North American Rockwell / Boeing B-1 Lancer

It’s flight profile, weapons carriage capacity and speed always made the Bone, to me, the perfect arsenal plane. Fly with 4th and 5th generation fighters launch about 50+ AIM-260s then use it powerful jammers.

Perfect platform
 
If you expect it to fly "with 4th and 5th Generation fighter", you'll need to have a nearly equal availability rate... Fleet wide.

Otherwise the gamut of missile you promise to provide one day will pale in comparison to the lack of them on overall regarding the number of flight package canceled due to the airframe grounded.

Arsenal is a statistical weapon primarily before any tactical advantages it can bring.
 
TomcatViP said:
If you expect it to fly "with 4th and 5th Generation fighter", you'll need to have a nearly equal availability rate... Fleet wide.

Otherwise the gamut of missile you promise to provide one day will pale in comparison to the lack of them on overall regarding the number of flight package canceled due to the airframe grounded.

Arsenal is a statistical weapon primarily before any tactical advantages it can bring.
Click to expand...

Availability is just a matter of money and priorities.
 
The JimmyCarter B-1B was a compromise of the more maintainable B-1A so the B-1B was obsolete and hard to maintain from its inception. The B-1B has many great advantages but certainly needs to be replaced and the, smaller than B-2, B-21 is not the answer for payloads required. Smaller and smaller munitions are great but do not obviate the needs that only a large payload craft similar to B-1 can meet.
 
jsport said:
The JimmyCarter B-1B was a compromise of the more maintainable B-1A so the B-1B was obsolete and hard to maintain from its inception.
Click to expand...

Wrong. The B-1B traded top maximum speed for lower RCS. It was determined the net effect was to make it MORE survivable. Also the B-1A was argualby less maintainable. It had much more complicated overwing fairings, inlets, and engine nozzles.

jsport said:
The B-1B has many great advantages but certainly needs to be replaced and the, smaller than B-2, B-21 is not the answer for payloads
Click to expand...

Your options are: 1. Maintained B-1Bs
2, Nothing.

There is no door #3.
 
TomcatViP said:
If you expect it to fly "with 4th and 5th Generation fighter", you'll need to have a nearly equal availability rate... Fleet wide.

Otherwise the gamut of missile you promise to provide one day will pale in comparison to the lack of them on overall regarding the number of flight package canceled due to the airframe grounded.

Arsenal is a statistical weapon primarily before any tactical advantages it can bring.
Click to expand...
TomcatViP comments stand. The Bone is a hangar honey and needs to be replaced. This NDAA is no where near. A 900B is only a start.
 
LM's proposed H-Bomber would be good start, it should be manned vs what LM proposed as Unmanned as it still needs to carry and fulfill Bone missions which include CAS. Some of the resource spent on too many Hyper projects could be spent on a manned multi-mission bomber/launcher.
 

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jsport said:
The JimmyCarter B-1B was a compromise of the more maintainable B-1A so the B-1B was obsolete and hard to maintain from its inception. The B-1B has many great advantages but certainly needs to be replaced and the, smaller than B-2, B-21 is not the answer for payloads required. Smaller and smaller munitions are great but do not obviate the needs that only a large payload craft similar to B-1 can meet.
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It was Ronald Reagan's B-1B. Carter cancelled the B-1 in favor of cruise missiles on B-52s and the B-2 (which he found out about when he took office).
 
To achieve a replacement for the Bone, they need to last a lot longer yet. The money is just not there right now.
 
jsport said:
LM's proposed H-Bomber would be good start, it should be manned vs what LM proposed as Unmanned as it still needs to carry and fulfill Bone missions which include CAS. Some of the resource spent on too many Hyper projects could be spent on a manned multi-mission bomber/launcher.
Click to expand...

Ok, you really have to be deliberately trying to be this wrong.

1) That's not a Lockheed Martin proposal for anything. It's somebody's faked up concept art for the Russian PAK DA. I'm sure LM has some hypersonic bomber art but this isn't it.

2) Hypersonic strike and loitering CAS are two roles that cannot possibly be accommodated in one airframe. An airframe that can manage Mach 4+ cannot efficiently loiter for hours at subsonic speeds. It's not physically possible within shouting distance of the current state of the art.

3) USAF is developing a manned multi-mission bomber. It's called the B-21. That's all the money there is. Killing all of the hypersonic missile programs in total wouldn't fund another manned bomber program of any sort, much less your hypersonic loitering fiction.
 
