Sorry, I erred. The boondoggle B2 program requires upwards of 120 hours of maintenance for 1 hour of flight time, all of which must be done in special air conditioned bunkers 

Is this a joke? israel, georgia, the entirety of europe with the whole "missile defense is antagonizing the russians", and lets not forget the friendly pro democracy iraqies and other arabs in the region. To name a few.

Are you in all honesty claiming that the COLD WAR was an act of the USA APPEASING the russians to victory? what kind of fantasy world do you live in.

My statement about "not offending the Russians" was SARCASM (which should have been clear from the tone of my entire post)...theres your problem lack of understanding.

Unbelievable!! This is the same mantra that Stalin used to attack/occupy (parts of) Finland, the Baltic States, and Poland. has Canada's love of socialism made you a little red under the skin? You give a free pass to current Russian aggression, in the name of buffer zone, with a total disregard for the Independence (and freedom to choose their friends). I don't know want Canada is putting in their text books that makes a return of the USSR sound so appealing to their kids. 

Apparently not liberal Canadian stupid. I don't expect your infantile mind to grasp the analogy, since by the sound of your posts here and over the months and years you come off a a spoiled, never-did-anything-but-take brat, with the occasional platitude for the Canadians that did make a difference and still are. Yet some how you know it all right (except for history)?

It has been reported in recent days that Iran can field a device now. Can they? I don't know. And since Obama has the CIA afraid to do their jobs, I'm sure he doesn't either. As a person with some military experience (unlike others that never had or will), I know you just don't snap your fingers and your missile defense system is in place when you want it to be. It is estimated that it would take 5 years to build the MD system. Where will Iran be in 5 years with their nuke weapons program? Who knows. You don't wait for the enemy to get the upper hand---is that simple enough for you.

If you believe Georgia and Ukraine have no say over their own affairs then your statement is correct. I don't believe this for a second.

Not sure if you get the news up your way but the US economy isn't good. And it will get worse if the government gets into the heath insurance business. It is a typical of liberal thinking to throw money at a problem, nothing new here. Imagine that defense strategy---we'll just out spend the Russian if they try something---how moronic and naive. What was done in the past was done, it worked, but that doesn't make it the ideal approach.

Funny how I've heard you rail in the past about the US's military involvement in the world, yet here you are advocating a return to the cold war. Russian has it's own problems to worry about (Chechnya) without getting involved in the Eco-politics of its former subjects. They rejected Russia's "influence" by leaving the USSR. What is it you don't understand about that? The US is not pushing NATO on them they are asking for it. Same with the EU membership.

Addressing Arty (a slightly more reasonable Canadian liberal )

Your statement just addressed the entire problem...it's not for use against Russian ICBMs. They know it too.

The ABM system is in its infancy (might be why they need 10) and is still developing, so is the Iranian missile program.  If Russia or most any other country with missiles in the northern hemisphere fire missiles they go over the Arctic Ice cap. Placing ABMs in Poland...would only benefit Europe at this stage.

Not according to some Canadian (would be) economic professors (see post 17). They propose we "just out spend" the Russians aka Cold War style.

Since your a man of figures, maybe you could explain what the cost of one moderate to large nuked European city would cost? Will it happen? Probably not.

BTW Your Iraq war cost is over inflated (LINK , still expensive though, do you thing the Iraqi appreciate it?). You must be thinking UHC.

What is up with Canadians supporting "elbow room" for Russia... with no regard for the rights of those sovereign nations? Guess it's easier to "do as I say not as I do".

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/story.html?id=a3dcc991-8df0-40c7-9732-8ed5641953c7

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2007/08/mil-070809-rferl04.htm

http://www.robertamsterdam.com/2007/08/the_arctic_claim.htm

It is so easy to give up someone else's rights, isn't it? Not so nice when it your own. Yet somehow I get the feeling there are some in Canada that would welcome their Soviet Russian liberators with open arms.

