Federal legislators support more funding for B-2: bomber program supports some 11,000 jobs in L.A..

The B-2 stealth bomber program -- and its 11,000 Northrop Corp. jobs in Los Angeles County -- may not be dead quite yet.

The controversial project, which every year goes through a noisy budget debate, is on the verge of extinction but there are some public officials in Washington, D.C., who are trying to keep the production line and supplier network open.

In a March 16 letter to the House (of Representatives) Armed Services Committee, all 22 Republican members of the 52-member California congressional delegation asked for $150 million in additional funding to keep the project alive.

In addition, California Sen. Diane Feinstein, a Democrat, has spoken out in support of funding to keep the production line open, according to industry sources. Her Washington office did not return a phone call for comment last week.

For its part, Century City-based Northrop is not doing anything out of the ordinary to sell elected officials on keeping the project going beyond its scheduled termination date of 1997, said company spokesman Jim Hart.

"All we are doing is providing information on the project to anyone who asks," he said.

Part of that information package is pointing out statements by high government and elected officials who might favor continued funding for the project.

However, defense-industry analysts said it is unlikely supporters of continued funding will ever get enough votes in the House and Senate to keep the project going beyond 1997.

"I know that there is certainly some support in Congress (for keeping the B-2 alive) and there is certainly interest in the Air Force, but I think the prospects are pretty slim," said Steven Kosiak, an analyst with the Defense Budget Project, a think tank in Washington. "The defense budget is already tight and is likely to get tighter over the next few years."

Another analyst at a second Washington think tank, Kathryn Schultz of the Center for Defense Information, also doubted there is enough support to keep the project going.

"I think there is widespread sentiment that we don't need slow-flying bombers any more. Nowadays fighters are the thing, along with precision guided munitions. ... The B-2 has been on life-support systems for a long time and now its time has finally come," said Schultz.

The B-2 bomber has been one of the most controversial United States military projects ever. Built at a cost of about $850 million each, the long-range plane is designed to carry both nuclear and conventional bombs without being detected by enemy radar.

The Air Force originally requested more than 130 B-2s. Under President Bush, the number of aircraft was lowered to 75 and two years ago the project was capped at 20.

Northrop is the prime contractor on the B-2 at facilities in Pico Rivera, Hawthorne and Palmdale. In anticipation of the termination of the B-2, the company has instituted or announced layoffs that will reduce employment on the project by year-end from a high of more than 12,000 to about 10,700.

Eventually, just about all of the B-2 employees will lose their jobs, and the company will close its sprawling Pico Rivera facility, Northrop officials have said.

In the March 16 letter, the Republican representatives said the $150 million allocation in the fiscal 1995 federal budget, which goes into effect Oct. 1, is necessary to keep the B-2 infrastructure alive.

"These funds will enable the government to: halt the disassembly, storage, and destruction of tools; purchase necessary long lead items; re-establish select production facilities, and importantly, maintain critical manpower skills at the subcontractor and vendor level. ..." the letter states.

"This expenditure," it adds, "is warranted due to the B-2's unique capabilities and the lack of any substitute for it."

Armando Azarloza, a spokesman for Rep. Howard McKeon, R-Santa Clarita, said it makes more sense to keep the line up than to close it down.

"One of our main concerns is that to disassemble the whole production and supplier line at this time is a mistake," he said. "It would cost less now to keep it open than to tear it down and reopen it later."

According to Northrop, an allocation of $150 million would keep the production line up and retain about 1,300 B-2 workers beyond the project's 1997 expiration date.

Azarloza said the immediate aim of the delegation is to keep the production line open, not to build more B-2s. If the delegation is successful, however, it would then campaign for production of another five B-2s, he said.

So far, President Clinton has shown no indication of changing his position of halting the B-2 project at 20 aircraft.