Whether or not people want to believe this, it’s true. The A-10, for all it’s lack of speed shortcomings, is widely known as a highly survivable airframe along with it’s prowess with it’s main gatling gun. It’s a close air support aircraft designed to kill tanks. Whether or not that translates into future warfare scenarios is up to the politicians that decide it’s fate. It was CERTAINLY designed to be a survivable airframe with regard to pilots as many have returned home with massive damage that would have crippled other planes. It helps to think of an A-10 as a fast helicopter. They were and are seriously that slow.
Yes. The damn thing was designed to assume enemy fire and return home.
The “bathub” designation for the pilot protection was accurate…it was a a VERY survivable aircraft, despite it’s slowness.
There’s no fanboys here. It was and is what it was an is.
What i want to ask is: which airplane is going to replace the Warthog? In terms of CAS, I am trying to imagine the F-35 as it’s successor and failing. The Army has the Apache, which is old already and not as fast as a jet, and the Cobra, which is older still. What is the Army’s plan for CAS going forward? I know that there are coordinated efforts with the USAF that exist with any manner of planes. But the A-10 was always on call for the Army. What’s the next-gen CAS plane going to be and will it be better than the A-10?
you’re restating what I’ve already posted. The A-10 was timed out without the re-winging. That mod takes it structurally to 2028+. It doesn’t mean they turn into pumpkins on January 1 2028 but that is the next end of it’s structural life cycle. To keep it viable to that date it got other upgrades.
It’s going to get phased out by default unless they want to go to another structural retrofit.
Drones are probably going to replace it. The A-10 is a 30 year old plane and it was a formidable weapon in it’s day. But look how we use it now. Air superiority is established first which involves a variety of stealth, radar jamming, radar hunting, anti-aircraft destroying missions all designed to cut off an enemy’s ability to see and direct air power. When that’s done it’s open season for what follows and the A-10 is part of that. There is nothing like it around. Not even close.
But I’m describing “old” battle strategies. In this respect, the A-10 is old technology. We now have weapons that can be dropped from a B-52 that will deploy into multiple autonomous tank killing weapons. All that takes is something that can haul a payload.
Ah, no, I’m not restating what you’ve already posted. You’ve stated that the F-35 is going to replace the A-10 by sucking up all the oxygen out of the room by 2028 thus preventing any other upgrades:
The Air Force has always had only so much money to work with. They hate the A-10, and have been trying to get rid of the plane practically since it was foisted upon them. They wanted to get rid of it in 1991 and replace it with the A-16 and Congress told them to hand the A-10s over to the Army and Marine Corps if they went ahead with that plan. They wanted to get rid of them rather than re-wing them, but Congress again told them where to shove it and to re-wing them to ensure they will fly until 2028. Yeah, the Air Force wants to retire the A-10 in 2028, if they could they would retire it today. Every time they have tried to do so they have run into opposition from Congress so fierce that it has reached the point of Congress ordering them to hand them over to the Army, which is otherwise bound by agreement to not fly fixed wing aircraft from back when the Air Force was made a separate entity and was no longer a part of the Army as the Army Air Corps. Based on that track record there is no reason to believe the Air Force will get its wish to retire the A-10 in 2028 rather than 2040.
Again, you have ignored the operative word may in the sentence the A-10 will serve until 2028 when it may be replaced by the F-35.
If you’re talking A-10 versus small arms, no question there that the A-10 is survivable. If you’re talking A-10 versus AAA, it is also quite capable. Even A-10 versus MANPADS, it is better off than any other plane out there.
But the future threats are the Russian double-digit SAMs that are many times more lethal than any of those things. It doesn’t pass the laugh test to suggest that the A-10 is survivable against S-300/S-400 type threats, which are reaching the open arms market and are probably the best anti-aircraft weapons in the world today. The A-10 (along with basically all non-LO aircraft) are very, very easy targets for these systems, and the aircraft simply cannot hope to cope with that threat. Again, we’re talking warheads in excess of 150 pounds of high explosive attached to guidance systems that simply aren’t going to miss that kind of target very often at all.
The most effective counter to these systems is either sophisticated electronic warfare (which the US military really hasn’t invested very much effort in over the last 20 years) and stealth. Which is exactly why the Israelis are buying the F-35, as my previous cite shows.
I’m not even sure what you’re trying to say. I don’t see the A-10 lasting past 2028 because it’s going to cost them money. Congress is not going to let the F-35 die so by default it’s replacing the A-10.
