The Air Force’s B-1B Lancer Is Still Flying, But Not For Much Longer

FILE PHOTO: A B-1B aircraft passes over the ocean while on a flight out of Anderson Air Force Base, Guam, during Exercise Giant Warrior ”89. (Photo by USAF)

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Earlier this month, the United States Air Force deployed a Rockwell B-1B Lancer from Dyess Air Force Base, Texas, to Ørland Air Base, Norway, as part of the most recent Bomber Task Force Europe mission this year. It came just over two months since the Cold War-era bomber marked the 40th anniversary of its arrival at Dyess. In total, 100 of the long-range strategic aircraft were built, with 45 now in active service.

The B-1Bs continue to serve in a bomber role with the Air Force.

Lancers operating from Dyess took part in the first CONUS-to-CONUS combat mission just last year, when an undisclosed number of bombers assigned to the 28th Bomb Wing departed from the air base on February 1, 2024, and flew to the Middle East, struck ISIS targets in Iraq and Syria, and returned without landing 34 hours later. Given such capabilities, it may be hard to imagine that the B-1B’s days are numbered.

Yet, the old B-ONE will begin to be retired in the coming years as the Northrop Grumman B-21 Raider enters service. What is notable is that the fleet of Lancers is actually newer than the Air Force’s Boeing B-52 Stratofortress. That bomber entered service nearly three decades before the B-1B, with the B-52s now flying having been built in the early 1960s. The B-52s will keep flying in the 2040s and perhaps even the 2050s, while the B-1Bs will be headed to the literal “Boneyard.”

This isn’t exactly surprising, however.

“The B-52 can execute long-range missions in a cost-effective manner compared to counterparts such as the B-1B. The B-1B, being supersonic with variable-sweep wings, presents more complex and costly maintenance challenges,” explained Sourabh Banik, project manager for aerospace and defense at international analytics firm GlobalData.

“Therefore, if the U.S. needs to undertake a bombing mission against an enemy country lacking a credible air defense system, it is sensible to deploy the cost-efficient B-52 rather than the supersonic B-1B,” said Banik. “With regular maintenance, repair, and overhauls, many, if not all, aircraft in the current B-52 fleet could potentially reach the 100-year mark by 2050.”

The B-ONE: A Controversial Bomber

The bigger part of the B-1B story is that it almost did happen. The program was initiated in the 1960s, and its development can only be described as one of the longest in aviation history. It was one with significant controversy to go with it.

“The B-1B has been a political hot potato since President Ronald Reagan brought it back as the B-1B after President Jimmy Carter cancelled the B-1A,” said Lt. Col. Wayne Shaw, USAF (Retired), principal consultant for aerospace and defense at business consulting firm Frost and Sullivan.

Shaw added that the Lancer had no shortage of enemies in Congress who did their best to kill the airplane by underfunding its sustainment once it finally entered service in the 1980s.

“We had no spares and often our maintainers had to resort to cannibalizing one airplane to get another airborne,” said Shaw, who flew the same number of flight hours per year in the B-1B as he had in the B-52.

That required twice as much planning to get those hours.

“In other words, just about every other flight ended up being cancelled not for any other reason than the plane was broken and there were no spare parts,” Shaw continued. “I recall one sortie where me and my crew got all the way on the aircrew bus out to the airplane to discover it had no engines installed!”

Combat History Began Less Than Three Decades Ago

Even as the B-1B entered service in the 1980s, it wasn’t until December 1998’s Operation Desert Fox that the B-1B finally made its debut as a conventional bomber. The operation targeted Iraqi military infrastructure following the Middle Eastern state’s non-compliance with UN resolutions and interference with UNSCOM inspectors.

It was also akin to throwing a bone to the B-ONE, which had sat on the sidelines.

“When I was a B-1B aircrew member, we flew to and in a lot of airshows trying to ‘get the word out’ to taxpaying attendees at those airshows what their taxpayer dollars had paid for,” said Shaw.

He explained that after the Gulf War, he was routinely asked, “Did this airplane fly in Desert Storm?”

The answer, of course, was no. It hadn’t seen any combat operations, but that changed after Operation Desert Fox.

“Now, the B-1B is fully combat-proven and has flown in a number of conflicts,” said Shaw. “Unfortunately, the units are probably way too busy to do the airshow circuit like we did back in the early 1990s.”

But with its retirement loom, who knows, the B-1B might just have some spare time!