But at $1.2 billion a pop, your steward of the national fisc might earnestly hope for otherwise:
A US B-2 stealth bomber – one of the world’s most expensive planes – has crashed for the first time on the Pacific island of Guam.
The jet crashed shortly after taking off from the island’s Andersen Air Force Base, but both pilots ejected and survived, the US Air Force (USAF) said.
Black smoke could be seen billowing from the site, witnesses said.
The B-2 bomber costs $1.2 bn and is capable of deploying both conventional and nuclear weapons.
Happy the crew got out. But “b” is a big number.
WOW! That is horrible! Glad the pilots were ok! Growing up I lived between MacDill AFB and the Sun & Fun fly in. So I have had an awesome and rare opportunity to see these crazy birds in flight! Right over my home. They almost look like they are from another planet! ; )
Glad the pilots were able to get out, for sure.
Isn’t $1.2 Billion what we as taxpayers expect to pay for an Arleigh Burke DDG, which has a myriad of capabilities: ASW; ABM; AM; SAR, etc?
Unless the B2 bomber has a full “Death Star” range of capability, which I doubt, why are they needed? Nothin’ against the Air Force, but doesn’t that buy like 20 or more Hornets?
And the B2 can’t take-off or land on a boat.
Yeah, but it can take off from Whiteman in Missouri, bomb Baghdad, and land back in Missouri. And not be detected by any radar along the way. Not to mention it can carry quite a few bombs.
SJBill-
Yeah, but try getting the DDG to fly.
Would have been a lot cheaper except that we only bought 21 instead of 133. Lots of start-up costs that didn’t get amortized the way they should have been. There was talk a few years ago of reopening the line – price would have been $735 million each for a run of 40 more aircraft. Still expensive, but they do things no other airplane in the world can do.
Bad week for the AF. First the F-15 collision out of Eglin, now this.
“Would have been a lot cheaper except that we only bought 21 instead of 133. Lots of start-up costs that didn’t get amortized the way they should have been.”
Exactly. It had the misfortune (or fortune, depending on how you look at it) to get designed and authorized when the Soviets were still around, but actually built when they had just imploded.
A few years earlier, and you have the F-15E. A few years later and you have the F-22. So sucks that it happened late, but at least it got built at all.
Even at $732 million a copy, that’s still ridiculously overpriced. It is a disaster with every component custom built to its own customized MILSPEC–not a single OTS component on board. The F-119, although built to support a different mission, proved you could build a successful stealth aircraft almost entirely out of OTS components, put together to much less exacting tolerances, at a fraction of the price (about the same per copy as current fighters). The cost of the B-2 was generated by Air Force wet dreams and inexcusable contractural license.
The failed mission it flew to Baghdad, despite all the publicity it generated, was a failure because the B-2, like any platform that isn’t circling over the target when the call comes in, is useless against targets that can move. The target was hours gone by the time the B-2 got there, although the building the target had been in was still there. What the hey, let’s create a big smoking crater in the middle of a residential neighborhood anyway, and pretend the target’s still in it! I’d hate to fly all this way, burning millions of dollars of other service’s assets along the way, for nothing! It’ll generate some great press for the Air Force, won’t it! (Until the word gets out that they missed the target but killed a couple of dozen civilians — whoops! But isn’t that B-2 technology sexy?)
Contrary to the Air Force’s hyping of the “legendary mission,” the B-2 did not/NOT fly direct from Whiteman to Baghdad to Whiteman, and it did suck up a tremendous amount of low-density, high-value assets along the way–just to support one sexy AF mission for an otherwise unjustifiable platform, a mission that was a failure any way you slice it.
Maybe, just maybe, the theft of taxpayer dollars that is the B-2 can be justified by its use against the type of targets it was built to be used against–highly-defended fixed nuclear sites. Maybe it will get a chance to be used to the fullest of its capabilities very soon, as the crash on D-Gar suggests. Then I’ll lighten up on it, and sing the praises of the AF and the contractors who had the foresight to build this weapon in the service our our nation and the cause of Liberty. Until then, pshaw.