My point was that the U.S. have been the geopolitical aggressors in the regions, from Russia`s point of view. They don't see your recent movement as the U.S. yeilding to their power, but as the U.S. lowering one of the multiple gun pointing their head.

Please note that I am not condoning nor condemning Russia for these actions. I am not saying that Russia is treating fairly its client-states, nor that they have a right to oppress these nations.

What I am trying to make you understand is the motivation behind Russia`s action. Wether they are "fair" or not is irrelevant to the discussion at hand; they are acting like this, and this is treathening USA's geopolitical interest (funny: when I argue with people about US's reasons for intervening around the world and acting like you do, saying that you usually have an underlying reasons, they label me as a pro-American Imperialist.)

Now, let's take morality out of the equation, and concern us with the core geopolitics at hand. First of all: Georgia, Ukraine, etc... has, technically, every right to choose their allegiance. But Russia is deeply concerned and feels itself treathened. Are they right or wrong about that? Irrelevant. They feel treathened, and they will act on that feeling by re-creating the chessplay they have played against the U.S. during the Cold War. They have the feeling the U.S. are weak, but you have a bigger economy than you had at your best time of the Cold War, and they cannot hope to match the USSR's GDP.

Ukraine has been the target of intelligence operations since the Orange REvolution. They will probably freely choose to turn away from EU and NATO in the next 5 years, because of Russia's involvement in slandering the Pro-western politicians and backing up the pro-western organisation. It was a textbook intelligence operation. you will probably blame it on Obama's policies when it's gonna happen, but the trend had started ever since the Orange REvolution, because of a simple fact: Right now, Russia has a hundredfold more influence over Ukraine than the U.S. ever had, because of its proximity.

I am not sure about Georgia, however. But then again, the U.S. cannot DO anything about them. As said earlier, Russia has deployed tentacles around the world to upset you, and that gained leverage over you. Such tentacles are expensive, and Russia cannot  finance them too much, or too long.

Actually, it has been reported that they are farther away from achieving a delivery-able bomb than we initially though. The treath is less dangerous, but this is irrelevant to Israel.

As for your "We should not wait for them to have so", well, I did not really said that we should, or shouldn't. I just said that Israel feels itself treathened, and they will act on it. It wasn't a jugement of right and wrong, it was a statement of fact. Israel wants sanction or military muscle-up against Iran, Obama is trying to achieve just that, but he wants to avoid a shooting war that will drive Oil and Gas prices incredibly high and further increase Russia's national power.

The only way of avoiding a shooting war is to impose sanctions on Iran, or Israel will take matters in their own hand, whatever destructive consequence for the world economy (and for the U.S.) the action will have. Are they right or wrong? I don't care, that's what's gonna happen.

And guess what? It's only the beginning of your economical strenght. You don't have borders to defend against aggressive rivals, you are one of the main ressource producers of the world (Oil and Gas included). You overproduce food. The U.S. is only starting to tap on its potential, and has the capacity for even more than what it is doing. You don'T have large demographic strategic problem, like China.

I have learned quite a few things about geopolitics in the past year (STRATFOR helped a lot about that). Russia has much less internal troubles now since Putin shaken things up and reduced Russia's internal instability. Actually, since Russia waken up (Orange Revolution), their internal problem have lessen and their economical/strategical strenght have been bolsteren.

The U.S. is not pushing NATO on Western Europe or its new allies, off course. Nor are these countries will receive U.S.'s backing just for their pretty eyes. It is in both their interest to ally for now. Or it was, anyway. Ukraine was happy to turn toward the West when Russia was in shamble, but things have changed.

As for U.S.`s military involvement around the world, I decided to take a neutral stance about it, since there is little say I can have in the matter, and they are usually not done on a whim. There is usually a good reason for U.S.'s strategic involvement, usually arisen out of concern for your safety, but I will not condemn other power's reaction to these involvment, as I can understand their concerns too.

Anyway, for the matter at hand, Poland's safety, I will quote STRATFOR's most recent analysis on the topic:

And this:

So...

