Why doesn't the US Air Support roster in CMBS have the A-10 on it?

[Michael Emrys]

U.S. sending 'tankbuster' jets back to Europe

http://www.cnn.com//2015/02/12/world/a-10-jets-to-europe/index.html

 

Rattling the saber just a little harder to try to get Putin's attention, I would guess.

 

Michael

[Noltyboy]

Its a shame for the A10 that the USAF hierarchy full of fast jet zoomies that have never flown a Warthog so dont know its abilities.

Oh wait....

http://www.af.mil/AboutUs/Biographies/Display/tabid/225/Article/104966/general-mark-a-welsh-iii.aspx

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

Who was last an A-10 operator 25 years ago?   I think some stuff has changed since then.

[Noltyboy]

Probably. But people say they are getting rid of it because those in charge have never flown them and only care about flying away from the deck and shooting down commies in migs. Genuine mud mover there.

[Duckman]

Maybe we can just say the A-10 is busy fighting some colonial war? If the scenario takes place in 2017 Iraq and Afghanistan might still be going on.

 

Having the F-35 in service an hot-war capable by 2017 seems more unrealistic than the A-10's absence. The trusty ole F-15E and F-16 are the prime candidates for ground support in a war that soon.

[Duckman]

We (over a dozen communities of flight sim pilots from all over the world) recently completed a several week long campaign simulating hostilities in Georgia in DCS World. This included SU-25s and -27s on the Russian side, with A-10s, SU-25s, and F-15Cs (plus helos on both sides) opposing them. To the disappointment of most people flying ground attack, 90%+ of fixed wing attacks were turned back or destroyed by interception. This was in a very light SAM and SARH only air to air environment. While the balance of the campaign was built around gameplay rather than realism, the accuracy of mechanics and modeling of the systems is quite high. A modern conflict such as CMBS would be FAR more lethal on A-10s and SU-25s, and I'm presuming Battlefront took this into account. I for one was a big supporter of the A-10 up until the campaign, but after flying the F-15 and shooting down countless attackers while seeing their general ineffectiveness, my resolve was shaken.

 

That sounds really interesting, and an excellent use of conmercial sims even if there were some game balance considerations. Do you have links to any combat reports or videos?

[Imperial Grunt]

That sounds really interesting, and an excellent use of conmercial sims even if there were some game balance considerations. Do you have links to any combat reports or videos?

I have never played DCS world but I would be wary about drawing operational conclusions from a sim like that. I doubt a full spectrum operational framework is simulated but that the sim instead focuses on individual aircraft capabilities and weapon systems. Nothing wrong with that as long as the overall context of the game/sim is understood.

There is a great video on YouTube about Red Flag, an annual US Air Force exercise. In that video you get to see the very basic mechanics of an air campaign and how the different platforms support each other and are integrated. In this aspect the US and NATO is light years ahead of Russia. A fair and balanced air battle would never happen.

Just my 2 cents.

[Duckman]

I have never played DCS world but I would be wary about drawing operational conclusions from a sim like that. I doubt a full spectrum operational framework is simulated but that the sim instead focuses on individual aircraft capabilities and weapon systems. Nothing wrong with that as long as the overall context of the game/sim is understood.

There is a great video on YouTube about Red Flag, an annual US Air Force exercise. In that video you get to see the very basic mechanics of an air campaign and how the different platforms support each other and are integrated. In this aspect the US and NATO is light years ahead of Russia. A fair and balanced air battle would never happen.

Just my 2 cents.

 

Agree on both points. However I still think even commercial sims can have some real value, provided you understand and acknowledge their limitations. The military themselves use wargames and simulations in various forms, some of them modded or even off the shelf commercial ones.

 

As for the A-10s, they are going back to Europe so maybe they should be in the game after all:

 

https://medium.com/war-is-boring/a-10s-return-to-europe-to-stare-down-russia-20a0d902bd86

[Imperial Grunt]

Agree on both points. However I still think even commercial sims can have some real value, provided you understand and acknowledge their limitations. The military themselves use wargames and simulations in various forms, some of them modded or even off the shelf commercial ones.

