Ditching the A-10
How Is This Not A Mistake?
This has been bugging me for years, and I'm pretty surprised that it hasn't gotten more attention. I do realize that I'm no expert on this, but I really just cannot see how ditching the A-10--especially in favor of the unproven and seemingly ill-suited-for-ground-attack F-35--could possibly make sense. I mean, can you stick a couple of JDAMs on an F-16? Uh, yeah. Is this an optimal use of resources? Sure doesn't seem to be... So now it looks like F-35s are supposed to take on the role of both F-22s and A-10s...and nobody thinks that it'll be terribly good at either one. I was in favor of not acquiring any more F-22s because the things--awesome as they are--were just too damn expensive. This cannot be said of the A-10, which is a bargain no matter how you look at it.
I guess the experts know what they're doing here...but it sure doesn't seem that way...
How Is This Not A Mistake?
This has been bugging me for years, and I'm pretty surprised that it hasn't gotten more attention. I do realize that I'm no expert on this, but I really just cannot see how ditching the A-10--especially in favor of the unproven and seemingly ill-suited-for-ground-attack F-35--could possibly make sense. I mean, can you stick a couple of JDAMs on an F-16? Uh, yeah. Is this an optimal use of resources? Sure doesn't seem to be... So now it looks like F-35s are supposed to take on the role of both F-22s and A-10s...and nobody thinks that it'll be terribly good at either one. I was in favor of not acquiring any more F-22s because the things--awesome as they are--were just too damn expensive. This cannot be said of the A-10, which is a bargain no matter how you look at it.
I guess the experts know what they're doing here...but it sure doesn't seem that way...
posted by Winston Smith at
2:21 PM
6 Comments:
Huge mistake, but anyone who has been around air guard units has known this was bound to happen sooner or later. When I was working for the Navy I was on a joint reserve base that had an A-10 unit. Those planes are some of the best things we have ever built. The pilots I knew loved them and as the article you link to states, they are airborne tanks. The F-35 program is a failure, its time to scrap it and start over.
Really? Is the F-35 that bad? Damn.
Did you see that the article said that the "bathtub" is iron? I was all like "that's titanium, m*****f***er..."
Another fact that points to the failure of the F-35, the carrier version work, period, due to a overall design flaw they can't get the tail hook to work. Lockheed said the problem can be fixed but there is a DoD report floating around saying that the redesign is going to cost to much money.
Isn't it weird that the A-10 was maligned at its inception, has proven to be insanely useful (and very not sexy), and now again is being driven out of service by the same arguments that were so wrong in the beginning.
You never get credit for being correct too soon....
Somebody once said that you never make General in the Air Force by flying CAS. I suspect that your faith that the experts know what they're doing is misplaced.
Never heard that saying about CAS. Interesting, though it obviously bodes ill here...
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