It's been discussed for the last 30 years. I'm not holding my breath.
Where to for B-1 Bomber?
- Thread starter abramsteve
- Start date
Ozzy Blizzard
New Member
But they are both much more capable at penitrating IADS, which the B1B cant do any better than the BUFF can.i.e. great EW suite, heavy SEAD support and air dominance, which is achieved by smaller shorter ranged fighters anyway. So in such a situation were your facing an IADS the range is limited by other assets.
As a CAS platform there are alot more cost effective soloutions, that are still deadly enough. An AC 130 would be a far more cost effective, with serious fire power and loiter time. As far as the B1b vs B52, I doubt the speed difference would have been an issue. The payload may be a small difference but i would have thought the BUFF would have the edge as far as loiter time. Anyway the small difference in CAS capabilities between the B52 and B1B doesent justify the disparity in cost between the two platforms IMO.
I wouldnt like its chances against an S 400/Su37 air threat without heavy support. Unless the air threat has been dealt with by the F22's and the S400/S300 threat has been eliminated through SEAD missions the B1B has about the same chance as a B52, and is basically relying on their EW/ECM suite. A B2 on the other hand can penitrate one with ease, precisely hit its targets with a devistating payload and fly back to the states to do it all again tomorrow.
As far as a real big war, against a decently equiped foe, the only time the B1B is going to usefull is after the IADS and opposing air force has been eliminated, or as a platform for standoff weapons. In the first case its range advantage is reliant on smaler platforms to eliminate the air threat, in the second case it does the job no better than a BUFF. As a CAS platform it still is in the same ballpark as the BUFF in most peramiters.
The B1B is a capable platform, but i cant think of one of its roles that annother platform cant do in a more cost effective manner. It fills the exact same role as the B52 in the USAF force structure and costs a whole lot more. It might go a bit faster, look a bit sexier and carry a bit more, but i just dont see the justification for the substantial extra cost and down time.
Was around a B-1 unit for a few years right after it got it's Block D.
Some fun things in no particular order...
Block D is what really gave it huge practical conventional strike ability. This gave it the ability, for the first time, to have 24 JDAM (GBU-31 series) in it. The radar could on the final bomb run do "enhanced" coordinates that when pumped into the weapon on the rack before release helped get some dead scary accurate bombing with JDAM.
-Maintenance hog as mentioned. When then Sec AF Roche* announced that the B-1 fleet was going to be downsized back in circa 2001, part of the plan was that the savings in sending some to the boneyard would pump savings into upgrades for the aircraft, Block E etc etc. Like a lot of downsizing promises like that, the budget dollars rarely appear. Of course later USAF dragged more out of the boneyard and put them in service in a fast reversal of that decision. Maintenance on the aircraft has always been severely underfunded by USAF. Many would look at unit readiness rates that would get down to 51% and really tack on the maintenance hog label. The rest of that story not too long ago as told to me by a B-1 program manager was that USAF was funding B-1 maintenance circa 2001-2 at around 49%. That means on the average, the maintainers, through a lot of sweat and hard work, ( and "can" birds ), added that 2%. The ones I saw were always busy but loved the aircraft for what it was... I mean those in the community can always claim by video... that it is the only heavy bomber in service to do a roll at the top of a climb in a demo at an undisclosed location.
Powerful and impressive and given that we are only losing more and more overseas bases, big bombers become more and more important.
Best mods to make a big difference in improving maintenance up times ( besides proper funding) are to replace most of the legacy cockpit avionics, and flight controls. This really would help. Wish we had the funds.
AFAIK the first aircraft to use the ALE-50 in combat in the ex-Yugo region some years ago. At the time of the event there was only one jet that had it on it.
The Sniper-XR being put on the aircraft will be a big help for the bug hunt type of wars we are doing now. Being able to self designate lgbs will be handy.
This aircraft currently is nice for CAS. It zips out of the JSTARS stack pretty quick, carries a lot of gas and weapons and can hang around until the JTAC is happy. Makes some loud show of forces passes too when that is needed. "Speed" in response to 911 JTAC calls means something for the guy on the ground eating dirt. A B-1 or F-15,16 etc that shows up in 10 minutes or less beats an A-10 arriving much later. Time is blood. AC-130 isn't a 911 response aircraft but a kill box interdiction at night aircraft including pre-planned ops.
Also re: big bombers and CAS. Once things like F-22, B-2 etc beat down large SAMS and enemy aircraft all the rest of the legacys can drop PGMs that are in much use today like, JDAM, LGBs, CBU-105, JSOW etc from 30-40,000ft, and small battlefield SAMs, MANPADS, AAA and trashfire aren't going to do anything. I can touch you but you can't touch me. In the shooting fish in a barrel phase where ISR helps B-52,B-1, F-15~18 etc etc... plink heavy equipment,AFVs, Arty, ground equipment, logistics... no problem. Also JTACs routinely work with these platforms no problem and get the support they need. Again where the U.S. is losing more and more foreign base options, long range bombers are it if the carrier can't do it or isn't around. No B-52s need to be retired and B-1s need the upgrades I mentioned. All of that is good value. Also an "either-or" argument of B-52 and B-1 isn't especially useful. At this moment in our time we need the total number of large bombers we have. The obvious rings true that there are only so many B-1s and so many B-52s. It is having the total number of them on hand and not so much their different performance ability that makes up the firepower value. If it were a perfect world then that would be a different story. However right now for the USAF mission, big bombers offer much more total value then a new small single engine fighter that we can not afford partly due to so many funds going into a war paid for with the credit card.
