> U.S. forces first took these capabilities into combat last September, when Marine F-35Bs struck the Taliban in Afghanistan
against disorganized rebel forces less well armed than the average suburban American, with no air force and no surface to air missiles. and the U.S. still can't win that war.
1. Modern jets need long runways (aircraft carrier slingshot notwithstanding) so anytime troops were calling in air support, a supersonic f16 would fly for an hour, have enough fuel for a couple of bombing runs before having to fly back to the closest large airport, compared to what the troops really wanted, a super tucano turboprop, which can take off from the dirt airstrips available anywhere in the country.
2. Modern jets, with their stunning array of passive and active sensors, encourage an eyes-off approach to dropping bombs : pilots can only trust their data, they are not close enough to the ground to recognize who's friendly and who's not.
Alluded in my sibling comment, A10 warthogs would have been perfect for these missions -- I don't know where the unwillingness to fund them comes from. Googling now reveals that Super Tucano turboprops are now being delivered to the afghan airfoce, since that's what you actually need to fight small arms battles in the remote regions of the country.
Closest thing I found was 2015, detailing why modern technology doesn't win the war, 'low and slow' can be a better game plan:
https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/8qxzyv/low-and-sl...
That day, no less than six MiG-31s “intercepted” an SR-71 over the Barents Sea by performing a coordinated interception that subjected the Blackbird to a possible all angle air-to-air missiles attack.
Apparently, after this interception, no SR-71 flew a reconnaissance missions over the Soviet Union and few years later the Blackbird was retired to be replaced with the satellites."
That being said, the Space Shuttle didn't really make sense on it's face either and we built it, so I could def be wrong.
What's really fascinating is the x-37b https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_X-37 we have an autonomous space craft in orbit for years, yet I never head anything about it. It's part DARPA project so, it's probably some sort reconnaissance experiment.
I could go on and on, I just find this all fascinating.
I’m sorry, what?
As in can fly to proxima centuri?
The company that built them shuttered 16 years ago.
* https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/17236/a-10-replacement...
An older article talking about the current Warthog limitations and what a "Warthog 2.0" should have:
* https://warisboring.com/what-will-the-next-a-10-warthog-look... * https://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/mcsallys-case-let...
The data from the war in Afghanistan paints a pretty good picture of capability versus perception. The vast majority of the responses to troops-in-contact came in the form of precision munitions from F-16s or F-15s. What the "troops" want is not a good variable in understanding what the best method of providing CAS is. Everyone wants the A-10, it's sexy. The reality on the ground is that even in a low threat environment such as Afghanistan the A-10 doesn't nearly do the job as good as an F-16 for a number of reasons which I won't get into in a public forum.
The Airforce vision of CAS is precision munitions from both manned and un-manned platforms that present very little risk to both the operators of the platform and the infrastructure that support them. It would be a significant de-evolution of our capability as a military to continue to operate the A-10 purley on nostalgia and public perception of its' capabilities. I don't expect the public at large to look at this situation with nuisance or data, but let's use common sense if anything. The reason why the Afghan Airforce is operating A-29s and armed C-208Bs has much more to do with cost and sustainability than it does to do with effectiveness. In fact you can find multiple articles of Afghan brass complaining about how what we are giving them isn't particularly well suited to the mission they are expected to sustain. A couple of tool boxes and spare PT6 parts will keep that fleet flying for a couple of years. I don't see them really providing a meaningful impact on the battlefield however.
Being close to the ground is the Army's mission and they do it really well. Adding a couple gunned turboprops won't change anything on the ground today or tomorrow. We are training and developing doctrine for a near-peer threat. We've been focused on COIN too long, and developing budgets and technology for yesterday's conflicts is exactly what set us back in the early days of the GWOT. So consider for a moment that the F-35, despite it's many setbacks and runaway budget might actually do the CAS mission quite well. I'll take the laser guided 500LB bomb over a spray of Hyrda rockets when some asshole starts throwing IDF my way. By the time we procure, field, and properly employ something like the A-29 it's basically going to be limited to a low threat environment scout attack role. Hey doesn't the Army do that??!!
So I told you what this soldier wants, and what the Airforce is doing. Hopefully that's good enough.
there is no aircraft on the planet that provides close air support as well as the A10. not even most military brass that want to get rid of the A10 will admit otherwise.
troops want the a10 because they dont want a friggen bomb dropped on their head, not because of nostalgia.
