There are no official statements regarding the stand down.  The speculation is that the Bush admin. wants to meet the SALT limitations and cutting the AGM-129 allowed them to do that without reducing any major delivery system.  It is likely they will find the same re-fit as the AGM-86 ALCM - into conventional warhead systems.

But why choose to scrap the newest nuke in the inventory? Why scrap the stealthiest nuclear cruise missile? Why not choose to scrap the older, non-stealthy cruise missiles in the inventory - of which there were many more? This baffles me.

I can speculate that (IIRC) the original development program had a lot of problems and someone decided they weren't reliable enough. Either that or they felt that it would be easier to maintain only one type of nuclear ALCM and thus simply scrapped the model with the smaller inventory. Otherwise the decision seems to make little sense to me.

they knew that the stealth approach is flawed.. I m keepin hearing things that suggest stealth isnt as effective as were told

You miss the whole point of some of the SALT goals.  The biggest "flaw" with a stealth nuclear cruise missile is that, just like putting massive anti-ballistic missile systems up, a government may find itself in a position to believe that they can nuke the other guy and maybe not get nuked back (wacky government and military officials of many countries have made such stupid mistakes before ).  Removing the temptation to start nuclear war is what MAD was all about and the SALT treaties were part of the process to maintain MAD.

No, stealth is not flawed or less effective than we're told.  They aren't skipping over the older cruise missiles, because all the older AGM-86 ALCMs were converted into conventional warheads several years ago if I recall correctly.  If USAF is now de-nuking the AGM-129s then we don't have any nuclear-armed cruise missiles left.

 

This alternative, for example, could be a parasite weapon lofted by another aircraft that promises to be less interceptable and much quicker than the retired cruise missile in question. And no I am not suggesting some mythical hypersonic LO cruise missile.

 

Herald

The trend is toward smaller - more accurate - warheads that have a short flight time on target.  The "Global Strike" mission being pushed is to have the capability to strike a target accurately anywhere on the globe within minutes - not hours.  The Stealth cruise is subsonic and its primary delivery systems are the B-52 and the B-1.  Both bombers have pretty much been pushed into the conventional role.

"all the older AGM-86 ALCMs were converted into conventional warheads several years ago if I recall correctly.  If USAF is now de-nuking the AGM-129s then we don't have any nuclear-armed cruise missiles left."

 

Not all the ALCMs were converted. Far from it. Please also remember the fact that the USAF still has an unknown number of nuclear bombs, and some pretty awesome line up of Stealth delivery platforms. (B-1B, B-2,)

 

 Consider the fact that only 400 some odd ACMs were acquired. Next, realize that that the last ones were built around 1992. Next, factor in losses due to destructive testing and unfortunate incidents. After that, consider variations in missiles ready at one specific time due to maintenance on the missiles themselves along with thier pylons. With all those factors in play, it is quite believable that the ACM has a pretty low availability rate. Especially when you realize that the missiles launch platform (The B-52 stratofortress) just happens to be fourty years old or so.

 

Also consider the fact that while the AGM-86 ALCM cost less 2 million a copy,  the ACM cost about 6 million a piece. Some of that was due to the smaller delivery run, a little was due to inflation. (The ALCMs were built in the early eighties, the ACMs were built in the late eighties, early nineties.) But a good portion of it was due to the design itself being so, well advanced. the ACM had longer range, which probably means a more advanced engine. It was touted as being more accurate, which means a more advanced guidance system. All those advanced goodies from a missile that wasn't all that new from the one it was supposed to replace meant that the ACM cost more, and somewhere in the maze of money, I'm sure its parts cost more too. So maintenance cost in relations to attaining spare parts almost certainly means that it costs more to keep an ACM ready than an ALCM.

 

Throw in all those stealth goodies, and the generation of stealth we're dealing with (The ACM isn't faceted like an F-117, its curved like a B-2. It probably uses the similar  radar absorbing materials, IE not cheaply or easily maintained.) and you have a really expensive maintenance intensive missile.