work, is the ability to sustain laminar airflow on a swept wing: this technology alone could deliver 32 hr. of time-on-station in an all-wing UAV, according to a Northrop Grumman technical report.

If such a SAP produces results, in terms of the vehicle and its primary sensors (synthetic aperture radar with ground-moving target indication), it would explain why USAF has been willing to curtail the Global Hawk Block 40 program.

Penetrating, persistent ISR is vital for the long-range strike family of systems because it provides targeting for other weapons: a Conventional Prompt Global Strike missile, new subsonic cruise missile launched from aircraft or submarines, or a hypersonic missile. In turn, that capability allows USAF to focus the new bomber requirement more narrowly and avoid mission and cost creep that apparently affected the earlier Next Generation Bomber (NGB).

For example, the new bomber could be smaller than the NGB was envisioned to be, because it could also provide targeting for offboard weapons, with less need for a “deep magazine” of onboard weapons. Offboard sensors would also reduce demand for simultaneous long range and high resolution for onboard sensors, reducing aperture size. Overall, the new bomber may emerge smaller than medium bombers of the past, and well under half the size of the B-2.

The Air Force is also leaning toward the adoption of features developed in Advent (Adaptive Versatile Engine Technology) and Heete (Highly Efficient Embedded Turbofan Engine) in the new bomber. Heete is aimed at cruise efficiency and delivering electrical power, necessary to support directed-energy weapons, and is expected to yield a fuel-burn improvement of 35% over current low observable-compatible subsonic engines.

One factor will drive up the cost of the bomber’s R&D: its status as a SAP. SAP status—whether the program is an acknowledged SAP, as the bomber is likely to be, or completely black—incurs large costs. All personnel have to be vetted before they are read into the program. Information within the program is compartmentalized, reducing efficiency. SAP status has been estimated to add 20% to a program’s cost.

The most likely reason for this measure is the sensitivity of ELO technology, combined with the fact that the U.S. is the target of what may be the most extensive and successful espionage program in history—China’s Advanced Persistent Threat.

Boeing Concept

[buglerbilly]

Next Gen Bomber Linked To Self-Funded F136

May 4, 2011

By Guy Norris guy_norris@aviationweek.com, Jen DiMascio jennifer_dimascio@aviationweek.com
Los Angeles, Washington DC

In a last-ditch bid to keep the F136 combat engine alive following cancellation by the U.S. Defense Department, General Electric and Rolls-Royce are developing a plan to convert the development effort into a self-funded demonstrator for the U.S. Air Force’s long range bomber as well as the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.

The emerging plan follows a decision by Rolls-Royce on April 29 to commit internal funds to continuing work on the F136, which is 80% complete with six development engines tested. Although expected to be funded at a much reduced rate of around $100 million per year compared to $480 million at its government-funded peak, the program would be supported 60% by GE and 40% by Rolls-Royce.

A GE-Rolls Fighter Engine Team spokesman says, despite the inevitable slowdown in the pace of development because of reduced funding, ongoing delays to the JSF mean it will still be enough to enable competition with Pratt & Whitney’s F135 baseline engine on later production lots 8/9 of Lockheed Martin’s F-35.

However, following the April 25 contract termination by the Defense Department, the success of the plan is contingent on congressional support to enable continued use of the development engines, all of which are U.S. government property. The GE-Rolls Fighter Engine Team says more than $200 million in F136 hardware is located in 17 facilities, including nine engines under various stages of assembly. All F136 activity ceased following a stop work order issued on March 24 by Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics Ashton Carter.

“We anticipate that next week the House Armed Services Committee (HASC) will be pursuing an effort to get the F136 back into the budget, but put down as a self-funded provision. So we’re asking for access to the hardware, test facilities and the Joint Program Office,” says the GE-Rolls spokesman.

In its planned markup of the defense authorization bill released May 3, the HASC subcommittee setting policy for the air and land forces would also hold money for “performance improvements” to the F135 hostage unless the Pentagon would make money available to two engines for the next-generation fighter jet. The bill would narrowly define those improvements to target plans under way at Pratt & Whitney to increase vertical landing thrust with the Marines’ short-takeoff and vertical landing variant (Stovl).

It is not surprising that the HASC, which has long backed an ongoing competition, would try to keep the program alive. But since Congress has already voted to de-fund the engine, it would be a feat if the language remains in the bill that eventually passes in both the House and Senate. However, GE-Rolls believes that self-funding, plus growing congressional interest in guaranteeing an engine competition for the bomber element of the Air Force’s emerging Long Range Strike family, will provide an additional incentive.

The subcommittee is scheduled to approve the markup on May 4. The following day, HASC chairman Buck McKeon is expected to hold a press conference to talk about acquisition reform and to likely discuss the self-funded F136 development initiative for fiscal 2011 and fiscal 2012.

Photo: GE/Rolls

[buglerbilly]

DoD OKs USAF Bomber Program Office

By DAVE MAJUMDAR

Published: 11 May 2011 12:57

The U.S. Air Force is creating an office for its new bomber program, a top service official said.

"We've got a general mandate from the Secretary of Defense to go forward with standing up the program office, so we're just at the beginning of that work," said Air Force undersecretary Erin Conaton at a May 11 breakfast sponsored by the Air Force Association.

