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Agreed! During the Korean War, the Fifth Air Force insisted upon and received jurisdiction over the 1st Marine Air Wing, which essentially eliminated the type of close-air support that only Marine pilots attempt, diving below tree-top level to deliver munitions just over the heads of the infantry.

Most calls for air support by the 1st Marine Division during the Korean War, when filtered through Fifth Air Force, either never arrived or arrived, too, late. It became a near-perpetual boondoggle and irrefutably cost the Corps heavily with regard to casualties.

How about this to get the attention of Air Force types who think close ground support is "beneath" them: deployed US forces are deployed under the jurisdiction of various regional commands (eg, Central Command covers the middle east, Pacific Command handles the Pacific region, etc). Units of various service branches are deployed to various commands. My proposal is to have the commanders of the various commands write the promotion evaluations of unit commanders under their jurisdiction, rather than their service hierarchy. Thus, if you are the CO of an Air Force wing in Iraq, your promotability will be determined by how the CO CentCom likes how you are supporting his mission

And flag-officer promotions, of whatever branch, would be controlled by a board of ALL the regional commanders

Whatever your service branch, you would either be a team player, or be passed over and cashiered

You are reaching. . .reaching way back.

Korea?

Okay, here goes (from a Gulf War I combat experienced ground FAC):

". . .which essentially eliminated the type of close-air support that only Marine pilots attempt, diving below tree-top level to deliver munitions just over the heads of the infantry. "

Nonsense.

Vietnam ring a bell? .

Back in the 80's I flew the A-10 and low level CAS was the plan of the day. Just ask ANY grunt on the ground in Germany that took part in the exercises.

Flying LOW is not a measure of "close." Not at all, and it's time people understood that fact.

Close has to do do with how close we deliver the munition. Altitude has nothing to do with it. CAS is basically the delivery of weapons while under positive control while in close proximity to friendly troops.

If you can deliver munitions accurately from outside the bad guy envelope, best do it that way. You increase your chances of surviving and being able to fly more missions. Flying low and into the teeth of the bad guys just because it looks neat in an air show is foolish. If you can deliver accurately from altitude or stand-off, do it. We USAF do fly into the teeth when the situation warrants and we pay the price (Steve Phillis, GWI).

Amateurs that watch too many movies and never studied the science of CAS always seem to make that same mistake. . .only believing CAS somehow means flying close to the ground.

Rubbish.