Evolving Technology - USAF May Reduce B-21 Order
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- Опубліковано 9 чер 2024
- Mover and Gonky discuss recent news that the Air Force may reduce its B-21 order due to evolving technologies. www.airandspaceforces.com/air...
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A B-52 will do a flypast at the B-21 retirement ceremony
That wouldn’t surprise me at all…🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
That would be a shame. That would mean we've stagnated as a society and are incapable of making genuine progress in aviation.
B-52 sucks
And when the last B-52 goes to the boneyard, the crew will ride home on a C-130Z.
@@crazypetec-130fe7 we should do an aviation comedy channel on UA-cam!
Well, that’s not a surprise. The US military always says they’re gonna order a bunch and then they order five.
Then everyone acts shocked when the per-unit cost goes through the roof.
They said they were going to order 100 from the beginning. It hasn’t changed.
I was on B-1 Flight Test '84-'86, B-2 Flight Test '89-'97. I watched Congress progressively cut back both programs. I'm fully expecting B-21 to suffer the same fate. The B-2 cutback to only 21 flyable airframes meant per airframe cost was astronomical. Those 21 jets represent all the R&D cost for materials and technologies.
Yes, but the total cost is lower.
That was probably --- by accident, not by design --- one of the smartest decisions the Pentagon was forced to make. Buying 100 B-2 that cost between $1.5B and $2B could have been one of the most wasteful of taxpayers money in the history of military aircraft procurement.
The reason the B-52 --- designed in the late 1940s and built by 1955 ---- are still flying is that they are NEVER touted as machines that could smoke, drink, party, do break dance, conduct Tchaikovsky pieces, do computer programming, organize Socratic seminars, etc. and do them simultaneously....
Instead, the sturdy, giant --- here I come and you had better get out of the way or you'd be sent back to the Bronze Age --- B-52's sole purpose is to deliver TONS of explosives & do it more efficiently, more reliably, and faster than any other bomber types.
It is NOT its job to be invisible to opponents, or to outsmart them, or to shoot opponents out of the sky, etc.
THOSE JOBS are the jobs of fighter aircraft, surveillance aircraft, radars, human intel, satellites, etc.
And the US has MANY THOUSANDS of those high-end, fast, agile fighter aircraft, electronic aircraft, surveillance aircrafts....
Again, if 100 B-2s or 250 or 500 F-22 had been purchased, THEY WOULD NOW BOTH BE APPROACHING obsolescence, where frontier-technologies are concerned.
But they are still perfectly fine.
Yet, I remember, ON MY OWN COLLEGE CAMPUS one of the first 4 CRAY SUPER COMPUTERS that were made available to public research universities, in the late 1980s/early 1990s.... around the time the mighty and ground breaking F-22s and B-2s were being rolled out as the FUTURE of high tech...
Right now, most high end cell phones are able to do more calculations than those 4 Super Cray Computers of the early 1990s.
That Cray Super Computer at my San Diego campus, when it first arrived, could only do around 2 GFLOPS.
Some of today's high-end cell phones could do processing around 1 TFLOPS.
ALL THIS IS TO SAY:
For extremely expensive, VERY HIGH TECH things ----- and $2B a unit like the B-2 is probably one of the Top 5 most expensive project ever built and they ARE definitely THE MOST EXPENSIVE aircraft ever built.... only the $10B James Webb Space Telescope cost more ---- you should only buy A FEW, for very secretive, tactical purposes.
Because TECHNOLOGIES will overtake them within a few years.
Again, imagine you now had 100 B-2s and 250 - 500 F-22!
You can't just let them go to the junkyard, since they really are some 5 decades newer than the giant, clumsy B-52s... but the TECHNOLOGIES around which they're built, from the 1990s, are Bronze Age, compared to today's high end technologies!
But to pay to upgrade not easily upgradable as well as to simply maintain 100 B-52s and 250 - 500 F-22s, from the time of the first Cray Super Computers of the late 1980s/early 1990s.... that WOULD MAKE AMERICAN TAX PAYERS LITERALLY SLAVES, for very little returns, in military edge!