As for the A-10s, they are going back to Europe so maybe they should be in the game after all:

https://medium.com/war-is-boring/a-10s-return-to-europe-to-stare-down-russia-20a0d902bd86

And I absolutely agree with you on the value of commercial sims. I once used CM:Afrika Korps as a tool to teach small unit tactics to my NCOs. It was great for that purpose but it certainly did not replace field and live-fire training. Edited February 13, 2015 by Imperial Grunt

[Duckman]

And I absolutely agree with you on the value of commercial sims. I once used CM:Afrika Korps as a tool to teach small unit tactics to my NCOs. It was great for that purpose but it certainly did not replace field and live-fire training.

 

I was a conscript 2nd Lt once (glorified NCO really), and I think sims are great because they can teach you precisely the stuff that is hard to get across by other means. Since so much time during exercises is taken up by necessary but mundane stuff like transportation, putting up tents, cleaning and what have you there is actually rather little time spent on, well, tactics (this might be different for professionals). So the sheer volume of training you can do with sims, even if lower quality, is quite amazing compared to live exercises. Of course this is also true for cases like aircraft where training is even more expensive.

 

Sims are not as good as exercises, but they are a very good complement and clearly preferable to only classroom study. As for the big simulations the military run to test operational and strategic scenarios they always struck me as some of the most "gamey" of all, even if they have classified info and better combat algorithms. The sheer scale of it and all the assumptions must make for a significant "game" factor.

[Skwabie]

I have never played DCS world but I would be wary about drawing operational conclusions from a sim like that. I doubt a full spectrum operational framework is simulated but that the sim instead focuses on individual aircraft capabilities and weapon systems. Nothing wrong with that as long as the overall context of the game/sim is understood.

I think in Codename Duchess' case, since neither side has claimed air dominance, the A-10s and Su-25s wouldn't have sortied at all if it were real.

 

But since it's the virtual skies they did. Let's face it, as an armchair pilot you've bought the game, the puter, the wild array of assorted gear. You've cleared your evening schedule. You've muted your phone, ready to immerse in the virtual skies. You're itching to blow some stuff up or in this case... be blown up. Why NOT take off?   Or to put more bluntly, the skewed operations conclusions is often not due to the sim itself but ppl using it. The "sim", at the end of the day, is just a game albeit boasting realism.

 

And the result is no surprise that they demonstrated the fixed wing slow mud movers' vulnerabilities in high intensity air conflicts: the only good they did was distract the Opfor's targeting and expend their missiles loadout!......

Edited February 13, 2015 by Skwabie

[vyrago]

I think they should be included in the game.  The game is set only 2 years from now and even IF the full fleet of A-10s was retired in that short time, you could imagine some being pressed back into service for a situation like this.  Besides, how hard would it be to add them along with a future update?  

[Imperial Grunt]

Exactly.

I personally can see A-10s being used in our hypothetical Black Sea scenario. But they would not probably be used much in early June when the conflict starts. But as the air battlespace matures, then absolutely, there will be a time and place for the A-10.

Same with SU-25s. They probably would not be flying around by themselves roaming the skies looking for targets. But they absolutely could provide CAS as part of a Russian 'surge' effort to achieve local air superiority over a specific area for a specific amount of time to support a specific ground operation. At the beginning of our hypothetical war that would be probably be frequent, by the end, not as much.

Edited February 13, 2015 by Imperial Grunt

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

 

 

I personally can see A-10s being used in our hypothetical Black Sea scenario. But they would not probably be used much in early June when the conflict starts. But as the air battlespace matures, then absolutely, there will be a time and place for the A-10.

Same with SU-25s. They probably would not be flying around by themselves roaming the skies looking for targets. But they absolutely could provide CAS as part of a Russian 'surge' effort to achieve local air superiority over a specific area for a specific amount of time to support a specific ground operation. At the beginning of our hypothetical war that would be probably be frequent, by the end, not as much. 

 

Agree with all.  That and including A-10s is such a low effort thing, it's not like there's a super-detailed A-10 model they have to include, and many of the distinctly "A-10" assets they have (namely noises) could be recycled from CMSF.

 

 

 

It was great for that purpose but it certainly did not replace field and live-fire training.

 

Also agree.  Simulators I found were best used as the preparation to go to the field.   If you ironed out all the idiot 2LT/new guy/how do I turn this on? crap in the simulator, it meant that the first day or so of training went a lot smoother and you all got more out of the exercise.

