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What warplane might the U.S. use to replace the current strategic bomber fleet?

Currently the USAF has an ongoing program for a B-3. However no one has yet made the decision on weather or not the B-3 should be a B-1/2 style penatraitor, something like a JSF to the F-22's B-2, or a big bomb truck, a huge plane that can haul a 200,000-pound war load anywhere in the world but has a bigger RCS then the Sears Tower.

I favor the bomb truck option, were going to have enough stealth strike aircraft in service by the time the B-3 shows up that it wont be an issue. And most targets that heavy bombers would attack with free fall bombs don’t have heavy defenses anyway.

Sea Skimmer wrote:Currently the USAF has an ongoing program for a B-3. However no one has yet made the decision on weather or not the B-3 should be a B-1/2 style penatraitor, something like a JSF to the F-22's B-2, or a big bomb truck, a huge plane that can haul a 200,000-pound war load anywhere in the world but has a bigger RCS then the Sears Tower.

I favor the bomb truck option, were going to have enough stealth strike aircraft in service by the time the B-3 shows up that it wont be an issue. And most targets that heavy bombers would attack with free fall bombs don’t have heavy defenses anyway.

Yes I myself heard of the B-3 program. I hope it's a cross between the "bomb truck" and a B-1 style plane. Primarily, it should be able to be like the bomb truck you described, but also should have good dash and low level characteristics, though this should be secondary. It should have some stealth, but this should be considered a distant tertiary consideration. Personally, I hope it ends up looking like an uber cool B-1 or B-52, I just absolutely HATE the B-2.

BTW I'm not a big fan of stealth aircraft in general, especially since the ChiComs are rumoured to have anti-stealth radar.

RayCav of ASVS wrote:

Sea Skimmer wrote:Currently the USAF has an ongoing program for a B-3. However no one has yet made the decision on weather or not the B-3 should be a B-1/2 style penatraitor, something like a JSF to the F-22's B-2, or a big bomb truck, a huge plane that can haul a 200,000-pound war load anywhere in the world but has a bigger RCS then the Sears Tower.

I favor the bomb truck option, were going to have enough stealth strike aircraft in service by the time the B-3 shows up that it wont be an issue. And most targets that heavy bombers would attack with free fall bombs don’t have heavy defenses anyway.

Yes I myself heard of the B-3 program. I hope it's a cross between the "bomb truck" and a B-1 style plane. Primarily, it should be able to be like the bomb truck you described, but also should have good dash and low level characteristics, though this should be secondary. It should have some stealth, but this should be considered a distant tertiary consideration. Personally, I hope it ends up looking like an uber cool B-1 or B-52, I just absolutely HATE the B-2.

BTW I'm not a big fan of stealth aircraft in general, especially since the ChiComs are rumoured to have anti-stealth radar.

NO, that is the worst possible outcome. The resulting plane would be essentially a B-1B, and cost three times as much. It needs to be one or the other. The penatraitor role is already filled by the F-117, B-2 and by the time the B-3 could show up, the F-35 and F-22. So the USAF is best off with a bomb truck.

Anti Stealth radar is irrelevant, beyond shear power the methods which can overcome second-generation stealth lack the accuracy to allow even barrage fire against the bomber. The B-2 is a very valuable addition to USAF forces, and in reality at least 30 should have been bought.

Even using shear power is a pretty marginal solution, since such radars are extremely easy targets, and can't be used for fire control due to the bands you need to use.

The B3 ought to be a bomb truck for one very simple reason. The B-52 is a bomb truck, and realistically she isn't going to remain in service much longer. We need a replacement.

A bomb truck is meant to flatten a target after the point defenses have been dealt with. That means F-117s, B-2s, F-35s, FB-22s (check out Popular Science on this baby) and even the F-22 can easily make tactical strikes to remove point defense sites while F-15s and F-22s can escort in the bomb truck. If you need a deep penertrator we already have B-2s and B-1s.

However if it is reasonably possible to incorperate basic stealth features and both some high speed and low altitude features into the B3 WITHOUT compromising the massive payload capacity and over pricing it by an extreme degree, then that is perfectly reasonable by me.

