Responding to questioning by House Armed Services Committee Chairman Duncan Hunter, the Air Force Chief of Staff, Gen. Michael Moseley, acknowledged that a new long-range strike platform is “a long time” away. Hunter believes the Air Force move to retire 38 B-52s comes down to money not a desire to eliminate non-performers. His concern, said Hunter, is that “the strength of [the Air Force’s] argument is also the weakness of [its] argument” because the service plans to eliminate its attrition reserve based on the rationale that the B-52s are becoming more vulnerable. Hunter maintains, “We may be at the point where we simply have to get more money if we’re going to modernize.”
Pentagon Deploys F-22s as Trump Weighs Strikes on Iran
June 18, 2025
U.S. Air Force F-22 Raptors landed at RAF Lakenheath in England June 18 as President Donald Trump weighs whether to join Israel's attacks on Iran.