And the result is flying B52s for a century, because they're the epitome of modern technology!
Yeah, it was a "wonderful" decision to cut the number of F-22s.
They cut the F22 to make way for this and NGAD. Both programs have been in quiet development for decades. USAF is always looking for the next sky Ferrari.
@@guitarazn90210They cut the F22 production because the short sightedness of people working in government saw no need to continue the production line when we were battling low tech insurgent groups in the middle east.
What is the US response to Chinas J-20 stealth fighter? With a .2m RCS could we detect it? If not I'd assume F-22, F-35, and NGAD would be the front line counter to the J-20.
Either we can detect and track it which may be the case or we would have to rely on other stealth aircraft to detect and destroy them before being detected themselves.
@@LentPanic7They cut the order because the price was astronomical.
@@LentPanic7 It's not "short sightedness" it's economics, the price of the two wars was staggering and we can't spend ALL of our money on defense. Decisions had to be made.
If the count goes lower then 100, doesn’t that create the death spiral of per unit cost increase? And causes more scrutiny and comments about why something costs multiple billions each?
Yes, as seen with B-2.
It does cause the per unit cost to go up, but buying less bomber is always be cheaper in the end. Buying 100. Bombers for 700 million is still cheaper than 125 for 650 million
You still have to pay to maintain the things. I don't have numbers to hand but for the expected lifetimes of combat a/c these days I'd think that ends up rather more than the purchase cost per unit.
@@thepilotman5378 True. But the point is that it can lead to a downward spiral that possibly leaves you with too few. For example it seems like we wish there were more F-22’s now. And keeping them in slow production may have allowed for more advanced blocks with less development lag.
The other issue is supply chain for fixing damaged aircraft. When they reduce the number of aircraft produced they also reduce the amount of repair or replacement parts produced. This makes it more difficult to keep the aircraft fleet operational and leads to cannibalizing parts from plane to plane and having to retire aircraft early because they simply can’t get the parts to keep them flying.
Also, when you have fewer planes for a particular mission, those planes see more sorties per aircraft which increases their flight hours per year and reduces the number of years they can remain in service.
Not a single person ever believed they were actually going to build 100. They literally do this on every single new procurement.
They NEVER make the mark on projected numbers...
Why would the air force need exactly 100 aircraft? There is a specific rational number for which fit in the budget, and adequately cover the areas of interest, based on range from bases and logistics.
@@enigmatic51me95All those F-15s and F-16s that got made say otherwise. Never say never.
We need some degree of “mass” as well. We cannot continually change tech at the cost of running out of capacity. US needs MASSIVE stockpiles of cheap precision capabilities.
Seconded. The war in Ukraine is arguably the perfect example of this RN. Ukraine may have a low number of good Western systems, but Russia had a large number of okay weapons systems. If you only have ten guns and your enemy has 100+, even if you outshoot them 5x on a per gun basis, they shoot 2x as many shells. That's excluding the substantially greater impact of barrel replacement. It's worse to lose 10% of ten guns than 10% of 100 guns to maintenance.
👉 ... " MAY " ... 👈
- reduce the order ..
= USAF : standard operating procedure .. !!!
Doubt I will see more than 30 in my lifetime.
Okay old timer. 😂
Sorry. The invitation was there and I couldn’t help it.
Yeah maybe 40 but that's the max. Where would they even put all 100? Whiteman?
@keirfarnum6811 hey I'm only 30, I can't afford to yell "get off my lawn" yet. 😂
@@colostomybag9367 There are B1s and B52s begging to be retired...unless something is actually wrong with the on budget & on time B21 we should build the heck out of it, before skipping to a new miracle ✈.
i agree with gonky. Even the 100 they are sticking with wont be the final amount they end up with. Most likely around 30-35 of them will be what they end up with. And because of that the 600 mill per bomber wont be achieved and it will be over 1 billion per Bomber..... Like a broken record with the defense department. never changes.
when was the last time they DIDNT reduce an order?
F35?