Still to come: detailed requirements, a firmer production plan than the 80- to 100-plane estimate, and more.

"We don't have a full life-cycle cost yet," Conaton said. "That's the work that'll be done now by the program office as they stand up," Conaton said.

The number of aircraft to be purchased will be refined as the service gets a better idea of the capabilities offered by the under-development bomber, Conaton said.

"Eighty to 100 is our current best estimate of what we think we'll need, but that estimate will be refined over time as we see the capability and what we think we can afford," she said.

Most important to the Air Force is that the fleet be much larger than the force of 20 B-2 stealth bombers, whose small numbers make them more troublesome and expensive to maintain, she said.

The Air Force plans to manage the program under the auspices of the Rapid Capabilities Office because it offers more streamlined acquisitions than the regular channels, Conaton said.

"The idea is to try to get capability as quickly as possible, leveraging as many existing technologies as possible," she said.

Conaton acknowledged that the bomber isn't being fielded under what is usually thought of as a rapid capability, but she said the process is faster and simpler than the traditional process.

[buglerbilly]

Lingering nervousness on the new bomber

By Philip Ewing Wednesday, May 18th, 2011 12:16 pm



DoD’s top weapons-buyer, Ash Carter, flew out to Southern California last week to talk with America’s twin titans of aerospace, Lockheed and Boeing, according to a report by Reuters’ Andrea Shalal-Esa. On the agenda was the Air Force’s next-generation bomber, an incredible new super-aircraft that will be able to cruise at eight times the speed of sound, drop a bomb into a thimble, change Pepsi to Coke, cure the common cold, use sunlight for fuel and produce an exhaust of only rainbows.

Kidding, kidding — those were the original requirements. Now DoD and the Air Force say they’re dialing back their goals for the bomber so that the Pentagon can build it with as little risk as possible, although as Shalal-Esa wrote, the aerospace industry types are already nervous about this program, even though it represents billions of dollars of income for them.

As Shalal-Esa wrote:


One big challenge is that work on the bomber is likely to be classified, but funding for the program will be in the public domain, said one executive who was not authorized to speak on the record. Defense companies are also worried that the Pentagon may try to develop the new bomber on a fixed-price development contract, rather than the cost-plus contracts used in the past, according to a second industry executive.

Carter, meanwhile, is focused on ensuring that development of a new bomber doesn’t run into the cost overruns and schedule delays that have plagued most big weapons programs. He told lawmakers last month the Pentagon wanted to build “affordability” into big weapons programs from the start.

“The military services have worked and reworked the requirements for these programs to ensure that we do not find ourselves, after spending billions on development, with a system we can’t afford to produce,” he said in written testimony for the House defense appropriations subcommittee.

The Air Force said it was focused on keeping the new bomber affordable by constraining military requirements and adopting a streamlined management and acquisition approach. Setting a target for the new plane’s average procurement cost would allow officials to make the capability trade-offs needed to keep program costs low, the service said.

Fine — but with a classified program, how will anyone know whether any of this has succeeded?

Read more: http://www.dodbuzz.com/2011/05/18/lingering-nervousness-on-the-next-generation-bomber/#ixzz1Mlcgo0q7
DoDBuzz.com

[buglerbilly]

Exclusive: Pentagon Arms Chief, Industry in Talks on Bomber (excerpt)

(Source: Reuters; published May 18, 2011)

Pentagon acquisition chief Ashton Carter traveled to California last week to meet with Northrop Grumman Corp Chief Executive Wes Bush and other industry executives about a new long-range bomber, according to three sources familiar with the meetings.

The Defense Department is working on a new long-range "penetrating" bomber, which will be designed to fly with or without a pilot on board, carry nuclear weapons, and cost about $550 million per plane on average, according to a new 30-year Pentagon plan for aviation procurement.

The plan calls for the Air Force to field 80 to 100 of the new bombers to replace the current fleet of bombers, which include 66 B-1 bombers, 20 B-2 bombers and 85 B-52 bombers.

That means the overall program will cost $40 billion to $50 billion over the next decades -- a huge opportunity for big weapons makers like Northrop, Lockheed Martin Corp and Boeing Co, which are bracing for declining defense spending in other areas.

The Pentagon's plan calls for upgrades to the B-2 bomber built by Northrop in the 1990s, to enhance its effectiveness and survivability, and divestment of 6 Boeing Co B-1 bombers built in the 1980s to pay for upgrades to the remaining fleet.

Senior defense officials have said that the fiscal 2012 budget includes $3.7 billion for the new bomber over the next five years, but industry executives are waiting for details on how the department plans to structure an acquisition plan. (end of excerpt)


Full story on the Reuters website below:



Exclusive: Pentagon arms chief, industry in talks on bomber

By Andrea Shalal-Esa

WASHINGTON | Tue May 17, 2011 8:35pm EDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Pentagon acquisition chief Ashton Carter traveled to California last week to meet with Northrop Grumman Corp (NOC.N) Chief Executive Wes Bush and other industry executives about a new long-range bomber, according to three sources familiar with the meetings.

