Posted on 05/27/2017 6:25:58 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Air Force leaders have reversed an Obama administration decision on the A-10 attack plane known as the Warthog.
The previous administration had decided to retire the aircraft, viewing it as an unaffordable extra in what had been a time of tight budgets.
Three years ago the Pentagon proposed scrapping the Warthog fleet as a way of saving $3.5 billion. Congress rejected that idea. Each of the next two years the military tried again, putting off the Warthog's retirement a bit further in the future each time....
(Excerpt) Read more at usnews.com ...
P47 was an excellent aircraft. Learned more about the from a friend who’s father flew one in WWII. We traveled to Millville, NJ for a racing event. It was a major training base for the P47. Upon entering the track, they had dioramas of a bunker with a scaled down 3/4 size plane in it. When walking the dirt parking area I found a spent 50 cal casing. This was in 2015.
After the first 15 seconds on contact, any low flying plane or helicopter would have been on borrowed time back then ...
The A10 was designed around the nose gun. The F15 was designed around the radar and the F16 around the ejection seat.
That's why I can't understand why they bought an airplane without a gun.
Those who worked with/flew them loved them for the incredibly capable machines they are. Friends who were in Desert Storm had nothing but praise for the job they did to clear out tanks and other artillery.
A-10s out of Whiteman AFB fly in pairs over the Lake of the Ozarks at least once a week. Someone said the pilots plan attacks on one of the bridges across the lake...
Have you seen this one about the P-47 in Italy?
Link
Buddy of mine was in Iraq early. They met fierce resistance across a river. His sergeant sarcastically asked him if they should call in the Warthogs. My buddy just smiled and said “sucks to be them”. They dug in for a few minutes, heard the hogs, and poof-no resistance. Ask any grunt about the hogs
Love the pics and the moto. Thanks.
That is one helluva keeper image and I have many.
Thanks. I asked my son if he saw an A-10 while in the stan and he said no. He’s a former Marine so I’ll check out the MAGTF. I bet they’re ALL happier with the new ROE, although not as happy as they could be.
LOL. Appreciated by a former Marine mom. He always loved the dirt. Now he hates sand.
Indeed. CAS is hard. It’s worse if you don’t have airframes designed for it!
I have not. Thank you for sharing
That film you just linked, that’s the film the documentary is about. I didn’t recognize the title but I have seen it. The gun cam footage is pretty crazy.
That would be a pretty awesome find. It’s not common to find left overs like that. Ive been to a number of decommissioned military airbases while filming standing mile races. I always poke around the dirt and look for little things like that and have yet to find anything.
“The Air Force has hated the close air support mission from the start, and compared to the Marines, they’ve pretty much sucked at it. “
Not really, and reaching back to WWII to make your point is a bit of a stretch. Things have changed a lot since then.
The reason for the Air Force trying to kill the Hog is because of the JSF — need funding, and the Hog is a single-mission jet, and the bean-counters in SAF/AQ are looking at the JSF (multi-mission) versus the Hog (single-mission). To those bean-counters you get more bang for your buck going with a multi-mission jet not a single-mission jet. They are wrong on that one.
CAS is a USAF mission that is second to the USAF air superiority mission. You need air superiority before you can focus on protecting the guys on the ground through CAS. You can fly CAS absent air superiority but that scenario makes CAS all that more difficult.
CAS in the Hog - a terrific and capable platform, very accurate, versatile and has an ability to loiter in the target area for multiple passes (unlike the Marine Harrier that could only hang around for a single pass, maybe two).
Marines have their “own” CAS because the Marines were not expected to “go deep” and would remain with specific units. That works for the Marines but does not work theater-wide.
Attaching a jet to a specific unit limits it effectiveness, as we found out back in WWII. Back then specific AAF jets were attached to specific Army units, and if not needed the Army units kept them for “what if. . .” missions, thereby depriving other Army units of important CAS support.
The Air Component Commander follows the lead of the Joint Forces Combatant Commander (Army). The commander apportions CAS assets based upon the needs of the Army, not the Air Force.
And most any jet can perform CAS. This is a concept most people have a hard time getting their mind around. A lot of people think a jet needs to fly low, very low, and the lower the better. That is fundamentally wrong. You only fly low when the A/A environment makes you fly low. Many a Hog-driver has been shot-up and killed giving it all for the guys on the ground (lost a student of mine in the first Gulf War: https://airforce.togetherweserved.com/usaf/servlet/tws.webapp.WebApp?cmd=ShadowBoxProfile&type=Person&ID=89212).
It is weapons effects that define CAS, meaning you can fly at 50,000 feet and if you have accurate targeting/weapons you can deliver ordnance in close proximity to friendly forces. Today’s JDAMS, SDB, etc, basically makes every bomb-dropper a CAS platform. The A-10 gun is unmatched by any other gun; accurate, powerful, multiple trigger-pulls. It truly is the ‘fist of gawd.’
To say again: the Air Force is to control the skies, first, then CAS platforms (too include Marine CAS) can then be flown under a protective cover.
Last time US troops on the ground came under enemy fire from enemy aircraft - Korea.
CAS is a challenging mission that requires skills completely different than A/A or deep strike. And the Air Force is darned good at it. . .ask any grunt on the ground.
(I’ve called in live CAS and flown CAS in my A-10. Impressive accuracy and surviveability.)
Logistics and hard-surface runways, maintenance and weapons depots, etc. . .hard for the Army to build those things while on the move.
And we did try it back a few years, see my earlier post.
Don’t agree with that.
I have my reasons that cannot be addressed here.
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