Sleek and sinister, the plane resembles a death machine out of Darth Vader's workshop. Swept back in a single delta-shaped wing, its curved surfaces feature no protruding stabilizers, almost no sharp corners or bends; its dark gray-and-black skin and skeleton consist of layers of graphite epoxies and ceramics honed to extremely fine tolerances. Virtually invisible to radar, it has been called the greatest achievement in military technology since the atom bomb. With the advent of the B-2 Stealth bomber, the U.S. could be on its way to maintaining military dominance well into the next century. Yet the B-2 is an enormously expensive aircraft with a dubious mission. It may pose more of a threat to the U.S. budget than to the Soviet Union.
The plane, which will not make its maiden flight until early next year, was rolled out to a specially composed Stealth Fanfare last week at the Air Force's Plant 42 in Palmdale, Calif. The coming-out party was both a public relations move and a pre-emptive strike against defense-budget cutters in Congress. Conservative estimates place the price tag on a single B-2 at $500 million. That figure could rise to $850 million by 1995. The Air Force wants to build 132 of the bombers for about $70 billion.
The Stealth is just one of an array of new and expensive weapons -- along with the Navy's $3 billion Seawolf submarine and the Army's $60 billion Forward Area Air Defense System -- that the Pentagon plans to purchase despite the urgent need for the incoming Bush Administration to bring down the $145 billion federal budget deficit. Defense specialist William Kaufmann of Harvard estimates that the military programs already in the acquisition pipeline could cost more than $900 billion -- three times the entire amount the Pentagon will spend this fiscal year. "The B-2 embodies the defense conundrum," says Gordon Adams, director of Washington's Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Defense Budget Project. "Controversial mission, extremely high costs -- all at a time of falling budgets."
George Bush promised during the campaign that he would fight to keep the defense budget 2% above the rise of inflation, but he is unlikely to get that much without a tax increase. Even with such an improbable hike, Bush's numbers would fall more than $140 billion short of what the military wants over the next five years. The President-elect has yet to spell out which military programs he will put on hold. Bush's likely pick for Defense Secretary, former Texas Senator John Tower, would only add to the controversy. An unabashed hawk with strong ties to military contractors, Tower came under fire last week from moderates who think the job should go to a disciplined financial manager. Tower wants to bring his own associates into the Pentagon, but Bush's aides are insisting that he accept an efficient administrator as his second-in- command. Bush's negotiators, said a source close to both Bush and Tower, want to be sure "they don't create another Cap Weinberger."