Posted on 12/22/2016 11:25:10 AM PST by StormPrepper
Check the video at this link. John McCain earning his pay at the hearings for phasing out the A-10.
"The B1 Bomber will now be used for close air support? This is why we can't take you seriously..."
(Excerpt) Read more at youtube.com ...
Well could be or not. That’s all speculation.
There is however, solid evidence he lied when he said let through that he volunteered to turn down an offer of freedom. The evidence comes from Admiral Stockdale’s own book that as CO of the Hanoi Hilton he gave the order to every POW that no one was to leave unless they all did.
So McCain was just following orders but instead he let the lie be created that he was some kind of hero.
As for his heroism, I reviewed each of his commendations, ribbons, medals and not one of them detailed what heroic acts he made in the line of duty other than to get shot down. And such a description is required by military manuals. I linked to the manuals, pages and paragraphs and they were not follwed. I then examined other heros in the Hanoi Hilton and their acts were indeed detailed.
As I wrote last summer, there were wounded men rotting away in the jungles that had given far more than McCain ever did. Yet they received not even one-tenth of the commendations that McCain received.
McCain was the grandson and son of Admirals. He was an ‘Admiral’s boy’ and earned for his 19 hours of combat duty about one medal per hour with no heroism ever described.
He merely did his duty and survived as a POW. He was no hero.
Then when he came home to his loyal steadfast wife who had been stressed out for years over his imprisonment, he dumped her because she had gained a little weight and he married a younger wealthier woman and proceeded to use her Arizona connections and money to run for Goldwater’s Senate Seat.
He is a despicable human being through and through.
Because all of us are now living in an ‘Age of Awareness’, an ‘Age of Connectivity’, with social media and an ability to cross-connect and bypass the national news media, we saw through McCain immediately after he attacked Donald Trump in the summer of 2015. I did my homework and was sickened to see what I found on McCain, and I happened to be trained as a very unbiased objective researcher.
In fact, last summer when I did research on Donald Trump, I went in thinking he was a no-good lying scumbag but came up finding he was the exact opposite. It shocked the hell out of me to find that Donald Trump is one of the kindest men on the planet with an even bigger heart. It really shocked me.
——Close Air Support from 30,000 feet is possible these days.-——
Maybe, but if I have a heavy MG position 75 feet from me, I prefer CAS that can get an eyes on after I pop smoke and myself not get hit by the resulting shytstorm.
His getting tortured is debatable.
I agree that it is debatable but it is in the arena of speculation whereas the evidence I found about NcCain’s true character is irrefutable.
Donald also had character flaws but being a liar was never one of them.
McCain is a liar. I can’t stand liars.
I have nothing good to say about McCain’s true character.
I don’t have any facts or proof but spent enough time in the early 70’s with my husband sitting in the O Clubs at Ramstein AFB and the Monterey Naval Base listening to stories about him to develop an opinion.
My opinion is that he is a complete traitor, a Manchurian Candidate, who lived well as a POW.
Depends on the definition of “close” but the Bones & Buffs did fine during the early Taliban campaign in Afghanistan.
yeah, that’s what I meant
We’re on the same page.
If that MG position is truly 75 FEET from your position, I think I would trust a dedicated weapons system operator looking at a magnified video or IR view of the target and lasing the exact spot until a 500 lb bomb turns it into a smoking hole, than I would a pilot with Mark I eyeballs trying to unload 30mm rounds while also avoiding controlled flight into terrain.
Or more realistically, you call in an Army AH-64 Apache who will expend a laser guided Hellfire.
What you miss in your cloistered view is that ground combat is the focus of effort in war: the air fight is a supporting arm. The young people in the ground fight need air support, surgically applied, to overcome enemy strongpoints, assembly areas, routes of reinforcement and retreat. It isn’t the same as airfield defense and nowhere as simple.
The Air Force has stubbornly resisted the “air-delivered artillery” perspective for more than three quarters of a century, insisting that “battlefield interdiction” is the proper use of air power - there is even an excellent color film that was put out in 1944 that described that tactic in lieu of close air support in the Italian theater.
Those of us on the ground know how effective a good air strike can be and how many of our lives will be at risk without that magnificent asset. I very likely owe my life and many of the lives around me to a low-flying F-4 with a load of Snake and Nape with a crew with brass balls. He was flying very low Indeed and he did not miss.
Merely guiding a munition to a given grid doesn’t do enough. Close Air requires knowing who you are supporting, what you are engaging, and that you can react very, very quickly - including munition flight time to the target and the configuration of the target array. Close Air Support makes the aircraft and crew an integral part of the ground combat element, not just a visiting bomb delivery system.
The most effective CAS is when the pilots have trained with the supported unit, know their supported commanders well, and have good training in target recognition as well as orienting their approach to be parallel to the friendly front lines where possible.
All of the wonderful technologies are excellent - but no substitute for knowing your "customer" and their needs in the close fight.
Precise coordination is now available via data-link. CAS remains something driven by the GROUND commander.
Nothing beats hits on target, too - which is easier when you are not at 100’ trying to avoid hitting the ground AND still hitting the target.
I’m an A-10 fan, but they’ve made mistakes too.
Pat yourself on the back for your service as a FAC. That's badass. But like McCain, your expertise ran out of currency a couple decades ago. It's a new world out there and it has obviously passed you by.
Proud of yourself? You have no idea what my combat history or my subsequent contributions to combined arms have been, but you feel free to throw a gratuitous slap my way for being an older veteran. Well done. How much difference between you and the average young and snotty Hillary voter?
Now a little reality; "loitering" over the battlefield for 8 hours in a bomb truck is only possible in an entirely permissive environment. The real world rarely has situations like in Afghanistan where we can fly at medium and high altitude doing donuts, sipping coffee. We get involved with a serious enemy with serious anti-air systems and there will be scattered B1B parts over several acres. Waiting around for S-300P or an S-400 to find you has limited long-term career potential. At least when you're down low in the clutter, the big boys have a harder time finding you, the munitions reach the target faster, and the ground guys can see your smiling face.
The Marine Corps picked the F-35B as we always do to try to satisfy multiple requirements and to maximize interoperability. Can't say at this point that it was the best decision; we'll see. We never picked the A-10 because we didn't envision taking on the Warsaw Pact tanks en masse and the 'Hog wasn't really suited to carrier operations.
I am a big believer in technologies - I have developed several new systems myself (I am a Program Manager for advanced weapon systems) - but I also know that we can't entirely rely on technologies in battle because systems fail, usually at the worst time possible. When they fail, we need the ability to continue the mission manually with the Mark One eyeball, down low in the grass if the ground guys need it.
Right, Kid?
Follow the money.
They have indeed: when I had an artillery battalion, I had a truck in my motor pool that looked like a colander with small shrapnel holes. It was hit by a "friendly" A-10 that didn't know what our stuff looked like.
Another important reason for our flying comrades to spend more time with the ground-gaining folks to learn how we do our job and how to best support it.
Now that's funny, right there--if it weren't so damned true.
You must have another definition of CAS....
Used to be a Warthog in the Air Force Museum in Dayton, OH. The Warthog is actually fairly small with one big bad ass machine gun on the front. The museum is a wonderful way to spend a day if you get the chance. It is literally a walk through aviation history.
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