Making the bomber nuclear capable will only raise the development price tag “a handful of percentage points,” according to retired Air Force colonel Mark Gunzinger, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense who is now a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments in Washington. “That seems like a pretty wise investment . . . considering that this aircraft could be around 30-40 years,” he said in a Jan. 18 telephone interview. “To build in that kind of mission flexibility makes great sense both from a strategic perspective as well as a fiscal perspective.”
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