The Premature End of the B-21

What did the President know, and when did he know it?
Howard Baker, Watergate Hearings.

Last month, in a hearing before the U.S. House Armed Services Committee, Lt. Gen. Richard G. Moore Jr., Deputy Chief of Staff for Plans and Programs, U.S. Air Force, reaffirmed the USAF’s commitment to buy 100 Northrop B-21 bombers by 2039. The Gen told the Committee he needed to get “predictable funding.”

That won’t happen. The 100-unit bit, that is. We’ve got the “predictable funding” covered.

On September 26, 2018, after giving an award-winning paper at an international annual conference (iceaaonline.com), I was asked to present it again to its Southern California chapter. The venue was a Northrop Grumman facility, with several NG people in attendance.

It turns out that the funding the Gen receives for bombers, fighters, and attack aircraft is very predictable. But its limits are far lower than Gen Moore imagines. The Demand Frontier for this market has been stable for over 25 years and will limit the purchase to just over 50 units. Even if the program makes its FY 2016 target of $610M/plane, it has a slim chance (< in 1M) of making 100.

When it stops in 2039, people will point to “changing environments.”

But the target was never in reach. We knew that in 2018.

When I related that to the crowd, nobody ran out the door, telling the company to “hold the presses” on the B-21 sales prediction. Why?

How long will it take a military branch unequaled in precise targeting to realize that the time to take aim at program requirements is when the program launches, not when it falls apart decades later?

#hypernomics #b21 #innovation