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Clipped Wings: The Death of Jack Northrop’s Flying Wing Bombers

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LESSONS LEARNED

CLIPPED WINGS:THE DEATH OF JACK NORTHROP’S

FLYING WING BOMBERSDr. Bud Baker

One of the mysteries in defense acquisition has concerned the fate of theNorthrop Flying Wing bombers, canceled by the Air Force more than 50 yearsago. Aviation experts have long suspected that the 1949 cancellations weremotivated more by politics than by the Wings’ technical shortcomings. However,public records, declassified Air Force documents, and personal interviews —never before published — reveals that the cancellation of the Flying Wingswas a sound decision, based on budgetary, technical, and strategic realities;and the issues addressed here are as pertinent to defense acquisition todayas they were 50 years ago. Like today, decision makers struggled to balancecost, schedule, and technical performance. They also had to deal with shrinkingdefense budgets, a declining defense industrial base, and a world situation inwhich the only constant was change. Nearly all the interviewees for this research— including Secretary (and Senator) Symington, Generals LeMay, Norstad,and Quesada — are gone now, but their recollections here serve to makeclear what really happened to the predecessors of today’s B-2 bomber. Thelessons of the Flying Wings remain pertinent today.

of their own technical shortcomings? Orwere they pawns in a high-stakes politi-cal power play, as Jack Northrop con-tended? This article will answer thosequestions.

For decades, doubts and rumors aboutthe demise of the Flying Wings went un-resolved. A congressional investigation in1949 seemed to absolve the Air Force ofblame, and Mr. Northrop himself testifiedthen that he had received no political pres-sure from Air Force leadership concerning

M ore than 50 years ago, a seriesof remarkable aircraft took tothe skies of America. These

huge all-wing bombers were the productof the genius John Knudsen Northrop, andthey promised to revolutionize the avia-tion world. But just a few short years laterall of the giant bombers were gone, leav-ing only photos and videos to mark theirpassing. Ever since their demise, rumorsand accusations have swirled around theirmemory: Were the Northrop wings victims

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his Flying Wings. But all that changed in1979, when Mr. Northrop claimed that hehad in fact been improperly pressured bythe Secretary of the Air Force, and thathis resistance to that pressure was the truecause of the Wings’ cancellation.

The research for this paper made useof declassified government documentsand other historical records. Far moreimportant, though, were the author’slengthy interviews with most of the majorgovernment decision makers, includingformer Secretary of the Air Force (laterSenator) W. Stuart Symington, GeneralCurtis E. LeMay, General Lauris Norstad,and other retired Air Force leaders. Tworetired Air Force Flying Wing pilots,Brigadier General Robert Cardenas andColonel Russ Schleeh, contributed theirperspectives. Thomas Jones, longtimechairman of the Northrop Corporation,provided his opinions, based on hisknowledge of the parties involved.

The interviews contained in this articlewere done nearly 20 years ago as part ofthe author’s doctoral dissertation. Theseconversations have never before been pub-lished: Shortly after this research wascompleted, the author was assigned to the“black world” environment of what wasthen called the Advanced TechnologyBomber (ATB). The very fact that the ATB(today the B-2 Stealth Bomber) was itselfa successor to Jack Northrop’s FlyingWings was then a closely guarded secret,so public acknowledgment of any connec-tion between the ATB program andNorthrop’s Flying Wings remained off-limits through most of the 1980s.

The similarities between the FlyingWings of the 1940s and today’s B-2bomber go far deeper than attributes suchas shared dimensions, appearance, and

flight control configurations. Much of theprogrammatic difficulty described inthese pages was repeated, 40 years after-ward, with the B-2. The capacity limita-tions of the 1940s described here still lim-ited Northrop’s ability to produce largenumbers of bomber aircraft four decadeslater. This and other issues caused majordelays for both the Flying Wings and themodern B-2, so that both programs cameto fruition in geopolitical worlds vastlydifferent from those in which they wereconceived.

The events described in this paper tookplace more than 50 years ago, but theyresonate clearly in today’s acquisitionenvironment. Perennial issues of cost,schedule, and technical performance areof course as pertinent today as they werethen. But so too are other issues: preser-vation of the industrial base in a time ofsevere defense downsizing; programmaticturbulence caused by changes in defenseleadership; and the role of government inencouraging (or discouraging) businessconsolidation among defense contractors.

This story embodies those issues andmore: accusations and counteraccu-sations, congressional hearings and inves-tigations, and momentous decisions thatquite literally changed the shape ofAmerican aviation.

THE CHARGE

In October of 1979, reporter CleteRoberts of Public Broadcasting System(PBS) station KCET-TV conducted anextraordinary interview with Jack North-rop, founder and former president of whatwas then the Northrop Corporation. In thefilmed interview, it is clear that Mr.


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Northrop was not in good health: Hisappearance was frail, his eyes watery, andhis voice broken. But his mind appearedsharp, and his memory seemed crystalclear. Led by Clete Roberts, Mr. Northroptold his story, clearly and forcefully, forwhat, he said, was the first time:

The same day that GeneralMcNarney[,] who was the chief— the military chief — of the AirForces, came to my office withthat additional order for thirty-five airplanes, which he said wasa drop in the bucket as far as theultimate order was concerned,Mr. Millar and I were requestedto visit Mr. Symington. At thatmeeting, he…told us that he didnot want to sponsor any newaircraft companies entering thebusiness and having to be sup-plied with business over theyears, and that he wanted us with-out question to merge with Con-solidated Vultee, which was thenoperating a government-ownedplant in Fort Worth, building theB-36, as a competitor to the B-35 or B-49 [Northrop’s FlyingWing bombers].

