[Man of the Right]

A JDAM costs $25,000.

JDAMs are for pin-point accuracy. Dumb bombs are for counter-terror.

In WW II, we bombed Switzerland and Czechoslovakia trying to bomb Germany. The Germans bombed the Republic of Ireland trying to bomb England. Heck, there was only the Irish Sea between them and their target. That's close enough for government work. If a crew is assigned to bomb Iraq and they plaster Iran instead, is either of us going to hurl ourselves on the funeral pyre? I'm not.

[Cannoneer No. 4]

From the JDAMs post above:

It was the height of the Desert Storm air war. The Air Force ruled the skies and was giving Iraq the mother of all poundings. “That night we dropped more than 288,000 pounds of munitions on the target,” he said. After the “bombs away” over the plant, they hightailed it back to base. The B-52s dropped conventional bombs on that carpet-bombing raid. Just like B-17 Flying Fortresses did over Germany 50 years before. Scratch one plant. Seven years later, the plant was back online. During Operation Desert Fox, it was also back on the target list. But this time in took just six Buffs — launching cruise missiles — to smash it. The bombers didn’t have to get close. “Today we could do the same job with one B-52 carrying a dozen JDAMs,” said Harysch, 23rd Bomb Squadron weapons and tactics chief at Minot Air Force Base, N.D. “And we don’t have to fly as close to the target.”

ECONOMY OF FORCE

Wouldn't you rather send one aircraft, 6 crewman, and 12 precision weapons instead of 100 B-17s, 1000 crewmen and 288,000 lbs of dumb bombs?