The key issue though is that the USAF needs a heavy bomber-not just fighter attack aircraft. If for no other reason for on call Time Sensitive Targets. The B-52 and the B-1 have demonstrated that in Afghanistan.
The real question I would ask is do we need Stealth capability and to answer that you have to ask your self what is the risk of war against a first tier power like Russia or China?
The price tag does not seem out of measure for me. At an estimated price of roughly around 100 million $ each you could either have 12 latest generation fighter/fighter-bombers or one B-2.
Zane… sure you don’t mean B-1? I thought it was a B-1 that was called in to take out that restaurant thought to have Saddam based on 45 +/- minute from detection to hit target freshness quality, back in 2003. A B-1 raced in and put down 4 JDAMs (2 BLU-109 and 2 Mk84). Because the original targeting tech source: (cellphone tracking) at the time was well over 100m cep and combined with stale-as-in minutes target info, around 18 AFAIK civilians died and no Saddam.
B-2 is useful, just not something you are going to use every day. Tail-less stealth aircraft have excellent wide-band stealth… just that the airframe performance sux (night-time only stealth and highly regulated paths to the target based on emitters. Also Guam, Diego and Fairford UK are B-2 hangouts based on contingencies.
Cool sensors on the jet. LPI radar with GMTI and SAR mapping which gives you sub 2 meter target accuracy with JDAMs. Also has a high end digital star-tracker in the left wing that gives outstanding nav refreshes to the INS as a backup to failed or non-existent GPS sources.
Something that can put down 80 GBU-38 (JDAM kitted to BLU-111/Mk80) and hit 80 different targets in one or multiple drops from 10-13 miles away @40k ft isn’t too bad. SDB will be set up on the jet someday, You can also do 16 GBU-31 series (2000lb class JDAMs), or a few GBU-37/GBU-28 bunker busters (4500lb class) weapons, JASSM, JSOW, or a new 30,000 pound GPS/INS bomb being set up and of course nukes.
It is one system that helps fill in the blanks other platforms can’t reach right away on certain parts of the map. Had we stuck with the Soviet Union threat, we would have needed 130 some that were originally programed. Times change and the 20 are what we now have. Niche stuff but useful.
Still requires HD/LD assets to support and not just tankers.
-SJS
“Still requires HD/LD assets to support and not just tankers.”…
So will the Buick of Stealth (JSF) of which no one at this time can say what it will cost with less than 2% test time on the books, tons of hype and lots of problems still to figure out. I would say the “affordable” word on the JSF patch won’t happen. (Gates $77m a copy claim for JSF is bovine product based on a lot of hope). Lets not make aircraft too expensive least we crash one of them occasionally.
Then again, USN sunk a Tico that only had 18 years in service. Ship building Mafia: “Rocko, Moose, help the judge find his checkbook. “
I hope the pilots weren’t 0-3’s! Think about it.
What Zane says is true and what ELP says are both true.
We use what we use because we got it. Everything else is 20/20 hindsight.
1.2 billion or 750 million? Cmon. Just like 65 million or 85 million for the star tanker of this blog. Use whichever pricetag suits your purposes o’course…
Sometimes we have to spend 1.2 billion because we didn’t plan for something that happens. That’s what just happened to the Naval Aviation.
Having a Class A mishap like this B-2 loss is something you plan for. As sure as an actuary plans the exact probablity of your demise when it comes to the cost of your life insurance.
Unlike that unfortunate Navy 1.2B above, 0-3’s or not this is just a business loss and like Lex says, after nearly 20 years it was inevitable. Lucky it happened near Diego and not in Missouri.
I’ve landed at that AFB a coupla times. They have a rare type Prairie Chicken that lives there. When I came in on approach once I was waved off for “Chickens on the runway”. Say what? I wonder if’n they wave off those B-2’s for the same. LOL.
