The Cold War was at its coldest in the 1960s, with the United States and the Soviet Union each engaged in massive military buildups to prepare for possible war with the other. Both superpowers wanted to develop production aircraft that had the potential to deliver advanced weapons systems to the enemy. Among many projects, the Soviets wanted to build a new strategic intercontinental bomber capable of supersonic speeds. This interest was, at least in part, due to the awareness that the United States was developing a successor to the Boeing B-52 bomber—the Rockwell B-1 Lancer—that would eventually fill this same role. The Soviets were also alarmed by the United States’
