It's essentially an assignment to the minor leagues of air combat.
Moreover, such planes would depend heavily on air supremacy gained by the Mach 2+ stuff.
OTOH, it would probably be a helluva lot of fun.
Warrant Officers. The Army had a program during OEF/OIF where enlisted servicemembers could take a test and qualify for flight school to become helicopter pilots as a warrant officer. I found this tremendously attractive as an enlisted service-member and would have gone that route if I hadn't planned to leave and go to college instead.
I think that's part of the intended use-case, yes. Currently "anti-insurgency" implies opponents who do not have an air-force.