@@appa609 has the us order for them gone up or down from initial? i dont know
If they build 10 per year then we are thinking about 10 years of development before this entire order is delivered. And it's not unlikely they can build a future version of that B-21 which includes technology developed over those ten years of production.
The 'Cessna' in the video is an A-22 Foxbat from Ukrainian manufacturer Aeroprakt. It is basically a 600kg (1300lb for those still using old measurements) microlight or light sport aircraft. Usable load with full fuel is about 200kg (450lb) that leaves a bit of space to pack it with 'explode-y' stuff.
B-1's are still supersonic at altitude. And even though they aren't down low, they're still fast. And they can stay in burner on the deck longer than the fighter chasing it!
Same with the British Government to the point that they forget that they have any armed forces because they are so small.
Seems like development is where all the kickbacks happen now.
Meanwhile the Buff is still flying for how much longer
Make 100 and sell the excess to Australia (If they want them) With the lager area they need to patrol and protect in a war, it would be a great asset to an ally
The idea was suggested and rejected already. The unit cost was apparently going to be prohibitively high.
Very confused why you cant build an airframe and allow for changes to the guts. Build a bunch of the parts and warehouse them. Even if you dont put them together into a bomber.
because its a waste of money to build a bunch of parts you don't actually use.
Yep, just go ahead and build them.
You can
Theyre projecting that the airframe itself will be outmoded in time.
That implies foresight of some really exotic materials coming down the chain that will be paradigm shifting.
Remember that the plane is made by tools, tools which work with certain materials.
The next thing after B21 may look exactly like it, but will be made with materials that current manufacturing chains cannot work with.
3:10 that one remote controlled cesna should be 100/day automous pulse jet V-1 replicas by now.
I really like your intro song. It slap. Great videos always too
Modern jets are mostly fast rocket launcher systems that dont risk as many shots back as they can be miles and miles off. You dont fly over enemy territory anymore. You cannot afford replacing the airframes nor pilots. Especially if you only build 5.
Planes are always obsolete by the time they roll off the line. However, you can't compare the B-21 to some future super bomber- you have to compare it to what it's actually replacing....and those planes are OLD! I think they should make a stripped-down tanker version of the B-21 to refuel stealth fighters close to the front line. Maybe they could just make some kind of navy-style "buddy pack" that fits in the bomb bay for extra fuel. Maybe they could also make a drone control ship, with crew capsules in the bomb bay to control swarms of unmanned aircraft.
Whenever this kind of conversation comes up I always think about the Germans in WWII. Really great, high precision, state of the art machinery but in limited numbers that were defeated by superior numbers.
Which is why the British went for centrifugal-flow jets - there was a British axial flow jet but the reliability wasn't there, meanwhile Me262 engines had a lifespan of 10 hours & caught fire with even slightly rough handling. And the British built possibly the best aircraft of the war out of plywood ( well, composite we'd say now ) which could be partly constructed in any random shed. Goering famously complained about german over-engineering...
I look at European military now & kinda think all those lessons have been entirely forgotten, even by the ones who've actually been in wars recently. Bar the one who's actually in a war now, ofc.
How about artillery shells?
IRST and other passive optical sensors are evolving so fast that by the time the B-21s are combat ready, they will have already become obsolete. On the other hand, you have the B-52 and the Rapid Dragon system that can conduct all the standoff bombing. Therefore, a stand-in stealth bomber doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
Yeah, I thought the B-21 was going to look more like the B-52 and use long range cruise missiles that fit on the wings. Maybe some of the cruise missiles could be drone like by flying over and area and dropping bomblets.
100 B-21's is still absolutley Bannana's tho so this is fine.
They won't build 100 of them.
They said the same thing about the B-2 and ended up with 20.
Not really. They built 700+ B-52s.
@@sferrin2 That was a way different time. The last B-52 was built in 1963 I believe??
@@christianpethukov8155 but we also had the B1 which was less than 10 years old when we got the B2. And then the Soviet Union collapsed. Right now we got a world full of war and rising technological threats. I bet we order at least 50 of these and we probably have some tech already in the works hypersonic wise or drone wise that is changing the calculus on timelines and effectiveness.