The Defense Department is working on a new long-range "penetrating" bomber, which will be designed to fly with or without a pilot on board, carry nuclear weapons, and cost about $550 million per plane on average, according to a new 30-year Pentagon plan for aviation procurement.

The plan calls for the Air Force to field 80 to 100 of the new bombers to replace the current fleet of bombers, which include 66 B-1 bombers, 20 B-2 bombers and 85 B-52 bombers.

That means the overall program will cost $40 billion to $50 billion over the next decades -- a huge opportunity for big weapons makers like Northrop, Lockheed Martin Corp (LMT.N) and Boeing Co (BA.N), which are bracing for declining defense spending in other areas.

The Pentagon's plan calls for upgrades to the B-2 bomber built by Northrop in the 1990s, to enhance its effectiveness and survivability, and divestment of 6 Boeing Co B-1 bombers built in the 1980s to pay for upgrades to the remaining fleet.

Senior defense officials have said that the fiscal 2012 budget includes $3.7 billion for the new bomber over the next five years, but industry executives are waiting for details on how the department plans to structure an acquisition plan.

One big challenge is that work on the bomber is likely to be classified, but funding for the program will be in the public domain, said one executive who was not authorized to speak on the record.

Defense companies are also worried that the Pentagon may try to develop the new bomber on a fixed-price development contract, rather than the cost-plus contracts used in the past, according to a second industry executive.

BUILDING AFFORDABILITY IN FROM THE START

Carter, meanwhile, is focused on ensuring that development of a new bomber doesn't run into the cost overruns and schedule delays that have plagued most big weapons programs.

He told lawmakers last month the Pentagon wanted to build "affordability" into big weapons programs from the start.

"The military services have worked and reworked the requirements for these programs to ensure that we do not find ourselves, after spending billions on development, with a system we can't afford to produce," he said in written testimony for the House defense appropriations subcommittee.

The Air Force said it was focused on keeping the new bomber affordable by constraining military requirements and adopting a streamlined management and acquisition approach.

Setting a target for the new plane's average procurement cost would allow officials to make the capability trade-offs needed to keep program costs low, the service said.

Carter also met with executives from Lockheed Martin Corp during his visit to Palmdale, California, where the company has its Skunk Works facility where it works on classified programs like the F-117A stealth fighter.

Boeing's advanced research facility in Palmdale, known as Phantom Works, is where the company designed its new Phanton Ray unmanned plane, which executed a first flight last month.

Officials at the three biggest U.S. defense contractors declined to comment on any specific meetings between their executives and government officials. No comment was immediately available from Carter's office.

Defense consultant Jim McAleese said the Air Force had likely already paid the three companies -- Lockheed, Northrop and Boeing -- at least $1 billion to develop technologies that would be used on a new bomber.

Last week's meetings were likely part of a "fact-finding" mission that would help Carter shape an acquisition strategy for the new weapons program, he said.

The Air Force's budget included $12 billion for classified research in fiscal 2012 alone, plus $18 billion for classified procurement, McAleese said.

Air Force budget documents foresee spending on the bomber of $197 million in fiscal 2012, which begins October 1, with outlays growing each year to around $1.7 billion in 2016.

Additional money would be spent on other weapons associated with long-range strike capabilities over the time, including $800 million for a new nuclear-capable cruise missile.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal-Esa; Editing by Richard Chang)

[buglerbilly]

DoD fights HASC on competing bomber engines

By Philip Ewing Thursday, May 26th, 2011 8:56 am



The Pentagon’s top weapons-buyer, Ash Carter, opposes a congressional proposal to require by law that the Air Force have two different engines for its next-generation bomber, John Bennett reports in the newspaper The Hill. House Armed Services Committee lawmakers want to prevent the kind of official ambiguity that has surrounded the alternate engine for the F-35 Lightning II and guarantee “competition” for the bomber’s engines by explicitly requiring it. That’s a bad idea, Carter wrote, per Bennett’s story:

In a letter sent to House Armed Services Committee Ranking Member Adam Smith (D-Wash.), Pentagon acquisition chief Ashton Carter called it “inappropriate and premature to mandate in statute what the acquisition strategy should be for a subsystem of one element of this program.”


“A major tenet of the new bomber program is to maximize re-use of existing systems,” Carter wrote. “Very realistic opportunities exist, which do not require development of a new engine.” … Requiring two engines to be built would drive up “cost and risk,” Cater said in the letter.

From the HASC lawmakers’ perspective, a legal mandate for two engines serves two goals: First, it would preempt a “debate” about the need for “competition,” like the one that has accompanied the F-35’s alternate engine, in which reasonable people can disagree, but for which engine advocates have no iron fallback — nothing carved in stone that says “thou shalt have two engines.”

Second, given that much of the bomber program is going to be classified, Congress is running out of chances to publicly influence it. Of course lawmakers will likely get confidential updates as work goes forward, but they won’t be able to talk freely about how they’ve bravely protected jobs in their districts. Likewise, once this program is underway and the Pentagon is inevitably complaining about the two engine mandate, lawmakers can say, “well we can’t change the law now because we can’t debate this in open session. So just deal with it.”