TomS said:
jsport said:
LM's proposed H-Bomber would be good start, it should be manned vs what LM proposed as Unmanned as it still needs to carry and fulfill Bone missions which include CAS. Some of the resource spent on too many Hyper projects could be spent on a manned multi-mission bomber/launcher.
Click to expand...

Ok, you really have to be deliberately trying to be this wrong.

1) That's not a Lockheed Martin proposal for anything. It's somebody's faked up concept art for the Russian PAK DA. I'm sure LM has some hypersonic bomber art but this isn't it.

2) Hypersonic strike and loitering CAS are two roles that cannot possibly be accommodated in one airframe. An airframe that can manage Mach 4+ cannot efficiently loiter for hours at subsonic speeds. It's not physically possible within shouting distance of the current state of the art.

3) USAF is developing a manned multi-mission bomber. It's called the B-21. That's all the money there is. Killing all of the hypersonic missile programs in total wouldn't fund another manned bomber program of any sort, much less your hypersonic loitering fiction.
Click to expand...
1). not sure how one knows that this is not a LM version but ok.

2).Ok, but understand the beauty of combined cycle is in allows conventional jet operation.

3). Never said kill all HYpers but it has benn made clear by Congress these program are an unmanaged contractor money grab. Charge a lot and deliver cheap redundancy. The B-21 (smaller than the B-2) so hearlded as the replacement of exactly what (?) as it will not carry what a B-1 can carry and eventually the 52 will have to retire and there is no large bomber to take its place.
 
apparition13 said:
jsport said:
The JimmyCarter B-1B was a compromise of the more maintainable B-1A so the B-1B was obsolete and hard to maintain from its inception. The B-1B has many great advantages but certainly needs to be replaced and the, smaller than B-2, B-21 is not the answer for payloads required. Smaller and smaller munitions are great but do not obviate the needs that only a large payload craft similar to B-1 can meet.
Click to expand...
It was Ronald Reagan's B-1B. Carter cancelled the B-1 in favor of cruise missiles on B-52s and the B-2 (which he found out about when he took office).
Click to expand...
So many compromises were made from the original higher speed design which Carter cancelled the Bone was not able to be contructed properly and thus many of the maintainence problems it suffers from today. So standing the mess started not w/ Reagan.

..will concede the RCS was improved while the speed was reduced.


The B-1A was canceled because as part of his philosophy and low opinion of Defense, Jimmy Carter repeatedly made a campaign promise that if elected, he would cancel the B-1 right away. In fact, he made it one of the Democratic Party's platforms. After he got in, and reviewing the results of B-1 testing so far, he reportedly started to have 2nd thoughts (reportedly his own DoD recommended keeping it), so the action was postponed. However, during the late Spring his supporters pushed for him to keep his promise and so on June 30, 1977 he killed the program.

Although USAF started the ALCM program in 1974 (rather than just go with the less expensive option of just using an air launched version of the Navy's Tomahawk missile already in development), this wasn't done just to allow the B-52 to do the penetration mission. The B-1A was also intended to carry it as well. Part of the reason, of course, was that it made sense, but also because for certain targets the launch aircraft was going to have to penetrate significant defenses in order to reach the launch point and to get there and that the B-52 wouldn't be able to do. There was talk about accelerating cruise missile development in lieu of the B-1, and there were Administration PR events showing how many more cruise missiles would be carried using modified 747-type carriers, but in reality neither of those initiatives were ever actually launched. Cruise missiles were just used as a rationale to deflect criticism for the cancellation.

Production B-1As would have had their penetration speeds lowered to M.85-.9, similar to B-52 speeds. The difference is that the B-52 was designed as a high-altitude bomber and when it went to the low level profile it dramatically increased the wear on the airframe and reduced operational life, even with the modifications. The B-1 was designed for low level operations from the start and its structure was built with this in mind. It's worthy of note that significant redesign and increases in cost resulted when in the development stage AF added low altitude penetration to the B-2 mission. The main reason for the reduction in speed was cost/benefit. Analysis with the F-111 and the B-1A showed that once you get M.8 or thereabouts at low altitude, you don't gain that much more in survivability from another .4 Mach, but it costs a lot more. Of course, the B-1 was much more agile than the B-52.