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Glad the crew got out safely. CNN is going to have a field day with this one:-(
But the Prowler that went down about ten days ago didn’t get much press. Not as expensive or as high profile.
I hope the maintainers don’t get crucified in the press.
Speaking of dialing for dollars, wait ’til the injury claims from the exotic materials in the smoke start rolling in. Remember the injury claims filed against the govt in the early 90’s from the open pit burning at Area 51?
-SJS
Yes, the B-2 is expensive.
On the other hand, have you priced, say, a Boeing 777-300ER ($279M) or an Airbus 380 ($320M, and another $50M to $150M if you want to trick out the carpet and drapes, according to Airbus) lately? They don’t have some of the more-expensive avionics of the B-2 either, for starters.
Doesn’t the B-2 price include spares, tools, etc. on top of the aircraft itself?
I’m just wondering … if we were building a heavy bomber today, would it look more like the B-2, or the B-52?
As I understand it, the B-2’s really good at flying in undetected and delivering a relatively (for a bomber) small payload. So that’s great if it’s the Cold War, and you want a nuclear first strike option.
But are we at all likely to be fighting a war against air defenses we can’t suppress? And given the rate at which countermeasures to stealth are appearing, how much longer can we count on stealth to make it “safe” for bombers to fly into heavily defended airspace?
Ray,
Any new bomber we decide to build will look nothing like anything that’s really been flown before. Of that much I’m confident.
[Edit: Stealth is nice to have. On the other hand , stealth is not the only performance-based driver in the decisions made for aircraft design, nor should it be.]
Oh, stealth will be around a while for sure. The interplay between detection/anti-aircraft technologies and low observability will continue to ensure that. As long as there is a hole in a sensor suite, designers will find it and exploit it with next gen stealth.
Yes, countries with viable air defenses may be few and far between, but they exist. And THAT technology is relatively cheap, meaning it’s proliferation is virtually assured. When that happens, we’ll need stealth.
And let’s not forget the importance of surprise. Getting fighter bombers inside the defenses to hit high value targets and soften those defenses on the first day of battle is essential to minimizing losses later on.
That’s the gist of JV2020 anyway. JSF is the goto guy for 1st and 2nd day of battle, then the better-armed Rhinos can boom in and deliver bigger payloads.
And speaking of bigger payloads, I don’t see as much of a need for them. Carpet bombing is a dying art, what with JDAM and LGBs. We’re in the “targets per sortie” world, not the “sorties per target” days anymore.
Even if all that doesn’t work, it’s still nice to be “invisible” when you’re trying to do things your enemy might not like.
Steeljaw beat me to it. First thing I thought was hope no one is near all that burning toxic plastic and composites.
Let us not forget, in fighting the current war, that the next war may be entirely different.
re- “So that’s great if it’s the Cold War, and you want a nuclear first strike option. ”
Gee. I didn’t know the Cold War was so misunderstood. I reckon it could be called “bad behavior” in todays parlance. How could we be so stupid. Snicker w/sarcasm.
re Stealth in general- If you give the B-2 or anything else the radar signature of, let’s say a hummingbird, folks will invent a radar/sensor to detect humminbirds. It’s just a math problem. See?
re- “That’s the gist of JV2020 anyway.”
Yeah. Hang your hat on that 100% and you’ll lose. Plus, you sound Naval Avaition centric…I hope we have the tankers to execute what you see on those multi-million dollar glossies of the “Enterprise”. Do you see any big wet wings on our “plans” Ensign? Didn’t think so….Another: Snicker w/sarcasm.
re “..And speaking of bigger payloads, I don’t see as much of a need for them”
Is that what they preach? Or is that just the nature of today’s enemy- beard and Kalishnikov? Sometimes you can’t fix a mech problem with 3/8 sockets and you have to go larger..Don’t scare me with such talk and make me think I might be better off living in Montana.
re- “…burning toxic plastic and composites”
Advice- Avoid the Rhino in that same scenario. Or anything “new”.
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