With these kinds of battles over the bomber taking place so early in the program — and with no way to know what kind of secret squirrel stuff is taking place behind the scenes — no wonder many people are so nervous about it.

Read more: http://www.dodbuzz.com/2011/05/26/dod-fights-hasc-on-competing-bomber-engines/#ixzz1NWDVEMVx
DoDBuzz.com

[buglerbilly]

Experts Discuss Future Long-Range Strike Bomber Requirements

(Source: U.S Air Force; issued May 25, 2011)

BOSSIER CITY, La. --- More than 30 military and civilian strategic air power experts gathered here May 5 to discuss ideas for a new long-range strike bomber.

The Bomber Advisory Group examined past and current global strike success stories and strategic air power's role in the 21st century. The group also brainstormed ways to bring Barksdale Air Force Base's surrounding Shreveport-Bossier City community into the thinking about the future of strategic air power.

Dr. Rebecca Grant, the director of the Gen. William Mitchell Institute for Airpower Studies, and Lt. Gen. Jim Kowalski, the commander of Air Force Global Strike Command attended the conference. Past Eight Air Force commanders, Lieutenant Generals Phillip Ford, Tom Keck and Bob Elder also attended.

Not all the nation's decision-makers understand why America must build a new bomber right now, Dr. Grant said, "and it is up to the practitioners of strategic air power to help us frame that answer - why does America need a new bomber right now, what are these missions?"

"This group is quite a distinguished group of people," said Maj. Gen. Floyd Carpenter, the Eighth Air Force commander and the commander of Strategic Command's Air Forces Strategic. "We need advocates for these types of capabilities," he said.

The general pointed out the prior Eighth Air Force commanders and industry leaders who know from experience how to articulate the nation's need for long-range bombers.

During her overview of strategic airpower, Dr. Grant discussed the evolution of bombers from 1917 on, as they addressed national strategy and security needs.

"Air power is key to our foreign policy," she said. "Look what we did with Libya," referring to Operation Odyssey Dawn. "Air power was key to the ability to have that response."

In the Air Force Posture Statement for 2011, Michael B. Donley, the Secretary of the Air Force, discusses the need for a new long-rang strike bomber.

"We must sustain our ability to consistently hold any target on the planet at risk with the development of a Long-Range Strike Family of Systems capability -- including a new penetrating bomber -- to create desired effects across the full range of military operations in both permissive and contested environments," Secretary Donley said.

In January, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates announced plans for the Air Force to invest in a new long-range, penetrating, and nuclear-capable bomber capable of either manned or unmanned operations, according to the Posture Statement.

"A major focus of this program is to develop an affordable, long-range penetrating strike capability that delivers on schedule and in quantity," Secretary Donley said. "This aircraft will be designed and built using proven technologies, will leverage existing systems to provide sufficient capability, and allow growth to improve the system as technology matures and threats evolve."

-ends-

[buglerbilly]

Ares

A Defense Technology Blog

What We Are Allowed to Know About the Bomber

Posted by Amy Butler at 6/30/2011 7:33 AM CDT

It is not unusual to stumble across a secret or two during the Paris Air Show.

In fact, amid the 16-hour days of slogging through rain from the train station, sweating it out on the 15th march down the chalet line (in the second day) or lugging a laptop and various power packs and cords through Paris paranoid you’ll lose one – stumbling on a secret can make it all the more invigorating and fun. And, this comes from someone that loves a good air show!

But, this year, I stumbled across an interesting secret. It’s a secret I’m allowed to know. I’m just maybe not supposed to know that I’m allowed to know it.

I noticed a pattern when I was talking to industry executives about the still forthcoming (yes, we’ve been saying forthcoming for many a Paris Air Show now) next-generation bomber program. Imagine my surprise when executives of the competing companies sounded, well, the same.

So … I started asking why. And, a while later, I got my answer. A program source let me in on the secret. Apparently those executives were told to sound the same. The U.S. Air Force, in leadership, drew up talking points for these executives on the program entitled “Unclassified Facts on the Air Force Penetrating Bomber.”

That way, everyone was literally on the same page.

This isn’t that uncommon. Often, customers have talking points for their contractors. But, this is a case of a would-be customer and would-be contractors being told what they would be able to say about what may be a would-be program. (We won’t really know if it would-be because when it will-be, it will be a SAP program). And, typically, the Air Force isn’t too happy when its talking points get out there … it makes things seem, well, canned.

At any rate, I figured I’d share what little I know of what the executives are told that they can say. (Just be sure and keep the secret that you are allowed to know what you know.)

Below is a copy of the talking points:

PURPOSE:

Provide industry executives the unclassified facts on the new penetrating bomber program.

FACTS:

- Based on Secretary of Defense direction, the Air Force (AF) is developing a new penetrating bomber.

- The new penetrating bomber will be a component of the joint portfolio of conventional deep-strike capabilities.

- The new penetrating bomber will be highly survivable, nuclear capable, and designed to accommodate manned or unmanned operations

- The new penetrating bomber will be able to employ a broad mix of stand-off and direct-attack munitions.

- The total annual budget by appropriation (i.e., RDT&E, Production) is unclassified.

- The Air Force plans to deliver the initial capability in the mid-2020s.