The title of this thread is a complete load of bullshit. It's fueled by anti-Obama resentment, and has no basis in reality. It is not a capitulation, and it's not even a complete concession on the part of the United States.

Personnaly, I think "Socialist" is becoming the new "Nigger" in the United States. The opposition Obama is receiving is so irrational on so many front, it's surreal. There might be a few core issue where opposition is legitimate, but COME ON! The notion that Death Commitee had been risen up? The protest against Obama's speech to the students that they should work hard at school?

And now, THIS? How can bystanders not believe that this is fuelled by racism? I wasn't believing the initial reports on the matter, as I understand many of the conservative wing's concerns. But the more it goes, the more irrational the accusations against your president are.

Maybe it's not racism (or at least, not in it's entirely - there IS racism present). But there is certainly irrationality fuelled by some resentment against what Obama is. After all, he is the first Urban president since a loooong time.

Iran became a world power in the creation and funding of international terror organizations. All because we looked weak enough for them to get away with it. Soviet invasion of Afghanistan because we looked feckless enough for them to get away with it and our response was to not send our athletes to the 1980 Olympics in the USSR. now the spin offs of this was the Taliban created by Pakistan, Al Qaeda a spin off of the Afghan war. Libya started to attack America because we looked weak. Wow it seems that the loss of two wars did hurt us, it was not quick and immediate because it takes time to see if America is a paper tiger and then to see what weaknesses we have and how to exploit them. Just as Mr. Clinton did not jump on Bin Laden when he had the chance allowed 9/11. We look weak bad people will exploit it. Most of the world knows that if you attack America with an army we will crush them. What the soviets figured out was if they grew terrorists organizations that were not openly sponsored by any nation state we would have no way to defend or fight them. That is the new war we are fighting it started when the USSR funded Black September and a host of other groups. using them to weaken the nation then makes it easier for other attacks on us until we can be attacked by a nation state and lose. it is an old strategy, death by a thousand cuts. One little cut is nothing but if you are cut at different places some serious and some minor it will wear down the person until a 6 year old can kick your ass.

This is a foolish myth, if you bother to read up on it you will find out what I am about to write. The Shah of Iran took power during WWII from his father. He ruled continuously until the fundamentalist pushed him out, President Carter withdrew support of him and that was that the end of an unbroken 5000 year rule. If it was unbroken as history books say, then how did the CIA put the Shah back in power. The answer was that it did not happen like that. The Prime Minister was taken out of power by the Brits and the CIA at the request of the Shah because the Prime Minister was trying to oust the Shah who was still in power at the time. The Shah has the power to fire the prime minister at will, he did but the man would not leave and was planning a coup d'état. The longest unbroken monarchy in the world was broken by President Carter. We looked weak in not supporting our allies in the region and the rest is bloody history. See how our current president is doing the same thing. Poland refused to take our Secretary of State’s phone calls. They feel abandoned by us. Once again the liberals have laid the ground work for an attack against us because the first move it to tell the world that well will not help or support anyone we don’t like today even if you were a great friend and help yesterday. What country or leader is going to help us when we need help if we always stab them in the back? Pakistan had been our enemy for decades, we made friends with them and now they are our enemy again or at least feeing abandoned by us in their time of need.

