My rant/fantasy regarding the A-10(A&B) Warthog.

MAD-4A wrote:I said "had" & yes some idiot with more gold on his sleeve, than brains in his head, decided that he didn't like the old ships with Mk10 launchers, and had them trashed. So we lost our long range air defense envelope, but with the new missiles coming out that will hopefully be rectified shortly.

It certainly could

& I was refering to range - If you can see me, I can hit you.

Thucydides wrote:I think most readers will be inclined to agree that things are different now, and GBAD had evolved from the lessons learned from Desert Storm, the Kosovo air campaign, Gulf War 2, the various Israeli air campaigns against rocket launchers, Libya etc. Even if few or no aircraft were shot down during these campaigns, everyone has been watching and developing better systems to deal with the tactics and measures observed during these campaigns.

Thucydides wrote:== CLIP ==

Contact patrol fighters in the Great War and Hans Rudel diving on T-34's with a cannon equipped Stuka were the appropriate means of dealing with ground targets in their day, and the A-10 made perfect sense to hit massed armoured columns in the north German plain in the 1980's, but it is 2015, and time to look at solutions that are appropriate to the problem today.

Dilandu wrote:Generally speaking, the A-10 represent still worthy, but too costly solution to the tactical problems. UCAV's and multirole fighters are better suited due to appearance of cheap, lightweight guided missiles and bombs in 1990-2000th. And the SAM and other methods of point defense became more and more dangerous; it is simply ineffective to build aircraft specifically to tactical missions in the A-10 style.

MAD-4A wrote:

Thucydides wrote:The SU 25 is the analogue because it was designed for the same role in the same era. If you want to find the analogue for a 4 stack destroyer you need to find a similar ship from that era, or a modern example with the same mission and limitations (the Arleigh Burke class are guided missile cruisers) otherwise your analogy becomes nonsense.

No, one's about as analogue as the other. The SU-25 may have been INTENDED to do the same job, but they are little closer in design as they are to the Apache. They both have wings & turbo-jets but that's about it. The design differences are what make the difference. the SU-25 was not designed with the armor, structural strength, or redundancy of the A-10 (as i said, it's an analog to the A-29 or A-4 Skyhawk NOT the A-10, there is NO analog to the A-10, it's a 1-of-a-kind). When the A-10 was designed, it was believed, that with SAMs & Radar AAA with Radar Prox Fuse, aircraft would become useless. After the 1st week or 2 of a war, NO-ONE would have any aircraft left (as with what happened to Israel in the opening actions of the Yom Kippur War) The A-10 was the only plane designed from the frame up to deal with being shout & blasted with SAMs as a matter of routine operations. the YA-9 & the SU-25 were NOT. The A-10s design is unique and has NO peer at all. Saying the SU-25 is like an A-10 is like saying the HMS Hood was like a Battleship, NO it wasn't, that's why its on the bottom, where the USS South Dakota isn't.

MAD-4A wrote:

Dilandu wrote:UCAV's and multirole fighters are better suited

Multi-role aircraft are NEVER better suited, to ANY situation, than an aircraft purpose-built to that situation. UCAVs are neat but lack the durability to survive some situations that CAS is needed. Only the A-10 has the durability to get in & out of some situations.

Dilandu wrote:appearance of cheap, lightweight guided missiles and bombs in 1990-2000th.

cheap Light weight missiles have been available since the 60s, ask the Israelis what happened in the Yom Kippur War. They sent their Aircraft across the Sinai. The Egyptians opened up their "Suitcase" Missiles & the Israeli attack aircraft disappeared (bang).

Dilandu wrote:Generally speaking, the A-10 represent still worthy, but too costly solution to the tactical problems.

It's only "costly" because it comes back and needs repaired. It's far cheaper than any other aircraft for the role, due to the fact that it DOES come back, where other aircraft (as with the SU-25) would NOT.

Dilandu wrote:...it is simply ineffective to build aircraft specifically to tactical missions in the A-10 style.

