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The House Armed Services Committee (HASC), for the second consecutive year, is proposing blocking the retirement of A-10 attack planes.
[...]The long-expected move was revealed Monday afternoon with the release of Chairman Rep. Mac Thornberry's version of the 2016 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which the full panel will mark up on [April 29].
The Air Force argues the decades-old A-10s are too expensive to keep flying. Lawmakers reject those arguments, saying the A-10s--which bring jobs to their states and districts--save US lives on the battlefield and must be kept operational.
"Rigorous oversight, endorsements from soldiers and Marines about the protection only the A-10 can provide, and repeated deployments in support of [Operation Inherent Resolve] have persuaded Chairman Thornberry and many members from both parties that the budget-driven decision to retire the A-10 is misguided," according to a HASC fact sheet accompanying the legislation.
On the downside IMO:
Responding to the Navy's and Marine Corps' shared list of "unfunded priorities" submitted this year to lawmakers, the House committee is proposing language that would clear the services to purchase more fighter aircraft than requested.
The Arizona Daily Star notes
Arizona [Congresswoman] Martha McSally [a former A-10 pilot and squadron commander] said she plans to offer amendments prohibiting both the A-10's retirement and the EC-130H [the Compass Call electronic jamming and surveillance plane] cuts.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by frojack on Wednesday April 29 2015, @04:47AM
The solution is give the airforce a choice.
Let the Army and Marines have fixed wing, and transfer the A10s to them, or do the job assigned to them of supporting ground operation instead of flying by in their office pushing buttons.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Fauxlosopher on Wednesday April 29 2015, @06:37AM
I intended to criticize what initially appeared to be your presentation of a false choice and started looking around for monetary figures to show how cheap USAF Predator drones are to operate...
... and it seems that you are correct after all. Predators look to be, on the whole, damned expensive to operate any way you slice it.
(expensive) http://nation.time.com/2012/02/28/2-the-mq-9s-cost-and-performance/ [time.com]
("cheap") http://www.jameshasik.com/weblog/2012/06/affordably-unmanned-a-cost-comparison-of-the-mq-9-to-the-f-16-and-a-10-and-a-response-to-winslow-whe.html [jameshasik.com]
(Score: 5, Interesting) by frojack on Wednesday April 29 2015, @07:17AM
Doesn't matter the cost.
The predator simply can not do the Job of an A-10. And the A-10 can't do the job of a Predator.
Totally different mission.
http://northshorejournal.org/call-sign-killer-chick-update [northshorejournal.org] (Yes, she flew it back home).
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2, Funny) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday April 29 2015, @01:34PM
Love that article. One of the images is captioned:
Enough to take any other thing that flies down... Enough damage to destroy a squadron of F-35s. Merely a "that will buff out" for a Warthog.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 29 2015, @10:40AM
They don't call it the Chair Force for nothing. :)
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday April 29 2015, @01:57PM
If the Army was given some fixed wing, the Airforce would be deployed a whole lot less. Marines are interesting in that they are actually under the Navy. The Navy does have fixed wing. It just has to be able to land on a boat.
I would love it if the Army had A10s. But even the Army is cutting down on air-frames. The OH-58 Kiowa Warrior is being retired which leaves the Army without an aerial scout craft and light Combat Air Support (CAS). Their plan is to use UH-60 Blackhawks as scout craft, lol. Might as well give the ground scouts some school buses at that rate. The AH-64 Apache is to take over the CAS role. The Apache can probably do that but it is far more expensive to operate and has other cons. For example of light CAS, the Kiowa pilot and co-pilot literally shoot their rifles out the windows to provide close support (modified M4s to be fully auto). They have rockets and other things but the point is they get really close and maneuver very quickly.
Right now the US (and everyone else i guess) needs a lot of CAS. So why is the USAF and US Army getting rid of their best CAS?
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(Score: 1) by albert on Wednesday April 29 2015, @04:07PM
Shooting hand-held guns out the window is a WWI tactic. It means wimpy weapons, difficulty with belt-fed ammo, lack of stabilization, greatly limited ability to aim, and much awkwardness.
They don't really do that, do they? Seriously?
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday April 29 2015, @05:01PM
They sure do. Not belt-fed though. Just M4s that have been modified to be full auto. It's as primitive as shooting out of HMMWV(hum-vee) and ground vehicle windows : ) The Kiowa is not a large platform. It's the equivalent of a HMMWV. Fast, used by scouts, can deliver only a few people to a target, mostly small arm weapons, with one or two "crew weapons". Imagine if the Army got rid of the HMMWV and the only vehicles they had were slow tracked and large wheeled. You'd have to do all your recon in vehicles over 10 tons!
I admit to being biased. I was a Scout. One of the mottos was "Speed saves lives". I couldn't imagine trying to patrol, scout, flank, or rescue with a large/heavy vehicle. I think the same thing applies to helicopters.
Nimble is a trait that is often traded for bigger weapons and armor. That is not necessarily always a good trade. I totally agree that M4s qualify as "wimpy weapons" though : )
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(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday April 29 2015, @02:32PM
If you know your aviation history, the AF never used to have anything like an A10. The missions that the A10 performs were developed by the Army Air Corps, and perfected by the Marine Corps. When the Army Air Corps was done away with, and the AF was born, no one in the Air Force wanted anything to do with the dirty grunt work. That crap was beneath them.
I can respect some AF personnel, but I have zero respect for the higher echelons of leadership in the AF. I spoke with an AF veteran just recently, who began by taking offense at my attitude. We spoke at length, and eventually, he all but agreed with me. The brass needs to be flushed, and more junior people who are WILLING TO DO THE DIRTY WORK can take over. Fok the brass.
No man who is to good to get his boots dirty may consider himself my equal - or the equal of any grunt on the ground. Silly sumbitch would need to stand on a stepstool to kiss any of our asses.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 29 2015, @09:27PM
the AF never used to have anything like an A10
I was thinking of the AD-4 Skyraider [wikipedia.org] that the ground troops in Vietnam liked to see show up.
developed by the Army Air Corps
...then I looked that up and damned if you weren't right.
(I should know better than to second-guess a hawk on weapons systems specs.)
The original airframe prototype was order on D-Day.
Even its successor, the A2D Skyshark, [wikipedia.org] was ordered in the last months of WWII.
(They only build 12 and the aircraft never saw service--and the designation is obviously an old Navy callout.)
The link in Fristy's comment touches effectively on every single aspect of the DoD/"defense"/acquisition topic to include the USAF brass' hate of supporting ground troops.
-- gewg_