This robust commitment -- detailed in the Air Force's proposed six-year spending plan, which was submitted to the Office of the Secretary of Defense earlier this month  -- would accelerate bomber modernization by two decades in a bid to augment the effectiveness of U.S. air power in the Asia-Pacific region.

“The purpose of this initially is to do some studies, design trade-offs as well as research and development,” a source familiar with the Air Force's new bomber plans.

“Some of it may be ‘very advanced' research,” the source said. “There really is a desire to get to a fly-off or a downselect and have a real competition among the aerospace companies.”

The new bomber funding stream, set aside in the Air Force's program objective memorandum (POM) for fiscal years 2008 to 2013, would likely fuel efforts built on elements of the former Joint Unmanned Combat Air Systems program, a Navy-Air Force effort terminated last December as part of a Quadrennial Defense Review decision to develop a new bomber.

The Air Force's spending request will be reviewed in the coming months by the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the White House Office of Management and Budget before being integrated by January into a wider Pentagon six-year investment plan.

While investment plans are being worked, another arm of the Air Force is busy refining the requirement for a new bomber through an analysis of alternatives. Under consideration, according to service officials, is everything from a single plane to a family of bombers, which could be unmanned.

To expedite the fielding of a new bomber -- possibly before the 2018 goal set in the Quadrennial Defense Review -- senior Air Force officials have suggested that the service may consider innovative approaches to working with industry.

“I'm willing to look at some creative ways to give [industry] an amount of money and say, ‘You guys come back in X number of months and see what we got.' Let's fly these babies off and see what we end up with,” Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. T. Michael Moseley told Inside the Air Force on March 10.

Industry interest in the program is high. Lockheed Martin, for example, this summer unveiled a high-altitude unmanned system -- the P-175 Polecat -- it developed on its own with an eye on a future Air Force bomber program.