B-21 Raider for RAF

NMaude said:
RAF, although I suspect that if the B-21 was affordable enough and was available for trusted close US allies I could see the RAAF wanting to get a squadron of them.
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According to BAE, GCAP/Tempest will have a large payload and a long range. Certainly not equivalent to a B-21, but with their limited funding focused on GCAP, I think there is about a 0% chance the RAF purchases B-21.
 
joshjosh said:
According to BAE, GCAP/Tempest will have a large payload and a long range. Certainly not equivalent to a B-21, but with their limited funding focused on GCAP, I think there is about a 0% chance the RAF purchases B-21.
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Certainly not with the current lot in power.
 
CJGibson said:
Get a grip, laddie.

Chris
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FighterJock said:
I would say never say never about the RAF getting some B-21s with the UK already putting up it's defence spending up to 5% of GDP in line with what NATO says it has to be at.
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I imagine that the B21 will be looked at by the MOD only in the context of comparing it with weapons for our SSN fleet which are easier to deploy and less vulnerable.
The US has a large safe home base (drones etc might change even this) which the UK does not have
 
I'd think a Britain that serious about defence would be served well enough by a large fleet of GCAP, which appears to be a big aircraft with long range and large weapons load.

Given the pitiful state of the British defence force's top line kit I'd say that there's a long list of things the British need before getting B21s. A large fleet of Typhoons and F35s for starters, and sufficient RN escorts and Submarines.
 
Dilandu said:
I think Israel may actually want B-21 too; the experience of recent conflict clearly demonstrated that their existing bunker busters (delivered by tactical planes) aren't sufficient.
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Michael Oren's Substack is leaking.

NMaude said:
RAF, although I suspect that if the B-21 was affordable enough and was available for trusted close US allies I could see the RAAF wanting to get a squadron of them.
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RAAF would actually make sense since they don't have forward basing? UK can just put GCAPs in Lithuania.
 
RAF? Maybe.
RAAF? definitely wants, but they probably cannot afford it.


Dilandu said:
I think Israel may actually want B-21 too; the experience of recent conflict clearly demonstrated that their existing bunker busters (delivered by tactical planes) aren't sufficient.
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Possibly.

But can they afford a dozen or two?

I expect the Israelis to make an offer to buy SCAF or F/A-XX. Plus develop a serious deep penetrator that only weighs ~2000-5000lbs.
 
martinbayer said:
I do not believe that the USA would *ever* share any of their strategic nuclear asset carriers with any nation, up to and including the Holy See.
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If any country would get the approval for it, it would be the UK - after all, it's already got strategic nuclear missiles built and maintained in the US, and its strategic nuclear warheads are closely based on a US design.

But outside cloud cuckoo land (although the F-35A purchase makes me think we might be headed there...) an RAF B-21 purchase doesn't really make sense for the UK. Especially with the latest SDR making it clear that the Euro-Atlantic region is first priority.
 
Only if we get to give it a cool retro 'V' name.
Vanguard
Voodoo
Vulcan II
Victor II
Valiant II
Vixen
Vexed
Venom (2)
Venomous
Vengeful
Vendetta
Vampire
Vamoose
Victory
Veddgie
Vainglorious
 
Dilandu said:
They sold F-111 to Australia, which was essentially medium-range nuclear-capable bomber.
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According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Dynamics_F-111C, those were *tactical*. By the same token, Germany, among numerous other countries, received F-104s configured for nuclear strike duties, so let's keep theoretical tactical secondary uses separate from clearly primary strategic ones, please. The same goes for the British B-29, which, also according to Wikipedia, were restricted to long-range *training* for strategic attacks against the Soviet Union.
 
martinbayer said:
The same goes for the British B-29, which, also according to Wikipedia, were restricted to long-range *training* for strategic attacks against the Soviet Union.
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They weren't inherently limited to training, and do seem to have been seen as a functional (if obsolescent) long-range bomber - had war broken out between 1950 and 1953, they would have been tasked against targets in the Soviet Union. But they weren't equipped to carry nuclear weapons, and in the time the UK had them the UK didn't have any nuclear weapons for them anyway.
 
If the US doesn't export the B21 even if there are willing customers it will be for the same reasons that they didn't export the F22, they want to keep the edge by having things nobody else does. As reliable as the UK and Australia are, they aren't the US and would have a different view on the security and use of the aircraft that might in the US view compromise the capability edge of the aircraft.
 
Hood said:
Only if we get to give it a cool retro 'V' name.
Vanguard
Voodoo
Vulcan II
Victor II
Valiant II
Vixen
Vexed
Venom (2)
Venomous
Vengeful
Vendetta
Vampire
Vamoose
Victory
Veddgie
Vainglorious
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I like 'Vengeance'.
 
Hood said:
Only if we get to give it a cool retro 'V' name.
Vanguard
Voodoo
Vulcan II
Victor II
Valiant II
Vixen
Vexed
Venom (2)
Venomous
Vengeful
Vendetta
Vampire
Vamoose
Victory
Veddgie
Vainglorious
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Tssk, tssk, we've had the discussion about the RAF not using numeric suffixes and the stupidity of the Envoy IV.

Chris
 
Grey Havoc said:
Certainly not with the current lot in power.
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Let’s be honest, which major UK political party is ever going to increase defence spending unless they absolutely have to? The general public have much more pressing desires for where government spending should go and that gets reflected.


