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United States: Congressman Wants More B-2 Bombers The chairman of the House Armed Services Committee last week said the United States needs to invest in slimmed-down versions of the B-2 stealth bomber (see GSN, Jan. 2, 2002). Claiming the nation’s bomber force is too small, Representative Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) said the production of additional B-2s should be considered until a next-generation bomber is developed. One possibility, he said, was to create a “B-2 ‘Chevy’” — a bomber that would be cheaper to produce because it would not be outfitted for use in a nuclear war environment. The U.S. House of Representatives recently approved spending $314 million on the B-2 fleet next year in its version of the 2004 defense authorization bill, $85 million more than the Bush administration had requested (see GSN, May 23). Hunter also said the B-2 should be outfitted with precision-guided weapons. One project under way is the development of a small-diameter bomb that would be as effective as the larger, 1,000-pound bombs the B-2 now carries, the Daily News reported. Under that plan, the B-2 would go from carrying 16 1,000-pound bombs to carrying as many as 80 500-pound bombs, each capable of hitting separate targets (Jim Skeen, Los Angeles Daily News, June 2).
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