Sometime in the next several weeks, the U.S. Air Force will award a contract for the first long-range bomber America has developed since the Cold War ended a quarter-century ago. The service plans to buy 80-100 bombers at a production cost of $550 million in 2010 dollars, with initial operational capability achieved in 2025. The plane will probably be designated B-3, because the last two heavy bombers the Air Force bought were designated B-1 and B-2.
It's a secret program, so the Air Force hasn't said much else. Secrecy is necessary not only to prevent potential enemies from building effective defenses against the bomber, but also to minimize the likelihood that foreign hackers can steal its sensitive technology. However, there are many things that can be disclosed about the Long-Range Strike Bomber -- LRS-B as it is usually called in the Air Force -- without compromising its security or operational effectiveness. Here are a few of the most important facts that help put the impending award in proper fiscal, strategic, and technological perspective.
Cost. Cost is typically the most controversial aspect of a new weapons program, so the Air Force has capped the production cost of the plane at $550 million in 2010 dollars, which is the baseline year when LRS-B began. In fact, it has made that price-tag a "key performance parameter" in the development plan to discipline design tradeoffs. The $550 million figure assumes a production run of 100 planes. In today's dollars, with five additional years of inflation, that works out to about $600 million per bomber, or roughly twice the price of a Boeing 777 widebody jetliner. However, while the $550 million includes the cost of engines and other on-board equipment, it does not include the cost of developing the plane. That component of the total cost included numerous uncertainties that could not be estimated reliably at the time the production cost was set.
People without security clearances aren't going to learn what the winning design for the Long Range... [+]
Requirements. LRS-B will replace the oldest bombers in the current fleet, many of which now exceed half a century in age, with a plane that gives the president the option of holding any target at risk, anywhere on the planet. That includes deeply buried and mobile targets such as ballistic-missile transporters, so in addition to the requisite range and payload, the bomber must be able to operate autonomously in hostile air space for extended periods. In order to survive such harrowing engagements, the bomber will incorporate the latest low-observable ("stealth") technology to evade enemy interception, and will also host a sophisticated electronic-warfare suite for jamming enemy radar.
Because LRS-B will be taking over much of the strategic deterrence mission from the current bomber fleet, it must not only be able to deliver nuclear gravity bombs and standoff munitions, but also to operate in an environment where nuclear weapons are detonating nearby. There are limits to what any plane can endure in a nuclear environment, but the requirement for nuclear operations dictates some design features of the airframe and an ability to function when communication channels have been shut down by electromagnetic pulse and other nuclear effects. LRS-B will not be certified for nuclear strikes until after its conventional capabilities are confirmed, but each production plane will contain all the necessary wiring for nuclear operations.
Technology. LRS-B is part of a "family" of long-range strike systems that includes aircraft like the B-1 and B-2 bombers, munitions, sensors, networks, and electronic-warfare systems. Some of these other systems will facilitate the new bomber's ability to find fleeting targets, and the plane therefore will carry an extensive array of secure communications links. However, because it must be able to accomplish missions even when those links are silenced, the bomber will be equipped with its own suite of sensors such as a multifunction, phased-array radar and self-protection systems that can deploy countermeasures against hostile aircraft. Much of this technology has been "re-purposed" from other programs such as the F-35 fighter to hold down costs and speed development.
Some of the design features of the B-3 were first explored in a previous program called the Next Generation Bomber that was canceled in 2009. The current program begun in 2010 has already engaged in three years of research and parts prototyping to reduce risk during development. Despite the use of mature technology in many parts of the airframe, there are major integration challenges associated with some aspects of development such as integrating the engines and antennas; these subsystems cannot be allowed to compromise survivability in the final design. All of the technical interfaces comply with open-architecture standards that will enable easy refresh of technology and avoid locking the Air Force into reliance on particular contractors.
Plan. Because there are still major uncertainties associated with integrating such a complex combat system, the Air Force will use a "cost-plus" contract during the development phase that protects the winning team from excessive losses while incentivizing cost discipline. Once production begins, though, the contract type switches to a fixed-price vehicle under which industry will incur significant losses if it fails to perform. The plan assumes that technical uncertainties will be largely resolved before production commences, and thus that responsibility for any cost overruns or schedule slippage will reside with the contractors.
The Air Force's acquisition plan emphasizes that the government will own the technical baseline of the program, meaning the intellectual property, so that it does not become dependent on the proprietary technology of a few vendors. It also stresses the importance of fielding a system that can be sustained over a multi-decade service life at reasonable cost. Maintenance of low-observable features on some legacy planes has been extremely costly and difficult, so the bomber plan aims at developing an airframe that is as easily supported as mature combat systems like its F-15E fighter-bomber. Execution of the acquisition plan is being led by the Air Force's Rapid Capabilities Office, which has a reputation for being brilliant but demanding.
Teams. Two industry teams are competing for the bomber award. One is led by Boeing with Lockheed Martin as a key subcontractor. The other is led by Northrop Grumman. Boeing has built most of the Air Force's heavy bombers, and collaborated with Lockheed Martin on its stealthy F-22 fighter. Lockheed Martin also is prime contractor on the tri-service F-35 fighter, with Northrop Grumman as a major subcontractor. Northrop Grumman also built the B-2 bomber, the world's first truly stealthy long-range bomber. Boeing was a major subcontractor on the B-2. In sum, the two teams pursuing the LRS-B award include all the companies that could credibly claim to be capable of integrating the new bomber.
The Pratt & Whitney engine unit of United Technologies will likely supply the engines. However, there will be few additional details on the subcontractors supporting the winning team, because the Air Force does not want to make it any easier for foreign governments to conduct espionage. On-line penetration of subcontractor networks is a favorite tactic of state-sponsored Chinese and Russian hackers. The two industry teams have adopted opposite strategies in telling their bomber stories, with Boeing-Lockheed saying virtually nothing in public, while Northrop Grumman has mounted a major public-relations campaign. (Boeing and Lockheed Martin contribute to my think tank; Lockheed is a consulting client).
The bottom line on the Long Range Strike Bomber program is that the Air Force has applied just about every available lesson from past acquisition efforts to fashion a program that should succeed well in the absence of political interference. It will not be cheap, but the service is overdue to replace its aging Cold War bomber fleet with a new strike aircraft that can survivably attack the full spectrum of likely targets in a future war. The service stabilized its bomber requirements years ago and has put its A-Team of acquisition experts in charge of the program. It is using cost and competition to discipline the outcome. So if ever there was a development program that measured up to the best practices of the military acquisition community, this is it.
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