Latest news with #JasonArmagost
Business Insider
30-06-2025
- General
- Business Insider
America's oldest bombers have officially been flying for the Air Force for 70 years
This past weekend marked another decade in service for America's oldest bomber. The B-52 Stratofortress,affectionately nicknamed the "Big Ugly Fat Fellow," has been flying for the US Air Force for 70 years. The air service has been upgrading the strategic bomber for years, allowing it to continue to play a key role in the Air Force's long-range strike capability. Far from a relic, the plane can serve as a conventional missile truck and a nuclear deterrent. Over the weekend, Air Force Global Strike Command Public Affairs celebrated the 70th anniversary of the delivery of the first operational B-52, which was originally delivered on June 29, 1955, to the 93rd Bomb Wing at Castle Air Force Base in California. "For seven decades, the B-52 has stood as a symbol of American airpower," the command said in a press release. "With its unmistakable silhouette and dual-capable nature, the Stratofortress continues to serve as a visible and credible strategic deterrent for the United States and its allies." There are 72 B-52 bombers active with the Air Force, with some in conventional roles and others still able to serve in a nuclear capacity. Others that are no longer in active service remain in long-term storage at the Air Force's "boneyard" in Arizona. Since the 1950s, the B-52 made by Boeing Military Airplane Co. has undergone numerous upgrades that have preserved the lumbering aircraft as a formidable bomber for the Air Force. The B-52 remains a reliable platform for long-range strategic bomber missions even though it lacks the speed of the B-1 Lancers and the stealth of the B-2 Spirits, which were used to drop bombs on three of Iran's nuclear facilities earlier this month. The bomber boasts a lighter maintenance lift, lower operational costs, and a heavy payload. The B-52 can carry an estimated 70,000 tons of mixed ordnance, from stand-off cruise missiles to weapons like naval mines. Emerging hypersonic weapons have also been tested on the bombers. Though built during the Cold War to function as a high-altitude strategic bomber, it can serve a range of missions. The B-52's airframe and durable design have kept the planes in good condition over the decades. And upgrades to their weapons capacities, communications and radars, hardware, and software have kept the planes modern, as well as capable of receiving future updates. "Since its creation, the B-52 has anchored strategic deterrence for the nation," said Maj. Gen. Jason Armagost, Eighth Air Force and Joint Global Strike Operations Center commander, per the release. He added that the Air Force is looking "to the next model to serve as the physical embodiment of the idea of peace through strength and carry us into the 2050s." Plans for the next version of the B-52, the J-model, include engine and radar upgrades, as well as a new long-range stand-off missile that will replace the plane's aging air-launched cruise missiles. But these planned updates have faced challenges. A US Government Accountability Office report said last year that the engine replacement program, which seeks to substitute the B-52's older engines with new military-configured commercial ones, was delayed "in part due to funding shortfalls to complete the detailed design." The operational capability date for these engines was delayed to three years after initially planned. The Air Force originally announced plans to update these engines back in 2021 for improved fuel usage and easier maintenance. The cost, too, jumped from $8 billion to about $9 billion. Costs to replace the radars of the B-52s to provide greater range and resistance to electronic warfare countermeasures also saw an increase, per the GAO. The upgrades are critical for the Air Force to follow its plan of keeping B-52s active into the 2050s, a plan that would see the plane fly for a century. Last year, the B-52 bomber successfully conducted a first-of-its-kind test of the All-Up-Round AGM-183A Air-launched Rapid Response Weapon, a hypersonic missile, in the Western Pacific. The missile is a multi-stage, boost-glided weapon with a hypersonic glide body that can maneuver at high speeds. Such weapons are difficult to intercept, and the US military and its rivals have heavily prioritized the development of hypersonic weapons in recent years. While the missile received mixed results throughout testing, leaving its future in the Air Force's arsenal unclear, it marked an interesting moment for the B-52, which continues to be important for long-range strategic missions.
Korea Herald
20-02-2025
- Politics
- Korea Herald
US can respond in 'overwhelming' way in case of NK ICBM attack: official
A senior US military official warned Wednesday that America can respond in an "overwhelming" way in the "time, place and manner of our choosing" in the event of a North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile attack as he underscored the strength of the United States' nuclear deterrence system. Maj. Gen. Jason Armagost, the commander of the Eighth Air Force and of the Joint-Global Strike Operations Center, made the remarks, responding to a question regarding what would happen to America's nuclear umbrella for South Korea when North Korea successfully acquires bombs capable of striking the continental US. "It is problematic for them (North Korea) to have an ICBM ... With current and imaginable capabilities, it is extremely difficult to attack that system of systems," Armagost said during a forum hosted by The Korea Society, a non-profit organization based in New York. "What that system allows us to do is to say that use of an ICBM would not result in the benefit that you are seeking because we can respond in a way that is overwhelming in the time and place and manner of our choosing," he added. Armagost was referring to the US' nuclear triad system consisting of ICBMs, strategic bombers and submarine-launched ballistic missiles -- three key nuclear delivery vehicles. "It's why we have a triad: ICBMs on alert, SLBMs for an assured second strike capability and bombers to be a forward and, or visible presence with regards to that ... what the triad does for a spectrum of capability for strategic deterrence," he said. A second strike capability refers to a nuclear retaliatory strike capability that remains alive even after a country sustains a first nuclear strike from an enemy. An SLBM is the centerpiece of that capability. The official underscored the importance of maintaining a "resilient" triad system. "The numbers of ICBMs matter greatly. The numbers of on-alert submarine-launched capabilities matter greatly. And the numbers of bombers matter," he said. "Because unless you have a resilient system, the triad becomes a tricky thing." Pyongyang's push to have credible ICBM missile capabilities have raised concerns that the US might dither on coming to the aid of its treaty ally, South Korea, as it could fear that continental American cities would become a target of a North Korean ICBM attack. To dispel such concerns, Seoul and Washington have been working to strengthen the credibility of America's "extended deterrence" commitment to South Korea in recent years through a set of measures, including the Nuclear Consultative Group, the allies' key nuclear deterrence body. To further deepen deterrence cooperation, the allies have been pushing for a "conventional-nuclear integration" initiative under which South Korea mobilizes its conventional military assets to back America's nuclear operations in a crisis scenario. Whether such training cooperation would continue to develop remains to be seen as during his first term, President Donald Trump described military exercises between the two allies as "expensive." In a separate press event later in the day, Armagost described allied efforts to work together in an integrated manner as a "powerful" thing, while refusing to comment specifically on examples of CNI operations between Seoul and Washington. "When I talk about habitual training and planning and exercise relationships, what we see is the ability to seamlessly integrate those operations across the spectrum of conflict all the way from competition activities through crisis and conflict," he said during the event hosted by the Foreign Press Center in New York. "That relationship of working together, planning together and operating militarily together is an extremely powerful thing to practice and to conduct. So that translates all the way from conventional operations to nuclear operations." (Yonhap)