Same old song and dance. The ever changing target which drives up the costs of the CURRENT models. Why are they always doing this?
Because officers make the decisions and it's not their money they're spending.
Because that worked out so well for the F-22s
Will this be available for export?
Seems the USAF would be lucky to get 250 of these on time and on cost. (Of course they are probably now saying: "What if we bought less and added this new tech instead?")
actually they are ahead of time and cost I believe.
Can't say I'm surprised. Congress had a collective stroke when they saw the cost of the B-2. Cant see this one being cheaper.
That's why I always use old, outdated computers. I get them used and broken, and fix them. I never buy a new computer because something better will soon come along, and probably for cheaper, too. I just keep waiting forever and have to put up with using inferior computers my whole life. I do this because I'm kind of stupid that way. And it's an even dumber way to run a military, in my opinion, because when you actually need the equipment, you'd hardly have any on hand, and will lose. It's not that bad, in this case, more like a compromise, but it's still the same kind of thinking. Maybe this balanced approach is better. One just needs to be careful about always looking ahead while overly neglecting the present.
How much room is there in the cockpit? Can the pilot leave the seat, stand up and stretch legs like some other bombers? Or they are supposed to sit 10-12 hours...?
I heard the B2 was $1billion per piece, now this is only $700 million...for that price they could have gotten 4-5-6 of the F35...honestly this bomber seems a bit unnecessary, still having the awesome B1...but hey, at least they keep the engineers working/developing new stuff...and it is more efficient (green) than the B52s...
stealth bombers are a larger asset than the B-1 and B-52 being able to cut off supply lines or take out specific enemy assets without the enemy ever knowing your there is what makes it worth the the hefty price imagine operation praying mantis but with F-35s and B-2's Iran wouldn't know what hit them
@@FlerdaManLets clarify something. Stealth aircraft are still visible on the very low frequency ground radars, so the enemy will know what/who hit them, just they will not be able to send a missile to intercept effectively...
For the same mission you can send in a long range ballistic missile with less risk and cheaper...
They have yet to come up with tangible sustainment dollars for the B-21.
Like all platforms.
We gauge project time using the time it took us to fight WWII.
B-21 is in the 3-factor phase.
Gen Alvin apparently didn’t get the wink wink from NorthrupGrumman for post retirement board position.
Yeah, something is up...I suspect someone trying to divert the funding to their favorite needy aerospace contractors not building the current model.
What use is the B-21? a subsonic stealth bomber when you have long range a-g missiles?
IS this news a rerun from 1991 and 1984?
I have a feeling DoD is seeing how much faster missile and drone technology is evolving relative to bomber technology and want to hedge their bets. Large payload bombers, manned or unmanned, will always be part of the battlefield but it is hard not to see how effective missiles and drones are in current conflicts relative to bombers. Russia just had a Tu-22, their B-1 equivalent, shot down just a few days ago.
I am with Gonky in that I just don’t see 100 of these being put into service. The B-2 order went from 75 to 20, which became 21 when a prototype was converted, and then back to 20 after the Guam crash. I don’t even think all 20 are on active flying status right now. I don’t know where they’d get the manpower or hours to operate 100 of those things. If you add up all available B-1, B-2 and B-52 across active and reserve you have 141 aircraft. The 76 B-52 are supposed to remain in service until the 2060s, which is amazing since my grandfather was a navigator on B-52s 65 years ago. I am guessing they’ll settle on around 50 B-21, augmented by the other three bombers, until the next next-gen bomber comes along. That’s perfect if you ask me, great diversity in bomber systems covering any possible mission in the modern battlefield.
Makes sense that they would need and want fewer when you think about the transformative changes happening rapidly right not. Hypersonics, multi-cycle engines, rotating-datonation engines, and AI may require or allow drastic redesigns of an airframe for speed or removal of crew. Older platforms like B-52, F-15 variants and palletized munitions dropped from cargo aircraft that continue to operate and may leverage newer systems with increased stand-off ranges and accuracy, negating some of the need for stealth penetration.
