Posted on 02/25/2014 1:56:03 PM PST by bkopto
TUCSON, AZ (Tucson News Now) - The Defense Secretary announced today that he is recommending the elimination of the A-10, the mainstay aircraft at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, as part of a proposed military budget.
Chuck Hagel made the announcement today in at the Pentagon.
The Air Force has said it would save $3.5 billion over five years by cutting the entire fleet of 343 A-10s.
Hagel said he consulted with the military service chiefs on how to balance defense and budget requirements.
(Excerpt) Read more at tucsonnewsnow.com ...
Could not have done Afghanistan without the A 10.
Maybe that’s the point.
Getting rid of the A-10 is welcome news to anyone who owns a Russian or Chinese armored vehicle or main battle tank.
Smooth move, Obama.
Unless I am mistaken, the Warthog is the only ground support aircraft designed to fly low and slow for a long time over a battlefield.
The pilot sits in a specially armored cockpit and the plane can take a lot of hits from groundfire.
Not to mention the lethal mini-gun and large rocket and bomb loads it can carry to decimate troops and armored vehicle that put our soldiers in harms way.
Since it was first bought a long time ago, the hardware costs have long been amortized. Putting the F-35 into service as a ground support aircraft may only be a way of validating the cost of the F-35 program.
That is one great picture. The only plane I love more is the Mosquito.
Nor could we have done Iraq.
Yes.
That IS the point.
I’ll spell it out for our resident aviation geniuses here on FR since it’s apparent there is a basic lack of understanding...
The “basic” design, of which the current model is representative of, is over 50 years old. I concede a point that I don’t recall ever debating, but apparently I somehow did?...however, if you look at the link in post 39, you might find something that clearly shows the aircraft this article is referring to are anything but.
The article “claims” the U2 is over 50 years old. I refute that because, although the current is similar in appearance to the former, they are, in no other fashion related.
So you geniuses can now get back to your “debate”...or posting rebuttals or whatever...I’m done.
>>They’ve been predicting the death of the A-10 since about 10 minutes after the first one deployed, I’ll believe it when I stop seeing them.<<
It is still the case. A-10 is a dead meat in NSW engagement with any relatively near-peer adversary.
The problem is that after Cold War there are no NSW engagements in sight, and platform proved to be very useful in SNC to push around camel-jockeys who has little means to threaten aerial assets anyway.
It makes sense to retire the type only if they aren’t planning another A-stan or Iraq operation in near future.
Michigan’s A-10’s are part of the 127th Wing at Selfridge Air National Guard Base. Sure it politics! Selfridge Field became a military airfield and base in 1917. One of these days they’ll finally succeed in closing it down.
It wasn’t too long ago that Michigan had at least four Air Force Bases, two Air National Guard Bases, the bombing range in Grayling, Alpena Combat Readiness Command (Phelps-Collins)...Today, all that’s left air power-wise is Selfridge ANGB and soon there will be none anywhere in the state.
Surely you jest. With the rules of engagement preventing close air support or arty, there’s no longer any call for them. S>>>>>(which means sarcasm.)
They are very, very devastating on a low-tech, lightly-armed, no-Stinger missile enemy...which, of course, is why they are being taken out of service.
A lot of people don’t understand. Just because something was first built in some year doesn’t mean something with the same basic airframe couldn’t be built decades later.
The C-130 is a prime example.
Yes...I hope I clarified that point in post 66
Just read up on Gary Powers. Yeah, the U2 is that old.
Yes, what Szonian is saying is that while the airframe design dates to the 1950s the aircraft currently still in service were actually new build airframes in the 1980s. Totally newly manufactured aircraft updated and call the TR1 at that point and time.
So, the design is 60+/- years old but the current aircraft are about half that age.
You may be thinking of the SR-71 Blackbird.
LOL, I understood him, but some people just didn’t seem to get it.
well,....not bazookas like in WWII exactly.
“They’ll never send an F-35 down into the weeds on a CAS mission.”
No, they probably won’t. I remember reading quite a bit about how the CAS missing was evolving and being performed over ‘stan and Iraq. There was a lot of CAS being performed by aircraft orbiting at altitude and using SDBs to hit ground targets rather accurately. Aircraft like F-16s and even B-52s were being employed to provide CAS in this manner. They didn’t expect or want them to get low and slow, no. They wanted them up high and out of MANPAD range dropping mini-munitions on machine gun nests, caves, hideouts, etc. as the targets were called in from the ground. Literal flying artillery. I think this is where the USAF sees CAS going. I also think deployable UCAVs will begin to play into the CAS role in the near future.
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