Debate Inside DoD on LRS

Originally posted by ch1466

Maybe the CIA has such a ring of black-constellation satellites up there that the area coverage of any given 1,000X1,000nm target zone doesn't have to obey the laws of 1-2 KH-11 type long-interval orbital mechanics.

IMO someone did and still does but not apparently the USA. Does that explain the following more logically than the alternatives?

Maybe they also have the bandwidth and processing capacity to auto-task from all the streaming video data on shapes and patterns of shapes so as to provide instantaneous real time targeting of these same totality regions.

www.janes.com...

Apparently not or at least not something they are going to use in a low intensity war like Kosovo or OIF...

But I doubt it. Because if they did, UBL would have been dead a long time ago.

Well apparently they had the predator looking right at him but still decided not to do it ( well apparently there were some mix up but i'm not buying) then and there; what would the US after all be without terrorist stalking America now that the Libyans are not longer on the mean streats of the capitol.

And cheap conventional ballistics or aeroballistics (the SRAM dates back to 1972, Skybolt to 1962) would have long since become the derigeur choice for reactionary attacks on threats which are otherwise too fleeting to TLE lockdown in the interval between sighting and weapon carrier transit to LARs.
KPl.

The air force said it had received White House approval for a $51m programme to convert 92 nuclear-tipped cruise missiles into conventional missiles, and fit a new guidance system. However, this still has to be ratified by Congress.

news.bbc.co.uk...

It's one thing not to build enough of the things but when the will go this far one wonders who is paying them what or holding guns to their collective cowardly heads... " Sell out house" seems ever more appropriate.

Stellar


[edit on 4-11-2006 by StellarX]

[edit on 4-11-2006 by StellarX]

I think rushing on the LRS to get an "interem" airframe might be a mistake. The LRS should be a aircraft that can carry us well for many years. I've never been a B-1 fan, but I'll agree the large payload would be nice. What we really need is a logn-term aircraft that can forfill a wide spectrum of missions. I would shoot for a flying wing simular to the B-2 but with a much heavier payload, longer range and a bit faster.

The biggest problem with the B-1 is the swing-wings. Swing wings are suceptable to more wear and tare then fixed wings, which means the aircraft costs more to maintain and has a shorter life span.

Tim

IMO B-1(any variants) has no chance in such a competetion. B-1A, a faster B52, retired long ago ,B-1B, designed for penetrating enemies ads at low altitude, also outdated in modern warfare.

This thread is pretty thought provoking as far as the military-industrial complex goes.