They tried to pass off some CAS F-16s as "A-16s" at one point.
It didn't last very long as I remember.
Posted on 08/13/2019 2:56:43 PM PDT by jazusamo
“’We really do get stupider as we get older, don’t we?...Nobody today knows how to design and build new aircraft, specially one that uses ideas that were perfected 50 years ago...The electronics take up so much more space today for 1/4 the utility...upgrade avionics or other electronics in a system that is using a long proven design... They’ve been shooting down A-10s like there’s no tomorrow in the sandbox...but as an engineer, I damn sure have a LOT more confidence in the designers and constructors of military assets...There is a company that is currently building brand new DeHavilland Beavers. DeHavilland went out of business about the same time the A-10 was in the design stage...” [Don W, post 80]
My my...I’ve been poormouthed by people with far worse tempers. And tossed out of the offices of general officers for telling them truths they didn’t want to hear. Please don’t spend too much energy patting yourself on the back.
I was an operational tester for many years and worked closely with dozens of engineers, of numerous specialties. None talked like you do.
No one makes modern military airplanes like they did in the 1960s. If someone dusts off the blueprints for the DHC-2, knocks out a couple, and manages to sell them, it tell us nothing about the feasibility of doing something superficially similar with a warplane like the A-10. The requirements are different.
Design concepts, materials, and construction methods have not remained static since the A-10 was first thought of. Not for any piece of military hardware. Changes in electronics, aviation, and space systems have been the biggest. When it comes to the subarea of avionics, it is not a case of building smaller, lighter black boxes that to the same thing those of 1970 did. Communications systems do not even function that way today. And today’s military aircraft are not festooned with a bunch of separate radios linked by wires to antennas, fit in as an afterthought once every other dimension is set in concrete (metaphorically). They are integrated from the beginning, with structure and power supply and propulsion, sensors and weapon mounts, life support and everything else.
Making new A-10 airframes could of course be done. Tooling and other factor support equipment would be doable and painfully expensive: the self-satisfied, self-righteous critics of the military industrial complex would complain first and loudest.
But the real limitation would be skilled personnel. Everybody who fashioned A-10s for Fairchild Republic has long since retired and most have quite likely gone on to their ultimate reward. Recruiting a work force and training it today will probably cost a lot more than the physical plant, and (moreover) take time we cannot afford. Competency can be rushed only a little. If any of it can be done at all in today’s America.
Your assumption - that we need only look to the past, choose a system that worked OK then, and remake it - is flawed. Nothing in military endeavor functions that way: systems have not been static since gunpowder was introduced. And the pace has really picked up since the 18th century. There are no “timeless truths”. To fall behind is to fail.
“...suggest the people that should have the biggest say are the experienced ground units. Which units do they prefer for air support.” [Steve Van Doorn, post 79]
This doesn’t work either. As the British Army found out in North Africa, early in the 1940s when the Allied cause stood on the brink. Then the US Army insisted on doing it almost the same way, though the RAF warned US decisionmakers it wouldn’t work. Luckily, American largesse rescued the entire effort.
Ground forces cannot see enough of the total picture to make optimal use of air support across the battlespace. The most ornery among their apologists have even asserted that it’s the most “proper, heroic, and honorable” thing to do, to attend only to that portion of the front line directly in front of them. Combat is something a bit bigger than the 20 ft directly in front of the private solider. It’s also bigger than the 20 miles or so a division commander must attend to.
Close support requirements are better filled by rotary wing assets, which do have limitations of their own.
More generally, “let the experts design it” or “give it to the experts and let them see what can be done with it” has historically resulted in disaster. This has been true for more than a century. Interested parties should track down a copy of _Ideas & Weapons_ by I B Holley Jr. Not a very long book.
They tried to pass off some CAS F-16s as "A-16s" at one point.
It didn't last very long as I remember.
based on what?
” ‘More generally, “let the experts design it” or “give it to the experts and let them see what can be done with it” has historically resulted in disaster.’ “ [my post 84]
“based on what?” [Steve Van Doorn, post 84]
So your memory failed before you hit the end of my paragraph?
I’m minded to recall that portion of Gulliver’s Travels where Lemuel encountered the immortals, who weren’t immune to mental aging, thus were unable to read more than a sentence without forgetting what they were doing in the first place. I forget what Jonathon Swift named that strange people.
For those dying to know, it’s based on the efforts & experiences of the US military establishment during the development of the air weapon, chiefly during the First World War. Unless and until you learn what Irving Brinton Holley Jr contributed to the development and explication of doctrine, you will never progress beyond a kindergarten level of understanding here.
By way of encouragement, _Ideas & Weapons isn’t a terribly thick book. Don’t be scared.
I got to spend some time at Nellis AFB to watch them work. I still have a video tape about it. The tape ends with a scene saying, “Think A-16!”
This seems like a circular argument. If there is no general guide line to make a weapon then no weapon can be made.
