Soviets Show New Bomber to Carlucci

The Soviet military unveiled its new top-secret Blackjack bomber to U.S. Defense Secretary Frank C. Carlucci today and staged thundering aerial and artillery displays at two bases normally off limits to foreigners.

Carlucci spent about 10 minutes in the cockpit of the strategic bomber while foreign reporters were allowed within about 50 yards of the sleek white jet. Soviet military brass were clearly uncomfortable with the access accorded the visitors and refused to tell reporters anything about the plane.

“Why do you want to know about the bomber? Why frighten people?” asked Col. Gen. Boris F. Korolkov.

The Pentagon’s reference book Soviet Military Power says the plane is the world’s heaviest and largest bomber, but does not give exact dimensions.

Can Carry Cruise Missiles

Jane’s All the World’s Aircraft, a respected British reference book, says the plane, code-named Blackjack by NATO, is 177 feet long, has a wingspan of 182 feet and weighs 550,000 pounds.

The aircraft has been under development for 10 years, can travel at twice the speed of sound, has a flying range of 4,500 miles and can be armed with bombs and cruise missiles, according to Jane’s.

No Western official had been shown the plane before Carlucci’s visit to the Kubinka airfield 30 miles west of Moscow.

Korolkov said the bomber became operational “recently.”

Carlucci inspected the underbelly of the four-engine Blackjack and then climbed orange stairs into the open bomb bay doors and entered the cockpit. He told reporters later that he could not give technical details of the plane but he compared it to the B-1 bomber of the United States in that it can fly at low altitudes and carry heavy payloads.

Mystified by Instruments

“They let me sit in the cockpit, but I couldn’t tell one instrument from another,” he said.

The Soviet military chief of staff, Marshal Sergei F. Akhromeyev, was allowed to climb aboard a B-1 bomber at Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota last month.

At Kubinka, Carlucci also inspected an Ilyushin-78 tanker plane and an Mi-26 helicopter, and was treated to an acrobatic flying display by four MIG-29s.

Next it was the army’s turn to put on a show for Carlucci. He drove to the Taman Motorized Division Headquarters 12 miles to the southwest to watch noisy and dusty war games.