@petekaragiannis1716 Absolutely!
The B-52 ‘Stratofortress’ phased out the B-29 ‘Superfortress’, B-36 ‘Peacemaker’, B-45 ‘Tornado’, B-47 ‘Stratojet’, and B-50 ‘Superfortress’. Saw the demise of the B-49 ‘Flying Wing’. Outlasted the B-57 ‘Camberra’, B-58 ‘Hustler’, and B-66 ‘Destroyer’. Also saw the demise of the B-70 ‘Valkyrie’; is watching the B-1 ‘Lancer’ decommissioning; soon will watch the B-2 ‘Spirit’ go for pasture; and definitely will watch the B-21 ‘Raider’ for retirement!
I’m shocked!! 😂
This happens right after wars. Technology and tactics change rapidly and you always see a flurry of new designs to address new threats encountered in the conflict. When the next big tech emerges, you want to get ahead of it, but when you start the design work, no one has had time to really figure it out, or how to fully employ it. Jet fighters after WWII for instance. We went through loads of them in no time until things started making sense and tactics stabilized after Korea. Bombers too. Think about all the bombers we developed between the B-29 until we ended up focusing on the B-52 at the beginning of the Cold War. Remember all those flashy Stratojets in the 50’s? The B-58, B-36, XB-70?
Right now we are going through an AI/Drone/Stealth revolution. So, they are throwing stuff against the wall and looking for what sticks now that they see what Russia is really incapable of doing.
Mathias Rust landed a Cessna in Red Square Moscow at the height of the cold war.
is it not suppose to replace the B1 and B2 fleets
The issue with the B21 (and the B2) is that there really is not a big need for it. It could only be used once to deliver a nuclear weapon because to a Tier1 opponent because that would immediately escalate into an exchange of ICBMs and SLBMs. To think that it could be used for Strategic bombing is likewise a fantasy, because if the US were to strike targets in China or Russia and these countries really had no way to stop them (which is highly debatable) they would once again turn to nuclear weapons. In fact, even the US Gen 5 fighters don't have much use. Most people would be surprised to know that no US fighter has shot down a Chines, Soviet, or Russian Federation aircraft since 1970. These weapons are mainly used against Tier 3 powers, and even the F-15 is a huge overmatch against that level of opponent. The B1B has never been used in the role that it was sold to the public for (not once), instead simply playing the roll of bomb dump truck, but the B52 (a plane that the Pentagon wisely decided to re-engine with the Rolls Royce F130 engines) could perform that roll because the assumption is that the US would be able to establish air superiority over tier 3 opponents. If the Pentagon is going to spend the money to upgrade the B52 to the J model, then one has to question why they would do so if they thought the aircraft was no longer viable, but again, once you establish air control over a tier 3 opponent, what do you need a trillion dollars worth of stealth bombers for? I can't even imagine that we need 100 stealth bombers because there is unlikely to be a "limited" war against the Russian Federation or China. I am struggling to understand the need for a bunch of horrendously expensive stealth bombers and the Pentagon seems to be questioning that need as well. They have an F-35 that is causing them to go broke, and they already realize the the F-22 and F-35 are near obsolescence, so they will want a few hundred NGADs, and between the procurement, maintenance, and upgrade costs of the F-22 and the F35 the Pentagon budget is being devoured by planes that don't every really get used in the role they were built for. The F15 and the F-16, and F-18 were the only really sensible weapons systems purchases the US has made since the F-4 Phantom.
The future is platform agnostic. More and more capability is being put into the munition rather than the aircraft. Pilots are going to hate it. The twist is the B-52 will be the ultimate aircraft.
Bingo!
Of course they will reduce the order... They always do. Short sighted per normal. Increase cost per unit, and create even more logistics issues at the end of their service life.
Classic we'll buy X to scale the price per unit to Y, then actually buy a significantly lower amount and drop the project due to high costs (after plenty of media coverage simply stating high cost but leaving out the context). Where have we seen this before?
I thought 100 was always the official number stated by the AF.
What!!? I’m shocked!!!