After the lengthy diatribe on Mr.Symington’s part, I said, “Mr.Secretary, what are the alterna-tives to this demand you’re mak-ing of our merger with Consoli-dated Vultee?” He said, “Alterna-tives? You’ll be goddamned sorryif you don’t!”

General McNarney said, “Oh,Mr. Secretary, you don’t mean

that the way it sounds,” and Mr.Symington said, “You’re damnedright I do!”

Well, this was a rather stagger-ing termination of the meeting.(KCET-TV, 1980)

Interviewed for the same broadcast,Richard W. Millar, who in 1948 was theNorthrop chairman of the board, corrobo-rated Mr. Northrop’s story.

We were in effect directed tonegotiate or work out a mergerwith Northrop and Convair. JackNorthrop asked the question,“What if we don’t merge?” andMr. Symington was quick to replythat we’d “be damned sorry if wedidn’t.” We were told to get to-gether with Mr. Odlum to workout a basis for the merger. I mightsay parenthetically that when Mr.Symington said in effect that wemust do it, and we’d be sorry if wedidn’t, General McNarney spokeup and he said, as I recall, “Mr.Symington, you don’t mean that,do you?” and Mr. Symington saidin effect that, “Yes, you’re damnedright I do.” (KCET-TV, 1980)

The proposed merger never cameabout. According to Mr. Northrop and Mr.Millar, they visited Floyd Odlum, thenpresident of Convair’s parent company,but could reach no agreement on terms ofa merger. According to Mr. Northrop, itwas shortly after the merger talks brokeoff that he received a telephone call fromSecretary of the Air Force W. StuartSymington:


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I got a telephone call a few dayslater from Mr. Symington. Hesaid, “I am canceling all your Fly-ing Wing aircraft.” And I said,“Oh, Mr. Secretary, why?” Andhe said, “I’ve had an adverse re-port,” and hung up. That was thelast time I ever talked to him, andthe last time we could ever reachhim by phone or any other way.(KCET-TV, 1980)

Mr. Northrop went on to claim that themoney that was to be used to purchasethe Flying Wing bombers then went in-stead to Convair and was used to purchasemore copies of the rival B-36.

MR. ROBERTS: Did he give thecontract to someone else?

MR. NORTHROP: He continuedthe construction of the B-36 byConsolidated Vultee in FortWorth.

MR. ROBERTS: So, in fact, thecontract was taken from you, andgiven to Consolidated becauseyou had refused to merge withConsolidated, as you were or-dered to do by the government,is that accurate?

MR. NORTHROP: That is abso-lutely accurate. (KCET-TV,1980)

THE QUESTIONS

Were Mr. Northrop and Mr. Millar cor-rect? Considering the strong similarities

between the original Flying Wing bomb-ers and today’s B-2 bomber, is it possiblethat American aviation development wasset back for decades by a corrupt politicaldecision? Were the Flying Wing bomberscanceled because of political chicanery,or were there instead legitimate concernsthat prompted the cancellation? Beforeanswering those questions, it is necessaryto briefly examine the complex history ofNorthrop’s Flying Wing programs.

JACK NORTHROP AND HIS FLYING WINGS

The Northrop Flying Wing bombersdid not suddenly burst forth, fully devel-oped, in the late 1940s. Rather, they werethe culmination of years of effort by JackNorthrop, arguably the most talented andinnovative aircraft design genius of histime. Mr. Northrop had long soughtdesign solutions that would minimizedrag while maximizing lift. It was clearto him that an all-wing aircraft, if onecould be successfully designed, would bethe ultimate in aerodynamic efficiency.

His first “flying wing” — called X216H— was a compromise design, half con-ventional, half revolutionary. It flew in1929, and he refined the concept over thenext decade. Northrop’s N-1M — now ondisplay at the National Air and SpaceMuseum — was his first all-wing aircraft:It first flew in 1940, and proved that all-wing aircraft could maintain stable andcontrolled flight. So Mr. Northrop turnedhis attention to larger aircraft. On May21, 1941, he wrote a confidential letter tothe Army Air Corps:

[W]e have made very successfuland encouraging flights of the


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flying mockup (N-1M) and I be-lieve the time is here when we canseriously consider buildingbomber aircraft to this design.(Northrop, 1941)

With World War II raging in Europe,the need for such long-range bombers wasintense. Just 6 days later, the U.S. ArmyAir Corps tasked Northrop to perform adesign study for just such a bomber, witha desired range of 6,000 miles, a top speedof 450 miles per hour, and a ceiling of45,000 feet. Within months, a contractwas signed: Northrop would produce oneFlying Wing bomber (called the XB-35)for $2,910,000. Delivery would be in 24

months (Contract No. W535-AC-21920,1941).

Almost immediately, problems arose.Space was so limited at Northrop’sHawthorne plant that there could be noassembly line. In fact, there was not evenroom to assemble a single XB-35, unlessNorthrop built a new structure for thatpurpose. Even that proposed buildingcould handle only one bomber at a time;assembly of subsequent aircraft could notbegin until the previous one was complete,unless outdoor production lines were used(Northrop, 1941). This proved to be a cru-cial problem, and lack of production spacewould eventually prove to be one factorcontributing to the Flying Wing’s demise.

What he lacked in formal education Jack Northrop made up for withbrilliance and creativity. The Flying Wing bombers were the

realization of his quest for aerodynamic efficiency.

