Current US Military

[C-Mag]

I shouldn't be shocked they're changing the uniform again. I didn't expect it so soon, but I should have.

I had nine different uniforms in eight years while I was in.

It's fucking stupid.
Green fatigues lasted from Korea to about 1980
BDUs lasted from 1980 to 2003
Then shit went nuts

[C-Mag]

Lawmakers Back $400 Million for Possible A-10 Successor

That's right folks the US is looking at a new prop driven Tactical Attack aircraft to replace the A-10 Warthog. Why, I don't know, maybe just spending money. Prop driven aircraft tend to have one big advantage over jets, loitering time near the battlefield. In Vietnam is was the Skyraider that could hang around the battlefield for hours in support of ground troops. I don't see any of these aircraft matching the firepower and ability to soak up damage of the A-10.

[ssu]

Lawmakers Back $400 Million for Possible A-10 Successor

That's right folks the US is looking at a new prop driven Tactical Attack aircraft to replace the A-10 Warthog. Why, I don't know, maybe just spending money. Prop driven aircraft tend to have one big advantage over jets, loitering time near the battlefield. In Vietnam is was the Skyraider that could hang around the battlefield for hours in support of ground troops. I don't see any of these aircraft matching the firepower and ability to soak up damage of the A-10.

I assume that a trainer aircraft can be used in secodary role of COIN-aircraft, but not much else. Skyraider and even the Bronco had more weapons capability.

[Ex-California]

Lawmakers Back $400 Million for Possible A-10 Successor

That's right folks the US is looking at a new prop driven Tactical Attack aircraft to replace the A-10 Warthog. Why, I don't know, maybe just spending money. Prop driven aircraft tend to have one big advantage over jets, loitering time near the battlefield. In Vietnam is was the Skyraider that could hang around the battlefield for hours in support of ground troops. I don't see any of these aircraft matching the firepower and ability to soak up damage of the A-10.

Gotta keep that spending up,

"IF WE DON'T FIND A WAY TO SPEND IT WE'LL LOSE IT NEXT YEAR!"

[Smitty-48]

I assume that a trainer aircraft can be used in secodary role of COIN-aircraft, but not much else. Skyraider and even the Bronco had more weapons capability.

COIN is the only low and slow CAS mission the Americans are going to fly at this point, as if you tried to fly the A-10 or any other jet low and slow against a near peer, they'd get shredded; flying an A-10 against the 1st Guards Tank Army with its IADS consisting of Panstyr, Tor, BUK, S-300V, and S400, would be a suicide mission.

If the Russians came roaring through Belarus into Lithuania and Poland, the current inventory of A-10's wouldn't last a week, too slow, too low, it's just not a survivable aircraft in the contemporary SAM/Radar paradigm, already at the threshold now, where flying low and slow CAS manned against a combined arms formation is basically obsolete, stand off precision guided weapons is the only viable option, unless you're talking low threat environment as per COIN.

That being said, AT-6B is too small even for COIN, the COIN plane is the AT-29B Super Tucano.

The way the Russians actually fight, artillery based army with massive indirect fires protected by layered mobile armored IADS, the most important weapon in the NATO fire support inventory would be the MLRS, not the A-10. If you want to kill Russian tanks, the best way to do it is MLRS launched top attack anti-armor submunitions, flying the A-10 at them would just get pilots killed to no particular utility.

[Speaker to Animals]

Lawmakers Back $400 Million for Possible A-10 Successor

That's right folks the US is looking at a new prop driven Tactical Attack aircraft to replace the A-10 Warthog. Why, I don't know, maybe just spending money. Prop driven aircraft tend to have one big advantage over jets, loitering time near the battlefield. In Vietnam is was the Skyraider that could hang around the battlefield for hours in support of ground troops. I don't see any of these aircraft matching the firepower and ability to soak up damage of the A-10.

It's far more effective. I'd go with twin engines, personally, but whatever.

[Smitty-48]

See, thing is, the Russians and Chinese are aware that their combined arms formations would be vulnerable to air attack if they simply launched them headlong into a blitzkrieg, but as such, that's not how they actually fight, the way they actually fight, is like a giant sized Grand Battery of artillery, protected by a mobile IADS, they're not even going to launch their tanks into an offensive, until such time as their artillery has already destroyed the formations in front of them, so they're not going to provide the targets for the A-10 to fly against, they'd just hang back and pummel everything in their path with the likes of Smerch, protected by triple digit SAMs, at which point, you'd have to go deep against them, and A-10 is not the platform for that.

[Ex-California]

Lawmakers Back $400 Million for Possible A-10 Successor

That's right folks the US is looking at a new prop driven Tactical Attack aircraft to replace the A-10 Warthog. Why, I don't know, maybe just spending money. Prop driven aircraft tend to have one big advantage over jets, loitering time near the battlefield. In Vietnam is was the Skyraider that could hang around the battlefield for hours in support of ground troops. I don't see any of these aircraft matching the firepower and ability to soak up damage of the A-10.

It's far more effective. I'd go with twin engines, personally, but whatever.

Bring back P38s!

[Smitty-48]

America already has the twin engine CAS plane to replace the A-10, it's called the F-15E Strike Eagle, because if you're flying any lower and slower than an F-15 against a near peer IADS, you're dead anyways, long before your get you shots off.

[Speaker to Animals]

Fuck dumping the CAS role on F-15E squadrons with a stick.

Just hand CAS over to the Army.