[Pak40]

The A-10 is being sent back to Europe because of the Ukraine crisis

[vincere]

A10 getting new wings: "This makeover will allow the A-10 to continue to protect our troops and to operate into 2035"

 

http://boeing.rollcall.com/topic-a/sponsored-post/10-thunderbolt-ii-gets-new-wings-ensures-sound-freedom-2035/

[Wicky]

Suffolk Police buy Apache Gunship

 

​The new Suffolk Police helicopter was criticised today for being out of proportion with the county’s crime levels.

 

Despite crime figures being on the increase, the Suffolk force’s decision to buy an Apache Gunship helicopter is seen as wildly over the top.

 

[c3k]

Suffolk Police buy Apache Gunship

 

LOL! A couple of points. First, does this Apache come with "Whisper Mode"? (See "Blue Thunder".) Second, it's amazing what a bureaucrat will do when faced with extra money: give back to the citizenry, or spend it on a multi-million dollar, inappropriate, toy. Third, how will it actually arrest a criminal? Will the chain gun be loaded with non-lethal (oops, "less lethal") projectiles? Big taser missiles instead of hellfires? Rapelling station for the gunner to drop down, a la Robin, and apply handcuffs? Fourth, with a limited top speed, an enthusiastic motorcyclist can outrun it on the M5 (or whatever M passes through the County).

 

But, despite all that, it's a great idea.

[Imperial Grunt]

LOL! A couple of points. First, does this Apache come with "Whisper Mode"? (See "Blue Thunder".) Second, it's amazing what a bureaucrat will do when faced with extra money: give back to the citizenry, or spend it on a multi-million dollar, inappropriate, toy. Third, how will it actually arrest a criminal? Will the chain gun be loaded with non-lethal (oops, "less lethal") projectiles? Big taser missiles instead of hellfires? Rapelling station for the gunner to drop down, a la Robin, and apply handcuffs? Fourth, with a limited top speed, an enthusiastic motorcyclist can outrun it on the M5 (or whatever M passes through the County).

 

But, despite all that, it's a great idea.

Maybe it has a 30mm Nerf gun and sticky-foam rockets!

And of course it has 'whisper mode' DUH.

[John Kettler]

A-10s are conducting anti-ISIS strikes in Syria, while the Air Force indulges in verbal acrobatics to describe what the various planes involved are and aren;t doing, and for whom. Additionally, the Air Force appears to be employing creative accounting in assessing the A-10's contribution to the overall effort.

 

Regards,

 

John Kettler

Edited February 23, 2015 by John Kettler

[Agiel]

Excellent piece from the pre-eminent Richard Aboulafia of Teal Group:

 

 

 

Dear Fellow Cromnibus Scrutinizers,

Teal Group’s aircraft reports cover about 135 planes. Having written or edited these reports for 25 years as of January, I’ve come to know these planes like friends. But I never wrote a report on the iconic A-10 because it ended production about seven years before I started my job. As a relatively simple plane, there were few upgrade opportunities. There was no reason for us to cover what we expected to be a slow but steady cruise to retirement.

The A-10 has been in the news lately because the Air Force has proposed retiring the fleet. They say they can’t afford to operate single-mission aircraft, and that the cash would be better spent on multi-role fast jets (F-35A, and F-15/F-16 sustainment). Congressional opponents of this move say the Air Force neglects the vital mission of supporting ground troops. Since I can’t offer anyone a Teal A-10 report, I’m going to give the A-10 it’s very own Teal Monthly Aircraft letter, to provide some context for the debate.

A bit of history may be useful. A year after I started at Teal, the A-10 got an unexpected big break. In Operation Desert Storm, A-10s helped strafe and destroy a long column of retreating Iraqi tanks. This was a bizarre combination of circumstances that were perfect for the A-10: the enemy had thousands of tanks, but absolutely no air force, no integrated air defense system, and only a few surviving surface-to-air weapons. The A-10, along with its pal the Army’s AH-64, became TV stars, loitering like those Skynet robots from The Terminator over tons of dead metal. But, I wondered, could this combination of circumstances happen again in the A-10 fleet’s remaining decade or two of life? Thinking about that, I figured there’d be no point in writing a Teal report.

Sure enough, the A-10 had little relevance in the ‘90s, with little or no presence in the Somalia and Serbia conflicts. Even in the Second Iraq War and the Afghanistan war, it has played a relatively small role. A lot of the fighting has been done by the Marines, who have their own organic Close Air Support (CAS) capabilities, but absolutely no interest in the A-10 or an A-10-like plane.

