By Marina Malenic
The Air Force’s top officer said yesterday that the country needs a new “penetrating bomber” aircraft and that the air service expects to start developing such a platform in the next budget cycle, which the Pentagon will unveil early next year.
Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz called for a development effort that would be “modest” in price and upgraded incrementally over its expected 30-year service life.
“It’s my conviction that the nation benefits from a long- range strike capability,” Schwartz said during the Air Force Association’s annual conference outside Washington, D.C.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates suspended the Air Force’s next-generation bomber development plans over a year ago, asking service officials to better flesh out ideas before proceeding. The president’s FY ’11 defense spending request includes a relatively small amount of money for industrial base sustainment, but the FY ’12 request is expected to include substantial seed money for a full-scale development effort.
Ever since Gates sent the Air Force back to the drawing board, Pentagon officials have said they envision development of several new weapons capable of everything from long- range and prompt global strike to electronic attack and persistent surveillance (Defense Daily, March 30).
Schwartz said a new aircraft for the so-called “family of systems” will not be a “lone wolf” but will instead be inherently dependent on other systems for various functions. For example, he said, the bomber may have to rely on outside systems for extensive targeting data acquisition.
“We could build a machine that could do everything all by itself…if money were no object,” he said. “But instead, we are taking advantage of other capacities that exist elsewhere.”
He added that the Air Force leadership recognizes that “there are supporting capabilities in the portfolio that need not be duplicated.”
Schwartz also advocated broader cooperation with the Navy, pointing out that there are synergies in the strategic roles of both services. He hailed the Air-Sea Battle concept being developed by the air and sea services as a way to combine resources. He referred to the Navy as the “other strategic service.”
Yesterday, Air Force Secretary Michael Donley said any new bomber fleet ought to be larger than the 21-aircraft B-2 Spirit production numbers “but not so large that we cannot afford it.” The secretary said the Air Force is looking to “avoid the mistakes of previous bomber programs” (Defense Daily, Sept. 14).
The legacy fleet of U.S. nuclear capable bombers has been off alert for many years, and fleet-size reductions are being examined. Still, the Obama administration decided in last year’s Nuclear Posture Review to retain the nuclear triad of bombers, ICBMs and submarines indefinitely.