Summary and Key Points: During the Bayou Warrior Exercise, the U.S. Air Force's 2nd Bomb Wing tested its long-range strike capabilities with B-52H bombers at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana.
-The B-52s loaded live AGM-158 Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles (JASSMs), simulating real-world combat scenarios to enhance readiness.
-Despite its 70-year history, the B-52 remains crucial to the Air Force’s strategy, with upgrades ensuring its viability into the mid-21st century.
-This exercise, involving rarely used and expensive JASSMs, underscores the B-52's capability to carry a vast array of nuclear and conventional weapons, preparing crews for potential high--stakes conflicts.
As part of the service’s Bayou Warrior Exercise earlier this month, the U.S. Air Force’s 2nd Bomb Wing tested its long-range strike capabilities with its fleet of B-52H bombers.
The B-52s loaded live AGM-158 Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles (JASSMs) during the readiness exercise at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana. Although the exact details of the simulated combat scenario remain classified, the 2nd Operations Support Squadron commander said the drills were designed to mirror a potential real-world situation:
“Here’s the U.S. response. This is how you got to this situation in this scenario. You are now being asked by a combatant command to generate so many aircraft, so many weapons, in so much time. So that sets the tone. That sets that real-world scenario for our crews, that, no kidding, you have a period of time you have to get these jets ready, loaded, and airborne.”
Don’t be fooled by the B-52’s seventy-plus years in service. This old bomber is key to the Air Force’s aerial strategy. Upgrades will make the platform fit to continue serving well into the mid-21st century.
This bomber was conceptualized at the end of the Second World War, when the Air Material Command issued performance attributes for a new platform that would not need to rely on advanced and intermediate bases controlled by other nations.
The Stratofortress was designed to be jet-powered – unlike its predecessors, which were all propeller-driven. The strategic bomber can fly at high subsonic speeds at altitudes up to 50,000 feet.
While the bomber can carry a wide range of nuclear and conventional weapons – gravity bombs, cluster bombs, and Joint Direct Attack Munitions among them – its primary role has always been as a conventional bomber. The upgraded B-52H variant is capable of launching the largest variety of weapons in the U.S. inventory. The bomber can carry more than 70,000 pounds of diverse ordnance, including AGM-86A air-launched cruise missiles, AGM-84 Harpoon missiles, and an assortment of others.
The use of live JASSMs in Bayou Warrior was significant, since the Air Force rarely uses these extremely pricey weapons in training exercises. Each JASSM reportedly costs more than $1 million. A weapons systems officer with the 20th Bomb Squadron who has participated in a live-fire JASSM test told Air & Space Forces Magazine that, “It’s not that common for us to actually fly around with JASSMs on the pylons. So, this is a big deal because there are some differences between the indications of simulation in the jet versus actually having the shapes on the jet. It’s good for aircrew to fly with this because it makes them more proficient in the sense that they have a better idea of what they’re going to see, so that way, we can be ready to go anytime.”
As tensions between Washington and Beijing continue to escalate, drills like Bayou Warrior provide pilots with the training necessary to ensure readiness.
Maya Carlin, National Security Writer with The National Interest, is an analyst with the Center for Security Policy and a former Anna Sobol Levy Fellow at IDC Herzliya in Israel. She has by-lines in many publications, including The National Interest, Jerusalem Post, and Times of Israel. You can follow her on Twitter: @MayaCarlin.
All images are Creative Commons or Shutterstock.
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