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As wonderful as the Spads are, they are no A-10. I say that as a strong admirer of the A-1, but it's time has passed. I thought the Piper Enforcers (a P-51 with a turboprop, basically) would be nice, until I thought it through. Nope, there simply are no substitutes for the A-10s and Apaches.

At least, as things are now. I wish someone, somewhere, would come up with a replacement for the Warthogs, a modernized version, but the Air Farce is full of zoomies, not groundpounders.


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Jfruser, my understanding of manpads is congruent with your own. What survives amongst the airborne menagerie is much a matter of strategy and tactics. Nothing is without vulnerability but the style of application steers that buggy significantly. War is a very fluid envoirnment and it's better to have capabilities unused than wishes & dreams .

Air defense systems have their own vulnerabilities and as I recall Saddam Hussein could testify to that if he was still around.


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Here you go.

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Originally Posted by jfruser
Since VN, we have operated in environments where we crush enemy AD networks and then the only enemy AD left is MANPADS and light cannons. AD suppression of near-peer foes will not be so easy.


Yep. Build your sanctuary and operate in it. The biggest difference the last 50 years have made is the weapons available. Laser and GPS guided weapons have been transformational. "Hit my spot" has largely replaced "hit my smoke" and weapons like Maverick and the GBU-39 are incredibly lethal and have much smaller frag patterns than traditional bombs.

In Iraq during urban warfare concrete bombs were dropped that would wipe out an apartment with just frag and energy and not harm the neighbor next door.

Always room for a gun but when you can put a B-52 or B-1 20 miles away and have them drop a precision weapon that will strike within 12" guided by the guy on the ground in the action it's a game changer.

Those mad scientist at China Lake are always inventing.


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Why DOES the Air Force want to get rid of the A-10?

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Originally Posted by Triggernosis
Why DOES the Air Force want to get rid of the A-10?



It's a battle that has been going on since 1947. Some in the Air Force do not think Close Air Support should be the function of the Air Force at all and that is the opinion of the Army as well. The Air Force has always been commanded by fighter pilots with certain exceptions such as Curtis LeMay, they dont speak low and slow very well. All political.


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.The AF has always been forced to reinvent itself with changing threats, different theaters of operation and enemies with unorthodox tactics .LeMay's successful efforts to turn a ragtag WW2 bomber force into well disciplined squadrons was a win win fathering SAC as we all know..Korea was a test bed for new high performance aircraft yet left over low and slow WW2 recips proved their ability to handle a mutitude of tasks which only they could accomplish..

..Enter the long Vietnam war where early on we were shocked into a wake up call for reinventing the wheel.again...No guns on fast movers was a total misread of the threat which proved costly to many aircrews but then the light bulb came on again with hard point gunpods on wing stations first then the transition to self contained internal weaponry. Again we see the use of old vs new prosecuting the war with renewed technology upgrades such as retrofitting old DC-3's with mini guns for the gunship program I was proud to have been a part of..

..The Air Force is certainly not perfect which is an understatement be it by design or intervention however as with other branches has boxed itself into mainly trial and error mode relying on outside sourcing for policy making.


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Originally Posted by jnyork
Originally Posted by Triggernosis
Why DOES the Air Force want to get rid of the A-10?



It's a battle that has been going on since 1947. Some in the Air Force do not think Close Air Support should be the function of the Air Force at all and that is the opinion of the Army as well. The Air Force has always been commanded by fighter pilots with certain exceptions such as Curtis LeMay, they dont speak low and slow very well. All political.

Gotcha. I had forgotten about that.

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Originally Posted by FlyboyFlem
Enter the long Vietnam war where early on we were shocked into a wake up call for reinventing the wheel.again...No guns on fast movers was a total misread of the threat which proved costly to many aircrews but then the light bulb came on again with hard point gunpods on wing stations first then the transition to self contained internal weaponry. .


No guns on fighters may have worked out fine if Robert Strange McNamara hadn't implemented an ROE that gave away all the advantages of radar guided missiles to ensure the MiGs of the 1950s; had the advantage.


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These would be fine fighting a narco terrorist in Columbia, but not in a real shooting war. I could see them used in some anti-terrorist measures if the bad guys didn't have ground to air rockets or good AA guns.

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Originally Posted by Triggernosis
Why DOES the Air Force want to get rid of the A-10?



Because it's not fast and sexy.... Even more so, because it does not require a multi billion $$ development program with billions more in logistical tail.

In my career, I've flown H-60's doing rescue, and later C-17's. I've participated in multiple large force excercises, and several deployments. I've never been a ground pounder.

In -60's, we operated with A-10's, Apaches, F-16's and OH-58's in varying degrees as our "rescort." - The Sandy misson where the Hawks do the pickup, and the armed AC clear the way, and protect the Hawks during the run in and pickup.

The A-10's were by far the best. They were fast enough to daisy chain around us and scout ahead, but slow and low enough to keep eyeballs on us. The F-16's were almost useless. They had no time, they were too high and too fast to see us, and they couldn't engage pop up targets fast enough. The Apaches and 58's were less than useless. They flew slower than us, and couldn't scout ahead without us running racetracks.

I disagree with most posts here. I would LOVE the AF to pick up light attack. Why? Because the A-10 is not coming back into production. It just isn't for too many logistical reasons. Light Attack can't replace the A-10, nor should it. What we then have is a huge gap between the F-35 and the AH-64. Light Attack AT-6's cost less to buy, and less to operate than the Apache. They have longer loiter time, and can react faster to a TIC call (troops in contact). They are more able to evade manpads than AH-64's.

