Actually, they’d hand out leathermen and take all wrenches, hammers, knives, corkscrews, pliers, tweezers, saws, screwdrivers, awls, etc etc since they have a new all in one tool that does the role.
It should be a simple questions does the F-35 fill the role of the A-10 leaving no loss in agility and power? It clearly does not. Stop forcing the F-35 to do the A-10s job and you’ll save enough money to run the A-10 program.
Perhaps the Defense Department should consider the 87-implement Wenger 16999 Swiss Army Knife Giant. It's on Amazon:
Trust me, it's worth checking out if only for the hilarious customer reviews.
Not only does it not replace the A-10. It is less capable than a 16. This thing is a joke and a monument to political influence and procurement careers.
Its only calling card is the stealth that it is 100% Guaranteed to lose. NO matter what stealth is built in, radar does indeed “see” the plane. The problem now is that the computing power isn’t quite there to let the radar “know” it sees it.
Airframe improvements in stealth are difficult, slow, and barely incremental.
Computing power is growing at an exponential rate.
Inside 5 years, the stealth it has will be stripped away. Possibly effective against a circa 1999 radar, it’ll be helpless against a 2025 radar. And we will have sunk a fortune into airframes we are married to for 30 years.
And they will be crappy airframes, filled with performance compromises to achieve the stealth they no longer have.
The USAF/USN F35 is an F117, F16, F18 replacement...
USMC F35 is an F18, AV-8 replacement...
[NOTE: Some F18s, not all, like the Growlers and other unique mission aircraft.]
I keep trying to find the SOURCE of the original claim that the F35 is actually/factually/functionally capable of being an A10 replacement.
I don’t believe that anyone in aviation or the F35 program truly believes this to be the case. Bean counters are notorious for being ideologically blinded and extremely stupid.
If sequestration gets taken care of [stopped], I am of the opinion that this whole issue goes away. As it is, sequestration is still with us and the DoD is going to keep getting hammered whilst the gibsmedats keep getting fat, drunk, pregnant and stoned.
Hell, they gonna make an F-35 variation to replace the KC-134 and may be the Abrams, too.
Wonder how many A-10s could be purchased for the cost of one F-35? And we will probably have to borrow the $$ to make them.