Wait. No I’m not. 😏
I so can't wait for the alien spacecraft from independence day.
It was said that the B21, would be replacing the B1B, B2 and B52, i doubt they will make 100 B21's as suggested, the fleet needs to be diverse in terms of it needs and coming heavy on the B21, makes no sense.
I'll buy em if they wont!
It's one thing to try to look forword, but we still need something to fight with. Right now, the AF is buying F-15's at a higher per unit cost than the 35. I know they need seats to put a$$'s in, as alot of birds are past life expectation. I just have very little faith in AF leadership in making fleet decisions.
I think the B-21 is just a replacement for the B-2. We still need dump trucks which is why 4th gen fighters and the B-52 are going nowhere.
For what do they even need B-21? B-2 became detectable by enemies' radars?
I'm an old guy but it seems to me that the future is large swarms of relatively explosive drones to do the bombing roll. These would progress to use greater amounts of learning capability.
Show me one that can fly 6000 miles.
They'll just deploy those drones from a cruise missile launched hundreds of miles away from a 150-year-old B-52
Yup....Iran.
@@sferrin2 Smaller drones can be stationed out of nearly any airfield, so they wouldn't need to fly transoceanic routes.
Can’t do heavy bombing to take out infrastructure with drones, also B-21 can carry nukes.
looks like what happened to B2 is now happening to B21
The B-21 platform might be able to serve as the replacement for the KC-135 Stratotanker, particularly in an un-manned roll.
Damn, you beat me to it! Alien craft should be re engineered by 2035, and we should see a tic tac fly around Beijing 60 times
Remember when they scaled back F-22 production ….
F-22 be like
ah shit here we go again
Lockheed needs to spend more on lobbying. LOL
This makes sense to me, the technology is just developing too fast. Especially with adaptive cycle/RDE engines. I wouldn't be surprised if NGAD was a multirole bomber with fighter armaments and capabilities. 100 B-21's is more than enough to fill the B-2 role. Loyal wingmen drones are just so much cheaper and quantity is a quality all of its own.
They only need one
Don't they always reduce the order number?
What is wrong with the USAF? Procurment spiral.
Classic F-22 mistake all over again.
It’s drones era
This. Spending more money on jets and bombers is an entire waste of time and money. Flooding the battlefield with killer drones is going the way to go now. Especially with AI allowing "launch and forget" drones which will target anyone ina killing zone or will target specific targets.
Duncan Sandys, UK defence minister in 1957 cancelled a vast number of projects ( and pretty much killed the UK's aerospace industry who were - and it's odd to think these days - a world leader at the time ) because he thought unmanned was the future. He wasn't wrong, just far too early...
How long have we had autonomous cruise missiles in service? they don't have the longest range ever but you surely don't need a crewed $800m stealth aircraft as a range extender...
Until lasers become man-portable. As soon as Iron Beam gets small enough to be vehicle-mounted, drones will become virtually obsolete.
USAF just heard about drones 😂
they should follow the F-22 all the way... After they build a limited number of B21's they have to make sure they destroy all the tooling to make sure no new parts can be made. After all the plane will be so good it wont need spare parts.
Just another way of saying we're extending the B-52 service life even further
The bomber equivalent of an iPhone SE
So let’s talk about the “better stuff”.🤫
Well, the standard always is screw it up and make each copy cost as much as five, stupid and predictable.
I don't get why they are building a stealth bomber. It's clear that in past conflicts the US mainly needed a B52 replacement. Something versatile that can drop a vast array of anything at your enemy. Unless they genuinely order a spec for that then why bother building a large fleet of smaller stealth bombers when you can order hundreds of multi role fighters for the same price.
The B21 never looked like it was the real deal, it looks like a Toy.
RAAF will get a few under AUKUS, probably about 24
Not a chance, the idea has already been floated and rejected. If the fabled 4th squadron of F-35 is not being preceeded with a squadron of heavy stealth bombers is not going to happen.