"there is no aircraft on the planet that provides close air support as well as the A10"
Apache drivers love their guns, don't say that too loudly. Those Marine AH-1 guys hate their lives so they might not care so much you have that opinion. Those Air Force F-15, F-16, F-22 and B-2 drivers might however be a tad salty that despite the fact they are the ones present at those troop in contact missions most of the time they don't get any love because of LUL BRRRRT.
Troops if anything don't want the A-10 because they don't want a friggen strafe ran over them when they could've had a JDAM. But hey, BRRRRRT
CAS is more than just "staying", if anything it has a lot more to do with "getting there". We're very good at getting a lot of shit down range, what gets there QUICKLY makes the difference to those on the ground.
What's really interesting is looking at the data; the majority of CAS missions in Afghanistan were performed by the B-1, hardly what comes to mind when you picture that aircraft. But it has high speed, packs a ton of munitions, and has the ability to persist for a long time over the battlespace.
Loiter time isn't as big of a variable as people make it out to be. We'll just throw more assets into the mix. What matters is getting there fast to be able to actually impact the fight in a meaningful way.
(I mean, that's a source of lots of the problems with the program)
A plane different than the F-35 doing CAS doesn't have to be the aging A-10.
For someone like the Army, it seems like a drone version of the A-10, which drops a lot of the pilot armor for increased munitions and dwell time, would be a decisive factor in CAS.
If you look at say, the ambush on American forces in Syria by the Wagner group, substantial amounts of fire were provided by helicopters and AC-130s.
So I'm just lost at how a plane which can reach target faster than a helicopter, but provide similar close in support doesn't have a role in such engagements.
That's not to say that stealth penetration, ECW, and targeted strikes aren't important -- eg, providing openings in IAD, hitting fortified targets quickly, etc. Just that given how things with Wagner went, it seems like long-dwell, high munition count CAS is useful.
The issue right now isn't with loiter time or payload. Range is the enemy more than anything right now. We fight a global conflict and providing resources anywhere at anytime is alot harder than it sounds. Making A-10s into drones doesn't solve any particular problem. Once the Army fully realizes future vertical lift we'll have a better picture of what "local" CAS will look like moving forward. Right now we team 64s with UAVs all wholly owned and operated by the Army to project force locally.
Response time is key. An F-16 hauling ass from Al Udeid will give me more than an A-10 hauling ass from Al Udeid. Low risk precision is key. A UCAV at altitude raining hate in the from of hellfires presents very low risk to the asset and a great deal of precision for the troops on the ground. The A-10 can act great as a delivery platform, but it is slow and incredibly vulnerable. Time matters for those troops in contact, and providing fast precision is the key ingredient in CAS right now. Sustainment comes in the form of larger platforms such as the B-1 and the B-52. In a low to moderate risk environment you can start throwing in Army assets and special mission stuff like the AC-130. Air power is built as a stack, and the idea to to provide quick reaction to troops in contact with precision munitions. Bring in ISR platforms (or already have them in place) at altitude to develop the battlefield. Finally, sustain air power with larger platforms or locally employed assets (think short range long loiter) such as AH-64s, AH-6s, DAPS, etc.
The reason why the A-10 doesn't have a KEY role in all of this is because after decades at war, lessons were learned. Now the A-10 isn't SUPER BAD at CAS, we've just evolved. An F-35 will do the job just well in that it provides that critical speed, range, payload, precision and all with an amazing capability set. If we ever need to destroy battalions of tanks en-mass with zero risk of effective counter air or anti-air, I'm sure we'll see the A-10 again.
In terms of Khasham, you're also ignoring the dozen or so sorties flown that day by F-22s, F-15s, and B-52s that provided probably more than 80% of the total payload. Not to mention the many un-named ISR and UCAV platforms that probably stayed in the stack for the better part of that week. Going back to the "stack" mentioned above.
Edit:
> Making A-10s into drones doesn't solve any particular problem.
Just wanted to call out -- it actually does solve one problem, and one I've heard expressed as a concern, which is the potential loss of pilots involved with low-flying, slow CAS aircraft, such as the A-10. It also substantially changes the performance requirements when you're not trying to safely house a pilot -- fuel capacity, electronics, lighter or smaller craft (if we're talking future planes), etc.
