The YF-23 and X-32 were losing competitors in a program that went ahead, though.
The entire concept of high altitude supersonic nuclear bombers died, and with it the idea that you’d need/be able to intercept them. The UK offered Canada the English Electric Lightning instead of the Arrow - an aircraft that would do Mach 2 in level flight but only had a combat range of 135 miles (and that’s an F.6 with ventral and over-wing fuel tanks). 15 years after the Arrow was cancelled (4 years after the B-58 was retired, 18 years before the Lightning was retired but around the same time the RAF began phasing it out of service), the AGM-86 ALCM, with a range of 1500+ miles, went into development - neither aircraft would have been able to reach, never mind attack, the launch platform for those.
The successor to bombers like the B-58 and Valkyrie are mostly ICBMs/SLBMs but also things like the B-1B (launching stand-off missiles) and B-2. As the sibling points out, the Arrow didn’t have the range, RADAR or missile technology to counter those, and couldn’t use its few advantages (speed and altitude) that it would have cost a fortune to develop.
The entire concept of high altitude supersonic nuclear bombers died, and with it the idea that you’d need/be able to intercept them. The UK offered Canada the English Electric Lightning instead of the Arrow - an aircraft that would do Mach 2 in level flight but only had a combat range of 135 miles (and that’s an F.6 with ventral and over-wing fuel tanks). 15 years after the Arrow was cancelled (4 years after the B-58 was retired, 18 years before the Lightning was retired but around the same time the RAF began phasing it out of service), the AGM-86 ALCM, with a range of 1500+ miles, went into development - neither aircraft would have been able to reach, never mind attack, the launch platform for those.
The successor to bombers like the B-58 and Valkyrie are mostly ICBMs/SLBMs but also things like the B-1B (launching stand-off missiles) and B-2. As the sibling points out, the Arrow didn’t have the range, RADAR or missile technology to counter those, and couldn’t use its few advantages (speed and altitude) that it would have cost a fortune to develop.