Tim Korso – SPUTNIK Oct 28, 2021
The Pentagon has yet to build the replacement strategic bombers, but has already started to train the crews of the ageing aircraft for a new role, a media outlet has claimed.
The US Air Force has been planning to retire its 40-year-old B-1 stealth bombers for some time now: first, they were stripped of their nuclear capability, and now they are set to be replaced by a new generation of stealth bomber – the B-21. It will take years to build a full replacement fleet of B-21s, but the Pentagon has already started to mothball the B-1, business magazine Forbes has revealed.
But the bombers won’t go to the scrapyard just yet – instead they and their crews will be trained and armed to take on Russian warships, specifically the ones sailing in the Black Sea, the journal said. Forbes indicated that these bombers have been actively used in drills in this region lately.
Several B-1s from the 7th Bomb Wing flew on the 12-hour mission from the Royal Air Force base at Fairford on 19 October, reaching the North Sea and then travelling all the way to the Black Sea.
The former strategic bomber has a 5,000-mile (8,000 kilometres) range and can carry 25 tonnes of payload. This payload might include 24 new Long-Range Anti-Ship missiles (LRASM), Forbes suggests – a stealth missile designed to strike ships as far away as 300 miles (480km). The journal claims that a pair of B-1s could potentially kill Russia’s Baltic Fleet.
The latter, however, is not guaranteed. Although the missile has stealth coating and a decent range of 300 miles, there is no guarantee it won’t be taken down by the air defences – Russia’s internationally recognised speciality. The AGM-158C LRASM’s range is only slightly outside the maximum operational range of the S-400 air defence system, but is well within the range of S-500s, which have already started to make an appearance in the Russian military. The latter could potentially take down a B-1 even before it fires its deadly missile, if one such system is installed onshore to cover the fleet.
Furthermore, the Russian Navy possesses ship-based analogues of S-350 and S-400 air defence systems, which are declared to be capable of detecting stealth targets, for example, a newer generation of bombers – B-21s. The on-ship version of S-500 is also in development and will probably possess an even greater ability to detect stealth targets, as well as the ability to intercept hypersonic missiles (if the US finally develops one for its Air Force). In addition, most of the Russian warships are equipped with jamming projectiles A3-CP-52 and A3-CO-52, although it is unclear whether they can trick the anti-jamming systems of the AGM-158C LRASM.
Showboating and an opportunity to transfer even more public money to military contractors. The Russians can detect these aircraft and shoot them down with ease. The wouldn’t even get to launch their missiles.
Pure propaganda.
My mate in Russia says he just saw an RS-28 Sarmat with ‘RAF Fairford, God bless you.’ painted on the side. 10/15 warheads, just one would take out London and the Southeast UK. What says that Russia takes these planes out over Northern Europe? The reason why they are planning to use planes, that the Russia can jam US ships and planes, but the US figures that 300 miles gives them a slim chance of success. These B21’s if they survive, won’t be going back to RAF Fairford.
Before anyone mentions Russian bomber patrols, all Russia has done over recent years is to restart their old Cold War defense strategy, because it is Russia which is under potential attack.
And I say this again. The US doesn’t give a toss about turning the UK and Europe into a radioactive wasteland.
White America would be strong if it worked for itself, but as a lap-dog it slowly decays , and not so as to be mourned.
“The US doesn’t give a toss about turning the UK and Europe into a radioactive wasteland.”
Computer gamer? If you drop a nuke anywhere in the world, some part of the fallout will eventually make it’s way back to you. Drop more than one and more will come back to you. Pollution doesn’t stop when it reaches the ‘border’ of a ‘country’. This is the one and only reason no one’s dropped any yet – because it’ll kill just as many of you as them in the end. Drop enough and who knows what effect it’d have on the ozone layer – it could wipe it out and thereby wipe out all life on earth. Really, the human race, who’d want the things anywhere near them – not me, that’s for sure. I keep expecting some filth from the ‘government’ to turn up telling me what to do or not to do, and I’m so stupid that I just know I’ll tell him the truth – “I have never wanted any part of your so called society, your so called country, or your so called species, so you may as well go and tell it to your victims in the farms as to me”. Has anyone else noticed how much humans reek? I don’t know what it is, but they just stink. It’s probably all that evil leaking out of them.
No, they just don’t wash
All this aggression from the Jew S A.
Why and for what purpose?