Hence the reason for my suggestion: it shifts the risk envelope in terms of sending them as CAS, while offering a distinct platform from say, Predator style drones, with relatively lighter armaments.
Let me just conclude by saying my information on military hardware largely comes from Wikipedia, may not include various platforms that haven't been widely publicized, and certainly doesn't include accurate information on combat.
Again, I appreciate you taking the time to talk.
Aircraft peashooters aren't strong enough to shoot down tanks nowadays.
Why would the A-10 (Or a light attack aircraft) be hauling ass from there instead of already being in the air near the AO since it has a lot more fuel and loiter time (and lower cost per flight hour)? Or being closer since they can launch from more austere airfields.
Also, I have read articles:
* Quoting JTACs saying dialling in the fast movers afer their arrival takes a lot longer than a slow-mover in a near-contact situation which can be a serious issue (and large removes the "haul ass" 8-minute rule advantage)
* Quoting army captains saying the loiter time is so low after the fast movers have arrived that enemy forces basically learned to stop the attack for 30 minutes then resume after the fast-mover has had to go to the nearest tanker to refuel.
I can maybe see the F-35's sensor suite helping with the first one but not the second (Unless it is so good that it can reliably find targets on the ground even when the JTAC cannot be sure).
Or when I read about Special forces literally having to do end-runs around official policy to get some A-29s to support them because the existing kit wasn't doing the job.
I am not an "A-10 forever" type but I find the "F-35 solves EVERYTHING" crowd to be a bit over-zealous and I have read enough about issues with the Airforce (brass especially) and its relationship with the CAS/COIN role to make me wonder about their ability to evaulate without bias.
> Why would the A-10 (Or a light attack aircraft) be hauling ass from there instead of already being in the air near the AO since it has a lot more fuel and loiter time (and lower cost per flight hour)? Or being closer since they can launch from more austere airfields.
That's a bad way to frame it, I could just argue that a bunch of B-1s should have been at altitude already as well. I guess we'll prop up multiple airfields in Syria because .... well we don't have to, we'll just use other equally as good assets that can be rapidly fielded from regional bases. It simplifies cost, provides quick and effective fire all at a much lower risk. Ultimately the ground force commander builds their own stack and helps arrange and field assets before any major operation. In a low threat environment, hell yes have a bunch of A-10s in the stack ready to rock. But what about some ODA in Nigeria that randomly gets ambushed? That's how we need to be talking about CAS.
> Quoting JTACs saying dialling in the fast movers afer their arrival takes a lot longer than a slow-mover in a near-contact situation which can be a serious issue (and large removes the "haul ass" 8-minute rule advantage).
"Quoting JTACs" is like quoting the private news network in my eyes.
> Quoting army captains saying the loiter time is so low after the fast movers have arrived that enemy forces basically learned to stop the attack for 30 minutes then resume after the fast-mover has had to go to the nearest tanker to refuel.
I wouldn't say that the loiter time is what led to that outcome. Being all holed up in a COP on a mountain side isn't the best place to be in the first place. That's why local CAS must also come into the picture somewhere if you plan to sustain operations.
> Or when I read about Special forces literally having to do end-runs around official policy to get some A-29s to support them because the existing kit wasn't doing the job.
Special mission stuff will always be special mission stuff. We still have OV-10s doing high speed shit in Iraq. That doesn't mean we should build more OV-10s. Tailored solutions are just that.
Everyone, you need to drive the Ford 35 Mustang. It's not the fastest car but it's pretty fast. If you strap a trailer on the back then sure it now loses all it's maneuverability but it's now a truck, right? So we don't need trucks any more.
Since it's invisible you don't need any combat capability, unless you load it out with 8 pylons and now it's not invisible any more, so now it does need to outfly the enemy. But it can't because it needs to carry all this load.
It needs to take off and land vertically which means it needs a small cross section but it needs to be able to have a high wing load to turn so it needs a large cross section.
It needs to do close air support but it can't get close. It needs to be slow but it also needs to be fast.
It needs to be a bomber and have long range, but needs to be a fighter and have high performance (or energy maneuverability).
It's what Boyd warned everyone about during the last generation, you need to avoid mutli role aircraft as they're not good at anything.
Like the F-16 or the F-15E? Hillaker said he'd have designed the F-16 differently(more akin to the F-16XL) if he had known it was going to be multi-role.