FighterJock said:
… putting up it's defence spending up to 5% of GDP in line with what NATO says it has to be at.
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Important to remember that the headline 5% of GDP figure is split – 3.5% going to the main defence budget, which can include stuff like pensions, and the other 1.5% for security infrastructure. Depending on how loosely they define security infrastructure it could end up being spent on any number of things.


archipeppe said:
They also sold the Boeing B-29 Superfortress to UK during early '50s (before the V bombers introduction) dubbed the Washington.
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IIRC the aircraft weren't sold but actually loaned from the USAF.
 
Siberia said:
Let’s be honest, which major UK political party is ever going to increase defence spending unless they absolutely have to? The general public have much more pressing desires for where government spending should go and that gets reflected.
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Which imo applies to the vast majority of Europe.

For the people at large, governments have to solve other issues and fund other things than stealth fighters and bombers. Issues that are actually pressing and are felt by the average person.
 
After reading the entire thread, I have to say that I agree with the people who (rightfully) brought up GCAP as making the B-21 for Britain redundant.

GCAP is designed around long ranges, it will most likely be pretty big and operate with CCAs. So it will be able to bring a decent amount of ordnance from Point A to Point B. Most likely in the form of a cruise missile or bombs utilized by it's unmanned goons. GCAP has British industrial involvement, it creates jobs, it is tailored to British needs and is already being funded and will continue to eat money in the future.

So GCAP can double as a tactical bomber/strike fighter if need be. Especially when the payload capacity of linked up drones is considered too. For most use cases that's enough. A strategic bomber isn't really justifiable for any central or western European nation, nor really in the cards financially or politically to be honest.

I see the biggest potential for foreign B-21 sale (or stationing) in Australia. But that depends a lot on how much the Aussies are willing to spend, how much of a threat they think China is to them and how much the US trusts them. But all in all I doubt the B-21 will be exported. Strategic bombers, even one that's advertised as being versatile, are not only expensive but also bring a lot of political baggage with them. It would also paint a huge bullseye on Australia, something that may not be the case just yet. It may also be necessary to weigh it up against the AUKUS project which is an SSN, but it still serves at deterring aggression while being inherently more defense oriented than a purely offensive weapon like a bomber. Meaning it's more palatable to say that nuclear subs are required to protect Australia, while a strategic bomber isn't really meant for protection, if anything it turns you into a potential threat that needs to be eliminated.

So B-21 for the UK? Yeah that's not going to happen.

B-21 for AUS? Maybe-ish? But I doubt it.

All in all, the UK would be wise to focus as much on GCAP and the Navy as possible.
 
CJGibson said:
Dunno about that. I don't think they were Silverplate B-29s.

Chris
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It's very clear that they were a purely conventional bombing force. Which was no great hardship, in 1950 a fair chunk of SAC was also a de facto conventional bombing force.
 
If AUKUS falls through on subs for the RAN, B-21 may be seen as the next best strike option for that part of the role. With large ADF spending increases it could happen, but of course there would need to be a willingness from the US. I think it's actually a much more realistic capability to field than trying to man and maintain 3 Virginia class subs.
 
I have looked again at the B21 and I am now tending to re-visit 1966 and 1981.
The B21 offers the kind of aircraft the RAF needs to strike land targets more effectively than a handful of F35s from QE.
But if this jeopardises GCAP then maybe not.
 
uk 75 said:
I have looked again at the B21 and I am now tending to re-visit 1966 and 1981.
The B21 offers the kind of aircraft the RAF needs to strike land targets more effectively than a handful of F35s from QE.
But if this jeopardises GCAP then maybe not.
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I would not expect GCAP to carry more than about 4x 2000lb class weapons. That said, you can pack a lot of SPEAR/SDB sized weapons into that kind of volume for conventional attacks, and up to 4x nukes as well.

And unless NG got really creative, 4x nukes is half the capacity of a B-21.
 
The UK was part of early F-117 development, the US offered the UK the aircraft and they didn't want any, I think they bought the F-35 out of necessity since they didn't have anything.
 
Hydroman said:
The UK was part of early F-117 development, the US offered the UK the aircraft and they didn't want any,
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I don't think the UK understood how big a game changer it'd be. Crud, the USN had no clue how to use a stealth airframe for a really long time.


Hydroman said:
I think they bought the F-35 out of necessity since they didn't have anything.
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Agreed.
 
You're right on the money SK, the USN should have bought some F-117Ns, they would at least had a decent LO attack capability. I may be wrong here regarding the UK and the F-117 but what I had heard was they did not want 1st gen LO tech, that's all there was at the time.
 
It's difficult to see how a F-117 procurement would have fitted into the UK force mix in the 90s. It's an expensive, niche asset for attack to go into force that had large numbers of Tornadoes just upgraded to GR4 standard. For attack of fixed targets like F-117 then UK was already going down the stand-off weapon route with development of Storm Shadow air-launched cruise missile from Tornado.

It appears from public domain info that the offer during the mid 80s was just too difficult while F-117 remained a black programme. UK would acquire jets but had to base them in TTR and rely on USAF to deploy overseas... errr... Then appears that LM offered a derivative in the mid 90s that was largely a new aircraft - sounds pretty expensive and where does it fit in the UK force? And UK was already in UK/US ASTOVL programme leading to F-35 that they actually had design influence, access and industrial benefits from.
 
The F-117 was a limited platform avionics wise-it and offered nothing a fairly basic Jaguar GR.1 couldn't provide, except for it's low observability, and at the kind of tree-top hugging operations the RAF were wedded to pre-1991 that LO capability added very little to survivability (to paraphrase Major Kong "if we fly this Bucc any lower we're gonna need cow bells on this thing").

As impressive as the B-21 is, I suspect GCAP will provide a cheaper strike launch platform and multi-role capabilities to boot.
 

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