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The XB-35 program turned into adebacle. Under the pressure of wartimedemands, Northrop proved incapable ofdelivering as promised. Despite borrow-ing talent and facilities whenever possible— at one point 350 draftsmen were onloan from Otis Elevator Company — theprogram fell further and further behindschedule (Carroll, 1944). Air MaterielCommand grew so frustrated with delays,and Northrop’s lack of capacity, that pro-duction of the B-35 was, for a time, takenfrom Northrop and shifted to the GlennMartin Company, which did have the nec-essary production capacity in Baltimore(Hanley, 1942).

World War II was long over when theXB-35 finally made its maiden flight onJune 25, 1946, three years late and about

400 percent over budget (Air MaterielCommand, 1947). Its flight test programwas racked by difficulties, most relatedto the complex propulsion system of push-ing, counter-rotating propellers. Northroptest pilot Max Stanley summed up thetroubles in a 1980 speech:

It was plagued with problemsfrom the very beginning…pro-pellers which would fail to gov-ern, or fail to feather, and if theydid feather they would fail to un-feather. The driveshaft would de-velop unacceptable vibration. Thegearbox would overheat. Each ofthese malfunctions resulted inprogram delays, some of whichwere extensive. (Stanley, 1980)

The complex system of huge counter-rotating propellers neverworked satisfactorily, and doomed the XB-35s to failure.

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By 1948, the seemingly endless prob-lems suffered by the two XB-35s were fastcausing Air Force interest to wane. OnAugust 16, 1948, Air Force and Northroprepresentatives discussed what to do withthe 11 YB-35s then in production. Nonehad yet flown, and Northrop wanted atleast 25 million dollars to store the planesuntil a propulsion solution could be found.After a series of letters and negotiations,the Air Force told Northrop that “the wellwas dry,” as far as any more money forthe over-cost YB-35s. They would eitherbe scrapped or stored at Northrop’sexpense (Director of Procurement andIndustrial Planning, 1948). Northrop wasunable to underwrite that expense, andthe B-35s were disassembled at theHawthorne plant. The future of Jack

Northrop’s Flying Wing would have torest with the jet-powered YB-49.

THE BEST HOPE: THE JET-POWERED YB-49As jet engine technology developed at

the close of World War II, the Air Forcedecided to experiment with a jet-poweredFlying Wing bomber. To minimize devel-opment time, two of the B-35s then un-der construction were converted to aneight-jet configuration and redesignatedas YB-49s (U.S. Army Air Corps, 1945).

The YB-49s were almost identical tothe XB-35s, except in the propulsion sys-tems, where eight jets replaced the fourR-4360 engines and their balky propel-lers. Vertical fences and fins were addedfor stability, replacing the engine/propel-ler shaft housings, and two bomb bays

Two XB-35 airframes were modified, to become the eight-jet YB-49.First flight was October 21, 1947. Both YB-49s were eventually

lost in accidents.

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were converted to fuel tanks to feed thethirsty jet engines.

The result was a sleek and estheticallybeautiful aircraft, promising greater speedand maneuverability but at a high price:The range of the jet-powered wing wasexpected to drop from 4,175 miles toabout 3,500 (Hodge & Feicht, 1946).Considering that the original specifica-tions had called for a desired range of6,000 miles, this was a major disappoint-ment to the Air Force. And range was justpart of the problem: The YB-49’s smallbomb bays, designed in the early 1940s,could accommodate only the smallestconventional bombs. Larger bombs re-quired leaving bomb bay doors partiallyopen in flight, and standard 12,000 and22,000 pound weapons did not fit at all.Like the XB-35, the YB-49 could notaccommodate the atomic bomb (AirMaterial Command, 1947).2

Furthermore, newer and better aircraftwere on the way, including Boeing’s B-47 and others. Members of the Air Staffdoubted that the YB-49 was worth saving:

If procurement was initiated forthe B-49, it would not reach tac-tical units before other bombersof the same class having equalperformance and with provisionsfor carrying the A-bomb. There-fore it is felt that unless the B-49can be modified to carry the atombomb, further procurement isunwarranted. (Powers, 1946)

Air Materiel Command was well awareof the shortcomings:

Although the YB-49 has obviouslimitations, primarily due to the

fact that it is a modification, it isconsidered that the airplane will beextremely valuable as a researchproject. (Hodge & Feicht, 1946)

The first of the two YB-49s made itsmaiden flight on October 21, 1947 (“Jetwing flies,” 1947). The subsequent flighttest program was vastly more successfulthan the XB-35’s, but it revealed a cru-cial problem: The aircraft’s instability inpitch and yaw made it impossible for it tobomb accurately. A stability augmenta-tion system eliminated some of the yawproblems, but none of the pitch problems.The result was that bomb runs by experi-enced bombardiers took four times as longas in the B-29, and average miss distancesof 3,000 feet were twice those of otherbombers (Williams, 1948).

But the PBS documentary quotedNorthrop test pilot Max Stanley as say-ing that the Air Force had declared theYB-49 “an acceptable bombing plat-form.” Not so, according to Colonel RussSchleeh, the Air Force test pilot who flewthe bombing tests:

I flew the airplane eleven times,evaluating the aircraft as a bomb-ing platform both with and with-out the autopilot. The bombingresults were very poor…. I neversaid it was acceptable, and noneof us who flew bombers and knewbombing ever said it was an ac-ceptable bombing platform. (R.E. Schleeh, personal commu-nication, July 20, 1983; R. E.Schleeh, personal communica-tion, to E. T. Wooldridge, Na-tional Air and Space Museum,November 24, 1982.)