Eh, if it went into production as they had envisioned, it would have been built only to F-104 kind of numbers. By compromising a little on the air to air aspect, they gained enormously in the air to ground aspect and overall utility. Most of the sorties have been air to ground for a good awhile now.
These are the design constraints. Really it should be 2 or 3 different, almost certainly cheaper, aircraft.
http://jockopodcast.com/2017/04/05/69-the-real-top-gun-battl...
That reminds of a talk I heard by a historian who pointed out that the Sherman tank was actually a better tank than its reputation suggests. While a bigger gun and more armor could have helped, the tank commands actually turned down bigger guns (because they hadn't yet seen tanks that needed them) and providing sufficient armor to actually stop the weapon fire being trained on them may not have been possible with the logistical constraints of the US Army.
If you're defining CAS as dropping overkill PGMs from 30,000ft in clear skies.
But that form of CAS is unique to the 'last war'. How will the F-35 fare in Central Europe where 90% of days are overcast and media coverage means you can't just throw a 500lber into a block of flats to suppress a sniper.
> So I told you what this soldier wants, and what the Airforce is doing.
The soldier wants the target suppressed ASAP, in any weather and with minimal risk to friendly force. The Air Force is following its usual tactic of appearing to do just enough to fulfil the soldier's needs so that it can keep the Army away from armed fixed-wing.
Unique like how the A-10 has been operating in such uncontested airspace of the 'last war'? An SU-25 was downed by a MANPADS last year in Syria. The A-10 is tough and highly survivable, but the case of not being hit in the first place has some merit.
Even on an overcast day you could still throw a munition through a window of a building, I don't know why you think that cloud coverage diminishes our capability.
In your opinion, does this article accurately reflect the current limitations of the A-10, and list useful enhancements of what a "Warthog 2.0" should have? For example:
> Because CAS missions often take place at very low altitudes and low airspeeds — anywhere from 150 knots to 300 knots — the aircraft must be able to perform a two-G sustained turn at a rate of five degrees per second with a turn radius of no more than 2,000 feet.
> The instantaneous turn rate — that is, how quickly a plane can wheel around in the first few seconds of a maneuver — would have to be better than 20 degrees per second while pulling six Gs. The aircraft must also be able to remain less than one mile from a target between attacks while pulling no more than two Gs — except for the roll-in to the attack and the time it’s leaving the area.
[...]
> The A-10 cannot take off at its maximum weight in places like Afghanistan and must either off-load weapons or fuel. The next-generation aircraft must be able climb out of a runway at maximum gross weight at a rate of the 4,000 feet per minute at a density altitude of 20,000 feet. Further, it must be able to operate out of a 3,000-foot runway at sea-level with a full fuel load and an internal gun. Ideally, it should be able to operate out of austere 1,500-foot runways.
> A cruise speed of at least 360 knots is desirable, the pilots said. Initially, the group believed that it would be best for a next-gen aircraft to cruise at 480 knots with a dash speed of 540 knots. However, with Sprey’s input, the team came to the conclusion that such a requirement would be aerodynamically incompatible with a tight turn radius at low airspeed.
[...]
> The prospective next-generation Warthog replacement needs to have a minimum combat radius of 150 nautical miles with at least four hours on station time with internal fuel, the pilot explains.
* https://warisboring.com/what-will-the-next-a-10-warthog-look...
* https://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/mcsallys-case-let...
The Air Force. Air Force brass has less than zero interest in maintaining the A-10 fleet. Just a few months ago a friend of mine recounted a conversation he had with a base commander. Basically, the Air Force believes the F-35 and UAVs provide superior capabilities than the A-10 for every conceivable mission.
I asked him why the Army doesn't offer to takeover the A-10, but I just got a big shrug. I don't think that possibility is on anybody's radar, by which I infer not even the Army is particularly keen on the A-10.
What all the evidence suggests to me is that there's overwhelming consensus at the Pentagon to scrap the A-10. Congress, the defense media, and anecdotally every ground trooper from Iraq and Afghanistan disagree, but there you have it.
Grunts love firepower. Back when the M16 was new everyone got full auto. Then the powers that be decided it was overkill and gave them three round burst. Now the marines are fielding the M27....
Just because they eat crayons doesn't mean they don't know what works and what doesn't.
That said, having your CAS system be capable of showing up at mach 1.8 is worth something.