After the invasion became the counterinsurgency, the A-10 flew 19% of all Air Force CAS sorties between early 2006 and October 2013, compared with 33% for the F-16. But these figures exclude Marine and USN sorties, and of course they exclude attack helicopter sorties. They also exclude UAV Hellfire strikes. And even this limited A-10 role was only made possible by having an enemy with no air assets and very limited anti-air capabilities.

A-10 supporters believe that it’s the best plane for CAS. It’s very good at CAS (particularly against tanks), but the advent of precision munitions, coupled with better ISR and targeting, has made fast jets just as relevant and far more survivable. Attack helicopters have gotten better too. The real reason the A-10 is loved by ground troops and their political supporters is because it guarantees an Air Force commitment to CAS, even on Day One of a war. After all, an F-16 could be tasked with many days of air-to-air missions before the air war had been won. Only after that, the Army believed, would F-16s be tasked with air-to-ground missions.

An A-10, by contrast, is good for exactly one thing: CAS. This fact also means that it is utterly defenseless against enemy fighters, and not particularly survivable against decent anti-air weaponry either.

So…why was this vulnerable plane built in the first place? Consider its Cold War origins. Better still, consider Steve, a friend and Dungeons And Dragons comrade from my home town who joined the Army after college and flew an AH-1 Cobra in central West Germany. After grad school in the mid ‘80s, I got a Eurail pass and paid him a visit. He had a great life in a delightful Bavarian town, with a lovely German wife and plenty of opportunities for day trips and fun hobbies. He took me up in a glider and we spent a terrific day looking at storybook castles. For him, it was just another weekend away from the base.

There was just one hitch. If the day came and thousands of Warsaw Pact T-72s started pouring through the Fulda Gap, his life expectancy would be measured in minutes. NATO forces were expected to take horrible casualties, just as long as the kill ratios were sufficient to erode the enemy before they reached the English Channel. The A-10 was slow, low-flying, and again, defenseless against other aircraft. Despite all that blather about a titanium bathtub cockpit, it wasn’t expected to last much longer than Steve’s Cobra, or any other weapon that made contact with a giant wave of steel. As long as each Cobra or A-10 killed six or a dozen T-72s before it was shot out of the sky, well, they did their job. And until that day, pilots’ lives in Germany were idyllic.

Our notion of war was different back then. The line between War and Peace was thick. Today, it’s almost non-existent. Since 2001 the US has been continually strafing or bombing someone or another, and the opposition never seems to have much by way of an air force or air defense capabilities. The ISIS campaign means another few years of this, at least.

In short, when we discuss the A-10, there’s a much broader political debate here, one that’s way beyond a mere aircraft. On one side of this debate are people who think the US military should primarily be reserved for fighting existential threats to the US and its allies, like the one my friend Steve prepared to face on the Fulda Gap, or against an increasingly aggressive China. On the other side are people who think our military should focus on brushfire wars, counterinsurgencies, and Black Hawk Down-like interventions.

In the first scenario, the A-10 no longer has any relevance. The Asia Pivot, for example, involves no possible role at all for the A-10. When A-10 supporters propose sending the plane to Eastern Europe as a bulwark against Russian expansion, they presumably hope that the Russian Air Force sportingly recuses itself from the conflict. Otherwise, most of the A-10s die in the first minutes of a war. But in the second scenario, as long as the bad guys have no air force, or just a few AK-47s for air defense, the A-10 still has tactical relevance.

These are two very different views of the US’s strategic direction. I’m starting to regret not doing that A-10 report 25 years ago. There’s much to discuss.

But, back to what we do cover, this month’s updated Teal reports include the F-16, A350XWB, B-1, B777, B787, Bombardier’s Challenger 300/600/Global Series, and the Special Mission Aircraft overview. Have a great month.