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Still the flight test program continued,until June 5, 1948. The second YB-49 hadflown only about 66 total hours whenMajor Daniel Forbes, Captain GlenEdwards, and crew took off to perform aseries of stall tests. A memo found in therecords of the subsequent investigation in-dicated that at least one of the test pilotshad concerns about the stall performanceof the YB-49: “It is known that the pilotwas reluctant to attempt the higher powerstalls” (Collins, no date).3

Evidently the concern was well-founded: the aircraft disintegrated thatmorning, high over the Mojave Desert,and all five crew members died.

Surprisingly, the crash did not kill theYB-49 program. The surviving YB-49was grounded for a time, but then resumedflying. On March 15, 1950, it was de-stroyed in a high-speed taxi test (History,1950, p. 103). The pilot that day, then-Major Russ Schleeh, had been the firston the scene of the Forbes/Edwards crashin 1948. He was luckier than they were:Badly injured in his own crash, he sur-vived and became an important source forthis article.

A RECONNAISSANCE VERSION: THE YRB-49At the start of this paper, we saw Mr.

Northrop’s claim that he had received a

Northrop had never before built such large aircraft, and lacked thefacilities to do so. Most assembly had to take place outdoors.

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firm order for 35 bombers. Yet, this re-search shows that the Air Force was highlycritical of the YB-49’s bombing perfor-mance, and, indeed, that the aircraft couldnot even carry the most important bombsin the American arsenal. So, which viewis correct?

The answer is both…sort of. Mr.Northrop did receive an order, not for 35aircraft, but for 30. However, the orderwas not for bombers, but instead for along-range reconnaissance variant, calledthe YRB-49.

If the YB-49 had suffered by being amodification, as Materiel Command sug-gested, then the YRB-49 was doublydamned by being a modification of amodification. One look at the aircraft

reveals the compromises: Four of theinternally mounted jet engines wereremoved to make way for fuel tanks,whereas two jets hung awkwardly insingle pods from beneath the wing,sullying Jack Northrop’s dream of anaerodynamically pure all-wing aircraft.

It was this aircraft the Air Force orderedin 1948, to be delivered on a three-air-craft–per-month schedule. At this point,the long-term issue of Northrop’s lack ofproduction capacity arose again. Northrophad never been able to produce anythingclose to three large planes per month (AirMateriel Command, 1948). When theSoviet blockade of Berlin increased worldtensions, the Air Force felt it would needeven higher-rate production, and the Air

A hybrid design, the YRB-49 saw four of its in-wing engines replacedwith fuel tanks. Two engines were added beneath the wing in pods.

The Air Force ordered 30, then canceled them.

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Force began to look at other plants to buildthe Northrop design. This was not a se-cret and was in fact reported in the indus-try magazine, Aviation Week.

Northrop’s productive capacity ofonly three bombers per month atits Hawthorne, California facili-ties cannot meet the accelerationof the program desired by the AirForce. (“Air Force,” 1948)

At the same time, the huge Air Forceplant in Fort Worth was about to bevacated, as the production of Convair’sgiant B-36 was expected to soon end. TheAir Force had been unhappy with the B-36, seeing it as too unreliable and tooslow. The B-36 production was expectedto end at the 95th aircraft (McNarney,1948). At the direction of the Air ForceChief of Staff, Air Materiel CommanderGeneral McNarney wrote to Northrop andConvair:

Since it is not intended to buymore than the ninety-five B-36airplanes presently on contract, itis desired that the production ofRB-49s be moved to [Fort Worth]at the earliest possible date….Itis requested that representativesof Northrop Aircraft and Consoli-dated Vultee Aircraft arrange thenecessary plans. (McNarney,1948)

General McNarney’s letter stands to-day as a model of bureaucratic miscom-munication. What did he mean? WasNorthrop supposed to just turn over itsmost promising design to its competitor?Or was Convair just expected to relinquish

the massive Fort Worth operation, alongwith its thousands of employees, toNorthrop? The record makes clear that thetwo contractors had these questions andmore. They met, as requested, but couldnot agree on afair arrange-ment. Finally,on July 16,1948, Air ForceSecretary Sy-mington metwith the headsof both firms inLos Angeles.This was almost certainly the meeting atwhich, according to Mr. Northrop, Sec-retary Symington raised the issue of amerger. The parties agreed on a solution:All but one of the RB-49s would be builtby Convair, in Fort Worth. In return,Northrop would receive two-thirds of theprofit on the $84,000,000 contract.Convair would receive a third of the profit,while — and this was far more important— keeping open the Fort Worth factories(Testimony, 1949a, p. 68).

So, as the summer of 1948 waned, thesituation looked like this: Thirty RB-49swere on order, with at least the possibil-ity of a great many more to follow.Convair would keep its workforce andgovernment-owned plant operating in FortWorth; Northrop would gain two-thirdsof the profit involved, while keeping itsown small production capacity alive; andthe Air Force would be able to get moreaircraft faster, especially if the contem-plated boost in orders took place. The dealseemed to give none of the parties every-thing they wanted, but reasonably ad-dressed the conflicting needs of Northrop,Convair, and the Air Force.

“GeneralMcNarney’s letterstands today asa model of bureau-cratic miscommuni-cation. What didhe mean?”


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CANCELLATIONIn the fall of 1948, though, three sepa-

rate events spelled the end of the FlyingWing bombers. The RB-49 order mighthave survived any one, or even two, ofthese events, but the coincidence of allthree proved insurmountable.

RESURGENCE OF THE B-36Convair’s B-36 had proven to be a

major disappointment to the Air Force. In1946, General George C. Kenney, the firstcommander of the Strategic Air Com-mand (SAC), had recommended that theprogram be halted: The six-propeller B-36 was just too heavy, too slow, and toovulnerable to attack (Testimony, 1949a,p. 47).