Disclaimer: I flew the Shadow 200 TUAV in OIF II and did targeting for several A10 missions. Nothing quite like a BRRRRRRRRRTTTTTT cutting the thing you’ve put a laser on in half! I still don’t think it would do well against a modern Russian armor division.
There's some interesting counter-arguments to that view in this thread; I'm not knowledgeable enough in the domain to have a strong opinion.
There were plans for light attack propeller aircraft. The US actually bought a bunch of them for the Iraqi airforce and were falling over themselves saying how good they were for the job. The US airforce then trialled their own light attack aircraft (apparently grudgingly) but...
https://www.defensenews.com/air/2019/01/18/the-air-forces-pl...
and to be honest, ths reasons given are pretty suspect to me anyway.
The A10 is a lot less vulnerable to ground-fire and MANPADS than helicopters, can carry more and loiter longer. It's like a AC130 but cheaper to operate and with more missiles.
While the gun isn't going to be effective against a modern armored division having a high capacity missile truck is worthwhile as evidenced in desert storm.
That said, time to get on scene is very important and the A10 is very poor at that compared to other fixed wing aircraft.
Have you ever been in combat with an A10? I have. I was literally the guy putting a laser (from my Shadow 200 TUAV) onto a weapons cache building in Tal'Afar, Iraq and watched an A10 BRRRRRTTTTTT cut the building in 1/2 before it ignited from all of the ordinance inside.
As to showing the A10's effectiveness in Desert Storm, that was what, 1991? The Soviet T90-A was designed to specifically be fine against 30mm GAU8 rounds, and it was released in 1993. Soviet armor divisions also have serious business anti-aircraft like the Pantsir system, which would obliterate an A10 no question. All recent Soviet weaponry, up to and including the most recent T14 Armata would survive strafing from an A10 just fine, and in the meantime provide targetting data to anti-air platforms to take it out.
TL;DNR: Using the weapons from the early 1990s to fight a war now is a great way to lose. The A10 is an amazing machine, but so was the P51 Mustang in its heyday.
:-)
If you get a combat patch and combat pay, it is combat. If your operational flight record says you have 482 combat flight hours, what would you call it (that is the number of hours I got in OIF II 2003-2004). You don’t have to kick down doors and drop bodies with your hands to be in combat. It was the RQ-7A in specific I flew as the RQ-7B is a bigger airframe with better endurance.
Also, a tank without optics and sensors is pretty damn useless.
https://www.quora.com/Can-an-A-10-Warthog-airplane-take-down...
Again, a hellfire missile from an Apache is a much better way to kill a modern tank.
It is clear that a single GAU-8 shell to undamaged frontal armor will not cause serious damage. Everything else points to the A-10 being highly effective.
Since we don't get to fire at the T-90 for testing purposes, note that smaller and slower shells from the Bradley have taken out the M1A2 Abrams.
Nothing says you can't hit the same location 100 times. For increased accuracy, improving the ammunition is possible. A few years back, DARPA got 50 caliber (12.7 mm) bullets to have active steering. If we can do that in 50 caliber, 30 mm should be easy.
As for the Hellfire, the A-10 has that beat too, with the Maverick. It goes 3 times as far, carrying 7 to 15 times as much explosive. The A-10 can also carry Paveway, JSOW, and various other precision bombs.
I don't think the psychological effect should be ignored either. Having an A-10 visibly loitering over the battlefield will have an effect on the morale and behavior of both sites of the conflict.
The A-10 is still effective against light cavalry and mounted cavalry using low-armored ground vehicles, which are the units of choice for highly mobile hit-and-run guerilla combatants. Shooting pennies to destroy dollars is a viable strategy, and the A-10 spews nickels instead of launching quarters.
That is 100% false. The 160th SOAR flies some CASA-212s, the MC-12 and the regular army flies a variety of SEMA and transport fixed wing aircraft. The Army doesn’t fly fighters, but air superiority isn’t their mission, that’s the Air Force’s job. Naval Aviation is really just a weapons system for ships; it’s for force projection rather than air superiority; Marine Aviation is strictly close air support for Marine operations: not force projection or air superiority.
The Army isn’t more than satisfied with Apaches: they’re not going to be buying any more as the FVL program comes online. That program is taking over from the Blackhawks and Apaches. The Apache was designed to fight tanks in Western European Cold War scenarios.
