I’d like to go on official record that I am against giving a surface to air missile to anyone, from rebels, to allies, to the US Army.

“I say let it rain MANPADS in Syria”

but of course, that’s the B-1's daddy... we even have the exact same tape gauges as the XB-70 and the original shuttle

you really have no clue what you are talking about: “The B-1 needs a Reaper there...” I’ve never needed a Reaper to target anything. I’ve dropped over precisions 500 weapons in combat; you must be the other guy. By the way, my last sortie (over Ramadi, as it were), I was doing coordinated strikes with A-10s on vastly…

not sure why you think it is a really expensive plane, unless you are confusing it with the B-2. The B-1’s cost per flying hour, coupled with the loiter time, weapons payload, reduced tanker support to get it there, make it far cheaper to provide persistent overhead precision CAS than any other platform in a fight…

was on diego in 01 and end of 03- beginning of 04... my favorite deployment spot on the planet. I truly miss it.

Didn’t see this sooner....

B-1

Or it could have been the tanker guy Wing CC or Group CC onboard and giving it a try ;)

B-1s don't have ailerons, so...

ahh look, in a sea of amateurs, an actual professional posts. you are spot on of course, and what most people don't know is that those drogue hoses are good for maybe 15 sorties before the fail to retract or depart. I think in the Deid last year we were swapping out 5-6 a week!

actually its much harder when it is in front of you, not behind... its a function of the parallax... when he port is behind you fly formation off the big attitude indicator in the sky, aka the tanker in front of you, and the boomer does the rest. With the boom infant of you like in a B-1, young pilots tend to focus on…

Yes, it is. name another plane that carries 24 2,000 bombs.

I don’t know what’s better.. that you beat me to this joke, or that most didn’t even get it. Phonies.

60lbs... So the weight equivalent of 9lbs of gas... Oh my.

Spot on article yet again, Tyler. I'm in the keep the A-10 camp, even with alot out there overstating about its capabilities — But the Sandy mission is no joke. No one can do it better than the Hogs and I want them on the battlefield ready to do this if we ever need it.

With a full load of gas and weapons the B-1 can weigh over 400,000 lbs. There is tremendous thrust required to guarantee the proper lift at the air refueling speed and altitude.

Actually, my copilot did great here. We chose to disconnect and back out and cycle our system to see if it would fix the spray; it was purposeful.
Air refueling is definitely one of the harder "stick and rudder" skills. Most new pilots take a while before they master it, but usually only takes a month or two of a…

I miss Diego Garcia so badly. My favorite place the air force has ever sent me.

The B-1's wings move from 15 degrees all the way after to 67.5 degrees. We use 15 or 20 degree settings for takeoff and landing where the wings are forward and generating the most lift at slow speeds. Enroute to areas and in air refueling we use 25 degrees as this is balance between efficiency and performance — at…