- The new program will leverage mature technologies and constrain requirements based on affordability

- The new program will focus on affordability: unit cost target set to inform design/requirement trades and ensure sufficient inventory.

- The Air Force is projecting to build a fleet of 80-100 aircraft.

- The new program will employ enhanced security measures and be protected by a Special Access Program.

- All other details are classified to protect operational advantages and the nation's investment in critical technologies and capabilities.

- For further information, contact the Procuring Contracting Officer (PCO) or the Program Security Officer (PSO)

[buglerbilly]

USAF's Bomber Will Be One Aircraft, Not Many

By DAVE MAJUMDAR

Published: 15 Jul 2011 16:29

The U.S. Air Force's new Long Range Strike (LRS) family of systems will not consist of multiple aircraft types, as widely believed.

Instead, the service will most likely develop a single bomber airframe that will be able to conduct a range of missions, says the service's deputy chief of staff for operations, plans and requirements.

Depending upon its payload, said Lt. Gen. Herbert "Hawk" Carlisle, the new bomber will be able do everything from electronic attack (EA) to intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) - and will be key to the U.S. military services' emerging AirSea Battle doctrine.

"When we talk a family of systems, I don't necessarily think you're going to make four different airframes or five different airframes," Carlisle said in a July 14 interview. "There is either the ability to plug and play, or the same platform with different capabilities being ISR, EA or kinetic attack, or you have the ability of using other techniques of cross-domain and multi-domain capability to bring those things to bear."

Carlisle spoke just hours after the outgoing vice chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff, Marine Corps Gen. James Cartwright, questioned the requirements being set for the bomber program.

A self-confessed "bomber-hater," Cartwright told reporters that he wonders whether the aircraft, slated to be optionally manned, needs a human crew. ICBMs and submarine-launched ballistic missiles don't have people aboard them, he reasoned.

"Nobody has shown me anything that requires a person in the airplane. Nobody," Cartwright said. "I'm waiting for that argument and I haven't found it yet."

The survivability technologies needed to build an aircraft as the Air Force wants would just make the plane unaffordable, he said.

Cartwright said he believes the Air Force needs to think about an aircraft inexpensive enough to buy by the hundreds, not the 80 to 100 bombers planned.

He said the plane should be "a truck that has today's state-of-the-art survivability attributes," yet conceded, "A long-range, long-endurance asset that's an air-breather makes a lot of sense."

Multi-mission Aircraft

Carlisle said the number of planned bombers reflects much analysis.

"We've done a lot of work on the analysis of the fighter-bomber blend," he said. "There are scenarios where you rely on a heavier requirement for bombers and less for fighter aircraft, and there is the reverse … all the analysis indicates that we have that mix about right."

Carlisle said the bomber would not be a modular aircraft, but might carry mission-specific payloads.

"It very possibly could be where the payload could be an ISR package, EA package or a kinetic strike package," or even carry enough gear to do several jobs at once, he said.

Carlisle cited the F-22 Raptor, the stealth fighter jet that used to be described as an electronic vacuum cleaner that would "suck up intel."

Mark Gunzinger, an analyst at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA) in Washington, said he expected a multi-mission bomber.

"You'd want those attributes for an aircraft you'd expect to operate in non-permissive environments, where you may not have a secure command-and-control link," said Gunzinger, a former Air Force B-52 bomber pilot.

He said the aircraft would need to be able to defend itself and be able to find and track its own targets.

Carlisle said the bomber program will be key to the AirSea battle concept that the Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps are working on together. The concept is meant to defeat emerging anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) threats, Carlisle said.

"Without the Long Range Strike family of systems, you can't do AirSea battle," Gunzinger said.

The bomber, when operating in highly contested areas, would be supported by assets in space and the cyber domain, Carlisle said. And, he hinted, the other services might in turn be vital to the bomber as it punches through the teeth of enemy air defenses.

"It could be supported by a submarine," he said. "It's AirSea battle, it's the whole integration of multi-domain and cross-domain capabilities."

Gunzinger said using the Navy's submarines to help knock out the most potent of the enemy's air defenses would greatly increase the new bomber's potential.

"Undersea capabilities would play a critical role in AirSea battle as we described it at CSBA," he said.

AirSea battle will be a comprehensive concept that will include everything from training, to doctrine, to new "materiel solutions" to allow the three services to work together much more tightly, Carlisle said.

One of those solutions could be a new Navy long-range unmanned strike aircraft, Gunzinger said.

Much of the concept involves taking advantage of the unique capabilities of each service to support the others against A2/AD threats so that they work in a complementary fashion, Carlisle said.

In some cases, all three services will have to possess a certain capability, he said. In others, one will take the lead, and there also are areas where both the Navy and Air Force will have to develop completely new capabilities.

"We've taken 'joint' to the next level. So it's beyond 'joint,' it's integrated across domains," Carlisle said. "It's F-35s, the bomber, it's submarines, it's surface capabilities, it's space capability, it covers the spectrum."

AirSea battle is not necessarily designed for the western Pacific theater, but rather for the Air Force and Navy's global responsibilities, Carlisle said.

Gunzinger cited Iran as another nation that is developing capabilities to prevent U.S. forces from operating in its vicinity.