Regarding the top speed, the plan as I remember it was that production B-1As would retain the variable intakes, but they would be deactivated in normal operations. This would save a significant amount on maintenance, and if it was later determined that on certain missions the capability would be needed, they would be activated. I don't know if activation involved just pushing in certain circuit breakers and telling the FCS the intakes were back or whether external actions had to be taken on the flight line. The Navy followed the exact same stratagem on the F-14D. The variable ramps were there, but deactivated.

On the B-1B, it's not just the intakes that limit its top speed to M1.25. The B can actually go faster than that. But in order to reduce the empty weight of the a/c (the gross of the B is 25% greater than that of the A) as well as cost, structure was removed from the wings since they no longer needed to withstand higher Mach flight. As a result, you start getting too much faster than its current top speed and vibration sets in that can affect flight characteristics and cause damage. In effect, it advises the crew, "Hey! That's it, foot off the gas pedal"!

Another thing that isn't remembered much today is that the B-1A also had a major conventional and tactical mission that figured in its design. One of the reasons they were going to build 244 of them is that it would take over the F-111 mission (it was the cancellation of the B-1A that required the development of the F-15E). As a result, it would be equipped to deliver just about every kind of conventional a/g in the AF inventory. In addition, there were equipment bays in the fixed portion of the forward wing roots containing retractable sensor packages. One held streamlined LLTV and optics to aid in navigation and flight, especially at very low levels. The other contained a sensor and designator turret similar in concept to the Navy's TRAM turret on the A-6E. Couple these with the B-1A's 6,100 mile range and payload and you had one formidable strike package. Consider the impact on the Warsaw Pact in a conventional conflict of planes based in the UK that could basically run their fighters out of fuel through course changes, had defensive countermeasures designed to penetrate the Soviet Union itself, and were each carrying, say, 60+ Mavericks...

In short, the B-1B was definitely more stealthy and had greater range/payload, but the B-1A was faster, somewhat more agile and more versatile.

All these A capabilities had to clombed after the fact to the B.
 
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Irrespective of structural or other issues with the B-1B it makes up the bulk of the conventional strike fleet. By 2030 the newest will have been in service for 40 years. How many 40 year old airliners are flying in revenue service today? No shame if it's retired once it's capability is migrated to a different platform in my opinion.

General Ray who commands the Global Strike Command has asked Asst. Sec. Will Roper for a low cost stand-off bomb truck. This may end up being the B-1B replacement:

breakingdefense.com

Ray Asks Roper To Explore 'Bomb Truck' For Cheap Standoff Capability - Breaking Defense

"There is no significant game plan here," Ray said about the idea of a 'bomb truck.' "I just think, why not? You can't win if you don't play."
breakingdefense.com breakingdefense.com

As for the difference in payload between the B-2 and the B-21 how may nuclear strikes can a bomber realistically make before the crew and or airframe are in-operable? Can you deliver 16 nukes to 16 aim points and survive without running out of fuel, damage from near misses or incapacitating the crew from radiation exposure? I would think range is more important than payload in nuclear strikes.

The bottom line however is the price of admission to the Super Power club. Folks grouse over the costs of maintaining the military aircraft fleets and weapons but if you want to be a super power you need to pony up. Maintaining 67 B-52H's, 66 B-1B's and 20 B-2A's is the price of admission either we're in the game or we are not.
 
jsport said:
TomcatViP said:
If you expect it to fly "with 4th and 5th Generation fighter", you'll need to have a nearly equal availability rate... Fleet wide.

Otherwise the gamut of missile you promise to provide one day will pale in comparison to the lack of them on overall regarding the number of flight package canceled due to the airframe grounded.

Arsenal is a statistical weapon primarily before any tactical advantages it can bring.
Click to expand...
TomcatViP comments stand. The Bone is a hangar honey and needs to be replaced. This NDAA is no where near. A 900B is only a start.
Click to expand...


Apparently you don't know how maintenance works. When you don't perform it, it doesn't happen. When you do, it does. Go back and read the article in the first post.
 
jsport said:
LM's proposed H-Bomber would be good start, it should be manned vs what LM proposed as Unmanned as it still needs to carry and fulfill Bone missions which include CAS. Some of the resource spent on too many Hyper projects could be spent on a manned multi-mission bomber/launcher.
Click to expand...