But by 1948 the B-36 had improvedtremendously, and its greatest improve-ments were in areas that mattered most:payload, altitude, and range. Where theYB-49 struggled with its undersizedpayload, the B-36 in one test dropped

84,000 poundsof bombs — anamount greaterthan the entireempty grossweight of itsNorthrop com-petitor (Testi-mony, 1949a,

p. 71). In that same year, another B-36climbed to an altitude of 46,000 feet,addressing at least part of the Air Force’sconcerns about its vulnerability(Testimony, 1949a, p. 71).

Similar progress was made in range.When General Kenney recommendedscrapping the B-36 in 1946, the best esti-mate of its range was about 6,500 miles.But by late 1948, B-36s were flying

simulated bombing missions of greaterthan 8,000 miles (Testimony, 1949a, p.71), making the B-36 the only aircraft ca-pable of round-trip strikes on Eurasiantargets from American bases, without re-liance on foreign locations or the primi-tive air refueling technology of the day.

The last major concern the Air Forcehad about the B-36 was speed, and eventhat was addressed in late 1948. Convairproposed to add four jets to the six pusherpropellers of the huge bomber, increas-ing top speed by almost 100 miles perhour (Testimony, 1949a, p. 74).

GENERAL LEMAYIn October 1948, as the B-36 was im-

proving dramatically, a new commandertook over SAC. General Curtis E. LeMaydirected a thorough review of SAC’sneeds for long-range reconnaissance air-craft. The review board assembled inNovember 1948 and issued their recom-mendations: The newly improved B-36was their first choice, followed by twoBoeing designs, the B-47 and B-54. TheRB-49 was omitted entirely. Major Gen-eral F. H. Smith explained why, in 1949congressional testimony:

Between the summer of 1948 andthe reconnaissance meeting inNovember, a number of develop-ments occurred which made theB-49 look less promising in com-parison with other airplanes. Forone thing, the Air Staff felt lessconfident about the early avail-ability of the B-49 as a bomber.Its aerodynamic design as a tail-less airplane caused it to yaw andpitch.

“In the fall of1948, though, threeseparate eventsspelled the end ofthe Flying Wingbombers.”


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It had other shortcomings….Minor problems of this sort areusual in a radically new designand undoubtedly could be over-come in time, but they were suf-ficient to…recommend postpon-ing development. (Testimony,1949a, p. 75)

THE THIRD STRIKE: BUDGETARY LIMITSIn 1947, Air Force strength had stood

at 48 combat groups. By late 1948 thatnumber had grown to 59, with an ultimategoal of 70 combat units. The RB-49 con-tract had been geared toward supportingthat 70-group force (Testimony, 1949a, p.79–82).

But President Truman refused to sup-port the Joint Chiefs of Staff budget pro-posal for fiscal year 1950. The serviceshad asked for $23.8 billion, and that waspared down by Secretary of DefenseForrestal to $16.9 billion. PresidentTruman, though, set a ceiling of $14.4billion (Millis, 1951, pp. 498, 503, 536),as part of his “pay as you go” budgetapproach:

As county judge, senator, andPresident, I consistently kept inmind the same sort of tax philoso-phy. It was a pay-as-you-go pro-gram, except in emergency con-ditions…. There is nothing sacredabout the pay-as-you-go idea asfar as I am concerned, except thatit represents the soundest prin-ciple of financing that I know.(Truman, 1956, p. 41)

“Pay as you go” meant one thing forthe Air Force: there would be no growthto 70 combat groups as planned, nor could

even the current 59 groups be sustained.The Air Force would have to retrench,cutting all the way back to 48 groups(Millis, 1951, p. 538; Testimony, 1949a,p. 83). To recommend exactly where ad-justments should be made, a group of foursenior Air Force generals was convenedin December 1948. It was called theSenior Officers Board.

THE FINAL BLOWSThe first meeting of the Senior Offic-

ers Board began on December 29, 1948.There were to be only four voting mem-bers: General Muir S. Fairchild, GeneralJoseph McNarney, Lieutenant GeneralHoward Craig, and Lieutenant GeneralLauris Norstad. General Fairchild becameill, so General McNarney chaired themeeting (Testimony, 1949a, p. 83).

Their star witness was the new SACcommander, General LeMay. At the meet-ing he asked forthe ability torestructure hisforce, cancelingsome aircraftorders to fundothers. First onhis shoppinglist: 39 more B-36s, some as bombers and some as recon-naissance variants. They would cost about$270 million, and that money had to comefrom cancellations.

In Mr. Northrop’s PBS interview, theviewer gets the clear impression thatNorthrop was singled out in the cancella-tion of the Flying Wings. But that is sim-ply false. To raise the $269,761,000 Gen-eral LeMay asked for, the Board canceledsix separate weapon systems from fourcorporations. Not only was Northrop not

“‘Pay as you go’meant one thing forthe Air Force: therewould be no growthto 70 combat groupsas planned….”


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singled out, it was not even the most se-verely damaged (see Table 1) (Testimony,1949b, p. 455).4

A telegram from Air Materiel Com-mand on January 11, 1949, formally toldNorthrop the bad news: “the contractor isdirected to stop all work authorized…with the exception of the engineering,fabrication, and flight test applicable tothe YRB-49A airplane” (Air MaterielCommand, 1949).

