U.S. Army Battles for Control of Smart Weapons

Strategy Page ^ | May 5, 2005 | James Dunnigan

[strategofr]

The army and the air force fight over who can be trained to call in air strikes just keeps on getting uglier.

The basic problem is that the air force is stonewalling U.S. Army efforts to expand the FAC (forward air controller) force. The army wants FAC support as widespread as their current artillery FO (Forward Observer, for artillery and attack helicopter) support. The air force insists that air force pilots be part of the FAC teams (which mostly contain air force sergeants), have higher security clearances and generally remain air force personnel.

The army wants to train their people to perform FAC duties. The air force fears losing up to 5,000 personnel slots if the army wins this tussle. If you lose missions, Congress takes some of your money away, and that's what all this is really about.

The latest army ploy is to develop ways to do without a lot of the air force bomber support. This is being done by introducing more army GPS guided weapons. This year, the army will issue artillery units the 155mm GPS guided Excalibur shell. If this works in combat (it has in tests), that will mean fewer calls for air force bombers. The army is also developing a GPS guided MLRS rocket.

This is important, because the rocket carries ten times as much explosives as the 155mm shell, and has a longer range as well (up to 70 kilometers). Some army officers are wondering why they can’t have their larger transport helicopters fly high and drop 500 or 250 pound JDAMs out the back. The air force would fight that one, but the army is the service with people in combat right now, not the air force. So air force arguments carry less weight. Even if the army doesn’t start using JDAMs, they have more equally accurate missiles under development as part of their FCS (Future Combat System) effort.

The main army problem is not with getting bomber support for Special Forces and other commando operations. The air force has no problem putting a B-52 or B-2 at the army’s disposal, anywhere in the world, on short notice, for these operations. Where the army does have a problem is getting air force support for larger army units engaged in sustained combat.

There just aren’t enough air force FACs to support the way the army wants to fight. The army wants smart bombs and missiles available all the time during combat, for all the combat troops involved. For the army, it’s a matter of life and death. For the air force, at least according to many army officers, it’s more of a budgeting problem.

[strategofr]

This is a serious issue that has been around, in different forms, for decades. It is why, in part, the Marines have their own planes. And Marine planes, historically, have been more under the control of the guys on the ground in the fight.

The Air Force has traditionally hated the ground combat support role and been more enamoured of fighter combat and/or bombing enemy cities. See Boyd, the Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War (by Robert Coram, Black Bay Books, 2002) on the development of the A-10, maybe the greatest ground support plane ever---see index under A-10 Warthog.

In addition, interservice rivalry has always been a problem. Hence Boyd's line, "We don't care what the Russians are doing. We only care what the Navy is doing."

This is a support the grunts issue. I have the greatest respect for airmen, but we the people need to get behind our grunts in this battle with Air Force Brass.

[in hoc signo vinces]

Man...fix the budget then. Allocate more, the various service branches are already getting more funding than any time since the Korean War (including the Reagan Era)...granted they need it.

It's pretty simple. If troops in a forward area need a feaking smart bomb to take out some whack-job jihadists...or Ted Kennedy on a drinking/whoring binge give it to them.

Granted Inter-service Rivalry has been going on since America had a military...but there's enough Glory to go around these days.

[King Prout]

lordy... key west accords, round umpteen.

[Starwolf]

I always found the push for the CAS version of the F-16 somewhat amusing while the USAF brass was doing all it could to kill the Warthogs, a machine designed for just that mission.

Ground troops are real serious about the call for fires approach. They literally don't care where it comes from as long as it is timely and accurate. A giant bomb dispenser in the sky would suit them just fine.

[El Gato]

This is a support the grunts issue. I have the greatest respect for airmen, but we the people need to get behind our grunts in this battle with Air Force Brass.

The battle should be with Congress and the Executive branch. The problem is that there aren't enough precision guided bombs to support high tempo large Army formations. I'm sure the Air Force has no problem using BUFFS to hit enemy troops on or near the line of battle, but they'll have to do it mostly with dumb bombs, provided of course that the air environment is such that the BUFFs can operate. It's one thing to go in "under the radar" to nuke a military installation. It's quite another to operate up where every missile site in the country can see and shoot at you. Too much of that and you run out of BUFFs (of which there less than 100 flying) pretty quickly (There are only about 60 B-1s and 20 B-2s) They only built 102 B-52H models (the only ones still flying) and many of them are not longer flyable. Like this one

If it's the one I'm thinking of, that one ended up as a smoking hole and a ball of twisted aluminum. Most of the crew survived though, when the crew compartment broke off from the rest of the aircraft on "landing".

[El Gato]

Allocate more, the various service branches are already getting more funding than any time since the Korean War (including the Reagan Era)...

Only in then year dollar terms. In real, that is constant dollar terms, they are not. In terms of the fraction of the GDP (formerly GNP), the current DoD spending levels are still near post WW-II lows, excepting those achieved during the 'toon adminstration.

[snarks_when_bored]

What's most important is what's best for the defense of this country, not what's best for the Army or the Air Force. Somebody needs to knock some brass heads together.

[slowhandluke]

you run out of BUFFs

I think this argument is about to heat up. Boeing has a 250 lb un-powered guided bomb, with a long range, something like a 10-1 glide ratio 5 miles up, hit 55 miles out, described on on this thread. I suppose the range drops considerably if the launch platform can't supply a lot of forward momentum, but you're still likely to have several miles range from 10,000 feet. And a quicker time-to-target might be appreciated.

[Dilbert56]

Given that our Air Force has no enemies capable or willig to fight it, they should be bending over backwards to support the Army, which is sorely pressed right now.

[strategofr]

"our Air Force has no enemies capable or willig to fight
it,"

Key point.

[Domangart]

A little late but it still boils down to the ability to drop 1000 munitions and when someone calls for the 1001st, have that one available and in position to use. It does no good to have tons of them in the baggage trains somewhere.
If you have no planes left then you have a real problem.