But at this scenario USAF wouldn’t have to content with B-1B’s high upkeep and modification costs. Or at very least, they could have kept larger number of B-52’s operational.

The cost reduction of maintenance and upkeep is somewhat meaningless. You don’t save enough to make procurement of a new aircraft from cutting back flight hours or maintenance of an existing one, especially in your scenario if the USAF is still keeping a larger fleet of older more expensive aircraft in operation.

For example, if we took the $59k per flight hour cost (taken from link below in 2013 dollars) of a B-1B and multiplied that by 250 hours flown in a year we get $14.75 million. For all 100 aircraft manufactured and flying 250 hours a year (an unlikely scenario) we get $1.45 billion. Given the cost to acquire a single B-2 bomber was upwards of US$700 million in 1997 dollars, or adjusted for inflation $1 billion dollars in 2013, you get to buy one and a half more B-2s by grounding a fleet of 100 aircraft for a whole year.

Yes the calculation is rough and doesn’t take into account other factors like basing and staff and food etc (all necessary for additional B-2s or B-52s) but you get the idea that reducing or eliminating flight hours from a fleet doesn’t give you massive savings and in this case significantly reduces capability.

The other side of it is that USAF funding for acquisition and sustainment come from different buckets of money. It is not easy and in some cases they are prohibited from transferring between the two.

Effective is not the same as cost-effective. B-1 has RCS reduction, supersonic dash performance, swing wings and enormously complicated self-defence suite, all of which costs money to maintain and hasn’t the slightest use in Afghanistan CAS duties

That high speed dash capability was very important as the B-1B can reach a TIC faster that pretty much any other platform, and once it arrived could then stay over the area for a long duration, by adjusting its profile to suit endurance.

If you compare the cost per flight hour taken from here http://nation.time.com/2013/04/02/costly-flight-hours/ then that claim isn’t accurate. The B-1B is only marginally more expensive per flight hour than an F-15E, a common aircraft for CAS in Afghanistan, and three times more expensive per flight hour that the A-10, but carrying four times the payload and likely 6 times the endurance of the A-10.

The article is crap.

I think it is a pretty good reflection of the fact that arm chair generals have derided programs for many years when that program subsequently produced a system that was viable and effective for the life of its service.

However it is true that B-1B is pointless. They should have just modernized the B-52G’s so that enough of BUFFs would have been available until B-2 arrives in suitable number.

In 1987 when the article was written the B-2 likely had only recently conducted its first test flight and wouldn’t IOC for another ten years but a year after the article was written 100 B-1Bs had been manufactured. To not build the B-1B because the B-2 was coming would have been a heck of a gamble on what was an untried, essentially untested airframe and an essentially untested concept given stealth attack via the F-117 wasn’t really validated until the 1991 Gulf War. The subsequent cost of the B-2, being acquired in a post cold war budget timeframe, also wouldn’t have seen additional numbers had the B-1B not existed.

The interesting thing is the B-1B was and remains a perfect candidate for post cold war conflicts. After being denuclearized in the middle 90s it was able to provide significant support to conventional conflict around the globe with its long reach and large payload. The subsequent service of the aircraft over Afghanistan proved how valuable in the long run the fleet became. It was ideal for long duration CAS support over Afghanistan and covered the gaps in coverage when other platforms, even those based in country, were not able to generate sorties.

Ozair, i’m not talking about doctrine but about what happens in RL. Identification of assets, deconfliction, guidance, exchange of information, simply receiving coordinates from a JTAC and clear isn’ t far enough..All tasks that require to be close to troops. Btw, most often, a show of force is largely enough and widely used (doese not fit with distant CAS theory of LM)

Halloweene, who do you think writes doctrine, LM? Really????? It is Operators and in the case of US Joint CAS Doctrine it was updated in 2014 after the US had been heavily involved in CAS operations for the last eleven years… I think we can trust that they had a rough idea of the operating environment they were writing about, as in real life.

It appears you may at least have grasped the concept that CAS has nothing to do with the platform and everything to do with the effect.

Lol.

Starting with operations in Afghanistan in 2001, B-52 proved to be the best CAS weapon. It carries many JDAMS and could stay on station for 10 to 12 hours. It was the anti-Taliban “Northern Alliance” tribesmen backed by B-52s which drove Taliban out of Afghanistan.

Even more amusing when you consider that since 2008 the B-1B has been the most utilised aircraft for CAS in Afghanistan.

That may in fact what LM proposes (ie restart with F-35 avionics). Guess we’ll find out as time goes on.

One thing they need to address is range as the current F-35 easily out ranges the F-22.

My solution to the Japanese requirement is a fuselage plug into the current F-35, extend the airframe perhaps 2.5 meters giving it better area rule, change the sweep of the wings to improve supersonic performance and increasing size and fuel carriage while retaining all F-35 avionics and sensors. Perhaps either a modified F135 with smaller fan for better supersonic performance or use the new AETD but either with the thrust improvements coming to the F135 be able to deliver an engine with the required performance.

The fuselage plug addresses longer range through greater fuel carriage, larger or longer weapons bay for more missiles (perhaps a novel staggered solution required to fit eight 3.7m missiles) while retaining all F-35 avionics and sensors maintains commonality with their emerging fleet.

Given the Japanese already have a production facility for the F-35 changing that to accommodate a modified version would be easier than an all new line and there would obviously be a lot of parts commonality.

The F-22/F-35 hybrid that uses the F-22 as the basis is a rabbit hole. There is nothing the F-22 provides over the F-35 other than supercruise at high mach. The changes to the F-35 I have proposed above should be able to deliver that, with an increased internal payload, at a significantly lower cost than any foolish attempt to restart F-22 production…

The F-35 is in a different category than the F-18. It has special export and modification restrictions and political strings attached which is why I am brining this up.

The F-35 has that today, just like the F-18 did when the Swiss purchased it in the 90s. The Swiss in purchasing the F-18 signed up to a US/Swiss eyes only agreement that included the Swiss being wholly reliant on the US for spares, upgrades, knowledge, weapons etc (as well as joining a global Hornet community funding group wide software development). There is no difference between that agreement today with a potential F-35 order and the F-18 order.

The FY18 Omnibus spending bill which the Congressional appropriators released last night is going to (when passed) fund 90 F-35s in FY18. For reference, the US services and the President’s FY18 budget had requested 70 aircraft so a net gain of 20 split between the F-35A (10), and the F-35B and C (10).

LOL, the death spiral continues…

Seriously, that is a good result and nice to see the USN get some more F-35Cs and obviously all aircraft will come in Blk 3F.