Sea Skimmer wrote:

RayCav of ASVS wrote:

Sea Skimmer wrote:Currently the USAF has an ongoing program for a B-3. However no one has yet made the decision on weather or not the B-3 should be a B-1/2 style penatraitor, something like a JSF to the F-22's B-2, or a big bomb truck, a huge plane that can haul a 200,000-pound war load anywhere in the world but has a bigger RCS then the Sears Tower.

I favor the bomb truck option, were going to have enough stealth strike aircraft in service by the time the B-3 shows up that it wont be an issue. And most targets that heavy bombers would attack with free fall bombs don’t have heavy defenses anyway.

Yes I myself heard of the B-3 program. I hope it's a cross between the "bomb truck" and a B-1 style plane. Primarily, it should be able to be like the bomb truck you described, but also should have good dash and low level characteristics, though this should be secondary. It should have some stealth, but this should be considered a distant tertiary consideration. Personally, I hope it ends up looking like an uber cool B-1 or B-52, I just absolutely HATE the B-2.

BTW I'm not a big fan of stealth aircraft in general, especially since the ChiComs are rumoured to have anti-stealth radar.

NO, that is the worst possible outcome. The resulting plane would be essentially a B-1B, and cost three times as much. It needs to be one or the other. The penatraitor role is already filled by the F-117, B-2 and by the time the B-3 could show up, the F-35 and F-22. So the USAF is best off with a bomb truck.

Actually I was thinking about something along the lines of the original B-1A - a supersonic bomb truck. Just a lot more emphasis on the bomb truck part, but still retaining high dash speed, and very limited steath features. Besides, I'm a Reagan era fan of big military spending anyway

Anti Stealth radar is irrelevant, beyond shear power the methods which can overcome second-generation stealth lack the accuracy to allow even barrage fire against the bomber. The B-2 is a very valuable addition to USAF forces, and in reality at least 30 should have been bought.

The Pentagon has said itself that the B-2A isn't necessary (source: John Stossel report). It's a 2.1 billion dollar clay pigeon. Besides, you said yourself in the future we don't need stealth, just something that can haul bombs.

Even using shear power is a pretty marginal solution, since such radars are extremely easy targets, and can't be used for fire control due to the bands you need to use.

True. I'm just going off of sheer rumor.

The B3 ought to be a bomb truck for one very simple reason. The B-52 is a bomb truck, and realistically she isn't going to remain in service much longer. We need a replacement.

I've heard from more than a few sources that the Air Force plans to fly at least part of the B-52 fleet in operation until 2060. That's an awful long time, i grant you. I doubt that they'll actually make it that long, but you never know....

Still, we absolutely need a bomb truck before we retire the B.U.F.F. Of course as much stealth should be incorperated as possible but we need a high capacity bomber. Look at how much B-52's were used in afganistan, desert storm, and vietnam. We need the kind of bomber than can absolutely flatten troop and vehicle concentrations in the way only B-52 can right now.

Alyeska wrote: However if it is reasonably possible to incorperate basic stealth features and both some high speed and low altitude features into the B3 WITHOUT compromising the massive payload capacity and over pricing it by an extreme degree, then that is perfectly reasonable by me.

There WAS. It was called the B-1A.

The official word from the Pentagon is dont trust anything we say. Most information that comes out of that building is just the option of one or two generals. Pleanty of commander think the B-2 was a great investment.

I did not say we dont need stealth, I said we dont need additional Stealth. Alyeska, the FB-22 is currently just a proposal, it chances of being built arent that great. Lots of quite impressive aircraft get proposed and have perhaps 30 million dollars worth of work done on them before being canceled.


Currently the B-52s are suppose to last till 2040, but they will need some major work done before then, and we wont by flying 90 of them by then, more like around 40. A new bomb truck will still be needed, even if the BUFF remains till 2040, since IOC for the B-3 would be around 2015-20.

The B-1A was pretty pointless, the Stealth as near worthless unless it flew nap of the Earth, something it could not do. And supersonic dash is of marginal utility; I'd rather replace the weight of fuel and engines needed with even more ECM and a big towed decoy.

Anyway, the payload of both the B-1A and B-1b is insufficient for it to be a real bomb truck. Like I said, were talking about a plane that can haul 150-200,000 pounds of bombs.

Sea Skimmer wrote:

The B-1A was pretty pointless, the Stealth as near worthless unless it flew nap of the Earth, something it could not do. And supersonic dash is of marginal utility; I'd rather replace the weight of fuel and engines needed with even more ECM and a big towed decoy.

