5 Air Force Bases Spending Billions To Prepare For The B-21 Raider's Arrival

The Northrop Grumman B-21 Raider is shaping up to be the most expensive military construction story in the United States Air Force's history, and the aircraft itself is only part of the bill. Fielding America’s newest stealth bombers means rebuilding the runways, hangars, fuel systems, and security infrastructure of the bases that will fly, maintain, and test it, several of which are still built around a bomber design decades old. Billions of taxpayer dollars are already flowing into five installations across four states, each racing against its own construction deadline before the Raider actually arrives on the ramp. Together, the projects amount to one of the largest peacetime military construction pushes the Air Force has undertaken in decades, touching everything from runways and fuel farms to housing and classified weapons storage.