Long-Range Strike: The Future

Source URL: http://www.afa.org/magazine/March2006/0306watch.asp
Posted at: http://www.air-attack/com/news/news_article/1186

With its Fiscal 2007 budget proposal, the Air Force embraces a dramatically new approach to long-range strike. The Air Force is to launch a new, possibly unmanned, bomber program far earlier than planned, moving the in-service year from 2037 to 2018. Air Force documents refer to the system as the Next Generation Long-Range Strike Aircraft program.

To pay for part of it, USAF would sharply reduce today’s bomber inventory, freeing money that would otherwise be spent on updates and maintenance. That won’t be easy (see next item).

Word of the new LRS program leaked to the press in January. The project supplants the Air Force version of the Joint Unmanned Combat Air System—which is slated for termination—with a larger, faster unmanned bomber.

The aircraft would have to cover very long distances and be able to loiter in the target area with a good-size bomb load.

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