They just have to hold out until we get a real president, one who puts America first.
By far my favorite plane in the U.S. arsenal. Save the Warthog!
This airplane has been on the hit list since before the first Gulf War, when it saved itself through service in that war by being so versatile and useful that the generals hoping to retire into work at competitive manufacturers were sore.
When the report does not compare replacement costs, and at benefit to whom, the story is incomplete.
It’s reliable, consistent and ominously scary to the enemy.
Anyone who has never seen a pair of slow, whistling A 10s go overhead is missing it, the Taliban know this.
I believe we would all be best served by selling the lot of them (steeply discounted) to the Texas militia. There by moving that particular weapons platform to a more responsible party.
I’m just not seeing how fighter jets can take over low speed loiter support roles.
Maybe the USAF could save money by closing some of their golf courses.
Make the Staff Officers play at public courses.
It’s absolutely consistent that this admin would do everything it can do to shunt aside and retire one of the most effective and lowest cost weapons we have. Didn’t the whole fleet of these things just undergo (and may not even be done) with I believe a $10 bn wing update? That’s chump change in terms of an aircraft program. I am 100% sure the problem with this plane is that it’s too cheap.
Personally I believe a 5/8 scale A-10 drone with miniguns instead of the GAU-8 would be an awesome weapon, though more anti-personnel versus anti-tank.
I had an Apache pilot tell me that the carnage that the A-10s can deliver is just frightening.
If the DOD or the USAF are looking for a program to cancel I suggest that's the one.
They need to amend this stupid law that prohibits the Army from having fixed wing aircraft (except for utility category) aircraft in their inventory
Removing a vital war fighting asset that has saved many a US life is just about criminal
While sitting in your trench ,you could lift your arm and light a match on the belly of these things
Truthfully, the heart of the A-10 is its engines. If congress could just appropriate money to build the high quality engines, we could export the engines to an ally who could build a fleet of A-10s, outside of the US where it is a perpetual political football.
The trick is that all of its electronics and critical systems are modular and redundant. So they would produce planes with a lot of empty slots, and if the US needed them, it would make just these systems, and plug them in to the basic plane.
The best part is that once in production, per unit cost would be around $20-25 million per plane, which is very inexpensive, compared to say, the Raptor, which is about $150 million each.
#339 Million? Chump change in today’s world of Four Trillion Dollar Federal Budgets.
That’s less than the VA spends on Solar Panels or Obama spends on Vacations.
In all seriousness, didn’t the Air Force spend more than that brewing up some Bio Jet Fuel that costs ten times as much as regular Jet Fuel? Nothing like Priorities.
I’m ready to make a low ball bid on one with it’s weapons systems disabled.
Love to fly one out of this little airport.
Shake up the neighborhood.
Add me to the list of Warthog fans. What a great war machine!
Solve the problem once and for all:
Make an inter-service transfer of all aircraft, support equipment and personnel to the Army and/or the USMC. The folks who really need and appreciate CAS should own and control the assets.
There are a heckuva lot of state Guard and Reserve units flying the A-10, so it was easy to get House support. Now let’s see of the Senate can back up the House, and if Zero will sign the papers.
As the article states, the real issue will be that the Air Force is not provided the funding to actually keep them operational.
IIRC this happened years ago with the USN carrier fleet. The USN wanted to retire the USS Kennedy. Congressional legislation prohibited it from doing so. So it parked the ship at Mayport FL with a skeleton crew and, ostensibly, kept it “in commission” for a few years.
Unless funding is found, that’s exactly what’s going to happen to the A-10 fleet. The planes will be parked where they are with no preservation and little to no maintenance, the squadrons kept “open” with minimal/cadre staffing all the while the experience to maintain and operate them is passively drawn down to the point where they can only be returned to combat-read status through exorbitant expenditure of funding.
The A-10 is exactly what we should have in Iraq now!!!
The stupid survalance flights aren’t worth squat!