Message posted by Vahe Demirjian (Member since 04/28/2022) on August 16, 2024 at 9:25:53 PST:
The postponement of the planned IOC for the B-52J (B-52H aircraft to be re-engined with F130s) to 2033 potentially could give the USAF a bit of fiscal wiggle room with respect to its next-generation programs (no matter which ones are reprioritized or put on the back burner for fiscal reasons) but providing a window of opportunity for the Air Force Global Strike Command to retire 15 B-52Hs from service given that the B-21 has apparently entered low-rate initial production. There's no question that the overall gestation of NGAD requirements by the USAF has been pretty protracted thanks to not just a roller-coaster fiscal environment over the past decade but also the increasing severity of external threat environments. This is why I'm still of the opinion that even if the NGAD program is fiscally resuscitated and one of the two remaining contenders for the NGAD contract is chosen to build the NGAD, then only 120 to 160 NGADs will be built due to high unit cost (the USAF originally wanted to procure 750 F-22s but only 187 production F-22s were built in addition to the two YF-22 prototypes and eight EMD F-22 vehicles). The Air Force will surely be staking its chances of providing funding for the NGAS program to develop a new tanker upon test flights of JetZero's suscale BWB technology demonstrator and the company's plans for a full-scale experimental BWB aircraft.
In Reply to: USAF Considers Reprioritizing Next-Generation Programs posted by Griffon_314 on August 14, 2024 at 8:33:47 PST:
Replies: