Bomber Money Down, Missile Money Up In Budget Request
Aerospace Daily & Defense Report
Bill Sweetman
Tue, 2016-02-09 16:53
THE PENTAGON – Lower budgets for the Long-Range Strike Bomber (LRS-B) and a big boost for a replacement intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) are two surprises in the fiscal 2017 budget.
Through fiscal 2020, the new budget takes $3.5 billion out of the LRS-B, and even with 2021 money – bringing total spending across the 2017-21 Future Years Defense Program (FYDP) to $12.1 billion – the total is just below what was previously planned by 2020. However, the Air Force – in an immediate response to publication of the numbers – insists that the classified program’s schedule has not slipped, but that the service has adopted a new independent cost estimate.
This reflects the fact that both competitors bid well below the Pentagon’s original independent cost estimates for the program – a situation that led to the Lockheed Martin/Boeing protest of the award to Northrop Grumman, on which the Government Accountability Office is expected to rule imminently.
At the same time, the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD) replacement for the Minuteman ICBM gets a more-than-doubled budget, starting in 2018. For 2018-20, the fiscal 2017 budget funds GBSD at $1.65 billion, versus $750 million in last year’s proposal, and another $1.58 billion in 2021. The 2018-20 money mostly covers the Technology Maturation and Risk Reduction (TMRR) phase, which is clearly being enlarged and is due to start this summer, while the fiscal 2021 funding covers the first full year 0f engineering and manufacturing development, planned to begin in the third quarter of fiscal 2020.
TMRR contracts for the Long-Range Standoff Weapon (LRSO), the replacement for the AGM-86 Air-Launched Cruise Missile, are expected to be let in the third quarter of fiscal 2017 (early next calendar year) a nine-month slippage compared to plans a year ago. However, funding levels have not changed significantly and the TMRR program is budgeted at $2.19 billion through the FYDP.
[URL unfurl="true"]https://aviationweek.com/print/defense/bomber-money-down-missile-money-budget-request[/URL]