The A-10 is retiring and the Air Force has no close air support replacement
taskandpurpose.com
taskandpurpose.com
Their bigger systems look reasonable on paper, but I doubt they would be up to the task of dealing with high end comms in an actual combat environment. They can barely keep them alive in Ukraine and from what open sources are reporting are either not very effective or deployed in such small quantities to be effectively nonexistent for the majority of areas seeing combat.
Sure, Iran was able to down a stealth drone years ago by messing with the electronic nav systems, but it wasn't like there was actual combat happening, and I don't think they have repeated that since then.
Why not ? I heard that the F35 is the best aircraft ever. /s
The US military and allies have been working to develop "loyal wingman" type UCAVs that can operate under the control of a crewed aircraft. Those show promise, but still require the controller to get fairly close in order to allow for reliable communications in a hostile EW environment.
Autonomous flight control software is nowhere near being able to perform CAS. That's probably decades away.
I could see a use of the a10s as a launch platform for 200-500lb loitering munitions to get them in range of frontlines, but using them for anything in the pacific would be suicidal.
The army has no qualms about operating helicopters even though they're vulnerable to fast jets and manpads, but the air force keeps raising the issue like its a deal breaker. The A10 can be thought of as an attack helicopter with much better range, armament, speed, and survivability. It is pretty dumb not to keep it going or replace it with something in the same category.
The air force position is that the F35 is the thing to do it. That's the case they made for the F35 - its a single aircraft that can take over these missions: A10, F16, F15, F18, F22. Completely bonkers.
https://archive.today/20130915210441/http://www.defensenews....
Meanwhile, the Marines are trying to figure out how to utilize the A-10 even more.
https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/your-marine-corps/2019...
If the Army doesn't pick up the A-10, then the Marines certainly would.
In my opinion, the only way the A-10 goes away is if the Air Force comes up with a direct replacement for the A-10's CAS, and the "Swiss Army Knife" F-35 isn't it.
The A-10 is dead. Time to let it go.
A-10 was developed for a Fulda Gap Cold War escalation, when Soviet Union had many many tanks at its disposal. China doesn't have near as many tanks as Soviets did, and now Russia's stocks are being depleted in Ukraine.
When you have drone/satellite coverage and know where everything is, you don't need loitering CAS as much, you can strike before threats are immediate with standoff munitions like what F-35 deploys, or artillery. Anything else you can clean up with drone Hellfires etc. loitering with less risk.
When you 'pop yellow smoke' and need a bomb planted there now, it is not the time to be in satellite comms asking for a drone tasking and then explaining to the operator what you need (being the drone has a soda straw sized view into the situation).
I'm not saying that the 35 isn't an excellent platform, nor am I saying the A10 would be a great asset in a conflict with china, but saying the f35 is a drop in CAS replacement for the A10 is kind of missing the larger picture of what it's used for today.
I am of the opinion that the f35 is a gerber multi tool and while it's super versatile, it doesn't do everything as well as purpose built platforms. The obsession with a one tool fits all is kind of silly. In every category, the f35 is objectively not the winner, there are faster fighters, fighters with greater a2a payloads, CAS with better loiter/payload capacity, bombers with better capacity.
One of the primary goals of CAS should be the ability to stay on station for extended periods of time. Part of the likelihood aircraft are on station is directly related to the cost to maintain and maintenance requirements. F35s have huge costs and require a significant amount of maintenance.
Sure, in a world of unlimited resources the Air Force would be better off with a new dedicated CAS platform. But the reality is that there will never be funding for that, so here we are.
Combat ranges are like 250-300 for a10 and maybe 500-700 for the 35. The big reason the 35 outranges the 10 is they calculate intercept missions as the combat profile vs the a10 operating in much more dense air in a CAS role. I would be willing to put money the range increase is negligible once you put it in a similar CAS mission.
It seems the direction we are going is fewer aircraft types in general.
I know that people love how the A-10 goes brrrrrrrrrrrtt...but it is also 2023.
An F15 has much better range than and F35.
An F15 can carry a lot more armament than an F35.
F15s are much more suitable for the interceptor role than F35.
Do you really want to burn precious F35 hours to send a fast jet out over the Atlantic to take a look at something, or send an F15? The F15 will be able to reach out a lot farther, get there faster, be able to do more when it gets there. It may not be as survivable as an F35 in a near peer combat situation, but that's why we have the F35.
But yeah the f35 is a dramatically worse price, not just in upfront cost but also maintenance. I'm not sure how much of that is due to the stealth coating and overall airframe, and how much of that is from the improved sensors. Regardless, I think it makes sense to use the f35 and f15 together in a high/low mix. Specialize the f35 for SEAD and interdiction in a high threat environment, opening the doors for the f15 to act as a "bomb truck". f15 is also probably a more efficient delivery vehicle for stand off weapons, like JASSM.
AF has public fact sheets on F-15 and F-35 ranges (3400 vs 1200 respectively). It’s trivial google search. The Navy and Marine version have worse ranges because of their mission profile.
From Air Space Forces:
“The unit cost of the fighters will average about $75 million a copy, but that is without the Pratt & Whitney F135 engine. With the engine, the last three-lot deal achieved a unit cost below $80 million per jet. The JPO did not provide Air & Space Forces Magazine an all-up cost for the fighters in Lots 15-17.
For the airframe and mission equipment only, the Lot 15-17 cost of F-35s ranges “from $70.2 million to $69.9 million for the F-35A, $80.9 million to $78.3 million for the F-35B, and $90 to $89.3 million for the F-35C,” a Lockheed spokesperson said.”
https://www.airandspaceforces.com/30-billion-f-35-deal-will-....
I figured why not go on a research tear while I’m doublechecking your numbers.
Another research paper states the US government would save 14.1 Billion keeping the A-10s flying.
“The current selected acquisition report for the F-35 proposes to acquire 1,763 aircraft. Posit, on a very conservative basis, that 10% of them will be used for CAS in low-intensity conflicts. Not building those 176 planes, over a 15 year period, would save a minimum of $18.3 billion.144 The Air Force estimates that retiring all of the A-10s would save $4.2 billion. Posit that only the 173 A-10s whose service lives have been extended to 2035 were retained, virtually one for one with the F-35s that were cut, and that no dollars were saved by cutting the other 110 A-10s. This budget would still save a minimum of $14.1 billion. More importantly, the United States would retain a far superior capability to fight low-intensity conflicts.”
https://www.belfercenter.org/sites/default/files/files/publi...
Even in lets say a theoretical Ukraine scenario, with overwatch from enemy S400 systems, is it realistic we'd run CAS missions without SEAD first?
The F-35 is no longer an expensive aircraft; the unit cost is quite low now.
It does appear to have the sensor suite for CAS, so it's possible it may be better served in a CAS protection role and target acquisition role. wdyt?
The F-15 has <checks> a 20mm gun with 15% less ammo.
However the video also claims the avionics are garbage and misidentified targets were common. Civilians and friendly fire were often attacked by the A10 during Desert Storm I.