“This seems like a circular argument. If there is no general guide line to make a weapon then no weapon can be made.” [Steve Van Doorn, post 87]
Asserting that there are circularities is a statement of indifference. “I know what I know and that’s that” is frequently resorted to in this forum; doesn’t mean it’s accurate. Nor is it any use in furthering the analysis.
There are guidelines aplenty, general and specific, on how to make weaponry, and how, and why. Entire bookshelves are filled with laws, rules, regulations, analyses, conjectures, and opinion. Some is nonsense, most is unavoidable (having been put in place by enacted law, directives from appointed officials, departmental instructions, and local unit procedures). We Americans - with conservatives at the leading edge - love to trash it all in a single dismissive gesture and repeat a bunch of “common sense” mouthings on how we won the Revolution with rifles, so everything since has no meaning or is a conspiracy fomenting tyranny and oppression.
A few hours’ perusal (not to say study) of historical developments since, oh, the introduction of gunpowder to Europe negates such fanciful thinking. In large part, military endeavor has been the story of technology and artificial energy sources replacing manpower and muscle.
The trend has picked up speed since the 1760s; essentially, since the Industrial Revolution took on a life of its own. To deny this is not to reiterate “timeless American values,” it is rather an invitation to disaster.
“Doctrine” in a military context has no religious content. It is, rather, the professional community’s codification of what is believed to be the best current thinking on the organization’s mission, and the best ways to accomplish it. Each armed service promulgates its own, and contributes (moreover) to the development of joint and combined doctrine.
Since most casual observers confuse military doctrine with religious dogma, they make sport of organizations & people devoted to the task of figuring out what this or that conflict or confrontation means, and how our own military establishment ought to adapt to developments.
The religious connotations assume a high degree of self-assuredness, moralizing, and “unchanging verities,” while in the military context doctrine is just the opposite. The situation is never static and mostly unpredictable; self-righteousness and certitude have no place. Advances in technology will not let us stand still; there is no place where we can stop and declare we are perfect. To assume there can be such certitude is to run the risk of not surviving; it is better to be effective than moral.
Those who do not realize the limitations here will also fail to recognize the opportunities. Thus they sacrifice any chance of contributing to the discussion on a meaningful level.
When the military has no control or very little control over how the weapon should be made. Who will make those decisions? The politician? The guy that can get a few more votes in his district if he builds more Sopwith Camels “five” which he miss understood to mean a fifth generation plane?
“When the military has no control or very little control over how the weapon should be made. Who will make those decisions? The politician? The guy that can get a few more votes in his district if he builds more Sopwith Camels...?” [Steve Van Doorn, post 89]
All excellent points.
In the United States military establishment, the uniformed military has very little control over design. And at the lowest ranks - where operators must use the stuff bought for them, putting their personal tails at risk, going into action - there is hardly any control at all.
Beg pardon for lack of clarity; I was thinking of “the military establishment” in broader terms: political leaders, senior civilian appointees, department functionaries, scientists and engineers (as government officials and contractor personnel both), technicians - in addition to everyone who does wear a uniform.
The superstructure exists not because evildoers are conspiring to victimize us citizens; it was built up gradually over generations - at first because the citizenry feared tyranny from an unaccountable military, and later because advances in science, industrial production, and technological specialization necessitated it. “The people” demanded that their elected representatives “do something.”
A large bureaucracy resulted.
Politicians do exploit it, and corrupt or divert much of it, including the acquisition process; officials tend, inexorably, to focus on one-upping and outmaneuvering each other at the expense of their primary duties. With the best of intentions, senior uniformed service leaders squabble and compete with each other, neglecting the main mission.
All very frustrating, to citizens more used to lack of government interference, and pleased with the way private business organizations can be more flexible and efficient. We Americans have always suffered from short attention spans; confronted with the glacial pace at which defense bureaucracies move, many citizens pitch tantrums, demanding deconstruction of the whole mess, a “return” to the Golden Age when everything worked better, or a redefinition of national interests to remove any need for power projection beyond our shores. Calls for better morals, enhanced devotion to duty, and suchlike abjurations reverberate.
Removing the mess might quell the average citizen’s sense of self-righteous outrage, but would render the nation impotent.
“Going back” to some point in time assumed to be “better” isn’t even possible: there was no Golden Age when things worked better. Besides, time’s arrow points only one way.
And national interests have extended beyond our shores since well before the Founding. Trading nations do not have the luxury of disengaging to flirt with isolationism.
There is no “answer”, no overarching, broad-based, politically painless solution agreeable to all. Things may be improved, but not perfected. And improvements don’t come along as quickly as we might like.
Interesting that you chose Britain’s Sopwith Camel as an example. Many history buffs believe it was some sort of magical fighter aircraft. They’ve seen too many episodes of Top Tens, Air Warriors, or Bullet Points. It was a hot performer, but so touchy the average RFC pilot could not handle it safely. The S.E.5a equaled or exceeded the Camel in most performance attributes and was more forgiving to fly - a better machine to put into the hands of pilots with scant experience. Overall.
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