One of the reasons it does not land outside the US is because we don’t want people knowing how it works. That is why they are stationed in the middle of the country. Unlike liberal thinking giving away our military secrets is not really a good idea. This weapon has the ability to fly into and out of enemy airspace and not be detected. That makes it a closely guarded secret. Also keep in mind that a maintenance hour is one man per hour. I seriously think that they have one man doing all the maintenance on the aircraft. You have the plane captain who is in change of the maintenance of the aircraft he has a team of people that work with him. If ten men work on the aircraft for one hour that is ten maintenance hours If they work on the aircraft for ten hours that is one hundred maintenance hours. It takes 16 hours to change the tires of the plane. Four men working four hours. While at that same time another team is working on the skin of the aircraft that takes eight to ten hours. Another team is working on the avionics, while another team is working on the propulsion systems, a team working on the bombing systems. So your 120 hours of maintenance is usually done in 8 hours what does that tell you besides that you don’t understand maintenance cycles? A bombing run over Iraq takes about 24 to 30 flight hours. According to you the plane would be taken out of service for 2,880 hours or 120 days, with so few planes I find it hard to believe that we waited 120 days per flight during the initial bombing during desert storm. I worked for a few airlines when I was younger and I know how the cycles work. Now after so many flight hours the plane goes in for a “D” check where the plane is literally taken apart checked and rebuilt that takes a good month on commercial aircraft the “A” checks that is done about every 500 flight hours takes about 2 hours per plane before it can fly again. On civilian air craft there are normally two to four mechanics doing an “A” check.

Nitro-

Thanks for keeping the dialogue going. While we certainly disagree on much at least we can carry on a rational conversation!

So here's the crux of the issue. Supposedly, we are told that the missile shield is for us to benevolently protect Europe from Iranian missiles. But, let's be real here my friend.

Europe does not need our protection from Iran.

If, and I sincerely hope that this never happens, -if- the day ever comes that Iran decides to launch nuclear weapons ( it would make not one, single, iota of sense for them to shoot at anything in Europe. No, if the day ever comes they will be targeting

1) U.S military installations in the middleast- meaning the mega-bases in Iraq like Balad airbase, bases in the emirates and so on. Iran knows that just next door they could potentially cause tens of thousands of U.S casualties, all of them military, in one day.

2) Israel

3) Saudi Arabia?

4) International shipping through the straits of Hormuz. That would send the price of a barrel of oil to 200 dollars practically overnight.

To say that Iran is going to start nuking Europe for no reason is utter hogwash and is the object of pure fantasy. Moreover, it's masking the real reason that the U.S started putting the missile shield in Eastern Europe:

Political capital. The missile shield is a big 'old sexy program. Just like the B2 bomber platform (again with a price tag of 1.5 billion per bomber) who cares if it'll really work or is practical in a real war? It looks and sounds cool, and besides, we can keep saying for decades that we'll get it working eventually. Placing the missile shield in Eastern European countries is part of a time honored practice of trying to pull other nations into our sphere. Of course it's not a single event, there's also NATO membership, NATO bases, joint military training agreements and of course, arms sales that follow it up.

And it has everything to do with Russia, not Iran. Why? Because everyone knows that if a hot war starts in the middleast, Russia could very well decide to get involved, and not necessarily on our side.

So, if the Russians have had a missile for more than 10 years that can overcome the missile shield that's so far cost over 100 billion dollars, why did we stick with it? For the same reason that the French built the Maginot line. For the same reason that the U.S navy thought their ships were safe from torpedo attack in pearl harbor. It's the inability, or perhaps the unwillingness, to acknowledge the fact that there is no technological 'magic bullet' that will make us impervious to our enemies. But we live in a society that worships technology as the answer to all of our problems.

And that's exactly what this missile shield is. A fraudulent magic bullet that has never worked and cost a rather large fortune. If folks were truly serious about missile defense, from a purely technical standpoint, beam weapons really are the way to go. So why didn't we pursue that with the same zeal? I don't know. I would imagine probably because Boeing, defence contractors, lobbyists and their paid for politicians, along with members of the Pentagon who are soon to be highly-paid consultants for said defence contractors, decided long ago that missiles were the way to go, and they've been swimming in tax payer dollars for so many years now that they're blind to the fact that they still haven't produced something that can truly deliver.