The last part of the telegram is signifi-cant: For 50 years, Mr. Northrop’s follow-ers have claimed that each and every Fly-ing Wing was ordered destroyed by thegovernment, as a sort of ultimate punish-ment, and this was repeated in the PBSbroadcast. But it was never true: Althoughthe B-35s were finally disassembled af-ter Northrop and the Air Force could notagree on storage fees, the surviving YB-49, and the YRB-49 as well, were spared.The YB-49 was the one later destroyed inthe taxi accident. The YRB-49, the six-jet reconnaissance plane, did not fly until

May 4, 1950, more than a year after thecancellation. It later was flown to Ontario,California, where it languished in outsidestorage until 1953, when a crew fromNorton Air Force Base cut it up for scrap.Only then was the last of Mr. Northrop’slarge Flying Wings gone (Maloney, 1980,p. 30).

THE AIR FORCE PERSPECTIVE

We have seen Mr. Northrop’s allega-tions that a corrupt decision by the Sec-retary of the Air Force caused the deathof his beloved Wings. Subsequent to hischarges, the author interviewed all thesurviving Air Force leaders involved inthe decision. Their words deserve to beheard.

Stuart Symington went on to becomea U.S. senator for 24 years. Contrary tothe claims made in the PBS interview, hewas never contacted before the show aired(S. Symington, personal communication,

Table 1. Cancellations of Weapons Systemsby the Senior Officers Board in 1949

Manufacturer Aircraft Quantity Amount OfCanceled Cancellation

North American B-45 51 $105,300,000

North American F-93 118 $57,930,000

Northrop RB-49 30 $88,500,000

Northrop C-125 30 $8,940,000

Kellett H-10 10 $6,831,000

Convair YT-32 1 $2,260,000

Total $269,761,000


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November 17, 1982; S. Symington, per-sonal communication to Col. WalterBoyne, acting director of the National Airand Space Museum, November 4, 1982).In fact, he did not even know of Mr.Northrop’s claims until this author con-tacted him for comment in late 1982.What Senator Symington did know,though, is that all the honors and awardshe regularly received in his later years hadsuddenly ceased, at the same time the PBSinterview aired on December 4, 1980.

Interviewed by the author in 1982,Senator Symington clearly recalled dis-cussing the Flying Wing with Mr.Northrop, but was not sure where or whenthe conversation took place. But given thebudgetary climate of the postwar years,the senator said that a merger might verywell have been discussed:

The Air Force Chief [GeneralVandenberg, Chief of Staff]wanted the B-36 and it was up tome to get it. Now you know, ofcourse, that there was a tremen-dous amount of overcapacity inthe industry following World WarII. It was clear that many of thesmaller companies would not sur-vive. Northrop came to see me,and said that unless he receivedhis Flying Wing orders, his com-pany would be in serious trouble.I knew at the time that the AirForce favored the B-36, built byConvair. I may very well havesuggested that he merge his com-pany with Convair, who we knewwas going to get business. I mayhave suggested he go see DutchKindleberger at North American,or Bill Allen at Boeing. What I’m

saying is this: I may very wellhave suggested Northrop talkwith Convair about a merger. I’mquite certain, though, that I neverwould have discussed such amerger with Floyd Odlum [headof Convair’s parent corporation].(S. Symington, personal commu-nication, November 17, 1982; S.Symington, personal communi-cation to Col. W. Boyne, actingdirector of the National Air andSpace Museum, November 4,1982)

In a later interview, Senator Symingtoncalled “preposterous and absurd” thenotion that he would threaten a firm,especially in an open meeting, with otherspresent:

If there’s one thing I learned inall my years in government, it’sthat it’s impossible to keep asecret. You’ve got twenty peopleworking for you, and they eachgo home and tell twenty people,and pretty soon it’s all over town.It may take a while, but you can’tkeep a thing like that a secret.(S. Symington, personal commu-nication, November 17, 1982)

Further, Senator Symington claimedthat aircraft requirements were deter-mined by the military leadership, and notthe civilian side:

Not once, as Assistant Secretaryof War for Air, or later as Secre-tary of the Air Force, did I evercancel an aircraft that had beenrecommended to me by the Air


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Force. If any recommendation topurchase the Flying Wing hadreached my desk, I would haveapproved it. None did. (S. Sy-mington, personal communica-tion, November 17, 1982; S.Symington, personal communi-cation to Col. W. Boyne, actingdirector of the National Air andSpace Museum, November 4,1982)

This view was supported by GeneralLauris Norstad, who was in 1983 the onlysurviving member of the Senior OfficersBoard. His statements to the authorsupported Mr. Symington completely:

Mr. Symington never pressuredme or any senior officers of theAir Force. It was my position tomake recommendations and I did.Generally, he accepted my rec-ommendations. Sometimes heasked for more information. Butnever, never did he suggest wechange our requirements, or gowith a different airplane, or adifferent company. All of this wasin my bailiwick, because my jobwas to develop requirements, andthe B-36 was the only airplane,then or for the foreseeable future,that could meet the require-ments. (Gen. L. Norstad, personalcommunication, January 31,1983)

Further, General Norstad confirmed thebottom-up nature of the procurementprocess. Speaking about Mr. Symington:

In no way did he ever generaterequirements. Those came fromme, and they came to me from theusing commands. (Gen. L. Nor-stad, personal communication,January 31, 1983)

The next place to look, then, was theusing command, in this case in the per-son of General LeMay. Interviewed in hishome in 1982, General LeMay deniedever receiving pressure, from Mr.Symington or anyone else, regarding theNorthrop Wings or the competing B-36:

No, I got no pressure on any par-ticular airplane. Wouldn’t havepaid any attention to it anyway….I don’t remember ever having anychoice in the matter. The B-36was it, and what we were push-ing. I don’t think [the FlyingWings] were even in the run-ning…. [The B-36] wasn’t thebest airplane in the world, no. Wedid have a lot of troubles with it,trouble with the gunnery system,trouble with the engines, exhauststacks kept burning out on it, butwe were able to keep it in theair…. We finally hung some morejet engines on the airplane, gotmore altitude out of it, betterperformance… so that duringits life it furnished us with aweapon system that would havedone the job at the time. (Gen. C.E. LeMay, personal communica-tion, September 29, 1982)


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THE CHARACTER OFTHE CHARACTERS INVOLVED

In the PBS show that aired the state-ments of Mr. Northrop and Mr. Millar,they appear to speak sincerely about themeeting with Mr. Symington, the threatthey said he made, the protestations byGeneral McNarney (“You don’t mean thatthe way it sounds,”) and Symington’sresponse (“You’re damned right I do.”)

