Rob Arndt wrote:
Ken S. Tucker wrote:
Rob Arndt wrote:
Well the XB-70 was a class above the B58,
but the Ruskies may have had something
better.

Ken

What a/c are you referring to? The Tu-128 Fiddler interceptor or the
Tu-22 Blinder bomber (both based on the failed Tu-98 Backfin)?

Tysbin had its own design based on the NM-1- the RSR:

http://vif2ne.ru/nvi/stuff/Bask/mode...ybin_rsr_2.jpg

Rob

Thanks...
IIRC the Ruskies built something similiar to
the XB70 though smaller, I'm sorry I couldn't
find an online ref. and it was obviously not
deployed, it may be rumor. I'll reiterate,
"may have had something better".
Regards
Ken


Ken,

That was the Su-100, a.k.a. "T-4":
http://www.pilotfriend.com/photo_albums/potty/19.htm

Hmmm, T-4 bears some superficial resemblance, though it apparenly lacks
the VG wing-tips and double fin, is smaller and never demonstrated
quite as high a speed. I've never heard "compression left" directly
associated with the T-4, so if anybody has, I'd love to hear it. And
don't ge me started about that nose-droop thing. The B-70 used some
kind of motorized wing-screen which always seemed more preferable to
the big pivoting nose on T-4 which seemed more aesthetically and
functionally appealing. Does anybody know what T-4's operating
altitude was? Or its mission? I heard that T-4 was designed to strike
at enemy warships in waters along the Russian frontier, as opposed to
the B-70's strategic strike mission. From the stories floating around
the net, it appears that the T-4 was less a Soviet weapon to be used
against the West than one to be used by Sukhoi against Tupolev, hinting
that Russian aerospace was probably inundated with all sorts of
warplanes and making it inevitable that one looking somewhat like one
of our own would emerge.

In response, the US would have used the XF-108 Rapier as a B-70 escort:

....which is confirmed by everybody else, including WPAFB website, but
I've always been skeptical of that given what I've read in Anderson's
"To Fly and Fight". While describing his work on the parasite fighter
program, he remarks on SAC's traditional aversion to escorts - noting
that bomber pros claim that they can go it alone and then pay the price
when that proves optimistic. (Anderson gave the Korean experience for
B-29's as an example.) Seems to me that the USAF requested the B-70 to
have high-speed/-alt performance in order to obviate the need for an
escort. So why the F-108?