It does not matter whether the ship smokes as long as it makes it down to the eastern med and manages to stay around there for a while. It’s an insurance policy in case something bad happens to those land bases. And I’d bet all those twelve 3M45 are aboard and nuclear.

No money for major updates, no growth volume in the fuselage. Maybe maybe in the 2025/30 timeframe replacement of the single-seater cockpit by semi-AI unit to fly it unmanned. With the twin-seater units acting as forward controller.

SM-6 (same goes for ESSM Blk2) is quite limited as interceptor against ballistic missiles. The AMRAAM seeker is severely range limited, which means in a head-on scenario the closing rate of ballistic missile and SM-6 ia high and there is *very* little time to acquire the target and correct the flight path for an intercept. And since the SM-6 does not have lateral piff-paff thrusters flight path corrections are purely aerodynamic, meaning sluggish reaction in the upper atmosphere. And then the warhead is blast-frag which is an issue against high rate of closure ballistic warheads.

Edit: The answer to non-nuclear ABM defence (and saturation attack defence) is probably short(ish) range missile salvos with rapid-acceleration command guided hitiles; or: good old massed AAA of no less than 57mm, rapid fire – the shotgun approach. But the kill zone has to be so far away from the ship that there are no kinetic leakers.

In the vast majority of mission sets the question of what platform carries the stand-off effectors is ever more in the background. The missions where pure dynamic airframe performance counts are less and less. The manned penetrating tactical bomber mission is in high-threat scenarios de-facto dead. In low-end scenarios some F-15E incarnations can do the job for another 30 years. It’s sobering that the overall best Western tactical aircraft is an almost 50 years old design.

http://www.boeing.com/news/frontiers/archive/2002/may/i_pw.html

The air-to-air game Red Baron style is quite romantic – and suitable for the air policing / air sovereignty mission – but a short/(medium) range ballistical missile with some sort of limited loitering mini missiles or just maneuvering kinetic darts dropped from high above onto an oncoming attack formation, or possibly right after takeoff, might be overall more efficient. Instant aerial minefield. Shooting down aircraft in air-to-air combat is the least favorable answer to the anti-air question.

Re that SASC McCain statement: Nonsense. In a situation where the number of qualified airframers and system integrators are so low as they are now, threatening them is idiotic. The aviation related MIC, due to its subcontract structure and limited qualified HR basis is a syndicate, with a monopsony on the other side (.gov). Too big to fail. It’s like Dr. Strangelove choking himself. And a ratio of ten females to each male … LOL

Agree, weight class of a B-47, around 100 tons MTOW. One weapons bay for something like the MOP or NGP, max 15 tons; not so much a stand-off cruise missile truck. Wonder what the intended mission profile is. High altitude penetration, range and loitering prioritized over speed. Thermal signature management a challenge for ops in cold air against cold background. Maybe with concrete plans to utilize non-kinetic effectors, but rather direct energy or cyber stuff, and as a forward ISTAR platform. Also I bet with active DE defense against those large SAMs that are the only ones reaching up far, but also detectable from afar; it’s all clear air up there – good for lasers. Also against manned interceptors (or at least their pilots) once in the upper xx kW or lower xxx kW range.