How about launching a few A-10's to fly patrols over the Strait of Hormuz? Those nose-mounted Gatling guns would make mincemeat of Iran's Bass Boat Navy in nothing flat! Ocean Skeet!
Jerry

Airforce does not operate from carriers.. But surely there is someplace close enough on land they could operate out of.

Although I am sure our Navy and Marine aviators could quickly eliminate anything Iran could put in the air or on the water.

Zap them with drones operated from Nellis AFB.

I have no interest in scoring, just counting. Dead is dead. Sunk is sunk. I'm willing to spend treasure, just not OUR blood.

Purple Hearts for nothing more serious than Carpal Tunnel during any Iranian conflict wouldn't irritate me a bit.

Nor I.

Navy don't want no ugly ass Warthogs.

They have enough ugly airplanes already, huh?

But marines under fire sure seem happy when they show up

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x36rsg2

'Hogs don't need no navy botes...

Mount those Gatlings on drones.

The only way an A-10 could be ugly in my eyes is if it fell into the wrong hands.

oldtrapper,

When (in the days when dinosaurs roamed the Earth!) we were "way down south" long ago & needed HELP, it was very comforting to hear the roar of a warthog "down in the weeds" & coming to get us out of any number of real messes.

I was pleased that the A10 is being "updated" & will be around to help the next generation of GIs when they need them.

yours, tex
USA, Retired

Yes. In spite of the Air Force brass.

Could it catapult, easily I'd say. But could it trap, don't think so. The landing gear and some internal construction on an aircraft that is designed to trap aboard ship is a good bit different.

Not sure you can add a tailhook to just any airplane as an afterthought.

The Warthog is a thing of beauty, IMO. An incredible weapon!

You don't tell a Warthog where to operate, you ask politely. They are kin to Chuck Norris.

160th SOAR has been used for operations of the gulf in the past: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/160th_Special_Operations_Aviation_Regiment_(Airborne)

They tore up small boats and platforms.

Anti- drone technologies and tactics are probably out there already and might be revealed if this Iranian stupidity gets ant worse.

PS Anyone remember when Obama delivered one of our drones to Ira---,I mean when the Iranians "captured" one of our drones and made it land on their field?

I have been through the straights a dozen times.....

Pucker factor was always through the roof.

Six guns don't miss 👍

Nope.

I doubt if an airforce pilot could land on a carrier deck in broad daylight.

We managed to get B-25's with bombs off of a WWII carrier (Dolittle raid on Tokyo). I'm thinking we could at least launch a partially armed A-10 off a carrier.

If this can...





Bruce

Warthogs are the Chuck Norris of the skies.

+1

g5m,

VERY TRUE. = The brass at HQ USAF never wanted the Warthog OR the CAS mission.
(CAS is VITAL for us ground-pounders but NOT "fancy" or glamorous enough for the Zoomies.)

Btw, when we Mike Papas talk about CAS & "Danger Close", we mean well-aimed fires within 10M of our fragile bodies.

Fyi, I've said for a long time that the A10 is PREFECTLY suited to the Army Aviation missions & that our LTs, Captains & Warrants would "have a ball" tearing up things IF they had the Warthog. = NO armored column, troop concentration, railway, bridge, tunnel, MSR, strong point and/or landing field would be safe from low speed/low level strafing/bombing by the Hog, when coordinated with fires from the other Army Aviation platforms.

Note to RVN vets: As I'm sure you remember, the Army HAD fixed-wing armed A/C in country & they were VERY effective at lots of tasks. - For example, what is now USASOCOM had OV-1 Mohawks that were "locally fitted with 7.62mm miniguns.

yours, tex
USA, Retired

CAS should be the job of the new Army Air Core.

Give them the Warthogs and get out of their way.

Props "bite" the air as soon as the plane starts to roll. Jets have to get a little speed up to force air into their intakes. That's why a jet doesn't slam the throttles all the way until it's rolling for a bit.

Getting them back was a bit of a problem. They landed all over the coast of China.

Crashed all over China. None were reusable.

Bullshit. Fans put out maximum thrust standing still (fans are nothing more than a ducted prop). In all reality an A-10 already has landed and taken off from a carrier deck. They only had to modify the already in place tailhook and they didn't use a cat shot to get airborne.

+1.............. And don't call them ugly. I have spoken to vets who were in situations where the sight of a Warthog was the most beautiful thing they have ever seen.

Have any proof of that?

Naah, all that’s needed is a few MK-20 rockeyes.

They sort of went out of business in 1947.

And it's corps by the way.

I'd say that's "proof" haha

Roger that!

I've sat in the IP seat for a few takeoffs. My job was to monitor engine instruments. We normally did static takeoffs. Taxi into position, set the brakes. Run the engines up to takeoff EPR, release brakes. Even on a 13k foot runway. The only time we were restricted to rolling takeoffs is when Boeing saw some data that suggest static takeoffs induced excessive stress on the tail. The EPR once set never changed (indicate additional thrust) as the aircraft accelerated to liftoff speed

That's a photoshopped pic. The original is an X-47B landing... The A-10 has never operated from a carrier. USAF fighters do however have a tailhook. It's used for emergency landings on USAF runways with BAK-12 arresting cables.

https://www.cnet.com/g00/news/hooked-x-47b-comes-in-for-a-carrier-landing/?i10c.ua=1&i10c.encReferrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8%3d&i10c.dv=19

"Jets have to get a little speed up to force air into their intakes" however, is entirely bullshit.

