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Saw the same thing in Bosnia, as a crew member on EC-130E/ABCCC. In fact, the shoot down of an RAF Sea Harrier(back in the spring of 1994) occurred under the type of circumstances you describe.

Serbs had been over-running so-called Muslim “safe havens” in eastern Bosnia. The UN (which had the authority to approve air strikes) had actually allowed us to put ordnance on target in response to those actions. During one of my missions, the Serbs were moving into a town called Gorazde, shelling the hospital, etc. The request for CAS had gone up the chain and would get final approval in New York (took at least 45 minutes on a good day).

We finally got the OK, and had a flight of two A-10s overhead, ready to obliterate Serb armor.
But someone in the NATO command structure decided the U.S. had been getting all the glory for conducting limited air strikes and it was time to get the coalition involved. We had two Sea Harriers coming off the Brit's small carrier in the Adriatic, and they got the tasking. So we put the A-10s in a holding pattern and sent the Harriers in (with very limited range/play time, you had to work them in quickly before they hit bingo fuel).

You can guess what happened. One of the Harriers (on the third pass over the target) got hit by a MANPAD and shot down. The CAS/BAI mission now became a rescue effort. The A-10 pilot became an airborne FAC as everyone searched for the downed British pilot. He was eventually rescued by the Muslims and at the end of the day, the Serb tanks rolled into the sunset, untouched by any NATO bomb, rocket or bullet.

Nothing matches the A-10 for loiter time, lethality and survivability. Air Force leadership has long tried to get rid of anything that isn't stealth or doesn't shoot down other aircraft. That's one reason my old platform was retired before 9/11, though it was tailor-made for the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. And it's the same reason they want to get rid of the A-10. Stupidity writ large.

The surprising thing is the granddaddy of the A-10 is the old Soviet Stormovik, aka “flying tank”, developed for CAS by the Soviets in WWII. It was a hugely successful aircraft that devastated the Panzers. Just imagine one or two A-10s going after a soft column of ISIS technicals as shown in recent news pictures. AS long as CAS is needed, the A-10 will be essential. BTW the Russians haven’t forgotten their WWII history; they now have an excellent CAS aircraft, the SU @%.