B-2 was released into production in 1988. It was built, designed, and
managed at Pico Rivera in what was logically named the "B-2 Division".


Very minor point. The B-2 was managed at Pico but manufactured at Palmdale in
the high desert save for some component parts. Eventually the entire B-2
program moved to USAF Plant 42 at Palmdale.




The ATF/YF-23 program was run from the Aircraft Division in Hawthorne.
Two distinctly different places. ATF fly-off decision came in 1990, so
it doesn't track that several thousand people at Pico Rivera would
have been caught drunk several years before program decision on a
different aircraft built at a different plant by a different division
of the company.

I am sounding like a "Me too" here but the B-2 program had a lot of issues
dealing with both the El Segundo and Hawthorne operations. They almost
operated like several different companies in total competition with one
another.



We might also note that the B-2 co-production company
was the F-22 partner of Lockheed.

Help me here. Boeing was a majo rmanufacturing partner of the B-2. I don't
remember muchif any involvement from Lockheed in the B-2 program even though
they were across the runway from Northrop at Palmdale.


You've mentioned program management, cockpit displays and language for
software. I don't think any of those could be called "politically
sensitive" issues. The major political sensitivity would be production
location and at the time of contract award, which was pre-merger for
both contenders, the apparent production would take place in the LA
area.


Full use of Ada was a source selection criteria at one time.

Final selection when the findings of the source selection board reach the
decison makers often gets influenced by political imperative and past
peformance.

Cost overruns by Northrop on B-2 as well as some scandal on parts
ordering on missile guidance systems for the Electronics Division
certainly muddied the political waters and may have cost Northrop some
points.




Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (USAF-Ret)
"When Thunder Rolled"
Smithsonian Institution Press
ISBN #1-58834-103-8



Steve