The American media return to talk about the "Long Range Strike-Bomber" project. We already know the price of the new bomber: 550 million dollars per specimen per fleet composed of 100 new generation aircraft and a total cost of 55 billion dollars.
The Pentagon wants a new strategic component "until now not even dreamed of by enemies".
The new bomber will cost a quarter of the B-2, currently under the USAF. The twenty-one aircraft built and the prohibitive operating costs relegate the B-2 more to propaganda aircraft than to realistic combat aircraft (also because there are no theaters that require the strength, power and technology of the B-2 dissolved the USSR ). However, the fear that is aroused is undeniable.
The Long Range Strike-Bomber is considered a top priority for the Air Force. By next spring we will know the company that will develop the bomber, although the choice will almost certainly fall on one of the two projects presented by Northrop Grumman and a Boeing / Lockheed Martin team. Both could be flying wings.
The Air Force wants a long-range subsonic bomber with high aerodynamic efficiency, the ability to evade any type of air defense and a virtually zero RCS (Radar Cross Section). The very low radar signature is a fundamental prerequisite of the new bomber.
In addition to conventional armament, the future bomber will have the ability to take nuclear warheads at enormous distances. The project is classified by the 2011, but as we know, between development and experimentation and what is shown to public opinion there is a gap of about 20 / 25 years. The proof is given by the fact that a new prototype of the USAF would already be furrowing the skies for a long time.
The USA has a special budget for the classified black projects and the one photographed last March in Texas and a month before in Kansas, could be just the new bomber (already just the one that in theory should exist only on paper). The one in the picture could be everything: a technological demonstrator of some kind, the stealth drone RQ-180, the LRSB prototype or the advanced (though larger) version of the X-47B.
At first glance the two exhaust nozzles of the aircraft are noted, which has a pronounced boomerang shape. According to witnesses, he would go through the sky without any noise, leaving behind an unusual trail. It could also be the batwing with camera that in the final rendering was influenced by a series of factors that distorted the image.
Of course, some details don't add up. It is not explained, for example, the reason why the Pentagon has decided to let the airfield fly by day and in the sunlight, therefore at the mercy of anyone. Not to be underestimated is the camouflage trail, used for decades by every nation: to make public opinion (or the enemy) believe that it is in possession of some kind of weapon system to hide shadow operations or secret projects. A targeted choice therefore to divert attention from something else (or to lower the crest as it happened when the F-117 was shown). In the spotlight the base of Nevada Groom Lake, also known as Area 51, over the years at the center of every conspiracy theory. Over the years the base has become a mirror for larks. Many do not know, for example, that in the USA there are at least ten other bases like the Area-51. No one knows where they are. Few know they exist.
Just to stay on the subject of ultra-secret projects, the Technical Research and Development Institute of the Japanese Ministry of Defense has recently released the first official photos of the Advanced Technology Demonstrator-X (ATD-X), the new technological demonstrator used to develop the next F-3 fifth-generation fighter in production from the 2027. The name chosen for the technological demonstrator is Shinshin, "Spirit of the Heart".
Franco Iacch