ROFL!!! Good luck with that. We're lucky to get one new bomber, let alone two.
 
sferrin said:
jsport said:
TomcatViP said:
If you expect it to fly "with 4th and 5th Generation fighter", you'll need to have a nearly equal availability rate... Fleet wide.

Otherwise the gamut of missile you promise to provide one day will pale in comparison to the lack of them on overall regarding the number of flight package canceled due to the airframe grounded.

Arsenal is a statistical weapon primarily before any tactical advantages it can bring.
Click to expand...
TomcatViP comments stand. The Bone is a hangar honey and needs to be replaced. This NDAA is no where near. A 900B is only a start.
Click to expand...


Apparently you don't know how maintenance works. When you don't perform it, it doesn't happen. When you do, it does. Go back and read the article in the first post.
Click to expand...
TomViP and I were never refering to your posting so not sure what your talking about. Referbishing is great and political climate is not a scientific one.
www.stripes.com

Maintenance needs limit availability of B-1 bomber fleet

The Air Force’s most maintenance-intensive aircraft isn’t its oldest, or even its stealthiest. It’s the B-1 Lancer, and the bomber needs about 150 hours of maintenance after each flight.
www.stripes.com www.stripes.com
 
Mark S. said:
Irrespective of structural or other issues with the B-1B it makes up the bulk of the conventional strike fleet. By 2030 the newest will have been in service for 40 years. How many 40 year old airliners are flying in revenue service today? No shame if it's retired once it's capability is migrated to a different platform in my opinion.

General Ray who commands the Global Strike Command has asked Asst. Sec. Will Roper for a low cost stand-off bomb truck. This may end up being the B-1B replacement:

breakingdefense.com

Ray Asks Roper To Explore 'Bomb Truck' For Cheap Standoff Capability - Breaking Defense

"There is no significant game plan here," Ray said about the idea of a 'bomb truck.' "I just think, why not? You can't win if you don't play."
breakingdefense.com breakingdefense.com

As for the difference in payload between the B-2 and the B-21 how may nuclear strikes can a bomber realistically make before the crew and or airframe are in-operable? Can you deliver 16 nukes to 16 aim points and survive without running out of fuel, damage from near misses or incapacitating the crew from radiation exposure? I would think range is more important than payload in nuclear strikes.

The bottom line however is the price of admission to the Super Power club. Folks grouse over the costs of maintaining the military aircraft fleets and weapons but if you want to be a super power you need to pony up. Maintaining 67 B-52H's, 66 B-1B's and 20 B-2A's is the price of admission either we're in the game or we are not.
Click to expand...
There remains an argument whether bombers should even be part of any Nuclear response. A bomer needs for sure to contribute to conventional peer to peer and B-21 is not that answer as it carries too little.
 
jsport said:
sferrin said:
jsport said:
TomcatViP said:
If you expect it to fly "with 4th and 5th Generation fighter", you'll need to have a nearly equal availability rate... Fleet wide.

Otherwise the gamut of missile you promise to provide one day will pale in comparison to the lack of them on overall regarding the number of flight package canceled due to the airframe grounded.

Arsenal is a statistical weapon primarily before any tactical advantages it can bring.
Click to expand...
TomcatViP comments stand. The Bone is a hangar honey and needs to be replaced. This NDAA is no where near. A 900B is only a start.
Click to expand...


Apparently you don't know how maintenance works. When you don't perform it, it doesn't happen. When you do, it does. Go back and read the article in the first post.
Click to expand...
TomViP and I were never refering to your posting so not sure what your talking about.
Click to expand...

Obviously. That's why I directed you, specifically, there. The claim is it's a "hangar honey" (I assume that's the cool-kid version of a hangar queen.) Readiness rates are a result of investment in time and money. Buying a new plane isn't going to change anything if you don't support it. On the other hand, if you spend the time and money to support it, you don't need to break the bank by replacing it.
 
jsport said:
There remains an argument whether bombers should even be part of any Nuclear response. A bomer needs for sure to contribute to conventional peer to peer and B-21 is not that answer as it carries too little.
Click to expand...
One can argue whether oxygen is necessary for humans too. Not successfully mind you but you can argue it.
 
im cool being a cool kid. mighty right and fooor sure Cool.
 
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jsport said:
Mark S. said:
Irrespective of structural or other issues with the B-1B it makes up the bulk of the conventional strike fleet. By 2030 the newest will have been in service for 40 years. How many 40 year old airliners are flying in revenue service today? No shame if it's retired once it's capability is migrated to a different platform in my opinion.