And one more thing I'd like to add. Iran can cause a world of hurt to the U.S, Israel and allies without launching a single nuclear, chemical or biological weapon and they could do this tomorrow if they wanted. It is also partially for this reason that even George Bush junior himself refused to allow Israel to bomb the bejeezus out of Iran at the end of his administration.... Israel's been wanting to scratch that itch for a long time and they were banking on doing it before Bush junior left office as they were concerned the next fellow wouldn't be so accomodating. But, even GWB wouldn't give the green light for attacking Iran so instead the consolation prize was their operation in Gaza.

One of the main reasons the U.S doesn't want a confrontation with Iran?

The sunburn anti-ship missile. It flies low enough and fast enough that most ships will only have about 25-30 seconds warning (most other anti-ship missiles can be detected at least a minute or two away) It's capable of cruising mere feet above the sea to minimize detection and of course,  evasive maneuvers as it closes with the target. The U.S Navy has quietly admitted that there is presently no effective counter-measure for this missile. In fact, navy planners were sensible and put the brakes on the planning or construction of any new Aircraft Carriers until this kind of missile can be effectively neutralized, otherwise, each aircraft carrier is just a big fat target.

With the sunburn missile, Iran could conceivably sink a lot of U.S and Israeli warships, as well as completely shut down merchant traffic through the straits of Hormuz. That alone would have catastrophic repercussions around the world.

Also, these missiles are small enough that locating them and taking them out ahead of time would be a virtual impossibility. Iran's got a lot of coastline and even if most of them were taken out pre-emptively, it would only take one or two to drop an aircraft carrier.

So, what's my meandering point?

If the U.S was really so incredibly worried about "the Iranian threat" you would be scrambling to shore up your defenses in the middleast and find a way to defeat the sunburn missile, rather than fictitious ICBM's launched at Europe!

That's nice. If you actually do just a smidge of research however, you'll find that actually, no, the B-2 bomber actually needs a special air-conditioned building to be housed in.

The reason is that during routine flight, a lot of the top secret stuff that keeps the plane so radar invisible actually gets damaged or starts coming off. To keep the plane radar invisible it needs to have this stuff repaired or replaced. While this is happening, the plane must be in a precise environment so that everything can cure properly, which can take upwards of a day or more.

Therefore, during this maintenance and while everything is curing, a specialized hangar is required that can keep the environment (temperature, humidity, pressure, blah blah blah) at the precise required levels.

Now, this is not just a plain jane hangar, it is a specialized hangar built only for the B-2, it is very expensive and very permanent. Meaning it cannot be setup quickly or temporarily in a forward location.

As to the 119 hours of maintenance for 1 hour of flight time, of course, yes, that is a standard that was calcaluted out cumulatively over time. No, after every single flight the plane doesn't need several days of maintenance, but stretched out over a year of routine operation and several flights, it adds up.

But I really don't need to go on about this, because there are documents online, released by the U.S General Accounting Office and even some Pentagon papers back in the mid-90's (I believe 1997) that detail all of this.

If you go out and look for them, you'll find em in short order. But if you would like, I can post the links for you.

Your desecration of maintenance cycles is dead on, good job clarifying it in layman's terms. Some folks are quick to dismiss people that have worked or intimately familiar with these systems.

Your argument assume that Iran only "hates" the US. In reality, Iran could very well be facing NATO (which includes Europe) if hostilities would occur. What is the best way to make Europe cry uncle? Give it a bloody nose where it hurts - their backyard. Additionally, US military staging points are in Europe.

But lets be real for one moment. Iran doesn't have to fire a nuke at Europe... all it needs is a credible capability to change the EU's policy toward Iran. The whole game changes for negotiations.

I do agree with you, chance for a launch to Europe would be low. It's the thought that counts. If someone is hovering over you with a club you might feel intimidated. If that same person was behind bars, you might be more inclined to speak your mind.

I feel that Iran would be more inclined to use a device against Israel. And probably covertly via proxies (hamas, hezbolah). They know a first use against the US would be the end for them.

BTW Iran is the last group that wants oil shut off. They export so much oil to buy commodities, that they need to import gasoline for domestic use. Imagine an oil producing country that is itself energy poor.