@@AndrewinAus and 2 years ago we were not getting nuke subs either
@@PeterOZ61 That happened because it would be to the USA's advantage to have a couple of Australian nuclear submarines closing off a few of the choke points to our north from traffic coming from China. Strategic strike aircraft are a different thing. Yes you could argue that we have had a similar capability before with the F-111's but the ADF is being rebuilt into more of a focused force that can exercise control over our immediate region. Long range stealth bombers don't seem to be part of that. At least according to the recent Defence Strategic Review. They were specifically ruled in fact “…we do not consider the B-21 to be a suitable option for consideration for acquisition,” was the direct quote.
@@AndrewinAus stick to reading comic books.
@@PeterOZ61 Awww resorting to insults so soon? I prefer to read unclassified public available documents on matters like this. You never know what you might find. Directly from the public version of the Defence Strategic Review "8.46 The Review has undertaken detailed discussions in Australia and the United
States in relation to the B-21 Raider as a potential capability option for Australia.
In light of our strategic circumstances and the approach to Defence strategy and
capability development outlined in this Review, we do not consider the B-21 to
be a suitable option for consideration for acquisition." Defence Strategic Review pg 65 www.defence.gov.au/about/reviews-inquiries/defence-strategic-review
The very suggestion that they may limit the B-21 to 100, will have the CCP and Russia a little freaked out, which is nice in itself. The recent DARPA developments of blown control surfaces and/or plasma control surfaces are worthy considerations at this stage, I suspect. At the same time, the F-22 will be retiring soon enough, and the F-35 will keep being developed.
100 aircraft seems excessive. It’s replacing 20 B-2s, I won’t mention B-1 or B-52, so we’re at a 5 to 1 ratio.
We need to start replacing the B1s & B52s....not on a one to one basis, but they're old!
Why aren't you mentioning the B-1? The entire B-1 fleet is being taken out of service to make way for the B-21's before they reduce the B-2 numbers at all.
Between the B-1 (45) and B-2 (20) it's a 1.5 to 1 ratio and with the USAF pilot shortage building an extra 35 bombers rather than 200 F-35's makes sense especially if they're looking at a Pacific conflict.
I believe it has something to do with the possible lack of tankers in a contested area. The J-20 has a longer combat range than U.S. fighters making the tankers have to be in range of the J-20.
They already have something “better” in the pipeline? And this thing isn’t even off the assembly line yet!? 😮
Probably someone wants to divert funding to Boeing or Lockheed....
If the B-21 is destined to be obsolete by 2030 then why sell it to the Air Force?
Thousands of small drones and big missile carriers will end up ruling the skies!
The b21 could be classified as a first nuclear strike capability aircraft meaning we hit them before they see us Red October in the air gentleman
I think the important number is how many are operational by 2027
There is always something in the pipeline developing. I believe the bombers will be the first to become remotely piloted along with transports.
I’m intrigued to see if the B21 becomes available for export. Saw some rumour mill reviews the quoted the Australian Air Force being a potential customer. Wonder if the 5 eye’s community will be able to order any like the F35. B21 seems to be a solely US project though. Would love the RAF to invest in a Squadron of B21’s. Also intrigued to see what the USAF does with the retired B2’s. I’m assuming they’ll be mothballed like the F117 and not completely scrapped.
Well stealthfighters/bombers arent completely obsolete but in modern war, another 100 00 ammunitions for medium and long rqnge anto air as well as a million small drones would server a much greater purpose. Imagine if ukraine had access to a few hundred storm shadows, enough anti air missiles and access to an unlimited ammount of fpv/recon drones. A single f16 is probably same value as thousands of small fpv drones. And they can be, and is, actively used on the front lines.
Why spend a fortune on a delivery system just to deliver very expensive ordnance when for far less money you can just extend the range of the ordinance? It makes no sense.
The days of manned bombers is long past.
Dont make the same mistake as the F22
You just have to fly 120 miles…straight up…well and sideways…get into orbit or sub orbital speed…🤣
B-21 to be replaced by tic tac 😂
Of course - we have been bankrupt for 14 years, and soon the can can’t be kicked further down the road.