General Ray who commands the Global Strike Command has asked Asst. Sec. Will Roper for a low cost stand-off bomb truck. This may end up being the B-1B replacement:

breakingdefense.com

Ray Asks Roper To Explore 'Bomb Truck' For Cheap Standoff Capability - Breaking Defense

"There is no significant game plan here," Ray said about the idea of a 'bomb truck.' "I just think, why not? You can't win if you don't play."
breakingdefense.com breakingdefense.com

As for the difference in payload between the B-2 and the B-21 how may nuclear strikes can a bomber realistically make before the crew and or airframe are in-operable? Can you deliver 16 nukes to 16 aim points and survive without running out of fuel, damage from near misses or incapacitating the crew from radiation exposure? I would think range is more important than payload in nuclear strikes.

The bottom line however is the price of admission to the Super Power club. Folks grouse over the costs of maintaining the military aircraft fleets and weapons but if you want to be a super power you need to pony up. Maintaining 67 B-52H's, 66 B-1B's and 20 B-2A's is the price of admission either we're in the game or we are not.
Click to expand...
There remains an argument whether bombers should even be part of any Nuclear response. A bomer needs for sure to contribute to conventional peer to peer and B-21 is not that answer as it carries too little.
Click to expand...

Without bombers how would you ensure the destruction of road mobile ICBM's and mobile command centers? It takes 20 minutes for an ICBM and 10-15 minutes for a SLBM to get there. That conservatively lets the target move 5 to 7 miles during the time of flight of the missile.
 
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jsport said:
www.military.com

Aging B-1 Bomber May Soon Have to Restrict the Way it Flies

The B-1B Lancer bomber, a plane designed with the ability to fly fast and low to the Earth in order to avoid enemy radars, might find itself operating at higher altitudes for the rest of its days.
www.military.com www.military.com

www.military.com

With B-1 Aging and B-21 Still Years Out, Air Force May Soon Have No Go-To Bomber

The U.S. is the only allied country that still flies bombers.
www.military.com www.military.com

"boneyard"
Click to expand...

 
If it can not fly low then it can be replaced C-17 or C-130 launching unreturning swarms. It is just a waste of money which can be used to replace it. A manned hypersonic which would be more effective in delivering hypersonic missiles as opposed to sitting duck for S-500 as vulnerable a transport plane. Another congressional boondoggle.
Likely and hopefully not every legislator agrees w/ this waste of money.

" It's no longer a question of if, but when the Air Force and Congress will send the aircraft to the Boneyard. "
 
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For the record does anyone on this forum currently actually know the B-21’s weapon load and payload/range characteristics?
Seems very early and strange to be writing it off as a B-1B replacement.
As the contention that a replacement “must” be a hypersonic loitering bomber carrying hypersonic weapons appears untethered to fiscal or technical reality.
 
With regards to the B1b speed limitation I understand the following;-

The intake spill vents are oriented such that they vented across the wing lower surface. Therefore in the event of a supersonic engine unstart (surge) the aircraft would yaw, due to the asymmetric loss of thrust, and roll into the yaw due to a loss of lift as a result the excess air venting from the spill doors impinging on lower wing surface. The aircraft was judged to be unrecoverable above approx 1.2 Mach and the probability of a supersonic unstart was unacceptable to the safety case.

This information came from a very nervous FAA test pilot who had to demonstrate supersonic unstarts as part of Concorde certification. Concorde’s intake spill vents operate downward, thus hence no loss of lift meaning supersonic unstarts were completely benign(safe) during any part of its flight envelope.

The technical lead for Concorde intake design, Dr Talbot, participated in consultancy to Rockwell in the mid/late seventies, where he was told the B1a’s total flight test time at 2.0 Mach was less than ten hours due the above concerns.
 

Minus the end of 'Sequestor' ie the Democrats out of office and a $900B NDAA, transports make the most sense.
 

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Zootycoon said:
With regards to the B1b speed limitation I understand the following;-

The intake spill vents are oriented such that they vented across the wing lower surface. Therefore in the event of a supersonic engine unstart (surge) the aircraft would yaw, due to the asymmetric loss of thrust, and roll into the yaw due to a loss of lift as a result the excess air venting from the spill doors impinging on lower wing surface. The aircraft was judged to be unrecoverable above approx 1.2 Mach and the probability of a supersonic unstart was unacceptable to the safety case.

