Posted on 08/05/2009 6:12:23 PM PDT by Excuse_My_Bellicosity
I know we’re on the same team, so please forgive my frustration. I’m an 8 year infantry vet. I’ve lost 15 friends in Iraq and Afghanistan.
It’s frustrating. The USAF has never particularly liked the CAS role, and the Infantry always ends up paying the price. How many times has the USAF tried to can the A-10, the Infantry’s best friend? The Army literally begged the USAF for more UAVs, to no avail.
The previous poster was right - the fighter mafia had their chance and they blew it.
Maybe it’s time to move all CAS to the Army and let the USAF do their on thing.
re: F22
Since the F22 is in production all is not lost since we have the design and some amount of manufacturing and support infrastructure. I’ll have to read more about the F22. I am ignorant of what the F22 can do that other planes can’t, and how those advantages benefit us in actual warfare as it’s waged today.
and Spads!
“Obama and Congress are going to try and reduce the deficit spending on the backs of the military, but they will always need an army.”
Just not the current army...
“...in actual warfare as it’s waged today.”
It is not how actual warfare as it’s waged today, but how actual warfare as it’s waged tomorrow.
Why, exactly, do you think we’ve gone up against “second rate armies”?
Because they were second-rate TO US.
You don’t get that way choosing pickups over Ferraris.
Ferraris like the F-16 and F-15.
And now the F-22 and F-35.
The A-10 has its place, but some of you really need to stop fixating on the big gun.
More fixation on the gun.
The F-35 will have speed, stealth (when slick) and a far better EO system than the A-10 will ever have.
Face it.
The A-10 is great for CAS, but isn’t capable of hanging with the big dogs in contested airspace.
The F-16 dropped far more ordnance in Iraq than the A-10 did. And dropped it closer and farther out.
Third and forth rate. Most of the people( worlds number one resource) and most of the wealth, albeit grossly mismanaged, lays in third world dumps. And that who we have and will continue to fight against.
The Army can deliver infantry in fighting vehicles, or duce’n halfs. It can deliver artillery by Blackhawks or trucks. Trucks are cheaper. Budgets are not unlimited. Conservation of money, and it’s efficient use is critical.
Much of the billions the Army spends upon helicopter CAS could be done cheaper by dedicated fixed wing. But neither bureaucracy seems willing. (Yeah, yeah, the Joints are victims of elderly legislation).
The Army does the same thing. Supposedly observing third world warfare for five decades, and having some experience with mines in Vietnam, the Army found its self with no MRAPs at all, even though they are multi generation experienced technology.
For the Navy it was not having a near shore force. Somehow all battles were to be in some vast open ocean space.
You can not tell me, that since WWII, in spite of near every war fought, the services haven’t been intellectually and thus materially captivated by ‘the big one’. A major war against a equal or superior foe.
No, zero, zip language, cultural skills at all. And all those relatively dirt cheap.
The F-16 dropped far more ordnance in Iraq than the A-10 did.
Duh, way more F-16’s. Right?
And dropped it closer and farther out.
Which service didn’t, well wouldn’t for a long time, up grade the A-10? It’s name escapes me.
Which aircraft had the lessor maintenance man hours and flight cost per sortie?( airframe/engin hours being equal and such )
Sure.
I was there on the West/East border in the late 1980s when The Wall came down.
It was our fixation on “The Big One” that gave us ALL the tools to defeat the second, third and fourth rate powers of the last thirty years. The same tools that we’re putting to good use in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Those IFVs weren’t designed for fighting the Taliban.
Those Blackhawks weren’t designed for Afghanistan, but they’ve proven invaluable.
Remember, losing The Big One was a game-stopper.
Struggling in LICs isn’t going to mean the death of the US, and we still have the time to develop and deploy MRAPs (albiet, at a real cost) and other systems in a fight that will be DECADES, across more than just Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Big One would have been THE “come as you are” war.
No time to bring in materials and reinforcements (regardless of what the NATO “pie in the sky” plans were).
No time to develop new systems.
We are far better off for looking forward and preparing for the greatest threat, than we would have been retooling for another Vietnam.
We should just buy off enemies, it would be cheaper than flying F-35’s against them.
I’m with putting the CAS in the Army. The Air Force other than justifying fighters isn’t interested as an institution other than using it as budge leverage.
Give them deep penetration, space and air space control.
The fighter guys should be happy because they can drop a lot of drag, weight and keep their chariots nice and air stripped sexy for..er...when ever.
I’m not saying the Air Force wasn’t dragging feet on the A-10.
I’m saying that constant reference to the A-10 are a non-starter, because it simply isn’t the most effective aircraft we have. Not by a long shot.
We use it in an explicit and limited role. Period.
It doesn’t go into unvetted and unattrited airspace.
It sure as hell doesn’t go alone if there’s enemy air or ADA.
Look at it for what it does and be happy, but also recognize its speed, range and deployment limitations.
Aircraft like the F-16 didn’t drop more ordnance simply because there were more of them. The did it because they got there FIRST, before A-10s were even allowed in the area and they got there faster and farther out. They also dropped their stuff A LOT more accurately. The deployment options for the F-16 and F/A-18 were simply much, much greater.
It’s a great thing that the A-10 “C” is finally getting a digital electronics and sensor suite. But all that stuff is still strapped to an aircraft that’s severely limited to its current role.
We could of defeated them with their weapons.
We keep fighting and dieing, and will so, in third world. That’s where the people and wealth are.
Poorly trained, poorly lead vs us poor languaged and poorly understanding the culture and languages. Then we get things like the capture of Baghdad and all the Pentagons Master’s and Doctoral degrees not having a clue what to do, and the Army having to dig up VIETNAM counter insurgency manuals.
But, good. We’re all done with being in third world places.
Now it’s paved roads, Cafes and enemy in snappy uniforms, right?
You'll find out as soon as American bombers start getting shot from the sky by enemy 5th Generation fighter planes.The U.S. has had Air Superiority because we paid for it in cold hard cash.
Air Superiority is not Guaranteed to U.S. I would Rather pay for it in cash than in the blood of our Air or Ground Forces who come under attack from those enemy Air Craft once they win Air Superiority.
I thought the A-10 was for Soviet Armored columns? And they were to be with out ADA? Who knew?
Come on, the A-10 community is the red headed step child.
Last to get anything, and because it shows up late with little, it’s its fault.
I can see even in air uncontested enviroment, pressing down enemy with , relatively, more costly aircraft because you have many targets, distance and time problems. Once done, it doesn’t make sense to use up fighters dropping bombs on un air contested ground enemies.
I guess it is like the German that was captured in France and said of fighting Americans, ‘Now I know what it is like to fight a rich mans army.”
Decades, not 'soon'.
Meanwhile first enlistment Americans will die for not having more basic weapons tailored to the war we have been fighting and will fight. The MRAPs for example. Having the Army use helicopters for CAS when safer fixed wings could take some burdens. We have and already pay in blood.
Decades, not ‘soon’.
The Problem is The U.S. Really has NO idea what type of enemy aircraft we will face in the Immediate future anymore then we did when we found out the North Koreans had MIG 15’s after they shot the hell out of our B-29’s and Subsonic fighters of the era.
I haven’t heard of any contested airspace in Iraq or Afghanistan. I work with F-16, A-10 and F-15E pilots every day. I know what they drop and how they do it, Not a one of them is happy wih a hundred plus bullets for the F-35.
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