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| Image: Flickr User - PACAF |
By Col Mike “Starbaby” Pietrucha
“With a well-considered upgrade plan, the B-52 can serve to its 100th birthday.”
The long rifle was the great weapon of its day … today this B-52 is the long rifle of the air age. -Gen Nathan Twining, March 18, 1954
It seems increasingly likely that there will be a B-52 flyby for the retirement of both the B-1 Lancer and the B-2 Spirit. The venerable bomber, which first flew in 1952, remains the primary component of the USAF’s bomber force for both nuclear and conventional missions. Lacking the stealth of the B-2 and the speed of the B-1, the B-52 remains a frontline combat aircraft because of its exceptional range, unmatched versatility, and flexible payload options. It is debatable whether today’s aviation industry could re-create an airplane with this essential mix of capabilities, but a fully modernized B-52, in combination with the new Long Range Strike Bomber (LRS-B), would provide the USAF with an asymmetrical advantage over both China and Russia that neither is likely to match. Far from being obsolete, the Stratofortress could well serve into the 2050s, making an updated bomber well worth the effort and expense, and ushering in the B-52J Centuryfortress – the 21st century bomber.
Background
Oddly enough, it is the substantial increase in the military capabilities of both Russia and China that make the B-52 an attractive prospect again. China’s pursuit of a comprehensive anti-access/area denial (A2AD) capability has not only resulted in a threat to air operations, but a threat to airbases as well. China has over sixty military airfields just in the four military districts closest to Japan and Korea, some of which are hardened to a standard that no U.S. base has ever achieved. Matched against this are six U.S. fighter bases in Japan and Korea. All of the potential U.S. fighter bases are subject to overwhelming attack by ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and combat aviation from a country that has more missiles, more aircraft, and the ability to rapidly and overwhelmingly mass effects against very few fixed U.S. targets. Combined with a major investment in ship-killing missiles, including the DF-21D antiship ballistic missile (the first of its kind), Beijing has the ability today to make it very difficult for the U.S. to operate aircraft or surface combatants in China’s front yard.
From a tactical standpoint, China clearly intends to negate the U.S. investment in air dominance by attacking the weak points presented by dependence on nearby airfields. This is a deliberately asymmetric strategy that offsets the fighter-heavy approaches preferred by the USAF and the only remaining carrier-based option for naval aviation. The Chinese target analysis is easy – if they inhibit the ability of the U.S. to fly aircraft and dock ships, then the U.S. will be effectively neutralized in the western Pacific.
The obvious response to this strategy is for the U.S. to engage in some asymmetry itself, including a number of options which entail fighting from a distance. In the old European model, where NATO and Warsaw Pact air forces squared off over compact territory, speed, survivability and maneuverability were the attributes that largely described the utility of combat aircraft, which reinforced a trend towards fighter aircraft. In the Pacific, with its long distances and island bases, the key attributes are range, sensor capability and payload, which are typically attributes of the bomber. For operations over long distances, the combination of penetrating bomber (LRS-B) and standoff platform (B-52J) could provide a formidable combat capability by the mid-2020s.
Read the full story at The Diplomat