Andrew Tilghman contributed to this report.

[buglerbilly]

New Bomber Brings ISR Surprises

Aug 26, 2011

By David A. Fulghum, Bill Sweetman
Washington, Washington



Several surprises are sure to emerge from the U.S. Air Force’s next-generation, long-range bomber program, including the technological sinews attaching it to the Navy’s unmanned carrier-based strike aircraft.

Several elements have been identified that will likely be part of the bomber competition. Two competing, low-observable, optionally manned designs will involve teams led by Northrop Grumman and Boeing. Each team will also offer a smaller, low-observable, unmanned, sub-sonic reconnaissance support aircraft. All four designs will have roots in the X-47B and X-45C demonstrator projects. Lockheed Martin’s contribution is expected to be a high-speed intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) adjunct aircraft.

They are being designed and integrated to overcome the greatest emerging threats to the U.S.—“anti-access tactics and . . . area-denial strategies,” says Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn. “Some nations are pursuing ballistic missiles that seek to push our forces farther from the battlefield,” he says, referring to China’s development of the DF-21 anti-ship weapon. “The diffusion of precision-strike technology will have a cumulative effect [by] creating challenges for our ability to project power to distant parts of the globe.”

Other asymmetric strategies and weapons could include terminally guided submunitions for use against air bases and aircraft on the ground.

The unit cost of the stealthy bomber has been notionally set at $550 million for a fleet of up to 100 aircraft. But Shay Assad, the Pentagon’s director of defense pricing, calls that a very rough prediction since requirements for the design have not been defined and the cost-prediction process has not been set. Moreover, new congressionally mandated budget pressures may push the program into a fixed-price arrangement pegged to what the Defense Department can afford. “Then you have to make the requirement” match the funding figure, says Assad. Bomber requirements will start taking shape around the end of the year, he told a House Armed Services Committee and Lexington Institute-sponsored seminar on electronic attack.

Part of the strategy will involve “making a major investment in a family of long-range strike systems that will allow us to penetrate defenses and deliver munitions worldwide,” says Lynn. “This family of systems includes electronic attack capabilities, more advanced intelligence and surveillance platforms, and a new long-range bomber capable of both manned and unmanned operations.”

Since all those capabilities will be impossible to fit on a single type of expensive aircraft, planning has turned to building a relatively small number of bombers and a bigger fleet of small, unmanned adjunct aircraft that will provide additional defensive support, targeting and specialized strike with electronic attack, and other directed-energy options.

The plan is a response to concerns that the bomber—known now as the Long-Range Strike Platform (LRSP)—would become unaffordable if it was designed with a complete set of long-range sensors or the ability to carry heavy, hard-target weapons. The new plan offloads some targets to other systems and provides airborne electronic attack (AEA) and reconnaissance support to the LRSP. Ultimately, tightly linked but widely dispersed groups of these aircraft will also provide information warfare and cyberattack capabilities.

“Absolute effects [from cyberattacks] are moving up a ladder of escalation,” Lynn says. “We are beginning to see cybertools used to cause physical effects [and] tools that can cause physical destruction are out there. So in cyber, we have a window of opportunity to act before the most malicious actors acquire the most destructive technologies.”

That sets the stage for the next wave of competition for aviation, weapons and electronics programs.

“This is going to be the last big aviation program for a long time,” says a senior aerospace official with insight into the programs. “It’s make or break for everyone. We’ll see more collaboration on the bomber. The competition will be like the tanker competition in that [planners] want to make sure the work gets well distributed. It won’t be a joint-service program, however, so we’re wondering how much of the mission will go to the Navy and Uclass [Unmanned Carrier-Launched Airborne Surveillance and Strike system].”

The advantage that a few manned bombers and a large number of smaller support aircraft will offer is a more formidable, faster and more comprehensive version of the complex capabilities used to trap Osama bin Laden. There the stealthy RQ-170 unmanned ISR aircraft with full-motion video was used to monitor activity at the Al Qaeda leader’s compound for long periods without being detected.

“There is a rapidly growing need to operate in denied airspace for extended periods,” says Lt. Gen. (ret.) Dave Deptula, former head of Air Force intelligence. The combination of a new bomber, the Navy’s Uclass and Boeing’s Phantom Eye concepts “are part of the distributed sensor construct.” In fact, he says that weapons delivery is now a secondary role compared with developing an information warfare capability that would include computer network invasion and electronic warfare.

But Deptula also warns of entrenched bureaucratic opposition to advanced networking schemes.

“The biggest obstacle remains a senior-level civilian mind-set that advanced sensors are there to provide data to the pilot but no one else,” he declares. “The evidence is in the Defense Department’s resistance to buying data links for the F-22 and F-35 that would let them distribute the information they are gathering. That mind-set is what’s holding up finalization of a set of requirements for the bomber.”

Boeing will offer a pairing of its Phantom Ray (X-45C derivative) as a supporting unmanned system. A scaled-up version of the design would serve as a manned bomber. Northrop Grumman, which is already working on a stealthy long-range UAV (see following article) will probably offer a bomber based on the cranked-kite configuration of the X-47.

