McCain Blasts AF for Trying to Mothball the A-10

I normally don't agree with this RINO on anything! But, this is an exception.

Read more @ http://www.airforcetimes.com/articl...ir-Force-lawmakers-clash-over-future-10-again

 

McCain is an idiot, I have massive respect for him and his service in Viet Nam and I thought he would have been a better President than Obama is.

Anyway back to my point. If I wanted to know what the troops on the ground wanted, I would go and ask them not the generals. Politicians have this remarkable nack of picking generals they like and then saying I support the generals position has knows whats best for the troops. Must of the time no the general doesn't. So making that argument is a mistake. Now if he was talking about grand strategy, logistics, tactics then the generals may be talked to. There as peace time political generals and then there are war time fighting generals sometimes it is hard to know which is which.

 

Where do you propose they get the spare parts to keep them flying?

 

The A-10 can be kept airworthy for another 25 years. They would need to develop a product structure and workflows to properly link and manage the engineering data, scanned data and physical tools with the Air Force Global Logistics Support Center and A-10 production facilities. The next phase would be to develop CAD/CAM interface data by reverse engineering (scanned data) where needed.

 

With the youngest airframe being 30 years old

 

The A10's job would be near the front of the line for capabilities being replaced by unmanned assets.... just because its pretty much a suicide mission to run nose onto a target laying down AGM's then cannon fire these days against any enemy force half capable. Yea sure with no anti-air threat they might be the most convenient, being slow and able to carry a lot of firepower - but you dont run entire squadron's for that scenario when other aircraft can do it too which are also survivable when things get more serious.

 

What about taking out the formations of Russian tanks? Are UAV's and Apaches going to be able to get around the Russians ground based AA systems? I think a case of fighting the last war on your part. Affordability shouldn't be an issue for the A-10, but it is being created because the Air force wants more big shiny new things. I know from my country the UK the RAF wants to replace the Typhoons with more F-35's and the funding that comes with it. Even though the UK has long had a two fast jets tactic and strategy, the fact that the Typhoon would be defeat almost any other jet in a close range dog fight over the UK doesn't seem bother the RAF or the fact that the F-35B can't dog fight. I will feel very safe from the Russian threat when the UK has the F-35 and Typhoon in operation together.

 

And how does an A10 do it.... it doesn't. It was fielded because it was cheap, and other platform's where not as adaptable...up to about 20 years ago. It would have never been a very survivable activity in Europe against the USSR. Now both those things have been really changing over the last 20 years, and technology has enabled every other fast jet to do the same ground effect as the A10!!! It's just not needed anymore, but obviously if there was unlimited funds and aircrew you could have every sort of platform imaginable - it's just you'd get more bang for your buck by using a more multirole platform that can survive dynamic conditions better.

So since the A10 was always going to roll through ground formations only once the SEAD and air superiority had done its trick, then under the same circumstances you dont need to use your UCAV for that type of stuff, you've got nearly every air superiority, mutlirole and strike platform being able to do the same job using improvements in weapons and sensors. The only question left is who breaks the back of attacking and defended ground formations, and the A10 cannot do this and survive. So you need specialized platforms doing SEAD whether its UCAV, stealth, cruise missiles etc. While remembering the only difference between a UCAV and intelligent munitions is the UCAV is meant to come home, the benefit of UCAV's is they can swarm and overwhelm a target because they 'should be' cheaper and are more expendable. The modern battlespace has no place for the A10. It should be relegated to the AFSOC as a unconventional support platform IMO (if they have any 2 seaters left flying).

 

Why not? The all-time AF mainstay is the B-52 Buffalo WHICH HAS BEEN FLYING SINCE 1956 [or a bit before]
I saw some of them flying out of March AFB outside Riverside, CA while I lived on a ranch the other side of the hills. Used to ride my horse up to the crest to watch then land and take off. Awesome. Then - and still today.

 

He has to try to save the A-10. There are a lot of A-10s based in Arizona.

 

Too right, it's great to watch them buzzing around in the sky around Tucson. Great plane. Anyway if they get dumped maybe the US can buy some Frogfoots....

 

This wouldn't be an issue if it was still the Army Air Corps...