Russia was never threatened by the interceptor missiles. In reality they could probably care less. Anyway a Russian nuclear attack on Europe would initiate a US response. They know that they can get support by crying foul. It's a no lose proposition for them with potential gains.

US ABM technology is by far the best in the world and (at least prior to Obama) improving everyday. Last years destruction of a defunct US spy satellite, traveling over 7000 miles an hour, is clear proof (the Chinese shot down a static weather sat. the previous year). To disparage it as a "fraudulent magic bullet" is not very fair. While it probably wouldn't hamper the latest Russian (or other space capable nations), it would certainly defeat Iranian technology. On top of that these systems are constantly improved to meet new threats. Just as the same Patriot missile system that was so successful in the first gulf was has been repeatedly improved since then. In that respect we owe Saddam a great deal of thanks.

I always get a kick out of it when someone calls out the cost of such things. The fact is if it weren't for the US military spending, we wouldn't have these capabilities. Imagine if like minded people thought the same way about ARPANET in the late 60's. One, they or their descendants wouldn't be here bitching on the Internet for one. What about GPS? Digital cameras? Simple truth is US military spending benefits the world. What has Russia's military given the world? China's?

Come now Arty, these missiles are almost twenty years old. Do you really believe the US has not developed a counter measure? If they were so wonderful why is Russia selling them to China and Iran? No country sells their best when it could find its way into unfriendly hands. BTW this missile uses active radar homing, which can be easily defeated. The moment Iran lights up the radars that control these missiles to paint our ships, those radars will be destroyed, then the missiles are useless. They have to acquire targets in the crowded Persian Gulf, which would take much more time than this missiles flight time. Funny, your flawed argument does not support Obama's plan for a ship based missile defense. You listen too much to the enemy propaganda. Read about this old missile here LINK.

Come on down to the Oceania Air Show Oct 17-18. A B-2 will be on display for two days without its "special air conditioned" hangar (I sure hope it stays fresh).

http://www.voanews.com/english/archive/2002-09/a-2002-09-17-3-Britain.cfm

Here's a news flash for you. All modern US military hangars are air conditioned (even aircraft carriers), especially the Air Force, just more comfortable for the maintenance crews that way. That may be considered special if your in another military's air force.

If you actually did some thinking to go along with your research you would have to conclude that the F-117 stealth bomber uses the same materiel as the B-2 yet is has been stationed outside the US, goes through the same type of maintenance cycles and needs the same air-conditioned hangers. The B-2 is safer in the air than on the ground. The only way for an enemy to know they are on the way is to sit at the airfield and watch them take off because once in the air you can’t see them with radar. They launce from the US you don’t know where they are headed. They launch from other countries you have an advantage, not much of one but some advantage.

the issue with the Sunburn is close to being true. their problem is that it has a very short range. 180 miles. A carrier group has 250 mile control of the sea, that is air, surface and subsurface so to launch the launch platform is already within detection range. the 800 pound warhead will damage a carrier but you will need more than one to sink it. The SM-2's might not be able to get it on such a low trajetery and high speed of mach 2.4 if it is sublaunched but the guns have a real good chance. Air launched we have a better than even shot of taking it out. let me put it this way, to launch it undetected they have to launch more than 250 miles away, the range of the weapon is 160 to 180 miles. in a sneak attack they have a good shot but once the systems are fully on line thier chances of success diminish quickly. The exerocet used to be the big bad anti-ship missile, not any more. Oh, and just for the record we stopped building carriers of one class the next class of carriers is already in the works and has been since the 80's. The ones we have now are rated for the next 50 years so there is no hurry for the next class of carrier. I think you give Iran too much credit. Out of the 25 ships in a carrier group against the 25 ships in the Iranian navy. We have more groups.

With the current administration I know Russia will not side with us. They want to be on the winning side and this administration is not interested in winning.

