Kent Conrad: “our Nation's bomber fleet is a vital national asset. Bombers today offer global reach, operational responsiveness, and…”

“our Nation's bomber fleet is a vital national asset. Bombers today offer global reach, operational responsiveness, and close air support for troops on the ground in ways that their designers could never have imagined. While our bomber fleet is currently aging, there is virtually no chance that new long-range bombers will enter service before 2020. If we remove bombers from our active force and do not furnish them with critical upgrade programs, they will be irretrievably lost. This will create a ``bathtub'' in bomber capabilities that will last over a decade. Over the last 2 years, the administration has proposed dramatically downsizing our bomber force, particularly by cutting the B-52 force from 94 aircraft to 56. Neither the House nor the Senate found the administration's arguments for cutting the bomber fleet persuasive. They both concluded that making deep B-52 retirements would put at risk our military's ability to carry out the national security strategy. Let me quote from the House Armed Services Committee's report: Committee also understands that the current B-52 combat coded force structure is insufficient to meet combatant commander requirements for conventional long range strike, if the need should arise to conduct simultaneous operations in two major regional conflicts.…”