Very importantly, there's a finite number of hours available on an airframe. These low intensity wars we've been fighting have eaten up a lot of hours on the A-10's, F-16's and B-1's. Cheap light airframes can fill a big gap and keep the hours off of our WW3 planes.

Why do they have two seats? Because the airframe is designed for 2 seats. The T-6 Texan II trainer is the base airframe. It would acutally cost more to redesign it for singe seat. Also, the weight is negligible. It can carry 4,000 lbs of stuff... break that down in gas, people and weapons. A 200lb guy isn't that much in the grand scheme of things. I also kind of doubt that the AF would actually carry 2 people on most missions (the Apache needs 2 BTW).

Last edited by LoadClear; 02/12/20.

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Some light attack aircraft might possibly fill a niche, since there isn't currently anything like them in USAF service. I do believe that an armored brute force stomper like the A10 is needed too. Will the F35 with fancy expensive guided munitions do both of those jobs, plus be an effective fighter? Starts sounding too much like the one size fits all plan of things.

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Originally Posted by Pugs
Originally Posted by jfruser
Since VN, we have operated in environments where we crush enemy AD networks and then the only enemy AD left is MANPADS and light cannons. AD suppression of near-peer foes will not be so easy.


Yep. Build your sanctuary and operate in it. The biggest difference the last 50 years have made is the weapons available. Laser and GPS guided weapons have been transformational. "Hit my spot" has largely replaced "hit my smoke" and weapons like Maverick and the GBU-39 are incredibly lethal and have much smaller frag patterns than traditional bombs.

In Iraq during urban warfare concrete bombs were dropped that would wipe out an apartment with just frag and energy and not harm the neighbor next door.

Always room for a gun but when you can put a B-52 or B-1 20 miles away and have them drop a precision weapon that will strike within 12" guided by the guy on the ground in the action it's a game changer.

Those mad scientist at China Lake are always inventing.


And to think I use to call on those ""mad scientist"" what was I thinking. Cheers NC


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Originally Posted by northcountry
And to think I use to call on those ""mad scientist"" what was I thinking. Cheers NC


I did a LOT of special projects at China Lake in my career and really enjoyed it. The flying was great and invariably the "what if" ideas they came up with make you appreciate their passion even if sometimes you'd come back from a flight with a "WTF were we thinking" grin

Pretty much all my flying there was with VX-5 then VX-9. We'd bring our jet down for the week or so since their Prowler was often down for maint or getting modded to fit something new on it.


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A little jealous here Pugs.

I'll get over it. laugh


I am..........disturbed.

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For me the issue with this concept has always been about survivability since I flew many missions in danger close environments.. You won't necessarily be engaged by ZSU's slinging 23 mike mike or fixed 37 or 57 mm AAA most of the time but however you slice & dice it this is a very fragile airframe, I doubt its ability to absorb even the smallest amount of punishment and survive..Redundancy is next to zero and the fact they plant a WSO in the back seat just because it's inherent to the airframe design makes no sense.

Guess we will just agree to disagree on this one ...


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Originally Posted by FlyboyFlem
For me the issue with this concept has always been about survivability since I flew many missions in danger close environments.. You won't necessarily be engaged by ZSU's slinging 23 mike mike or fixed 37 or 57 mm AAA most of the time but however you slice & dice it this is a very fragile airframe, I doubt its ability to absorb even the smallest amount of punishment and survive..Redundancy is next to zero and the fact they plant a WSO in the back seat just because it's inherent to the airframe design makes no sense.

Guess we will just agree to disagree on this one ...



Survivability is less of an issue in low intensity conflicts like we have now. This aircraft wouln't be used against a near peer enemy in the opening days. It's for COIN. Just because it has a back seat, doesn't mean it has a WSO. The F-16B/D has a back seat, but doesn't have a WSO. Having a back seat does offer flexibility however... Could be used as an ISR asset for example.


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Originally Posted by LoadClear
Originally Posted by FlyboyFlem
For me the issue with this concept has always been about survivability since I flew many missions in danger close environments.. You won't necessarily be engaged by ZSU's slinging 23 mike mike or fixed 37 or 57 mm AAA most of the time but however you slice & dice it this is a very fragile airframe, I doubt its ability to absorb even the smallest amount of punishment and survive..Redundancy is next to zero and the fact they plant a WSO in the back seat just because it's inherent to the airframe design makes no sense.

Guess we will just agree to disagree on this one ...



Survivability is less of an issue in low intensity conflicts like we have now. This aircraft wouln't be used against a near peer enemy in the opening days. It's for COIN. Just because it has a back seat, doesn't mean it has a WSO. The F-16B/D has a back seat, but doesn't have a WSO. Having a back seat does offer flexibility however... Could be used as an ISR asset for example.


I agree on the ISR format and with this airframe an extra set of eyes may be a good thing !


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What is it about the warthog that the damn Air Force just doesn’t get? The Army should just tell the AF to GFY, go back to square one, create an army air wing and buy their own...

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Originally Posted by Dryfly24
What is it about the warthog that the damn Air Force just doesn’t get? The Army should just tell the AF to GFY, go back to square one, create an army air wing and buy their own...


I've posted this many times before and don't mind again..The very first A-10's I saw fly in here and I'm talking many yrs ago where OD and had US Army logo on their tail feathers..It was all about logistics as the Army had no bases conducive for air ops and most likely would have ended up on AFB's anyway...As for buying their own there aren't any unless they want to resurrect them from the bone yard at DM..

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