Sure they are. The problem is that they are only good if you are a army of occupation that is staking out a protected territory and setting up defensive positions to defeat a conventional enemy force. That ain't why we are there,and that ain't what we are doing.
It is hard for enemies with only leg infantry to get at one, if properly situated.
Ok,so what? The Taliban don't have leg infantry,and what guerilla forces they have left are reduced to straggler status now.
The Taliban have made solid use of 82mm mortars.
So what? They ain't carrying them around on their backs and going on raids with them. They can use them because they are being attacked in their base camps.
This isn't a conventional war that can be fought by mechanized infantry with conventional heavy weapons. I can see a role if a delivery platform is developed that can deliver the hardware on pre-selected sites to provide cover fire for a planned attack,but even then it would require recon teams on the ground to verify it is safe to deliver the goods and men to man them on a isolated target where they are screwed if they get ambushed. Remember,most of the peaks these people and this equipment would be sited on are too small for a mass assault relief force to land.
Another gunship IS what is needed. One that can fly slow and has the ability to carry a load at those altitudes. Stripped versions of it could be utilized to sling in 105's or other similiar equipment and their crews,while gunship versions circle to provide fire support.
Pure horsepucky. They are workable and useful when set up 15 minutes before an engagement several miles away. Direct fire support groups are also useful set up minutes before an engagement up to a mile away. They can move as engagement areas move, over time scales of hours. Both are simply operational tasks that have been well within our forces' capabilities in the past, and there is no reason whatever to tolerate loss of those abilities.
"The Taliban don't have leg infantry"
Of course they do. Their guerillas are not armed with mere AKs, they have the standard weapons loadout of dismounted Warsaw pact style infantry.
"what guerilla forces they have left are reduced to straggler status now."
Horsepucky again. They have employed groups up to company size, and regularly employ groups up to platoon size.
"They ain't carrying (82mm mortars) around on their backs and going on raids with them."
Yes, they are. You are simply in error here. They have used mortars defensively when we go to their areas, and offensively to come after ours. They have also used MRLs for raids on our bases, which are distinctly harder to move around, but they manage to. If you don't even understand that the Taliban are not simply sitting up in their caves, but regularly fire on our perimeters, including using mortars and MRLs to do so, then you just haven't the faintest notion what is happening over there right now.
"isn't a conventional war that can be fought by mechanized infantry"
Straw man. Nobody is talking about mechanized infantry. I am talking about infantry heavy weapons, and heliborne infantry. Javelins and Mk-19s and HMGs and medium mortars are all designed to be used dismounted. Our enemies use their versions of these things, without running them around in BMPs or BTRs. They hump them on their backs up and down 8000 foot mountains, successfully. We have choppers to fly them near where they are needed, and only need to hump them short distances to where our plan needs them on a given occasion. There is a reason for that 4th element in all of those organization charts, from company upward.
"I can see a role if a delivery platform is developed that can deliver the hardware on pre-selected sites"
The delivery platform of lifts to high mountains is the CH-47, same as for the rest of the infantry. Lower down you can use UH-60s, same as the rest of the infantry. The delivery platform for movements over relatively level ground, to save fatigue, can be a small ATV. Of course down on valley floors you can add Humvees. The delivery platform for movements up ridge faces from drop off point to firing position is a human back, same as we now hump AT-4s and 60mm mortars around to have something, anything, on the ground that can damage an adobe hut.
"it would require recon teams on the ground to verify it is safe to deliver the goods"
It requires no more for an LZ for heavy weapons than is required for an LZ for a stick of grunts with rifles and SAWs. Moreover, an LZ for heavy weapons doesn't need to be as close to an objective to be useful, since heavy weapons have superior range. All the usual tactics for employing heliborne forces of course apply to insertions, regardless of what you are inserting - including prior spotting overflight, suppressive fire, etc. Ordinary infantry that gets ambushed is helpless, that is the reason more firepower is needed. If an element with a Javelin team gets "ambushed" by a single MG in a bunker, they won't be pinned down until nightfall or a successful F-16 strike, which is what we are actually doing now.
"Another gunship IS what is needed."
The Taliban have some of the most primitive air defense of any adversary we are likely to face, and they still manage to put the most advanced gunships out of action with rotor damage, and to bring down other choppers, with mere MGs and RPGs. How many choppers do we have to lose, with the men on the ground afterward hung out to dry for hours on end, before anybody wises up and admits that you need some firepower on the freaking ground? Enough to KO a medium machinegun, please, more than 200 yards away. It is criminally stupid that we are repeating this mistake, when we already paid the blood price for the lesson, and already have all of the necessary weapons.
And then I get lectured for pointing it out, because some people would rather think say or do anything, than admit that ranged firepower matters in modern warfare, even ground warfare. Which is simply insane.