U.S. Air Force, Lawmakers Discuss Return of Retired B-1s

The U.S. Air Force is negotiating with Congress over how many strategic B-1 bombers should be brought out of retirement, a general said last week. In the past few years, the Air Force has retired 32 B-1 bombers, but Congress last year ordered the reactivation of 23 (see GSN, Feb. 6).

General Hal Hornburg, head of the Air Force’s Combat Command, said it would cost the unaffordable sum of $2 billion to reactivate all 23 of the aircraft Congress wants returned to service. Hornburg said seven or eight of the retired aircraft probably could be reactivated for an affordable amount of money (Aerospace Daily, Feb. 17).

The long-range bombers were originally intended to carry strategic nuclear weapons, but have been converted for conventional missions (Marc Selinger, Aerospace Daily, Feb. 17).

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