Aurora Program May Involve Stealth Bomber or Fighter : Defense Document Tells of Secret Plane

An unclassified Pentagon document has disclosed the existence of a multibillion-dollar aircraft program called Aurora, but Defense Department officials Friday rebuffed questions about it because they said it is officially classified.

The unusual incident fueled speculation that Aurora is one of the Pentagon’s secret stealth programs, either the Northrop Corp. stealth bomber or the Lockheed Corp. stealth fighter.

The document, titled “procurement programs,� indicates that the Defense Department plans to spend $80 million on the Aurora in fiscal 1986, which begins this October, and $2.3 billion in fiscal 1987.

Almost everything about the Aurora seems to contradict the Pentagon’s usual ways of doing business. Secret, or so-called black, programs are almost never identified in budget documents and fund ing figures are always withheld.

In addition, an increase in program funding from only $80 million to $2.3 billion in a single year, representing a twenty-nine-fold increase in spending, would be unprecedented. Compared to spending on other aircraft programs, $80 million is a very small sum, even for development, and $2.3 billion is very large, even for production.

According to recent research reports by David J. Smith, an aerospace analyst at the Wall Street firm of Sanford C. Berstein & Co., the Air Force plans to spend $900 million to $1 billion annually on the Northrop stealth bomber from 1985 to 1988. At the same time, the Air Force would be escalating the Lockheed program to billion-dollar status as well.

Clearly, both firms are undertaking major secret programs, indi cations of which are spilling out every week. Lockheed is intensively recruiting engineers for its Burbank aircraft operation, including running radio commercials. Northrop is also actively hiring for its Pico Rivera facility, a closed facility.

One aerospace industry source also tells of an unusual Lockheed activity in Palmdale at Air Force Plant 42. Each morning, an aircraft departs with a load of Lockheed workers for a secret facility. Even the windows are taped over to keep the workers from knowing where they are going.

The name Aurora--the Roman name for the Greek goddess of dawn--could also indicate that the aircraft is not a typical tactical fighter, because those names are taken from hunting animals, such as the F-16 Falcon, the F-14 Tomcat and the F-15 Eagle.