100 units is like 4-5 units like Concorde. It is dead tech just like the F22. There will always be something more, the question is how much more? and at what cost?
Still, even now, as we saw with the F14 and the B1, airframes get repurposed. Strategic-Tactical-CAS missions appear to cover all bases. B52 lingers because of its amendable capacity bays, but Air Superiority and Defense Suppression must be complete short of stand-off weapons. B1 had its time, and faster served purpose for Station CAS in Country, impressive work, sad to see the beast go. B2...my uncle worked in the Northrup Boeing Vault on that. Had to be debriefed every 2 years for the rest of his life. I can really only suppose that it fulfilled its mission, and as quiet as chatter is about it, It probably did just fine.
We are just never ever going to see sky darkening numbers of ships every again. It is not necessary, and the human cost of diversionary efforts with real frames and crew is unconscionable.
Just take some lessons from ace combat😮
Sorry guys, but 100 is NOT a significant number! A significant number of bombers would be at least 500. A significant number of fighters would be at least 1,000.Quality is all well and good, but as V.I. Lenin once said, quantity has a quality all its own. Other countries can build good fighters for much less. Why can't we? China has at least 200 J-20s, and that number is growing. There's something messed up in the military industrial complex; we don't come close to getting our money's worth.
All of those planes would need pilots and mechanics and ordinance specialists and all the other people and equipment that are needed to support an aircraft. With our volunteer military, we don't have the people for that. When 1 advanced fighter can shoot down 5+ "inferior" aircraft, AND you have the technological advantage, AND you have a volunteer military, all of those factors synergize into what the current armed forces look like today. It's more nuanced than one can post in a UA-cam comment, but that's the gist of it. Now maybe if we were 3 years into WWIII and have had to institute the draft and crap has already hit the fan, there's something to be said about what you can put out in great numbers in a short amount of time. But we're not there.
@@Nighthawk429 those are good points. However, technology will only carry you so far. We can see a good example from WWII: the Me262, the world's first operational jet fighter. The Me262 was LIGHT YEARS better than anything we had! I was 120 mph faster than the P-51; it was better armed; it was better in every way. However, Nazi Germany never had more than 70 in service, so they were overwhelmed by superior numbers of inferior aircraft. I worry that we may fall into the same trap. Meanwhile China already has 200 J-20s in service, and that number grows daily.
@@Nighthawk429 they probably wont need pilots
A 100 is a good amount
@@the42nd If you want them "cheap" like the original commenter said, you can't fit them with advanced autonomous flight controls. This (cheap and autonomous) may be possible "some day" but I don't expect to be alive to see it.
What the heck is Gonky drinking?
We no longer need manned vehicles... drones have advanced enough, pilots have been replaced by video gamers... imagine TopGun X... some fat obese dude in a hawaiian shirt, tattered shorts wearing socks & slip-on shoes walking into a bunker somewhere in oklahoma... TopGun theme playing in the background... they're here to save America... LOLOLOL... best of the best...
The main question for me is will we actually see deep bomber strikes into enemy territory in a conventional war. Ukraine right now is the most current example and the Russians are using their strategic bombers as missile trucks. Sure, the B21 is supposed to be stealthy whereas the Russian bombers are not, but is command really going to risk them when they can just hurl missiles at them from outside SAM range.
I suppose it's all about cost. Apparently, in the predicted conflicts, it's cheaper / more viable to use super expensive bombers with short/medium range munitions than long range missiles.
But those long range missile truck can be seen. Based on the plane behaviors the defender can make some educated guess on what the target is and where the missile might came from.
Now, keep the missile the same but instead the launching aircraft is just not there. While your early warning system will likely still pick up the missile, it is now unclear where it came from and where it might be heading. In a worse case scenario, your radar sensor did not pick it up, instead the eo system did. At that point, it is likely too late for you to do anything.
Now let's think pacific. Whenever shooting starts and PLAN is now trying to protect their on supply while try cutting Taiwan supply. There might or might not be an uncertain quantity of lo aircraft that's carrying no less than 3 lrasm each from who knows which direction and altitude.