However, the Army actually wants F-35s rather than the Warthog for CAS. Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley said as much at a symposium last year. However, he wants the Air Force flying those planes as that has been the traditional division of labor for the Army: the Air Force generally provides CAS. But it doesn’t really matter what anyone says, there is a contingent of people that hate the military and everything the F-35 represents, regardless of the actual quality of the airplane. The critics have never flown the plane and many of those critics have never spent any time in combat situations where an F-35 would be relevant. There are plenty of ridiculous weapons systems that we don’t need (the Crusader artillery system for example,) but the F-35 isn’t one of them. It’s an incredible plane that allows missions that just wouldn’t be possible in a Super Hornet or a Raptor — at least not without unacceptable losses.
Is this desire based on technical merits or political/practical realities? What criteria could be used to evaluate which aircraft is "better" for CAS?
Seems that the F-35 has higher operating costs, is less maneuverable, is more fragile, etc. Does stealth have an advantage when one is strafing at less that 10K feet in a (generally) low-threat and low-intensity environment?
Given all the combat engagements the A-10 has had over the decades, wouldn't it be prudent to at least have the F-35 run some "live" CAS missions to see how it does first? IIRC, the F-35 can't even fire its gun yet (until there's a future software update).
Close aerial ground support is 100% a different mission profile than for air superiority fighters and air defense batteries.
If I were commander in chief, I would move most of the military to a new Logistics Corps, and put it in charge of all unit and cargo transport, aerial refueling, airdrops, at-sea resupply, construction and fortifications, vehicles maintenance, and permanent base buildings and facilities. Next, the nuclear triangle of long-range bombers, ballistic missile silos, and missile submarines would go into the Strategic Deterrents Corps, along with ballistic missile defenses, launch detection satellites, strategic-threat tracking radars, and hypersonic cruise missiles. The rest can go into Offense, Defense, and Special Teams, or any other arrangement they please. Once logistics, diplomacy, and strategic advantage are already taken care of, the tactics should be adaptable to the conditions of the conflict at hand.
Air Force officers manage people. They don't do things. Specifically, they don't risk their own lives. The Air Force is built around NORAD and SAC and ICBMs. Being the organization owning nuclear missiles is their dream state. They recently added space and cyber to that, both of which also don't involve getting shot at. The A-10 is the ultimate in "not our job" to the USAF. UAVs could not get here fast enough.
Unfortunately, they also don't want anyone else to have the whole aircraft thing. So the Army doesn't get to fly fixed wings and the Navy only has that "aircraft carrier" excuse.
The A-10 is a flying anti-tank machine gun from the 1970's.
1. https://hn.algolia.com/?query=super%20tacano&sort=byPopulari...
2. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/470769.The_Future_of_War
https://scholars-stage.blogspot.com/2018/07/what-cyber-war-w...
What proportion of chips used in American computers come from the far east?
In what fantasy world does anyone actually posit it not devolving quickly into nuclear war with these nations?
We've had MAD for half a century and yet today so many people seem to spruik this idea that conventional direct warfare is possible between nuclear armed states. It's simply not going to happen.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credible_minimum_deterrence
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimal_deterrence
Basically, it's not "I can glass your whole country" but more "I can nuke a few of your main cities, you will survive but it will hurt".
Mostly, only the USA and Russia can follow MAD, the other nuclear powers with a few hundreds warheads, follow Minimal Deterrence.
The point isn't necessarily to be able to wage a conventional war against Russia or China. Other countries, like Iran or Syria, potentially have access to the same weapons systems.
[1]: "Spartans in Darkness: American SIGINT and the Indochina War, 1945-1975", pp. 261-263. https://www.nsa.gov/Portals/70/documents/news-features/decla...
Suppose Russia invades Poland. With a conventional deterrent, NATO can deploy ground and air forces to a defensive front and hold Russia to a stalemate. Eventually it would escalate to a nuclear exchange, but only through a stepwise process. Most importantly, this is why Russia doesn't invade Poland.
Without a conventional deterrent, Russian tanks could reach Brussels and the only countermeasure would be a nuclear first strike against Russia. That wouldn't happen. Which means there's no reason for Russia not to invade every non-nuclear-armed country it wants to. Which means every single country in the vicinity of Russia is going to want their own nuclear deterrent, because that will be the only effective defense.
(Also, missile defense is getting good enough that MAD might not survive the 21st century, and then we'll feel silly for not having any other military options.)
