What it asked for and needs is a plane. But AF politics prevent that.
As for facts: helicopters are inherently inefficient platforms. They use horsepower rather than aerodynamics to stay aloft. The AH 64's payload is 1,700 pounds. The A-10's payload is 16,000 pounds. Their standby time is infinitely shorter. That is the difference between a helicopter and a plane.
That a 1980's era square peg is better than a 1960's era square peg doesn't make either fit into a round hole.
If the Army's deep strike capability is so obviously flawed (and I won't deny that mission was a disaster...their ORP was directly above an AAA position.) why didn't the AF do the mission? I can guarantee that the Army manuever commanders don't care who gets the mission done as long as it gets done.
If you are going to lecture me on Army Aviation you may want to familiarize yourself with them first. They see themselves as manuever assets, not CAS assets. And any claims that they are misunderstood is from the ground assets trying to get them to actually do CAS. And that failed mission is a prime example of them pretending to be manuever assets.
The people who talked to me (and I was in 3ID, although not at the time in went into Iraq) certainly weren't talking about how the AF destroyed all the Iraqi armor. I don't deny that the AF can shape the battlefield at the strategic level. They cannot at the operational and tactical level. That is missing...and that is what is needed. That is not a glamorous role. The AF didn't want to do it, so they didn't. The Army tried to get helicopters to do it, and they decided they didn't want to do it either. But the mission needs to be done. And we don't have the proper capability.
Claiming that people are 'bashing' the AF does not protect the AF from the truth. I have no complaints about their air-to-air. I have no complaints about their strategic bombing capabilities, or their logistics. But they are ignoring an important responsibility...and it is my life on the line when it doesn't get done. Accusing me of bashing doesn't get CAS done.
You give AF politics too much credit. They are hardly responsible for DoD policy reaching back to the late 40's.
"why didn't the AF do the mission? I can guarantee that the Army manuever commanders don't care who gets the mission done as long as it gets done."
Two reasons. First, the Army requested the mission. Second, the Army moved the Fire Support Coordination Line forward so quickly they outreached their own capability. Since they own the airspace inside the FSCL, the Air Force couldn't hit targets inside that line without direct coordination with army ground commanders. That wasn't possible, because the Army didn't have the assets to provide the required control that far forward of their actual leading edge.
"If you are going to lecture me on Army Aviation you may want to familiarize yourself with them first. They see themselves as manuever assets, not CAS assets."
Interesting that the Army ignores the CAS role. Perhaps it's not glamorous enough?
"And that failed mission is a prime example of them pretending to be manuever assets."
You've lost me here. Are they really CAS assets pretending to be manuever assets, or manuever assets that incorrectly get tasked as CAS assets?
"The people who talked to me certainly weren't talking about how the AF destroyed all the Iraqi armor."
Yet, did they describe great armor battles with the thousands of tanks of the Iraqi Republican Guard divisions. The fact is, what wasn't destroyed was abandoned before V Corps entered the scene. Obviously, it wasn't Army assets that did that.
"That is missing...and that is what is needed. That is not a glamorous role. The AF didn't want to do it, so they didn't."
You are so grossly ignorant on this point that I'm guessing you actually have no actual insight on the facts. The facts are that after the first week of the war, every single Air Force combat aircraft in theater was flying either in a CAS role or in a battlefield interdiction role in direct support of Army and Marine Corps ground maneuvers.
" Claiming that people are 'bashing' the AF does not protect the AF from the truth."
Except you are not speaking the truth. And you were not on the ground in Iraq. I was in a position with high visibility on what CAS was requested versus what was actually provided. The greatest problem the Navy and Air Force had in Iraq was getting enough requests to employ their ordinance.