Boeing pulls back the curtain on the NGB

long range, heavy payload, stealth bomber with an unknown but not obviously limited pricetag — didn’t we already build the B-2? *and* the B-1, come to think of it?
a medium-range, medium-payload, unmanned bomber built for overall economy might be genuinely useful in the kinds of bombing missions being flown today. (and a long-range, heavy-payload, screw-stealth unmanned bomb truck built by slapping some remote control, autonomous-flight electronics into a civilian cargo jet and cutting bomb bay doors in it might be even _better_, actually.) but what can a project like this do that we can’t already do with existing bombers, just as expensively?

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Hmmm, looks familiar…
And expensive.
That sound you hear is Jack Northrop doing 10,000 RPM.

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no bomber lasts forever. but when will we need to fight an enemy sophisticated enough that the unique capabilities of our existing stealth bombers will actually be needed? given that any enemy with that kind of technological base will also have nuclear weapons, and that we (wisely) work long and hard to avoid possible nuclear confrontations, i’d tend to think we’d have enough warning to replace however many B-2′s we’ve crashed between now and then.
in the meantime, the kinds of targets we’re *actually* bombing do not benefit from the extra cost of advanced stealth technology, but *could* benefit from having more (because cheaper) bombers available.
looking at the sorts of bombing missions the Air Force seems to be actually doing these days, it seems to me that most of them are carried out with F-15′s / F-18′s or B-52′s. how do the strengths of this proposed new stealth bomber address the challenges and requirements of the missions those platforms currently perform? could a different design address them better, at no extra cost?
sure, we’ll need to have _some_ stealth bombers available, at all times, if only to retain the know-how to build them. but is it really wise to make them the _only_ kinds of bombers we build, given that their particular advantages are most of the time unnecessary in the field?

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“Roy, why would you want an aircraft to do that? Can be done much less expensively from the ground.”
I just KNEW somebody was going to say this(& I’m not psychic,everybody else is just SO PREDICTABLE). In that case,AWACS & JSTARS duties could also be done from the ground. Maybe command & control could be better served if the operators were a lot closer than in the Nevada desert. How much more expensive would a Command & Control Aircraft to control unmanned bombers be?

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yeah, because fourth-plus generation fighter air forces and the SAM capabilities to shoot down any non-stealth air force units, *AND* hostile intent towards the united states, all just pop out of the ground fully formed on a regular basis. happens every year, right?
try being less paranoid. we have a state department (and an intelligence community, come to that) for a reason too, just like there’s a reason for the defense department. they’re not mutually exclusive.
in the real world, the only countries we could not defeat without stealth bombers are either (1) our allies, or (2) nuclear armed, or both. if we end up in a nuclear war, ICBMs will matter more than the handful dozen stealth bombers we have, anyway. it’s possible some country might some day join the need-stealth-bombers category without yet being either an ally or a nuclear power, but that cannot happen overnight; technology like that takes time. conclusion: we will indeed have strategic warning. let’s use that.

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“in the real world, the only countries we could not defeat without stealth bombers are either (1) our allies, or (2) nuclear armed, or both. if we end up in a nuclear war, ICBMs will matter more than the handful dozen stealth bombers we have, anyway. it’s possible some country might some day join the need-stealth-bombers category without yet being either an ally or a nuclear power, but that cannot happen overnight; technology like that takes time. conclusion: we will indeed have strategic warning. let’s use that.”
We are currently & purposely provoking Pakistan to fight us. Pakistan was supposed to be a vital ally of ours,but we are provoking her into war with us. Politics aside about this,this proves that we need to put out more of our most modern weapons.That includes stealth bombers,manned or unmanned. Turkey is tottering over to the dark side & we want to sell them stealth aircraft like the F-35. We are potentially about to face the very F-16s we sold to the Pakistanis,add to that the F-35s we are about to sell to Turkey……….
We are not just facing “stateless cavemen,” we are about to face conventionally well armed nations like Pakistan,Russia,& China. These are “LEGITIMATE” threats. I’m not talking about a bunch of “ghosts” whose profiles change with the wind(& causes ALL OF US to be considered terrorist threats),or ridiculous threats of “liquid explosives” that prevents mothers from bringing baby bottles on planes to feed their babies. What next,explosives made from piss or feces,or maybe even “fart bombs?”
We are discouraged from building our armed forces back up to face “legitimate threats,” but we are being scared shitless by a man in kidney failure hiding in a cave somewhere in Pakistan now,& the ONLY SOLUTION to combat this [fake] threat is to suspend all of our civil liberties & constitutional freedoms because “racial profiling” is so unfair & that 90 year old wheelchair bound,blind,& hard of hearing grandmother needs to be considered just as much a terrorist threat as an Arab or Muslim. The decription always changes about what these “terrorists” look like.Now they are blond haired & blue eyed,hmmmmm. Tomorrow will they have red hair & green eyes? How about brunette haired & hazel eyes? What total & senseless bullshit!!!! I’m sorry,why again are Russia & China NOT OUR ENEMIES?

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