wb9omc@ea.ecn.purdue.edu (Duane P Mantick) (02/13/90)
From: wb9omc@ea.ecn.purdue.edu (Duane P Mantick) >>From: christ@sci.ccny.cuny.edu (Chris Thompson) >I see in Saturday's paper that the Air Force has decided to ground the SR-71 >fleet. The rationale is that it costs too much ($200-$300 million/year for >the fleet) and that the KH-12 satellites being sent up now will replace the >planes admirably. Any thoughts? I have a thought - shoot the SOB that made that decision! :-) Seriously, a little in-depth reading on the SR71 *does* show it to be a pretty hideously expensive item to maintain. However, a little blackbird once whispered in my ear that the SR71 would be replaced with another aircraft, NOT with KH12 photos. I can't confirm or deny what the little blackbird in my ear told me (nor would I even think about trying to post such information - national security and all). Logically, there are always going to be occasions when it will be far simpler to overfly with aircraft than with a satellite - and given the current sorry state of affairs of the military/civilian launch vehicle programs, having enough KH-anythings on station to do the job seems to be a hit-and-miss proposition. Taking this and other factors into consideration, it would be even more stupid than the average (apparent) pentagon decision to take the SR's out of service without already having a replacement in the air (and even if I did know anything about it, I couldn't tell you at the risk of being arrested). On the other hand, I have heard from multiple news sources that before the USS Iowa goes into mothballs, the pentagon wants the gun turret repaired - at a cost of several million dollars! Doesn't make too much sense *unless* they knew that it would get un-mothballed and wanted to lock in the repair cost in today's dollars; still seems like quite an expensive gamble. [mod.note: Well, they're two for two so far! Given the relatively short times-in-service during this last outing, I'm inclined to think that the whole reactivation was merely a scheme for ensuring the ships would receive their every-fifteen-years overhauls. Perhaps we'll see them again around 2010... - Bill ] IMHO, the so-called "peace dividend" is coming ONLY from areas where the threat was of massive nuclear hit, NOT a conventional activity. The Iowas would have been 98% totally useless if the Warsaw Pact had overrun Europe. The best employment of the Iowas these days is most likely to be shore bombardments during some sort of action a 'la Panama or anywhere else near a coastline (within 25 miles or so). Given recent history, that includes an *awful* lot of possibilities. I really don't think that retiring 1/2 of such an efficient weapons platform makes too much sense. In a sense, that DOES tie in with the SR's retirement - as the pressure from Congress to cut costs mounts, we'll get to see whose pet weapons systems escape the budget ax and which ones don't..... Duane