If one assumes that Mr. Northrop andMr. Millar were telling the truth as theybest recalled it three decades later, thenan alternative interpretation arises. Is itpossible that Mr. Symington did urge amerger, and that Mr. Northrop resisted?Is it possible that Mr. Northrop, faced withlosing his dream to a competitor, asked,“What if I don’t merge?” Is it then pos-sible that Mr. Symington — aware of theAir Force’s desire to keep Fort Worth open— might have said, “You’ll be damnedsorry if you don’t.” Then General Mc-Narney’s statement (“You don’t mean thatthe way it sounds.”) takes on a whole newcast, in effect, “Mr. Secretary, what youmean is not what these two men, Northropand Millar, just now think they heard.”

If Mr. Northrop and Mr. Millar werecorrect in their charges, then the Air ForceSecretary was corrupt, and the Com-mander of Air Materiel Command was atthe very least complicit in that corruption.But every source interviewed for thisresearch rejects this possibility.

Not one person interviewed for thisarticle had anything but the highest praisefor General McNarney. In a 1983 inter-view General Elwood P. Quesada, AirForce pioneer and former head of theFederal Aviation Administration, said:

Joe McNarney was the straightestof the straight arrows, a realgentleman. If the world were fair,he would have been Air ForceChief of Staff, and he should havebeen. But he’d been shunted intostaff jobs instead of commandpositions in World War II. (Gen.E. P. Quesada, personal commu-nication, April 7, 1983)

General Norstad, of the Senior OfficersBoard, bristled at the author for evendaring to ask about General McNarney’scharacter, and expressed absolute faithin McNarney: “I knew him well. Therewas never a better disciplined officer, amore straight-laced officer than JoeMcNarney” (Gen. L. Norstad, personalcommunication, January 31, 1983).

Mr. Thomas V. Jones, longtime aero-space leader and past chairman of theNorthrop Corporation, in 1983 expressedsimilar sentiments about the integrity ofSenator Symington. But the 1949 can-cellation was long before Mr. Jones’involvement:

This was in the past, and none ofus now involved in the corpora-tion were there…. I have no directknowledge, nor do any of ourpeople have any knowledge, ofwhat caused the cancellation.

I have been a friend, a closefriend, of Stu Symington for along time. Stu’s record stands onits own. He has always been up-standing and fair in his dealingswith us, and I have no reason tobelieve he wasn’t upstanding andfair in this [the Flying Wing] case.


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I would serve as a characterwitness for him any day, but asfar as the specifics of [the can-cellation] are concerned, I cangive no testimony. Or rather, Iguess you’d say my testimonywould be inadmissible. I havespent a lot of time thinking how Icould do something to ease thehurt that this thing has causedStu, but I really don’t know whatI can do. (T. V. Jones, personalcommunication, November 4,1983)

General Quesada had this to say:

I’ve known Senator Symington along while, and I know of a num-ber of occasions where he, likeothers, could have enrichedhimself at the public expense.He never did, never even wasinterested.

At the same time, though, itwould be completely in charac-ter for him to blow his top andyell at somebody, even somethinglike the “You’ll be damned sorryif you don’t” remark. He’s gotsomething of a temper, you know.(Gen. E. P. Quesada, personalcommunication, April 7, 1983)

General Norstad’s position was simi-lar: In his opinion, the charge of Mr.Northrop and Mr. Millar had

utterly no basis and I’d swear itwas incorrect…. There was noskullduggery involved. I know allthe cast of characters, and it’s

inconceivable. (Gen. L. Norstad,personal communication, Janu-ary 31, 1983)

It is fitting that the final words on thiscome from General LeMay. The relation-ship between him and Mr. Symington wascomplex. During this research, it becameclear that the former Air Force Secretaryhad the deepest affection and respect forGeneral LeMay, and he claimed to havesuccessfully interceded with PresidentKennedy to facilitate General LeMay’sselection as Air Force Chief of Staff. Butthe general had a deep and abidingmistrust of politicians, and his feelingsabout Secretary Symington were no dif-ferent. Still, he rejected Mr. Northrop’sallegation:

Well, I’m kind of a pessimisticguy: All these politicians have alower order of moral value than Ithink they should have, but I don’tthink this would have been triedby anyone.

I don’t believe any of it. Mr.Northrop, maybe he did believeit, but I don’t think anybody getsmad at any particular companythat’s got something to sell to thearmed services. You may not likewhat they sell, and you don’t buyit, but to go and be vindictiveabout it after you’ve refused theirproduct, no. You’ve too manyother things to do to start fiddlingaround with that. You’ve got toomuch to think about with the suc-cessful guy, to make sure he getsout a product that meets your ex-pectations.


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There may have been hard feel-ings between Northrop andSymington. I could understandthat. Symington wasn’t the mostlikable guy in the world. (Gen. C.E. LeMay, personal communica-tion, September 29, 1982)

IN CLOSING

The research for this article began witha simple hypothesis: that the developmentof American aviation was dealt a severeblow by the cancellation of the FlyingWings a half century ago, and that thecause of that blow was political, nottechnical.