What other landplanes have experimentally or otherwise landed and/or taken off on a carrier? Any WWII AAF planes?

B-25 takeoff only

C-130 C-130 testing

OV-10 OV-10 testing

R4D (Navy C-47) R4D for Antarctica Takeoff only

Found one:

P-40 P-40 WWII carrier takeoff

Bruce

Just turn two keys at the same time in Wyoming and be done with it!

👍

Thanks for the verification.

Warthogs would be easy pickings for Iranian SAMs firing from Iran.

Take out the SAM batteries first with Wild Weasels- - - - -then splash their "Navy"!

As I understand, many of their SAMs are shoulder fired.

There would be a place for Hornets if such become needed. Hornets are well suited to air to sea attack.

Never underestimate an A-10C. Have saved thousands of lives and taken even more. They have been proven in Desert Storm, Kuwait, Iraq and now 15 +years in Afghaniland. A pemium CAS weapons platform.

So will the catapult not move it fast enough or will the air frame not take the G's? Will the plane be airborne at 150 knots or so?

The Iraqui SAMs, which were the latest Soviet versions, didn't seem to hurt the warthogs in that war, in large part because we eliminated their control centers with stealth aircraft.

It needs beefed up landing gear and frame. The F35C carrier version weighs 1500-2000lbs (sources differ) more than the F35A land version.

An A-10 brings fear into the eyes of the enemy. Not fast and certainly not stealthy but they are tough to bring down and the close in fire power can take care of any ground based enemy. I used to love to watch them practicing near the Fort Drum target area in upstate NY. They come in low and slow and strafe the enemy then do a tight loop and come right back with another burst. When those minis let go it brings a chill to my mind. As far sams taking them out our advanced stealth technology f22- f35 along with cruise missiles eliminate them. When their tanks start to roll and the ground troops start to move that is when the A-10 shines.

When I lived in central Louisiana, I could hear the 30 mms (England AFB) from about 20 miles away, if the wind was right.

Galena still has arrester equipment from back in the day when they had a pair of F-15s stationed there during the Cold War. They had just put Galena and King Salmon on ready stand-by when I went to work downriver in 1993.

We were fishing out of Conneaut harbor last week when two A-10 came in low and put on a little show, I feel they are some of my best spent tax dollars !

satx USASOC did not exist until 1987. When MPs talk about CAS and Danger Close? I am surprised to learn that calling in CAS is part of the MP mission and 10 meters certainly does call for well aimed fire.

The A1 D Skyraiders were the Prop CAS planes that I saw the most.


mike r

The only US planes that could provide CAS "danger close" in Nam were the A1E and OV10. Grunts don't enjoy having HE rain in their heads, particularly when delivered in large loads.

The U-2
https://www.cia.gov/news-informatio...e-u-2-flights-off-aircraft-carriers.html


P-47's were routinely delivered to the Pacific theater via aircraft carrier:

Interesting...

I wonder if they used the wing tip gear for takeoff and dropped them into the water or omitted them completely on the U-2.

The USAF LOVES CAS missions. They train it nearly every dang sortie! The reason the A-10 was on the chopping block was it was so fatigued and the previous budgets did not allow upgrades and improvements, it was the first viable option to be cut. It is a niche filling A/C. And with the current availability of insanely accurate, low NEW munitions, the gunfights are less and less needed.

You sound more like theory than reality.

First time I ever heard that big 30mm called a mini.

If you say so, Hoss. No, not Hoss, he's a great Viper pilot. Dingus, we will go with Dingus.

Yeah, a projectile that is nearly a pound in weight isn't too "mini" to me either.

Tell us how much experience you have in the world of combat in general and CAS in particular.

I've worked fighter aircraft for the past 16 years. Currently, I am working debrief and see the sortie schedules for the -16s in my squadron, CAS is at least 1/2 of the daily sorties with A/A situations being done seasonally and typically only one flight of committed A/A configurations. BFM is flown, often but with an emphasis on theatre insertion and safe exit.

P760,
You still stationed in S. Korea?

How much combat experience do you have? Not theory or support, the blood and guts kind.

I am, but currently TDY to Eielson, AK.

None. Where did I elude to it that I have?

It's always entertaining- - - -observing while the keyboard commandos and barstool tacticians pontificate! About the end of happy hour, they're in rare form- - - - -"Lemme tell ya how I won the war, sonny boy!"

Good grief, Charley Brown!

You didn't but your response above prompted the inquiry. Since you don't know much about CAS and have no experience I'll file you in the theoretical bin.

What would you use in support of a recon team requesting that you "shoot my smoke", knowing only that they had shallow foxholes? 20mm? HE rockets or bombs? How close would you place the fire?

Dingus

They look pretty damn good to me, as I bet they do to the guys down below them when they're flying CAS.

Coincidentally, my brother is in town and I asked him about A10s and carriers. He recently retired after 20+ years in the Air Force, many of those years on AC130s. His first response was "no idea", then a brain cell must have lit up and he told me a story about A10s when he was at Bagram. He said he saw fully loaded A10s struggling to get airborne from that airstrip and said that the only way he could see an A10 safely taking off from a carrier is if it had no load. Take that as the word of an Air Force lifer on the topic of Navy matters...

None of the pilots in the raid had ever taken off from a carrier before but all made it. It must be easy, right?

Edit: Lots of "experts" out there.

Maybe we could buy some SU-25's they can function from a STOBAR carrier, so they have half the problem licked.