Then you missed the mark if that is your point. We have no defenses in the middle east. The few small bases we have out there are not designed for doing anyting other than play with terrorists. Think of Germany during the cold war, we had a million troops sitting in Europe. The missile interception data you have is from the 80 with the SDI program. You have not seen the new data because it has never been released. Don't you ever wonder why all the information that is out there on our technical abilities dates back to the 70's. Nothing after that has been released because we made some advances that make the 70's stuff worthless. All you see is rehashed junk nothing that is good has been released to the public, even the B-2 stuff is prior to 70's technology. The flying wing or the YB-47 was cancelled in the 40's and no one talked about it. All of a suddedn we had the Sealth fighter that can't fight but is a great small bomber and the B-2 those were the Have-blue projects of the 60's. The idea is to stay at least three full generations ahead of what is released for public knowledge. The amazing things you can do with your cell phone is 70's technology. Notice how all the innovations that have come out have not bombed. Where are the Edsles, and the like? By the time a product hits the market is is obsolete. LCD monitors have been around for decades but are just coming out now? What makes you think that the weapons of Russia are a problem to us? The second latest generation of weapons systems that Russia had were used in desert storm. They lasted 30 minutes against our 1970's equipment. The M-1 tank is still 70's stuff. No other country can come close so that is all we use. Like when an aircraft breaks the speed record. every time they do we pull the SR-71 out fuel it and break the record then put it back in the museum that was 1960's tech. If we are deploying it it is because we need it to upgrade the systems to take the next three generations. I worked with a guy and his wife a few years ago he designed a missile that you can launch 1000 miles away from the target. it will go through a specific window in the building without any additional help once launched. One more point, the laptop and desk top computers were designed by the US Marine Corps in 1964 contracted to IBM to build. IBM stopped making desk top computers because?

Nirro, thanks I have a good idea what you do so I will say this. I rode on a habu from Kadena to Andrews in the 80's , I have been inside the B-2 and sat in the cockpit of an f-117. I also used to work for Lockheed Martin, you know how smelly that can be,         just before I moved to DHS.

That old thing.

The US could not allow an allied country to undergo a revolution.

The west has been propping up the "Palestinian" government for decades. Why is it a problem that the US used to prop up friendly governments?

Bravo. The U.S has been able to take out satellites with missiles launched from F-15's since the 80's. Shooting down a reconassaince satellite is hardly proof that U.S ABM technology is "the best in the world"

And, there you go with your assumptions that I'm automatically against all things expensive. A program like the ARPAnet vs today's missile shield is like comparing apples and oranges.

Some programs are practical, have long-reaching consequences and yield fruit. Other programs are collosal wastes of time and money and yield little else.

For example, let's look at ground-attack aircraft for close support. The current premier ground attack aircraft in use by U.S Forces is the A-10.

Now, the A-10 is truly an amazing piece of work. It can deliver massive amounts of ordnance accurately on target in support of ground forces, it can take a hell of a beating and can be easily maintaned and repaired in a field tent in the middle of the boonies.

It's also from the 1970's, and from the time of the program's inception to the time that planes were rolling of the assembly line was only a few short years -AND- the per unit cost is relatively cheap compared to other aircraft.

The A-10, in terms of what it can do is amazing, but it has an interesting backstory. And that is, that the fellow responsible for pushing it, a Colonel Avery Kay, had to fight not just the defence contractors but also his superiors at the Pentagon. As a former combat veteran and fighter pilot, Kay knew exactly what the plane DID need and what it didn't need, politics be damned. Because he stuck to his guns and chose to get actually get something done vs. making the popular choice with his bosses and defence contractors.

The result was a weapons program that was cheap, practical, and bang on for what was needed in the field.

And in all that time, the A-10 has yet to be replaced.

Now the A-10 was a success but what happens to a weapons program that has too many defence contractors with their fingers in the pie, wanting to milk it for as much as they can get?

