Posted on 12/23/2016 5:50:07 AM PST by sukhoi-30mki
B-25 or A-20?
Oh good!
It already carries only half the initial payload requirement and has half the range, so let’s load it down with munitions so it can perform the A-10 mission at half the speed.
B-25 had the 75mm cannon.
whoda guessed? Theater commanders need gun ships, retrofit $72 million Osprey to do the job of $6 million Blackhawk. Which it ain’t as good as in ground support role.
Ditto replacement of A-10 by B-1/F-35.
We need to end the doctrine that bankrupting the country / disarming the military by spending all procurement dollars on grossly overpriced weapons is a good thing.
This can come in very useful. The Osprey doesn't need a carrier. It can land and take off from a regular ship's helicopter pad.
Youtube: V22 Osprey Landing on supply ship USNS Sacagawea
If a ship's helicopter pad is too small, or it doesn't even have a pad, the V-22 would be able to hover over a ship, drop a fuel line, suck up fuel, then go refuel an F-35.
OH-58C with the back doors off. You wore a harness connected to the opposite seatbelt and had a grunt M-60 with a shoulder strap. 2/17 Cav.
A lesson we learned in Vietnam. Helicopters are great, armed helicopters are better. I can’t imagine any commander not wanting to improve the survivability of an Osprey or it’s crew. Of course, there is a diminishing return, too much external load, loss of performance.
Under the 1948 "Key West Agreement", the Air Force is supposed to own all armed fixed-wing aircraft. The Army gets to have armed rotary-wing aircraft.
Trump should revisit this.
Fixed wing glide range is great, but at the end, you still hit the ground flying above stall speed (hopefully).
With a helo you can usually zero forward airspeed AND rate of descent.
Caveat - with a heavy helo, like the CH-53, your final rate of descent is still high enough that you’ll shove the landing gear up through the sponsons, unless you can do a roll-on landing to a hard surface.
It glides well enough to get to the scene of the crash.
Look over your shoulder ... And you, without much of anything on your bio, ask me?
Would love to see the Marines get some A-10 Warthogs for this mission. Might take some doing to make it carrier capable; but not unprecedented. The F-86 Sabre Jet was modified as the FJ Fury. The F-22 and F-35 aircraft will be used by Marines, Navy and Air Force.
Semper fi
Do or die
Logic only operates within the parameters we specify, however. Okie01 raised some additional important points to consider in post 40:
Me: I don't believe the Osprey's have anywhere near that kind of toughness.
Okie01: The A-10's job is to get up-close-and-personal with the enemy at ground level. Consequently, it's highly offensive...and built tough.
The Osprey's job is to deliver troops and supplies to forward areas -- which the A-10 can't do. It would be a good thing if the Osprey could defend itself -- and pass out a little punishment -- while it's performing this role./p>
He's absolutely right; they are two different aircraft, designed for two different missions. I agree with him that giving the Osprey the ability to defend itself is a good thing. My problem was the article seemed to imply that the Marines thought it could replace the A-10 as an offensive CAS (close air support) platform. I'm an admitted A-10 fan, and think we should just give it to the Army. (I also don't much care for the inter-service rivalry argument, wherein the Air Force doesn't want it, but they don't want the Army to have it even less.)
Most Impressive is the ability of the author to insert two of the most overpriced, under-performing, highest maintenance cost, lowest lift capacity aircraft, since the wright brothers first flight, into a single article!
F35B and Osprey in same Article: Now that is some world-class Bunk!.
Then there was the armed up CH-47 “Guns-a-go-go” program early in the Vietnam ground war. Some old footage on youtube & some articles on line.
In Vietnam I heard rumors of weaponized Chinooks used for QRF/perimeter defense. Never saw one though; I was in my Huey doing other missions.
“The Osprey has suffered from the fact that it was lighter armed than the Black Hawks and other platforms it replaced.”
Not the USAF ones. They have a chaingun.
I’m a dinosaur, like a lot of readers I would imagine.
Who are you calling a dinosaur, you young whipper-snapper! If you were in a T-34 with a Vne of 280kts, it must have been one of them new fangled T-34 Charlies. The "Teeny-Weenie" (T-34B) had a Vne of about 165, IIRC.
/S
Now the T-28 B/C would get on down the road!
Auto rotation, look it up.
Pure fantasy.
They need to be turned into the scrap yard and museums.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.