Through several years of research, thathypothesis was disproved. Regardless of

the sincerity of Mr. Northrop’s recollec-tions, the truth — as revealed by once-classified documents, Air Force records,and the unanimous views of Air Forceleadership — is that the cancellation ofthe Flying Wings was a prudent deci-sion, based on technical shortcomings,budgetary limitations, and strategicrequirements.

Fifty years later, most of the partici-pants in this drama are gone. Mr.Northrop’s Wings are again airborne, inthe form of the B-2 Stealth Bomber. Andin the B-2, history has again repeated it-self, in programmatic issues caused byNorthrop’s limited production capacity, indefense acquisition cutbacks caused by achanging world situation, and in theresulting cuts in B-2 procurement. Butthose are other stories, for another day.

A YB-49 in flight: While the Flying Wing bombers are now gone,they paved the way for the future of airpower.

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Dr. Bud Baker is an associate professor of management at Wright StateUniversity, Dayton, OH, where he leads the M.B.A. program in projectmanagement. He is also a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel, having servedas Chief of Program Integration and later Executive Officer in the B-2 SystemProgram Office. Baker is a charter member of the Defense AcquisitionUniversity’s Research Integrated Product Team and a contributing editor forProject Management Network magazine.

(E-mail address: [email protected])


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United States Air Force. (1950). Historyof Edwards Air Force Base. EdwardsAir Force Base, CA.

Hodge, Lt. R. D., & Feicht, E. R. (1946,May 10). Justification of the YB-49(Memo to Lt. Col. H. E. Warden).

Jet wing flies. (1946, October 27). Avia-tion Week, 47, 14.

KCET-TV. (1980, December 4). The Fly-ing Wing — What Happened to It?Place of Production: Public BroadcastSystem.

McNarney, Gen. J. T. (1948, June 30).Letter from commanding general, AirMateriel Command, to Northrop Air-craft and Consolidated Vultee Air-craft.

Millis, W. (Ed.). (1951). The ForrestalDiaries. New York: Viking Press,1951.

Maloney, E. T. (1980). Northrop FlyingWings. Corona del Mar, CA: WorldWar II Publications.

Northrop, J. K. (1941, May 21). Letter toColonel Howard Z. Bogert, U.S.Army Air Force Materiel Command.Edwards Air Force Base, CA.

Powers, Maj. Gen. E. M. (1946, Novem-ber 5). Letter from the assistant chiefof the air staff to commanding gen-eral, Air Materiel Command.

REFERENCES

Air Force to boost B-49 orders. (1948,August 2). Aviation Week, 49, 11–12.

Air Materiel Command. (1947, February25). “Estimated Cost of Number OneXB-35 Up to Flight Test” (Memo).No specific author.

Air Materiel Command. (1948, May 3).Memo from Headquarters, Air Mate-riel Command, to Northrop Aircraft,Inc. No specific author.

Air Materiel Command. (1947, April 7).Routing and record sheet, summaryof B-35 Program.

Air Materiel Command. (1949, January11). Telegram from chief, Aircraft andMissiles Section, Procurement Divi-sion, to Northrop Aircraft Ind.

Carroll, Brig. Gen. F. O. (1944, February17). Letter to Maj. Gen. O. P. Echols,Commanding General, Army AirForce Materiel Command.

Collins, Lt. Col. F. J. (no date). Statement,contained in the records of YB-49crash investigation.

Director of Procurement and IndustrialPlanning. (1948, August 27). Memoto Deputy Chief of Staff/Materiel, AirStaff.

Hanley Jr., Brig. Gen. T. J. (1942, Novem-ber 9). Letter to CommandingGeneral, Army Air Force MaterielCommand.


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Stanley, M. (1980). The Flying Wings.Society of Experimental Test Pilots,24th Symposium Proceedings, 24,251.

Testimony before House Armed ServicesCommittee, investigation of the B-36bomber program, hearings on H.R.234, 81st Cong., 1st Sess. 68 (1949a)(testimony of Maj. Gen. F. H. Smith,Jr.), 47.

Testimony before House Armed ServicesCommittee, investigation of the B-36bomber program, hearings on H.R.234, 81st Cong., 1st Sess. 68 (1949b)(testimony of Lt. Gen. E. S.Rawlings), 455.

Truman, H. S. (1956). Memoirs by HarryS. Truman, Vol. 2: Years of Trial andHope. Garden City, NY: Doubleday.

U.S. Army Air Corps. (1941, November1). Contract No. W535-AC-21920,Project No. MX-140.

U.S. Army Air Corps. (1945, June 1).Change order 11 to contract W535-AC-33920.

Williams, Maj. (1948, November 8).Memo from the Aircraft Branch,DCS/Materiel, to Brig. Gen. D. L.Putt, Director of Research and Devel-opment.


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ENDNOTES

1. Mr. Northrop was incorrect here. The“military chief of the Air Force”would have been Air Force Chief ofStaff General Hoyt S. Vandenberg.General Joseph McNarney was Com-mander of Air Materiel Command,charged with acquisition and logis-tics support of Air Force weaponssystems.

2. The memo noted that many of thesame problems plaguing the XB-35would also affect the YB-49.

3. The position at the time of Lt. Col.Collins, who made this statement, isnot clear, nor is it clear which pilotwas reluctant to do the stalls.

4. Although North American was thebiggest loser in the January 1949 can-cellations, months later Boeing washit even harder: to purchase anotherbatch of B-36s, the Senior OfficersBoard canceled $179,937,000 worthof contracts for Boeing B-54s/RB-54s. See Testimony, 1949b, p. 456.


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