The 70s called and want their cruise missiles back.
The type of weapon you're describing already exist and are widely used. They are commonly launched by missile destroyers, submarines or large bomber aircraft behind the front lines. You still need a manned fighter at the front lines to find targets to shoot at.
Why a manned fighter? Why not remotely-human-piloted drones?
That pilot can also be replaced by, say, 200 kilograms of extra sensors and communication equipment and two or three people in a container in the nearest airbase.
The sane choice for the USA would be a new A10, redone mostly to avoid components that are getting difficult to source. Minor other changes are fine (geared turbofans, modernized armor, no bleed air...) but one shouldn't let Second System Syndrome make a monster.
The Paladin is based on a chassi from like the early 1960s and can only do three rounds per minute or one round per minute sustained up to 22km. In comparison the Panzerhaubitze 2000 that can fire 10-13 rounds a minute continuously up to 30km. The 2016 Russian 2S35 Koalitsiya-SV can do 16 rounds per minute up to 40km, even the older 2S19 "Msta-S" manages 6-8 rounds per minute up to 24km. Not to mention the modern wheeled based systems like the Archer or the CAESAR which would be ideal for rapid redeployment against threats in a low intensity conflict.
And then we have rocket artillery systems, here the USA actually have a modern piece that is good in low intensity warfare, the M142 HIMARS. But compared to the Russians the US basically doesn't have any long range rocket artillery systems available for fire support.
But if you insist on having a CAS platform then forget about the A-10. Ask the Russians if you can buy some SU-25 Frogfoots. It's the best CAS in the world.
\laughs in CIA supplied MANPADS\
And you're also ignoring ATACMS. HIMARS is nice for the Marines, but ATACMS is great for high intensity warfare.
And the SU-25? Junk. It wouldn't survive 30 minutes against anyone with a decent AD (though neither would the A-10). Everyone underestimates how lethal modern combat will be against any and all aircraft.
The only way to win is to convince the patient's immune system (the host country's civilians) to kill its own cancer.
There might be a chance of ending the war during a lame duck presidency, but that President will be thinking of Legacy at that point.
Thus the only politically-viable course of action is to keep the war going. As a sibling comment mentioned: war serves more than one purpose.
Unless of course the culture of America shifts to an anti-war or non-interventionist stance and sees peace as more important than "winning" or "losing" in Afghanistan. Unfortunately, I don't see that happening any time soon.
The Taliban also at one point did have surface-to-air missiles (specifically MANPADS) but most references to that are old enough that they might have run out by now unless someone's been resupplying them.
Not a California-spec AR-15 mind you, but a full bore, Screamin Eagle, Texas-spec AR-15, with a high capacity magazine and all the other bells and whistles.
You'd be surprised, they have access to a lot of old and not so old russian tech + captured weapons. Definitely not as effective as modern tech but much better than what a civilian can get anywhere in the world.
Afaik talibans shot down multiple military planes and helicopters. Americans are fighting in Afghanistan for 17+ years, clearly they have more than spears and stones.
f35 can achieve air supremacy against men with ak47 on Toyota pickups
I mean, why not? There is no current or planned plane as capable or as survivable as the A-10. F-35? Single engine, inline. Take that out and instant eject. Warthog was designed to lose an engine, even let it burn off and make it home. Control surfaces have mechanical backups. Not to mention the titanium tub protecting the pilot. And the cannon? Oh, the cannon. Can an F-35 take out a T-72 or T-80 on cannons alone? Doubtful.
A-10 is one of my favorite warplanes. Design was basically: here's this cannon, build a plane around it.
If we're actually trying to prepare for a near-peer adversary, I'm much more concerned with the vast suite of electronics on this platform than I am with it's ability to dog fight. What use is dog fighting in a early/mid 21st century war? If you're trying to dog fight I think you've already lost. As the US has dominated the sky (and the sea) for the last half century our near-peers have optimized on that they are good at, and what we are not. The Russians with more and more advanced missile technology, and the Chinese their cyber weapons - neither of which the F-35 has anything to do with countering, at least explicitly, and with the latter seems uniquely vulnerable to.
But yes, I agree, "take this huge cannon and weld a cockpit, two engines, and some wings to it" made for a pretty cool aircraft.