 

The A-10s have a big impact on the Tucson economy. I work about 1-1/2 mi. north of the base and you can't eat anywhere at lunch time without pilots and crews cueing up in front of you. In terms of numbers of planes and crews, they can't be replaced.

 

Yeah, it really is more of an Army-type plane. The Army likes it a lot more than the AF does.

 

At most A-10 Guard and Reserve bases, F-16s, C-130Js or KC-135s will be replacing them so few or no jobs or money will be lost. For the active duby bases losing their A-10s, there will be no follow-on mission. Davis-Monthan isn't the only base this involves, other A-10 active-duty units are at Osan AB South Korea; Moody AFB in Georgia and Eglin AFB in Florida. This is why Arizona politicians are scarmbling to save the A-10, the loss of them at Davis-Monthan would take a hit on the economy there, I'd venture to say close to a $1 billion dollars.

 

That's because supporting the Army is the main role the Air Force actually performs well, strategic bombing has never been as effective as close air support, even though that is the "reason" for a separate service.

 

That's actually a good point. Under the current agreements, the Army isn't allowed to operate fixed wing aircraft above a certain size.

 

This particular variant, the A-10A, saw action in Gulf War I. They destroyed more than 900 Iraqi tanks, 2,000 other military vehicles and 1,200 artillery pieces, It was by far the most effective aircraft of the war. A-10s were initially an unwelcome addition to many in the Air Force.

360 view from the office of a Hogdriver A-10A.

http://www.nmusafvirtualtour.com/media/072/A-10A Cockpit.html

 

That's interesting - I didn't realise the size of the base at first, but driving down through the highway that seems to bisect the storage area where the old planes are stored it's clear that the area is huge. BTW great aviation museum - replete with Roadrunners

 

McCain's opinion is pretty much irrelevent to me. Who cares what he thinks? I do like the A-10 though. I'd hate to see it go.

 

I signed a petition a year or so ago to keep the A-10s here. I don't think they are going anywhere.

I'd bet if you count only the mothballed planes in the boneyard, Tucson has the largest AFB in the world. A lot of those planes are outfitted as target drones and others are scavenged for parts, but others can be up and flying in a hurry.

The museum is cool. It could use some trees and landscaping and it is unfortunate that the sculpture out front is of three F-23s. I've been out there several times.

 

And how old is the youngest B-52? B-1? U-2? AH1? CH-46? C-5? F-15? AV8B?

You must not be aware that the majority of our aircraft date to the Reagan Administration and earlier.

And as an FYI, here are the answers: 42, 26, 25, 29, 43, 28, 28 (not counting the 230 modified to the E model), 29 (not counting the handful of Harrier II versions).

So your claim of airframes being 30 years old is meaningless. In fact, you would probably be shocked to learn that the majority of our military inventory is that old. The youngest PATRIOT launching station in my Battalion was 30 years old, and I was the only person in the Battalion who was older then the launcher he or she drove.

 

The boneyard at D-M has been drawn down at an alarming rate over the last 5-6 years. You can now see huge holes where there used to be aircraft of all kinds in storage.

https://www.google.com/maps/@32.1673038,-110.8559598,1749m/data=!3m1!1e3

I even remember where one of the storage areas was full of A-10s. Not that storage area is an empty field, all of the aircraft there destroyed.

 

And how many of the fleet of B52 are still flying compared to the warthogs

 

Irrelevant, completely irrelevant.

744 B-52s were produced, 716 A-10s.

Now of the B-52s, take out 35 immediately that were built as prototypes, test aircraft, or reconnaissance aircraft and not for actual combat use.

Then another 31 were lost in Vietnam alone. And don't forget to deduct the B-52G, the largest run of the aircraft at 193, close to 1/3 of the inventory all by themselves. All of them destroyed as part of the New START treaty.

And in the last 7 years, the A-10 has been taken away from 7 full squadrons, with most of those squadrons being disbanded.

Most of the B-52 squadrons were reassigned with more capable aircraft, either the B-1 or B-2 as the BUFFs were retired. There is no replacement for the A-10, none in development, none in design, the units are just getting closed with no replacement.