I’m not sure where you get that an F-35 is more survivable in the role of ground support. The F-35 has stealth to approach a target from afar but that’s not the role of the A-10. The A-10 was never designed as a first strike fighter. It was designed to fly low and slow and chew stuff up after air dominance is established. The A-10 was always vulnerable to the bigger long range missiles so in that respect you’re correct but it was never tasked with that. It’s like saying it sucks as a submarine.
That brings us to the F-35. It is not hardened against the type of weapons used for low flying aircraft which are going to be heat seeking, hand held weapons. The kind you can’t hunt down and kill on a first strike. There is no air superiority over a hand held weapon. This is where an A-10 with it’s twin engines and armor plating comes back where an F-35 with it’s single engine and lack of armor does not. When the A-10 is retired it’s style of mission retires with it.
Somehow I’m not entirely surprised. In what way was I unclear?
It cost them money to keep them in service in 1991 when the Air Force wanted to replace them with modified F-16s. It cost them money to re-wing them to remain flyable until 2040. It cost them money to upgrade the fleet from A-10A to A-10C standard from 2005-2013. It’s going to cost them money to keep them in service between now and 2028. Yet you take a sentence that they may be replaced by the F-35 from 2028 to mean that they are going to be replaced by the F-35 in 2028. The Air Force has tried to kill the A-10, but the Army wouldn’t let it die and they have Congress on their side. Again, Congress was going to take the rather extreme step of making the Air Force turn the A-10s over to the Army to fly in 1990-91. Congress not letting the F-35 die does not by default mean it’s replacing the A-10. Were that truly the case, the A-10 wouldn’t even make it to 2028; it would be replaced by production F-35s by then. It isn’t going to be.
The F-16 cost 15 million. The F-35 costs 150 million. room + oxygen = suck
It cost them money to extend the life of the airframe. 2028 is probably closer to the extended time than 2040. When it’s done it’s done. They’re not going to re-wing it again. It’s going to get phased out and the only plane available will be the F-35 or whatever drones are developed.
You realize this is an arguement for keeping the A-10 until 2040, right? Congress was prepared to hand the A-10s over to the Army over the A-16. Why would they retire it early for a plane ten times the cost of the A-16 when the airframes are still good until 2040? The B-52 is expected to remain in service until at least 2040, and it’s survived the production of both the B-1 and B-2.
They don’t have to re-wing them again. The re-winged airframes are good to 2040. Cite:
because Congress is not going to shut down the F-35.
The B-52 already replaces the A-10’s capability to kill tanks and support ground troops.
They’re good for another 8,000 hrs if nothing else crops up on the airframe. They will phase them out as they reach that number. It’s not a light switch scenario. On top of that you’re not taking into consideration it’s mission profile is old-school combat. It was a great plane in it’s day but the methodology of war has changed and will continue to change. B-52’s can drop autonomous weapons to kill tanks. They can also drop glide-to-target bombs to support troops. Going forward the drone will continue to grow in it’s military roll.
I agree-why not use drone controlled zeppelin airships-these can stay around for days-launching missiles and surveying the battle zone. No crew, no need for life support, and cheap to operate. of course, that flies in the face of fighter doctrine…but I’m not talking about refighting WWII, either.
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No crew, no need for life support, and cheap to operate. of course, that flies in the face of fighter doctrine…but I’m not talking about refighting WWII, either.
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Nothing that advanced, since it seems you want to reach back to WWI for inspiration instead. Maybe the enemy will send up Snoopy in a Sopwith Camel
Is there any way that the ‘public’ can answer this question? I do have a history with stealthy aircraft from the 80s having been an employee of xyz and my impression was that basically the stealthiness was a scam. How so? This is conjecture on my part but I think it is correct: radars have different wavelength signals and stealthiness against the short-range short-wavelength targeting radars is obtainable, but not against the long range long-wavelength tracking radars. And, stealthiness does noting for the infrared signature which is what the Sidewinder air-to-air missile uses, for example. So, the bottom line, in my day, was that (IMO) the stealthiness was a complete scam.
My impression is all this information is classified, the official reason is that if public it would aid the enemy, the reality being if public it would be evaluated and recognized as a scam.
We lost 39 strike aircraft to Iraqi surface-to-air missiles in 1991, none of which were F-117s. From this, we can conclude either:
(a) the Iraqis are in on the stealth scam; or,
(b) stealth works.
You pick.
The engines are stealthy(er) as well. In fact, a lot of the cost of the F-35 is in the engines. Or, I guess that could be a scam too I suppose. I mean, some guy on the internet who knows stuff and has been eagle eyed enough to point out that the Syrian gas attacks were from bankers and Jews says stealth is a scam, so we need to give that position serious thinkage before simply dismissing it…
Maybe the enemy will send up Snoopy in a Sopwith Camel