The smaller unmanned aircraft “provide high altitude [flight at roughly 60,000 ft.], payload variety and sufficient loiter time as an electronic attack and electronic warfare adjunct to support a bomber,” says a longtime Boeing official. “Northrop Grumman is growing the X-47 and adding work on ISR to leverage the bomber program. That’s no surprise. The bomber will be significantly larger than the ISR design. Phantom Ray leverages X-45 because [General Atomics’] Predator derivatives and Boeing’s new Phantom Eye ISR designs wouldn’t survive except in a permissive environment. A bomber adjunct platform would have to be as survivable as the bomber.”

“All the [major] companies want and need to be involved in the new bomber,” says a Northrop Grumman official. “Boeing can’t just keep making [F-15SE] Silent Eagles. They’ve been investing their own money into the X-45 derivatives like Phantom Ray.”

However, classified funding has been pouring into Northrop Grumman to fund what analysts once thought was a clandestine bomber but is now believed to be an ISR version of something resembling the X-47.

Because the F-35 has been absorbing Lockheed Martin funding at an unexpected rate, the company is not expected to offer a bomber design.

“About 60% of the new [acquisition] budget is going to be for F-35,” says the Northrop Grumman official. “[Pentagon acquisition chief] Ashton Carter’s goal is to come up with a tailored, affordable solution [for the bomber]. Right now the requirements are vague and the trade space is wide open. The trades will move around, but once they are done, then we will see who wants to work together.

“Lockheed Martin has a lot on its plate with the F-35, so it also wants to be part of the next and perhaps last big acquisition for a while,” he says. “Lockheed Martin is going to be involved in some way. They don’t care if they are the prime or not. They are willing to be a niche partner.”

But what that niche may be is still a mystery.

“Lockheed Martin has spent a lot of time working on high-speed ISR approaches that don’t have as much loiter time [as lower-speed unmanned air systems],” the Boeing official says. “Because the F-35 is eating up so much money, the company hasn’t been able to invest in new bomber and ISR technology. For Lockheed Martin to make a run at developing a bomber would cost them over $100 million. That’s a lot for them right now. There’s a chance a high-speed ISR effort would not fit into this part of the distributed strike, ISR, information warfare package.”

High-altitude capability does not add much to survivability, say aerospace specialists. Signature reduction and very high speed helps. But high speed means that dwell time over the target area is slashed. So stealth will be the major consideration for a bomber design.

“It will not be autonomous and it can’t wander around [heavily defended] denied-access areas without collaborative aircraft and supporting electronic warfare,” the Boeing official says. “Some EW will be on the bomber, but it will operate in conjunction with the autonomous, unmanned systems. Whether manned or unmanned, both will have to be able to operate in denied airspace for a while.”

The collaborative capability is why Boeing came up with the Phantom Ray. Northrop Grumman is going to exploit its X-47 in the same way. The X-47’s signature, planform and construction method are applicable to a bomber.

Photo Credit: Jim Haseltine

[buglerbilly]

Is Next-Gen. Bomber Biggest Air Force Mistake in Last 50 Years?

By Mackenzie Eaglen

Published: September 28, 2011



It may surprise many, but today's Air Force cannot hold every contested target at risk, a fundamental strategic goal. Last week, Air Force Secretary Michael Donley and other senior leaders at the Air Force Association's annual air and space conference made a clear and compelling case for long-range strike.

The Air Force plans to fund the entire long-range strike family of systems program in the special access, or black, budget. To keep the new bomber affordable, the Air Force also plans to introduce technology at lower readiness levels (i.e., six and seven) and insert greater capabilities as they come on line. Systems engineering will be done up front. The goal is to incorporate low-risk technology sooner, rather than build an exquisite solution later.

That approach may turn out to be the Air Force's greatest missed opportunity in a half century. Due to budget constraints alone, it seems the Air Force may build a less than 80% solution when the service in fact needs a next-generation capability. This is primarily because precision munitions and battle networks are proliferating, while advances in radar and electro-optical technology are increasingly rendering stealth less effective.

Since a new long-range strike capability is the Air Force's marquis modernization program for the next 20 years, its leaders should push the envelope, seize the moment, and build what is needed while balancing what is affordable. The Air Force must think big and go bold when innovating for the future.

On top of this, the new bomber will have to rely on modernized electronic attack and space-based systems but current budget projections offer no guarantee those systems will exist. The service plans to develop a communications network as well as electronic attack capabilities alongside the new bomber.

Fast-shrinking military budgets leave the Air Force planning to build a new long-range strike capability that is better than what is currently available ... but less than a next-generation leap forward.

While this approach may keep costs down in the short-term, U.S. military technological superiority is declining across the board. America's military is approaching strategic parity in select capability sets relative to others around the world now. That's dangerous.

To keep our edge, we need to design and build truly transformational platforms and technologies immediately -- and not let falling budgets paralyze defense innovation.

[buglerbilly]

New Bomber Won't Be Nuclear-Capable at First: USAF Chief

By DAVE MAJUMDAR

Published: 2 Nov 2011 18:21

The U.S. Air Force's top uniformed officer said the service's new Long Range Strike bomber will be built with nuclear capability but will operate as a conventional strike aircraft initially.

