Design
The design goals in January 2011 were:
- Total program cost estimated at $40 to $50 billion.
- Fleet size of 175 aircraft, 120 for 10 combat squadrons plus 55 for training and reserves.
- Subsonic maximum speed.
- Range: 5,000+ nautical miles (9,260+ km).
- "Optionally manned" (for non-nuclear missions).
- Total mission durations of 50 to 100 hours (when unmanned).
- A weapons load of 14,000–28,000 lb (6,350–12,700 kg).
- Ability to "survive daylight raids in heavily defended enemy territory".
- Ability to carry nuclear weapons.
- Designed to use off-the-shelf propulsion, C4ISR, and radar technologies.
- Intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition, and reconnaissance along with command and control gear to enable the crew to direct other aircraft and forces.
An August 2008 paper by Northrop Grumman highlighted the following trends and requirements:
- Airfields available for American use have declined since the Cold War.
- Hostile cruise and ballistic missiles could shut down the few available airfields.
- Fewer fighter aircraft will be available to escort the bomber force.
- Advanced fighter aircraft and surface to air missiles are being made available to potentially hostile states.
- The current USAF bomber force is small and largely outdated.
Read more about this topic: Next-Generation Bomber
Famous quotes containing the word design:
“The reason American cars don’t sell anymore is that they have forgotten how to design the American Dream. What does it matter if you buy a car today or six months from now, because cars are not beautiful. That’s why the American auto industry is in trouble: no design, no desire.”
—Karl Lagerfeld (b. 1938)
“Humility is often only the putting on of a submissiveness by which men hope to bring other people to submit to them; it is a more calculated sort of pride, which debases itself with a design of being exalted; and though this vice transform itself into a thousand several shapes, yet the disguise is never more effectual nor more capable of deceiving the world than when concealed under a form of humility.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)
“I begin with a design for a hearse.
For Christ’s sake not black—
nor white either—and not polished!
Let it be weathered—like a farm wagon—”
—William Carlos Williams (1883–1963)