Battlespace Dominance in the First Fays of the Next War: Cruise Missiles or Bombers

This monograph compares sea-launched cruise missiles to heavy bomber delivered munitions performing the battlespace dominance mission in the first five days of a major regional contingency (MRC). Battlespace dominance is a Navy doctrinal term. The paper uses the projected year 2006 cruise missile and bomber force structure each attacking the same hypothetical target list.

The paper examines two cases. The first case compares both cruise missiles and bombers without sensor fuzed weapons (SFW) and brilliant anti-tank (BAT). The second case posits that SFW and BAT munitions are in the force structure for the two means of delivery.

Both systems have advantages and with persistence. Cruise missiles are particularly well suited for attacking integrated air defense systems and other counterair targets.disadvantages. Bombers are better able to deliver a wide variety of munitions against many different targets