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Editor's note: This story originally appeared in December

The B-1 bomber makes a comeback

By LISA HOFFMAN / Scripps Howard News Service

WASHINGTON -- There was a time when the B-1 bomber was the butt of Johnny Carson's jokes, an extraordinarily expensive aircraft bedeviled by so many problems that, in some quarters of the Pentagon, it became known derisively as the "B-1 Bummer."

Calling the $280-million plane a too-costly flop, Jimmy Carter killed it. Ronald Reagan resurrected it, deeming it vital as a long-range nuclear bomber in America's battle plans against the Evil Empire, even though it remained lamed by an array of glitches.

But the Cold War melted, taking the B-1's reason for being with it. Since then, revolutionary radar-evading technology turned the once state-of-the-art aircraft into a monumental white elephant.

Until now. More than 20 years and $20 billion after its drawing-board debut, the B-1 has been reconstituted and reborn. The Nov. 17 deployment of two B-1B Lancers to the Persian Gulf marks the first time the plane has flown on anything but a training mission. And, if the ongoing standoff with Iraq over U.N. deadly weapons inspections worsens, the now conventionally armed bomber could finally see combat.

Even if it doesn't, the warplane has found a new niche in the front lines of national security strategy. Now, said retired Air Force Gen. John Michael Loh, former commander of the Air Combat Command, "It is the backbone of our bomber fleet."

That transformation is a result of changing global realities coupled with new defense needs, including that of the Pentagon to justify the existence of 94 huge, high-maintenance bombers gathering dust while the military budget withered, defense analysts said.

"They've finally found a job for it," said Mike Vickers, director of strategic studies at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a defense think-tank in Washington.

Born during the Ford administration, the B1 was conceived as a cutting-edge strategic nuclear bomber designed to penetrate Soviet defenses. Capable of speeds over 900 miles per hour, ducking radar and flying across continents without refueling, the B1s were to replace the trusty but aging B-52 bomber for heavy-lifting missions of top importance.

But from the start, bugs beset the Rockwell International-built plane, driving development costs so high Carter canceled it in 1977, choosing instead to upgrade B-52s with cruise missiles. After a long and rancorous national debate, Reagan reversed that decision in 1981 and Congress ordered 100 of the sleek, swallow-winged planes to be built. The Air Force got its first B1 in June 1985. The troubles continued. At one time or another, the B1 was crippled by cracks in its landing gear, fuel tank leaks and faulty engines that fell out of the planes. A lack of a de-icing system left the aircraft unable to fly over snow or slush. Engine snafus kept it grounded during the 1991 Persian Gulf War.

After the Soviet Union crumbled, some in Congress tried again to mothball the B-1, calling it strategically obsolete and an unnecessary drain of $1 billion a year. Then the development of radar-evading "stealth" technology rendered the B-1 even more old-fashioned, as the revolutionary B-2 stealth bomber essentially usurped its nuclear role.

Faced with a bulging inventory of the expensive Lancers, President Bush decided to turn them into conventional combat bombers. To do so will eventually require nearly $3 billion more; so far, more than $1 billion has been spent to equip the B-1 with five new types of non-nuclear weapons. All 94 existing Lancers are expected to be refitted and ready to join the flying armada around 2001.

When they are, they will have traded their original payload of 28, 500-pound nuclear bombs for the capacity to carry, among other armament, up to 84 Mark 82 conventional 500-pound bombs.

But it is the pairing of an armor-piercing cluster bomb with the B-1B that has vaulted it to the forefront of America's new battle plans.

The bombs -- called CBU-97s -- are 1,000-pound "smart" devices that, once dropped, open up to release cylinders held aloft by parachutes. Inside the cylinders are anti-tank rockets which automatically target heat sources. Each B-1B can carry 40 of the cluster bombs, which contain 10 cylinders and 40 anti-tank rockets each.

That kind of firepower could stop a column of enemy tanks in its tracks, at least for awhile -- a critical capability for the downsized American military, which in the future may not be able to fight two large-scale conflicts simultaneously. By doing so, the B-1Bs could effectively buy time for the arrival of U.S. ground troops.

"If you want to kill armor, I can't think of a better way to do it than with a B-1B," said Air Force Gen. Dick Hawley, commander of the Air Combat Command.

So far, reports give the Lancer passing marks for its performance in its new incarnation, although critics say it still is too costly to support, operate and maintain. Some in the Air Force also complain that the B-1B is overly vulnerable to enemy attack because it possesses no self-defense and requires fighters to accompany it for protection.

Still, analysts such as Vickers say the B-1B carries an important advantage - the ability to carry a large payload of bombs.

"The bomber is actually living up to its limited billing," he said.

(Lisa Hoffman covers the military for Scripps Howard News Service.)