Yours, ‘Til I Get A Titanium Clawfoot Bathtub,
Richard Aboulafia

Edited March 1, 2015 by Agiel

[John Kettler]

Agiel,

 

A great find, though I don't agree with a lot he says. According to him, the A-10 is meat on the table to fighters. This, based on my understanding of the systems involved, is by no means cut and dried. Finding something that looks like the ground from above isn't that easy to begin with. The A-10 is a highly maneuverable airplane which can turn inside most fighters without even trying. Big wings, lower speed, larger control surfaces. A-10s have pilots with their heads on swivels, plus rear view mirrors, RWR, chaff and flares and typically also have a jamming pod. Finding a low visibility target in the weeds is difficult for LD/SD geometry and gun attack, and if you're down there, you're likely in trouble, for the A-10 is also armed with the latest Sidewinder when it turns into you. With very little effort (Hughes designed it to fit Sidewinder launch rails; I know, because I counted every last one NATO had ), the A-10 could be set up to use the AIM-120 AMRAAM in active radar mode (missile radar used for acquisition, followed by a tone in the pilot's ears) off the rail, providing a lot more reach and capability than a Sidewinder. Survive the missile and it's GAU-8 time. Now, this may sound like some pipe dream, but there is historical precedent. 

 

During the Vietnam War, three NVN MiG-17s bounced an A-1 Sky Raider CAS bird low over the DMZ. Theoretically, it should've been meat on the table. One engine. Prop. Slow. MiGs come whistling in, figuring it's lunch time. On the ball A-1pilot instantly reverses into them; the pilot salvoes pods of 2.75" rockets in their faces and lets fly with 4 x 20 mm cannon. The MiGs were persistent, to the tune of one destroyed outright, one damaged and one which fled to NVN.

 

Teal Group is a respected firm, and the estimable Steve Zaloga, author of dozens of Osprey weapon books, works/worked there. Respected, though, isn't any guarantee of correctness of conclusions.

 

Regards,

 

John Kettler 

Edited March 1, 2015 by John Kettler

[nsKb]

Agiel,

 

A great find, though I don't agree with a lot he says. According to him, the A-10 is meat on the table to fighters. This, based on my understanding of the systems involved, is by no means cut and dried. Finding something that looks like the ground from above isn't that easy to begin with. The A-10 is a highly maneuverable airplane which can turn inside most fighters without even trying. Big wings, lower speed, larger control surfaces. A-10s have pilots with their heads on swivels, plus rear view mirrors, RWR, chaff and flares and typically also have a jamming pod. Finding a low visibility target in the weeds is difficult for LD/SD geometry and gun attack, and if you're down there, you're likely in trouble, for the A-10 is also armed with the latest Sidewinder when it turns into you. With very little effort (Hughes designed it to fit Sidewinder launch rails; I know, because I counted every last one NATO had ), the A-10 could be set up to use the AIM-120 AMRAAM in active radar mode (missile radar used for acquisition, followed by a tone in the pilot's ears) off the rail, providing a lot more reach and capability than a Sidewinder. Survive the missile and it's GAU-8 time. Now, this may sound like some pipe dream, but there is historical precedent. 

 

During the Vietnam War, three NVN MiG-17s bounced an A-1 Sky Raider CAS bird low over the DMZ. Theoretically, it should've been meat on the table. One engine. Prop. Slow. MiGs come whistling in, figuring it's lunch time. On the ball A-1pilot instantly reverses into them; the pilot salvoes pods of 2.75" rockets in their faces and lets fly with 4 x 20 mm cannon. The MiGs were persistent, to the tune of one destroyed outright, one damaged and one which fled to NVN.

 

Teal Group is a respected firm, and the estimable Steve Zaloga, author of dozens of Osprey weapon books, works/worked there. Respected, though, isn't any guarantee of correctness of conclusions.

 

Regards,

 

John Kettler 

 

Since modern radars makes good use of Doppler shift to reject clutter what makes you think the A-10 has a good chance of staying undetected. I could be wrong but the proliferation of high off bore sights/missiles has made maneuverability less important. 

[Duckman]

In defence of the A-10 it seems these "unlikely" circumstances keep happening, which makes you wonder if they are really that unlikely.

In other words: if the U.S. (and the West in general) expects to keep fighting colonial wars it might be time for a colonial air force. Historically relatively low tech forces along those lines have been very successful, like the French (with secondhand prop aircraft) in Indochina and Africa and the US Skyraiders (and assorted other props) in SE Asia.

Maybe having a CAS/COIN branch with A-10s and Super Tucanos (soon in Afghan-US service) isn't a bad idea, even if it flies in the face of holy standardisation and multimissionality?

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

Re: Teal Group

 

Which is all fun and good, but the SU-25s that are already in the game are even less likely to last more than a few seconds over target.  Clearly conditions can be met in game, or options that involve scenarios where a dedicated CAS platform can survive.  Why not include the A-10?