Well, you get things like the F-35, the F-22, the Comanche and the B-2

The Comanche program was cancelled. The F-22 is as good as cancelled as they're not going to make anymore, the B-2 they only ever made 21 of the things because they're so god-damned expensive, and the F-35 is being hyped us the ultimate fighter of the future yet former defence officials including folks that were involved with the F-16 and F-18 programs are calling the F-35 an abysmal failure that's going to see massive cost overruns and will be massivley overweight, underpowered, and ridiculously complicated thus ensuring ridiculous amounts of maintenance.

As to the maintenance issues with the B2:

"from 1993-2000, America’s B-2 fleet has historically had availability rates below 50% for a number of reasons. In practice, what this meant was that even with moderate usage, an average of only 6-10 stealth bombers were actually available for missions at any given time. "

http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/usas-b2-bombers-leading-the-way-in-contracting-for-availability-02950/

And in regards to the special hangars, this is a quote from a report of your own General Accounting Office:

"The Air Force has concluded it could not effectively deploy B-2s to
forward operating locations without sheltering the aircraft to
preserve and maintain its low-observable features.  Accordingly, if
permanent or temporary shelters must be developed and built at
selected forward operation locations or additional support equipment
must be acquired to meet deployment and maintenance requirements,
additional costs will be incurred. "

and

"While the B-2's performance met
requirements for initial operations, the aircraft are unable to meet
intended deployment requirements because some low-observable features
require substantial maintenance and the aircraft are more sensitive
to climate and moisture than expected. "

http://www.fas.org/man/gao/nsiad97181.htm

Again, the low-observable features are all the cool stuff that keep the plane radar invisible, which really isn't a priority at the airshows you were talking about Nitro. And, by the way, isn't it kinda sad that at a price tag of 1.5 billion per, these puppies best use right now IS an airshow?

SO I guess you missed all the missile tests that were ground launched that were a success. I honestly think that 45 hits and three misses is not bad.

As for the best in the world. It could miss every shot and still be the best in the world since we are the only ones with one. That makes it the best and the worst in the world.

You left out that it came in on time and under budget. You also left out that the A-10 was cancled twice and brougt back. The airforce is fighter orented so if it does not drop nukes or shoot down planes they really don't want it. The Marines want it but they won't give it to them.

The last project I worked on before I left Locheed was the F-35 It is a good plane that is being asked a lot of. It goes back to the 60's when they tried to save money and have a one plane fits all. they came up with the F-4 Phantom. A good plane but it still could not do what was needed. The F-35 can do a lot of cool things but it is not the panica they are saying it is. Like the B-2 it is almost radar nutral, it can cruise at supersonic speeds without afterburners so it can save fuel. Carries a smal payload but what it can carry will make most pilots either wet thier pants or cream their jeans. it all depends on which side of the trigger you're on.

That really cool thing you dismiss about the B-2 is the thing that makes countries tremble. You can't see it coming. You only know it was around when your buildings start to explode. There were 25 of them 4 crashed. All of them inside the US so all the parts were  recovered. they went so far as to use vacume cleaners to make sure they left nothing behind. The ability to go where you want and no one can stop you is worth the money. Three wars with no combat losses means they have already paid for themselves. In WWII we had a good day when we only lost 8% of the bombers per bomb run. The rule back then was if you completed 25 missions you got to go home. Less than 5% of the air crews were able to survive long enough to go home. How many planes and people were lost compared to the 21 B-2 planes we have and the hundreds of missions they have flown. Those 21 planes have replaced the hundreds of planes we would have used with heavy losses and replacement aircraft. So at 1.5 billion each they are cheap, in addition each plane does as much damage as a squadron of B-17's. with fewer civilian deaths. So yes the cost is high and the mantenance is high, but we have not had to replace one due to combat losses, we need fewer to attack because of the smart bombs they use and because of the smart bombs you need fewer bombs to take out a target.  

While we are on the topic of bang for the buck, try the SR-71 Blackbird. Under budget, from drawing board to production was 18 months, The fastest plane in creation. It can out run bullets, and missiles.