US Air Force Cuts Five F-35 Fighter Jets From Budget Request

The Air Force reduced the F-35A buy in FY-17 from a planned 48 aircraft to just 43, while fully funding the Long Range Strike-Bomber and KC-46 tanker. It is not clear if the Air Force will reduce the overall planned buy of 1,763 aircraft. These figures do not take into account the total F-35 buy across the US armed services or purchases by international partners.
The cut was purely budget driven, the source said, as the F-35 joint strike fighter program has made strides in recent years. The Marine Corps declared initial operational capability on time last summer with its F-35Bs, and the Air Force is on track to do the same with its conventional takeoff and landing F-35A this summer.
The F-35A cut is not a surprise. Analysts and top government officials have hinted for months that changes could be ahead for the JSF as part of the Pentagon’s effort to balance its books.
Cutting F-35As in FY17 will likely yield millions in savings over the next several years. The Air Force planned to buy 44 F-35As in FY16 and 48 in FY17, before ramping up to 60 a year starting in FY18. But reducing that to 48 a year would free up approximately $1 billion per year for other priorities.
defensenews

USAF Wants To Buy 100 Long Range Strike-Bombers

The US Air Force wants to buy 100 Long Range Strike-Bombers, Secretary Deborah Lee James said today, a figure at the high end of the 80-to-100-aircraft purchase the service predicted earlier.
“I believe the number is 100,” James said today at an event at the National Press Club, offering a rare detail on the service's plans for the hush-hush contract recently awarded to Northrop Grumman.
The service has faced mounting pressure in recent months to procure more LRS-Bs than the planned 80 to 100 planes, particularly in the face of increased aggression from Russia and China.
defensenews

Northrop's long-range U.S. bomber work paused after protest

Work on a recently awarded long-range strike bomber contract to Northrop Grumman Corp has been paused after rivals Boeing Co and Lockheed Martin protested against the selection process, the U.S. Air Force said. Air Force spokesman Major Robert Leese said the order to stop work was issued after a formal protest was filed on Nov. 6.
In October, the Air Force selected Northrop, maker of the stealth B-2 aircraft, to develop and build the new bomber over a bid by a Boeing and Lockheed Martin team.
Boeing and Lockheed Martin complained that the selection process was "fundamentally flawed."
news.yahoo

U.S. Air Force expects to award bomber contract in one to two months

The U.S. Air Force's acquisition chief said on Friday he expects the Air Force to announce the winner of a hard-fought competition to build a new long-range strike bomber in one to two months.
Northrop Grumman Corp, maker of the B-2 bomber, is competing against a team of Boeing Co and Lockheed Martin Corp to build 80 to 100 new LRS-B aircraft for the Air Force at a fixed price of no more than $550 million each.
reuters

New USAF bomber on track despite possible $460M cut

Two-star general in charge of the US Air Force’s nuclear mission says the Long-Range Strike Bomber (LRS-B) programme is “going exceedingly well” and meeting its major milestones despite a four-month delay to downselecting a prime contractor.
Maj Gen Garrett Harencak says he agrees with the $460 million funding reduction recently proposed by the house armed services committee for fiscal 2016, since the air force won’t be able to spend big on the programme until the contract is awarded anyway. Northrop Grumman and a Boeing-Lockheed Martin team are vying for the contract.
The air force wants to buy 80 to 100 stealthy, nuclear-capable bombers at a cost of about $550 million per copy to supplement and then eventually replace the aging B-1 Lancer and B-52 fleets. Air force acquisition spokesman says the service expects to award a contract this summer.
The new bomber will also support conventional operations.
flightglobal

Russia Wants a New Stealthy, Long-Range Bomber

Russia is developing a new strategic bomber called the PAK-DA as part of its post-Soviet military modernization plan, but with the price of oil falling rapidly, there are questions as to whether that nation will be able to afford the new plane.
There is little concrete information about the new Russian bomber—but a stealthy long-range penetrating strike aircraft is not cheap. The Pentagon’s secretive new Long Range Strike Bomber (LRS-B) program is aiming to develop an aircraft that will cost roughly $550 million per jet. Developmental costs for the American aircraft—which will supposedly rely on “mature” technologies--are likely to be in $50 billion range. While the Russia PAK-DA is not likely to be nearly as expensive, it is going to cost tens of billions of dollars at a time when Russia’s resource-based economy is collapsing into what could be a prolonged recession. Unlike the Soviet Union—which had a more or less full-service, if dysfunctional, economy—modern Russia is little more than a glorified petro-state. There are very real questions as to whether Russia can afford to complete the development of the PAK-DA.
Nonetheless, Russia’s Tupolev design bureau appears to be moving full steam ahead with the development of the new aircraft. Mikhail Pogosyan, head of the United Aircraft Corporation (UAC)—a state enterprise that includes Tupolev—told RIA Novosti, a state-run Russian new agency (now known internationally as Sputnik International), earlier in the year that development of the PAK-DA had started in earnest in 2014. Pogosyan said that preliminary design work for the new aircraft was completed in April 2014 and some components are already being fabricated.
The PAK-DA is expected to make its first flight in 2019. Russia is expected to complete operational testing of the new jet in 2023—which puts the timeline for the new bomber slightly ahead of the U.S. Air Force’s LRS-B, which is expected to become operational in the mid-2020s. “The maiden flight should be performed in 2019.
nationalinterest

Pentagon should abandon nuclear role for F-35

Barring investment from European allies, the Pentagon should abandon the goal of a nuclear-capable F-35 Joint Strike Fighter in favor of spending funds elsewhere, according to former US Air Force Chief of Staff Norton Schwartz.
Schwartz, who headed up the Air Force from 2008 to 2012, argued instead that those funds should be put towards the Air Force’s new long-range strike bomber (LRS-B).
The LRS-B is the Air Force’s next-generation bomber program. Only general details of the heavily classified program have emerged. The platforms are expected to enter service in the mid-2020s and cost about $550 million each, with a potential buy of up to 100. The program has been largely unaffected by sequestration because the funding streams are relatively small in the coming years, according to Air Force officials.
defensenews

New USAF bomber evades sequester-imposed budget cuts

The US Air Force managed to mitigate the disruption caused by automatic sequestration budget cuts on its high-priority Long Range Strike-Bomber (LRS-B) programme, but the service has little flexibility to absorb further levies in the future.

flightglobal

Could this be what a Northrop Grumman LRS-B might look like?

The US Air Force has embarked upon a new Long Range Strike family of systems--one component of which is the Long Range Strike Bomber (LRS-B). But even as the USAF proceeds with the new program in complete secrecy, there are new details emerging about the previous ill-fated Next Generation Bomber (NGB) effort that was cancelled by then Secretary of Defense Robert Gates in 2009.

Northrop Grumman, which built the B-2 Spirit, is one of three potential contractors who are likely to be building the new LRS-B. While the NGB was terminated, many of those technologies are certain to find new life on the LRS-B. The DEW Line has unearthed a patent filing by Northrop that details some of the features of their old NGB design--it could provide some hints as to what the company is cooking up for the new project.

Dave Majumdar-flightglobal