Cost-effective is the best description. It doesn't have to be a totality. For total operation costs (training/missions/acquisition/maintenance/capabilites), the B-52 is cheaper by orders of magnitude.

The B-2 does have its place and is better suited for certain jobs, albeit at too high a cost. The B-21 is purported to lower that. We'll see.

Edit: Looks like current B-2 operational/maintenance costs are now down to only about 2x that of the B-52, which is an impressive reduction (no sarcasm).

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markdown 10 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Why not just start making new B-52's again?

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jmalicki 10 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Is there a shortage of B-52 airframes?

They get upgraded regularly, the only reason to make more bombers is to try something different.

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rawgabbit 10 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

With eight engines mounted on external nacelles, it is the complete opposite of stealth. You need complete air superiority to use it without fear of being shot down.

	▲	somat 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		The eight engines is a side effect of of how large the aircraft is vs how big the engines of the day were. they are basically business jet engines by modern standards. During the recent engine replacement project using one full sized engine per boom instead of the twin small engine nacelle was seriously considered. So 4 engines instead of 8. I suspect the reason the twin nacelle was kept was that going to 4 engines required more engineering rework than they were happy with. It certainly would have improved the b-52's range and fuel efficiency. Either way probably a net zero on the stealth consideration. Fun fact: with the re-engine project the b-52 now has the same engines as the A-10.

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486sx33 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

[dead]

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giantg2 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

You're still only talking about the cost side. You're not talking about the effect side. So they're 2x the cost, but how much did they save in reduced casualties?