*Sec AF Roche when after announcing the initial B-1 to the boneyard thing in 2001, got a new nicknames from the B-1 community. Some not printable here. One was Jabba-The-Hut.
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Some fun things in no particular order...
Block D is what really gave it huge practical conventional strike ability. This gave it the ability, for the first time, to have 24 JDAM (GBU-31 series) in it. The radar could on the final bomb run do "enhanced" coordinates that when pumped into the weapon on the rack before release helped get some dead scary accurate bombing with JDAM.
-Maintenance hog as mentioned. When then Sec AF Roche* announced that the B-1 fleet was going to be downsized back in circa 2001, part of the plan was that the savings in sending some to the boneyard would pump savings into upgrades for the aircraft, Block E etc etc. Like a lot of downsizing promises like that, the budget dollars rarely appear. Of course later USAF dragged more out of the boneyard and put them in service in a fast reversal of that decision. Maintenance on the aircraft has always been severely underfunded by USAF. Many would look at unit readiness rates that would get down to 51% and really tack on the maintenance hog label. The rest of that story not too long ago as told to me by a B-1 program manager was that USAF was funding B-1 maintenance circa 2001-2 at around 49%. That means on the average, the maintainers, through a lot of sweat and hard work, ( and "can" birds ), added that 2%. The ones I saw were always busy but loved the aircraft for what it was... I mean those in the community can always claim by video... that it is the only heavy bomber in service to do a roll at the top of a climb in a demo at an undisclosed location.
Powerful and impressive and given that we are only losing more and more overseas bases, big bombers become more and more important.
Best mods to make a big difference in improving maintenance up times ( besides proper funding) are to replace most of the legacy cockpit avionics, and flight controls. This really would help. Wish we had the funds.
AFAIK the first aircraft to use the ALE-50 in combat in the ex-Yugo region some years ago. At the time of the event there was only one jet that had it on it.
The Sniper-XR being put on the aircraft will be a big help for the bug hunt type of wars we are doing now. Being able to self designate lgbs will be handy.
This aircraft currently is nice for CAS. It zips out of the JSTARS stack pretty quick, carries a lot of gas and weapons and can hang around until the JTAC is happy. Makes some loud show of forces passes too when that is needed. "Speed" in response to 911 JTAC calls means something for the guy on the ground eating dirt. A B-1 or F-15,16 etc that shows up in 10 minutes or less beats an A-10 arriving much later. Time is blood. AC-130 isn't a 911 response aircraft but a kill box interdiction at night aircraft including pre-planned ops.
Also re: big bombers and CAS. Once things like F-22, B-2 etc beat down large SAMS and enemy aircraft all the rest of the legacys can drop PGMs that are in much use today like, JDAM, LGBs, CBU-105, JSOW etc from 30-40,000ft, and small battlefield SAMs, MANPADS, AAA and trashfire aren't going to do anything. I can touch you but you can't touch me. In the shooting fish in a barrel phase where ISR helps B-52,B-1, F-15~18 etc etc... plink heavy equipment,AFVs, Arty, ground equipment, logistics... no problem. Also JTACs routinely work with these platforms no problem and get the support they need. Again where the U.S. is losing more and more foreign base options, long range bombers are it if the carrier can't do it or isn't around. No B-52s need to be retired and B-1s need the upgrades I mentioned. All of that is good value. Also an "either-or" argument of B-52 and B-1 isn't especially useful. At this moment in our time we need the total number of large bombers we have. The obvious rings true that there are only so many B-1s and so many B-52s. It is having the total number of them on hand and not so much their different performance ability that makes up the firepower value. If it were a perfect world then that would be a different story. However right now for the USAF mission, big bombers offer much more total value then a new small single engine fighter that we can not afford partly due to so many funds going into a war paid for with the credit card.
*Sec AF Roche when after announcing the initial B-1 to the boneyard thing in 2001, got a new nicknames from the B-1 community. Some not printable here. One was Jabba-The-Hut.
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I would say a conservative estimate of opening day, unescorted, low level attacks runs by the B1b, against an air defense like the Chinese, would have a 75% success rate. And that's very conservative. Its very possible almost all B1bs would make their runs and come back safely.
That is "unescorted" and "opening day" of hostilities. The bomber, and its EW and defense suite, was created for exactly that mission. Good luck to any ground based radar tracking a B1b flying ass in the grass at a time and location of its own choosing.
Truth is against a concerted attack by B2s and B1bs, using precision and stand off weapons, an enemy would have a bad time of it. And their air defense would never be able to recover. The days following the initial attacks would see a steady degradation of the AD network.
I agree with you mate...its an excellent plane..However, compared to the b-2, the b1 is only next to it...
Typical day at the office for the B-1 mentioned here:
http://www.defencetalk.com/news/pub...r_B-1B_Bomber_targets_insurgents100011854.php
http://www.defencetalk.com/news/pub...r_B-1B_Bomber_targets_insurgents100011854.php