Testifying before Congress on Nov. 2, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz said deferring the new aircraft's nuclear certification until the B-52 and B-2 bombers start to retire would help the service manage costs.

"The reason is that we're trying to control costs," Schwartz said.

Testing for the nuclear role is much more elaborate than testing for conventional weapons.

Nonetheless, "the airplane will be dual-capable," Schwartz said.

Schwartz reiterated that the aircraft will be designed and built with all the hardware for both the nuclear and conventional missions from the outset.

"This will not be backed in later," he said.

At least for the time being, the service's Air Combat Command (ACC) is the lead command for developing the new bomber, Schwartz said. That is because ACC has the capability and expertise to build requirement.

The Global Strike Command is still not fully up to speed, Schwartz said. Eventually, however, the command might take over the program, he said.

For the nuclear mission, Schwartz appealed to the congressional committee to ask the Department of Energy to modernize and upgrade the B-61 nuclear bomb.

During the rest of his testimony, Schwartz reiterated that defense cuts beyond the current $450 billion would seriously damage the U.S. Air Force. Already, he said, the service is looking at divesting itself of "hundreds" of aircraft.

Entire fleets, including the entire logistical train, may have to be removed if further cuts are made, Schwartz said.

Lt. Gen. Herbert Carlisle mirrored those sentiments later in the afternoon during his testimony.

Schwartz also stressed the importance of the KC-46 tanker, F-35 fighter and the new bomber. However, this time, he added the MQ-9 Reaper to his three priority programs.

Cyberwarfare is the only area in which the Air Force or Defense Department forces might expand, Schwartz added.

[buglerbilly]

CSAF details bomber phase-in plan

By Philip Ewing Wednesday, November 2nd, 2011 1:46 pm



The Air Force’s new long range bomber will initially enter the fleet only capable of handling conventional ordnance, but then the service plans to certify it for nuclear weapons a little further down the line. Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz told House lawmakers Wednesday that the service is planning to phase in its “dual capabilities” to save money and, if possible, get its new bombers quicker.

Schwartz was asked about the bomber plans during the House Armed Services Committee’s latest marathon hearing about the dangers of potentially deep DoD budget cuts, the first at which he and the three other service chiefs appeared. Each one, in his turn, repeated the cautions that subordinates, industry advocates and observers all have given — that the implications of budget sequestration are just too horrific to contemplate.

Schwartz, Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno; Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Jonathan Greenert; and Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Amos all gave the performances for which they’d been invited: Each one metaphorically rolled around on the pitch like a European soccer star grabbing his knee, trying to coax a call from the ref.

The question now emerging is, just who is the ref? No one in the military-industrial-congressional complex needs to be convinced about the dangers of deep DoD budget reductions. In fact, it was congressional leaders themselves who agreed to the debt ceiling deal with the White House that primed the deadfall mechanism that leaders keep saying would clobber the Pentagon.

At any rate, once the chiefs’ warnings all were in the record Wednesday, the session resolved itself into a standard House hearing, with members quizzing the brass about their various parochial interests.

It was in this context that Schwartz was asked about the bomber, which he said remains a top priority for the Air Force. The goal, he said, was to design, build and field the airplanes as quickly and cheaply as possible, and once they were making their way into the fleet, then confirm they’d be able to take on the Air Force’s airborne nuclear deterrence mission.

Nuclear certification would begin with an eye toward the end of the service lives of the service’s B-2 and B-52 bombers, Schwartz said. The process would be “quite elaborate,” he said, involving electromagnetic pulse hardening and other intense testing, which is why it would likely be comparatively expensive and time-consuming. Schwartz assured lawmakers the bombers would be built from the start to handle the nuclear mission, but just not tested and certified for it right away. The goal is for them to be ready for nuclear missions as the B-52s and B-2s leave service.

Implicit in Schwartz’s assurances was that the Air Force can ultimately build its new bomber and, more basically, that the U.S. decides to keep its nuclear triad. As we saw at the Naval Submarine League conference, there are high-level talks between the White House and Strategic Command about the future of the full triad, and even the prospect of a common future Navy and Air Force ballistic missile. In Austerity America, the Air Force might have a hard time trying to make the case for a new missile and a new bomber, especially given the procurement “bow wave” forecast as its bomber, the KC-46A tanker and new F-35As all go into simultaneous full production.

Fine, the Air Force might say — we don’t want a dumb ‘ol missile with the stinky ‘ol Navy. There’s a case to be made that the best deal for the U.S. is to have a nuclear dyad that comprises Air Force bombers and Navy ballistic missile submarines. A “dual purpose” bomber gives you more bang for your buck, bomber types might say, because it can take both weekend turkey-shoot missions dropping conventional bombs (such as Libya) as well as keep on standby for Armageddon. All a land-based missile does is sit there hoping it’ll never be fired.

It’s all still highly theoretical, as Schwartz himself admitted to a lawmaker frustrated by the cloudy way ahead: “It’s not final,” Schwartz said, “until it’s in the president’s budget.”

Read more: http://www.dodbuzz.com/2011/11/02/csaf-details-bomber-phase-in-plan/#ixzz1cbJc05VW
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