Anyway, the payload of both the B-1A and B-1b is insufficient for it to be a real bomb truck. Like I said, were talking about a plane that can haul 150-200,000 pounds of bombs.

BTW the B-1A was NOT a stealth aircraft it was meant mostly to fly in supersonic and high to avoid interception.

Me like big bomb trucks, as long as they have plently of cover, strong jammers, who needs STEALTH.

THe Yosemite Bear wrote:Me like big bomb trucks, as long as they have plently of cover, strong jammers, who needs STEALTH.

And look cool. I don't care what it has as long as it fucking looks cool (like B-1 or B-52 cool, not B-2 gay cool)

Once again, no offense to our esteemed homosexual members

RayCav of ASVS wrote:

SeaSkimmer wrote:

The B-1A was pretty pointless, the Stealth as near worthless unless it flew nap of the Earth, something it could not do. And supersonic dash is of marginal utility; I'd rather replace the weight of fuel and engines needed with even more ECM and a big towed decoy.

Anyway, the payload of both the B-1A and B-1b is insufficient for it to be a real bomb truck. Like I said, were talking about a plane that can haul 150-200,000 pounds of bombs.

That chart assume 2000 pound weapons, when you load up with the far more heavily used 1000 pounder's the B-52 wins out, the rotary racks on the B-1 can accept the same number of 1000 and 2000 pound weapons, while the B-52 can transport significantly more 1000 pounders, and an even greater number of 500 pounders.

Plus The B-52 maintains a range advantage at any loading, the B-1 need a lot of tankers to haul around just 48,000 pounds.

Max B-52 war load is 70,000 pounds, max for the B-1B is about 50,000

Nice to know. But back on topic

THe Yosemite Bear wrote:Me like big bomb trucks, as long as they have plently of cover, strong jammers, who needs STEALTH.

Who fucking needs jammer or SEAD if you have a B-2 loaded with 320 Small diameter bombs. Forgot SEAD, you can just destroy every last SAM TEL and Triple A piece, and still have enough weapons left over to wipe out an armored brigade, or every worthwhile target in a city the size of London.

I kind of like the ol' XB-70 Valkyrie.

Yes! The XB-70! The anti-stealth! Six 31,000 lbs. afterburning engines coupled with a massive radar cross-section means you can see it coming for about five seconds and then it passes you

Heh might as well slap warning lights on it just for fun to see the streak across the sky

Tsyroc wrote:


I kind of like the ol' XB-70 Valkyrie.

If that's what the B-3 will become, I don't know whether to hit my congressman on the back of his head or cheer on in jubilation.

I read somewhere that this thing can supply half a year's worth of combat in 'Nam for cost alone.

I wonder... How well would a XB-70B (modified to carry anti-ship missiles) would be against enemy surface ships?

Hmm how well it would do?

Hmmm considering speed and angles think it could double back get an extra payload and have each plane be able to shoot twice before the first wave hits?

VF5SS wrote:Yes! The XB-70! The anti-stealth! Six 31,000 lbs. afterburning engines coupled with a massive radar cross-section means you can see it coming for about five seconds and then it passes you

Got to love the XB-70, the only way any existing SAM could have hit it would be if the site launched when the bomber was still over the horizon and used a nuclear warhead, course the bomber still needs to fly directly over the launcher. Even the MiG-25, designed specifically to shoot it down would have been hard pressed, especially with F-108s riding shotgun.

As for anti shipping, the problem is that only a couple missile would fit in the bomb bays, and you can't use external racks.

Now if the Plane was modified for dive-bombing……………

Or low level penetration….

Sea Skimmer wrote: Got to love the XB-70, the only way any existing SAM could have hit it would be if the site launched when the bomber was still over the horizon and used a nuclear warhead, course the bomber still needs to fly directly over the launcher. Even the MiG-25, designed specifically to shoot it down would have been hard pressed, especially with F-108s riding shotgun.

As for anti shipping, the problem is that only a couple missile would fit in the bomb bays, and you can't use external racks.

Now if the Plane was modified for dive-bombing……………

Or low level penetration….

Wouldn't that shockwave and all the other noise that thing would be putting out be a bitch at low level or in a dive?

Well the pilots who flew the XB-70s said, " It was like driving a greyhound bus around a race track" Not the most nimble thing...