No, it's ineffective to build general purpose aircraft that can't handle the situation, send them into a situation that requires a specialist, & have them be destroyed. Special training for heart surgery is expensive. Maybe it would be cheaper & more efficient to send someone who needs heart surgery to a general practitioner.

Dilandu wrote:

Question: would the A10 take more hits than say the multi role would, since the multirole is typically at a much higher altitude?

Answer: the multi-role armed with standoff weapon generally would not take ANY hits, simply because it wouldn't go near enemy air defense. It would send his missiles from the long distance and go away; the main problem would be the enemy fighters.

And A-10 is completely powerless against anything like fighter aircraft.

So, the A-10 need F-15 to be anything like effective. The F-15 didn't need A-10 to be effective.

Weird Harold wrote:FWIW, The A-10s (and helicopter gunships) were used to suppress SAM sites and air defense radar sites in the first days of both Gulf Wars. The F-4/F-16 Wild Weasel teams weren't numerous enough for all of the SAM/AAA sites needing suppression.

Weird Harold wrote:The A-10, like every other aircraft except the F-117 and B2 Spirit, benefits from having air-superiority top-cover, but it doesn't really need [b]close escort; it flies too low and too slow for fast fighters to stay with it.[/b]

Weird Harold wrote:

Dilandu wrote:And A-10 is completely powerless against anything like fighter aircraft.

So, the A-10 need F-15 to be anything like effective. The F-15 didn't need A-10 to be effective.

The A-10 does have several AA "Kills" to it's credit; it isn't completely helpless.

The F-15E Strike Eagle is very accurate with smart munitions -- at a million dollars or so per shot. It can carry a huge payload of smart weapons, but that is in 2,000 lb (1000 Kg) increments, plus about 30 seconds worth of 20mm strafing (which requires low and slow with an aircraft designed for high and fast).

The A-10 OTOH, carries a mix of smart (LGB and AGM-65 Maverick) weapons and small dumb bombs (250 lb GP or 500 lb GP) or anti-personnel cluster bombs. It can deliver those "dumb bombs" with very near the accuracy of the smart weapons. A-10s deliver ordinance in hundred dollars to thousand dollar increments and can hang around a lot longer than faster multi-role Aircraft.

As aircraft go, the A-10 is far cheaper and far more survivable in the CAS environment than any multi-role fighter-bomber in service or projected service.

MAD-4A wrote:Wrong again, 1st the F-15E cannot simply fight enemy fighters while carrying out a CAS (or any other ground attack) mission. While loaded, the bomb payload, on its racks, add too much weight & drag for it to be an effective fighter plus it carries no Sparrow/AMRAAM missiles. Its only air defense is the Sidewinder (if the enemy happen to get in-front of it). If jumped by enemy fighters while on a ground attack mission unescorted, it has to jettison its payload to free itself up to engage in a close range dogfight, thus scrubbing & failing its mission. If enemy fighter activity is suspected, the Multi-role aircraft must be escorted to prevent its having to jettison and abort. The A-10 is also NOT defenseless against enemy fighters. You really should do your research better. It is extremely difficult for a jet fighter to shoot down an A-10, (I haven't found a single case yet, let me know if you can find one) They practiced this extensively at Cope Thunder. The A-10, flying on the deck with its twin tail, high maneuverability and high ground clutter, is a near impossible shot for air-to-air missiles (IR or radar). That leaves going in with guns, & THAT'S just stupid. The A-10 can fly the wings off ANY jet fighter in a close range dogfight, it can turn faster than an F-16 & with that massive GAU-8 waiting on the other end to turn you into Swiss cheese, it was described by F-16 pilots as “grabbing a Tiger by the tail”. It'll spin around on a dime and rip you to pieces. That's not to mention the fact that it flies below the radar envelope so the only way to know where to send the fighters is from visual reports from the fight & by the time the fighters arrive the A-10s will probably be gone & your ground troops dead.

Dilandu wrote:Basically, without escort it would be immediately destroyed by any enemy fighter that he may meet. The main reason for the low altitude is that you could hide behind the terrain (or under the horizon) from the ground-based radars. The aerial based radars look on the thins at the different ange (literally)