This information came from a very nervous FAA test pilot who had to demonstrate supersonic unstarts as part of Concorde certification. Concorde’s intake spill vents operate downward, thus hence no loss of lift meaning supersonic unstarts were completely benign(safe) during any part of its flight envelope.

The technical lead for Concorde intake design, Dr Talbot, participated in consultancy to Rockwell in the mid/late seventies, where he was told the B1a’s total flight test time at 2.0 Mach was less than ten hours due the above concerns.
Click to expand...
This conclusion would hint that Rockwell should never have been in the jet bomber business (an explaination of why they are not now) and the B-1 and its derivatives maybe should not ever been in service. Too many compromises like the Space Shuttle. Design by bad budgets and committees.
 
It’s always fun reading the opinions of arm chair engineers and scientists who don’t have one tenth of the information at the Pentagon or the people designing these systems. I’m not saying they’re always right, but a hypersonic bomber is one of the dumbest ideas I’ve read about, at least in the manned classic sense. In fact, we already have hypersonic bombers, they’re called ICBMs.

Second, the B-21’s payload is perfect for it’s mission it doesn’t need to carry more. A larger payload means a larger aircraft which means an easier to detect aircraft and fewer assets. The Pentagon wants more distributed assets, that can search out larger areas, in combination, apparently, with RQ-180s and other systems. A distributed system with many smaller nodes is more robust than a system with fewer larger nodes. I realize that doesn’t appeal to the fanboy cool looking stuff in all of us (Myself included), but that isn’t what determines the system should be. I mean, hypersonic? They went from supersonic to subsonic just on the huge cost differential between those two systems. Remember, the system difference isn’t just the airframe, it’s all of the other systems required to make it work. Thermal, targeting, ECS, Maintenance, etc.

I know nobody wants to hear this, but UCAVs and missiles (the hypersonic part of combat) are the future of air combat. There will be manned systems with them to help manage the battle, but given the current state of technology, the human limits what is possible and the military is intent on removing that limitation as much as possible.
 
jsport said:
Regarding the top speed, the plan as I remember it was that production B-1As would retain the variable intakes, but they would be deactivated in normal operations. This would save a significant amount on maintenance, and if it was later determined that on certain missions the capability would be needed, they would be activated. I don't know if activation involved just pushing in certain circuit breakers and telling the FCS the intakes were back or whether external actions had to be taken on the flight line. The Navy followed the exact same stratagem on the F-14D. The variable ramps were there, but deactivated.
Click to expand...

This is factually untrue in regards to the F-14D (or any F-14 for that matter). The AICS (Air Inlet Control System) was operational until the last flight of the F-14D. On museum aircraft that have not been repainted, you can see the wipe marks left on the inner vertical faces of the inlet as the AICS ramps were run to full limits during the BIT/OBC checks as the aircraft was powered up.
 
jsport said:
Zootycoon said:
With regards to the B1b speed limitation I understand the following;-

The intake spill vents are oriented such that they vented across the wing lower surface. Therefore in the event of a supersonic engine unstart (surge) the aircraft would yaw, due to the asymmetric loss of thrust, and roll into the yaw due to a loss of lift as a result the excess air venting from the spill doors impinging on lower wing surface. The aircraft was judged to be unrecoverable above approx 1.2 Mach and the probability of a supersonic unstart was unacceptable to the safety case.

This information came from a very nervous FAA test pilot who had to demonstrate supersonic unstarts as part of Concorde certification. Concorde’s intake spill vents operate downward, thus hence no loss of lift meaning supersonic unstarts were completely benign(safe) during any part of its flight envelope.

The technical lead for Concorde intake design, Dr Talbot, participated in consultancy to Rockwell in the mid/late seventies, where he was told the B1a’s total flight test time at 2.0 Mach was less than ten hours due the above concerns.
Click to expand...
This conclusion would hint that Rockwell should never have been in the jet bomber business (an explaination of why they are not now) and the B-1 and its derivatives maybe should not ever been in service. Too many compromises like the Space Shuttle. Design by bad budgets and committees.
Click to expand...
You know Rockwell equals North American Aviation, right? Not an organisation exactly unfamiliar with jet bombers and fighters.
Indeed apart from Convair (which became General Dynamics) no one else in US had even remotely the same pre-existing experience with supersonic bombers (for example Boeing certainly didn’t).
 

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