Re:survivability....The A-10 survives being hit. The F-35 avoids being hit in the first place. Modern SAMs like the S-400 will spot and engage the A-10 are farther ranges than they can even detect an F-35. The A-10 can survive ground cannon fire (say from a Pantsir-S1's cannons) better than the F-35...but the F-35 doesn't need to get "low and slow" to deliver ordnance on target in the first place.
If F-35s are tasked with doing gun runs on T-80s, then in your AOC (Air Force operations center) or DASC (Marine equivalent, roughly) somebody sucks at either weaponeering, building an Air Tasking Order, or both.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/02/05/a-10-j...
That's why we are moving to digitally-aided CAS and precision munitions. Of course, if we get in fight with the Chinese or Russians GPS will be jammed to Hell, so that needs to be taken into account too...
The A-10 does a lot of things well but it only works if you already have air superiority.
If you control the skies? Cool, bring it in for the BRRRT. Great for chasing down those insurgents in pickup trucks.
Against a modern and capable foe (Russia, China, or -- perhaps more realistically -- countries equipped by them) that is far less likely to be the case.
It's helpless against fighters and missiles. It might survive some damage, which is great for the pilot, but it still means the plane's been neutralized and hey, you still need to figure out how to get that air support.
Also, my understanding is that modern Russian tanks (reactive armor, etc) can survive the A-10's gun. The A-10 has been around as a feared tank killer for decades and hasn't really evolved. You don't think Russia has spent the last few decades figuring out how to deal with it?
Please provide robust examples to back up your premise. The last large conflict between US weapons and another competitor, resulted in absolute humiliation on the part of Russia/USSR in the Gulf War.
Russia can't globally project its military and neither can China. Russia can barely leave its borders and can barely afford to even in a limited fashion. Neither comes close to having the logistics, bases, comprehensive weapons systems and information systems necessary to fight a war outside their borders against the US. They simply can't do it under any circumstances. China will need 30 more years to get to that level at the rate they're going; they still haven't properly modernized their military, much less figured out how to use that modernization effectively.
Russia's entire military is rotting top to bottom. Putin has shifted Russia's focus to a narrow selection of propaganda heavy 'super' weapons, because they can no longer afford to maintain their military to keep up with the US broadly. They can't afford the SU-57, it'll never be constructed in meaningful numbers. They can't properly maintain or sustain their one aircraft carrier. Russia is no longer a broad military rival to the US, they're a narrow weapons systems rival (eg the excellent S missile systems).
Things are not going to get better for Russia on the military front, they're going to keep getting worse in line with their permanently stagnate economy. They'll have to make a choice on cutting the size of their military (further limiting their capabilities to mostly defense of Russian territory), or allowing the average quality of their forces to continue to erode. A $1.6 trillion economy - smaller than Canada's economy - simply isn't going to enable them to keep up over the coming decades with the US and Chinese economies.
China is the sole military rival to the US going forward. As of today, they're still solidly behind the US in nearly every weapon system. Maybe in a couple decades the story will be very different (one assumes), today it's not.
Yeah, we can count tanks and planes and bases, mobile or otherwise, and declare that the US would win in an overwhelming fashion in a WWIII scenario. But I think that assumes we'd be fighting based on our terms - which never happens in war. I don't think it's consequential, at all, that Russia and China struggle with the carrier vessel concept. These "super weapons" that are supposedly just Russian propaganda would render these things obsolete. Chinese cyber weapons knocking out US military communications systems would be catastrophic. Let's also not forget the very regrettable state the US Navy itself is in[1]. This is simply to say that I think you're overstating the primacy of the US military today for fighting a "conventional" style war. Actually, between the three countries only Russia has done so, fight a "conventional war", in the last decade or so when they annexed Crimea. The US has been engaged in a forever-war of "Counter Insurgency" that most assuredly has atrophied both experience and technical skill for fighting great land wars. I'm not saying it's an even playing field, but I would not underestimate Russian or Chinese ingenuity to exploit weaknesses here.
I also figure that a WWIII scenario would be much more like WWI than WWII, since there will be a myriad of new technologies all clashing together for the first time. I don't think anyone can say for certain today what trumps what. Do hunter-seaker drones take out infantry platoons faster than they can be replenished, or do EW units - something that's never actually been tested against these adversaries - knock out the drones first?
[1]https://features.propublica.org/navy-accidents/uss-fitzgeral...
The US was the vastly more powerful and technologically advanced contender but got whooped by some rice farmers with second hand AK-47s.