So here’s a question: is there still a need for an independent air force?
Good question. I think that we really do need an Air Force - but a different organization than we have now. The USAF we have now seems to be frozen in the 50s and 60s, but with better (and far more expensive) equipment. They seem to be oriented towards fighting the Russkies and occasionally lifting some equipment and dreaming of weaponizing space but also seem to never read a newspaper to see where the world is going now. They'd almost serve as a museum display, except they cost so much..
The realy criminal part is their desertion of the Army's need for close air support. When you can really get the Joint Air Forces Component Commander to shake a few sorties loose from all of the scheduled missions, they bomb from way up high and a long ways off (except for the A-10s which happily bomb and strafe us - can anybody in the Air Force bother to learn what our vehicles look like?). Really a shame - and since they insist that they "own anything that flies" the army is stuck with only rotary wing support.
I suspect that the only solution is to fire anybody above the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and completely rebuild the Air Force as a supporting institution - supporting the ground-gaining arms - as it always should have been.