[Bedford Forrest]

The mission in which they fancy themselves expert

That is to say, the provision of air superiority. First, as the Pacific war showed, the Nav and the Marines do not need the Air Farce to provide air superiority. Second, beginning with the end of WWII, the need to provide effective interdiction and close air support has eclipsed the air superiority requirement. The Air Farce has, quite simply, refused to accept this fact of life. Their miserable and in fact criminal performance in Kosovo bears this out. They have a severe case of cultural arrogance and they get away with it because they are past masters of stroking all of the right pimps in Congress.

[Pukin Dog]

Their miserable and in fact criminal performance in Kosovo bears this out.

The Air Force suffered in Kosovo from poor leadership and tactics (provided by the Army via Clark). I cannot say that had we been given their mission with our BombCats instead of the CAPs we flew, that we would have done much better from 15K ft. Also, the enemy had superb deceptive tactics against our mission. Clark was a fool. We followed orders regardless.

[JSteff]

Not to mention that the air force has wanted to be completely rid of the A-10 since it came out. A-10 drivers were looked down on by the rest of the air force. They quickly made the A-10 primarily a reservist plane. Congress several times (if I recall correctly) forced the Air Force to buy more of them.

Yet it has consistently and verifiably been one of the most effective in support of our guys on the ground. During Iraq I they had something like 2100 confirmed kills... kills where the ground troops could walk up and stick their arms in the holes of the armor.

The US ignores the ground support roles, and the navy at our own peril. We need to remember, the Soviets were more immediately scared operationally of Reagans Navy than star wars despite what the techie types in the pentagon would like us to remember.