Test pilot Max Stanley flies the XB-35, the distant grandfather of the B-2. It will take decades of engineering progress before flying wings are stable enough to fly in combat.
Northrop Grumman wins a contract to research a flying-wing bomber.
The Tacit Blue test airplane begins flights. The Air Force uses the data it generates to shape the B-2.
The B-2 flies for the first time in the skies of California.
The Air Force announces the B-2 is ready to drop conventional bombs.
A pair of Spirit bombers strike Yugoslavia with satellite-guided bombs in the B-2's combat debut.
B-2s bomb Afghanistan, the first response to the 9/11 attacks on the U.S.
B-2 stealth bombers open the "shock and awe" campaign in Iraq, hitting the correct targets with 2000-pound bombs but failing to killSaddam Hussein.
The Air Force declares its intention to field a new bomber in 2018.
A B-2 crashes without fatalities in Guam after its airspeed sensors are befuddled by moisture. Says Technical Sgt. Thomas Anderson: "For us, it was like when Kennedy was shot."
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates cancels the 2018 bomber.
Three B-2s from Missouri wipe out Libya's air force on the ground in one evening.
The Obama administration in its 2013 budget requests $6.3 billion to develop a new bomber, ready in 2025.
The Pentagon confirms the B-2 can carry the GBU-57, a 30,000-pound bomb, which explodes after penetrating hundreds of feet of concrete.