[tired_man]

If the Air Force is so bent on getting rid of these wonderfully useful, tough machines, then perhaps they should entirely leave the ground support role to the US Marine Corps and the US Navy, both of which have a long history of providing ground attack support to troops.

The A-10 is the best damned aircraft at this role since the AD-1 Spad's were retired.

All the Air Force wants is glitter and fame, they aren't really interested in life on the ground. Give them their wish, take the A-10s and give them to someone who will use them to their fullest potential.

[michaelt]

Traditionally in American politics (and doubtless in other countries too) if someone cuts your budget or doesn't increase your budget as much as you'd like, you can put pressure on them by announcing you're being "forced" to dump something useful and popular.

Local government wants more money? Threaten to close libraries. Air force wants more money? Threaten to retire a plane famous for its effectiveness in a recent conflict.

[TylerE]

The thing is, the last A-10 rolled off the production line 32 years ago. Airframes have finite lifespans.

[commandar]

As mentioned in the article, the Air Force has already paid Boeing to rewing the A-10 fleet and subsequently extend the lifespan of the airframes out to ~2030-2040.

[the_ancient]

Then Build more Airframes...

Start up the production again, I would rather them scrap the F35 program, which is vaporware at this point, than the A10

[novembermike]

It would probably cost more to start up the A-10 lines again than finish up the F35. There's a lot of tribal knowledge that goes into building an airframe and most of it has been lost for the A-10. You'd pretty much have to start from scratch.

[gherkin0]

> It would probably cost more to start up the A-10 lines again than finish up the F35.

It's not just about cost of the platform, but also the capabilities provided by it. So even if the F35 is "finished" it won't necessarily fill the void left by the A-10, so more A-10s might be a better investment.

From what I understand, the F35 did not gain effectiveness in proportion to its cost.

[gozur88]

It's pretty difficult to call an aircraft "vaporware" when over 100 are in service at this point.

[engi_nerd]

There are over 100 F-35 aircraft in existence right now. You might not like the program, but calling it "vaporware" is just flat out wrong.

[adamson]

Huh? F-35s are in production

[bpodgursky]

F-35s will not be able to fire their cannons until the 2020's (last I checked), because the software has not been written.

[gozur88]

Because the cannon is useless. It's only there because every time you point out it's useless people start yammering about the F-4, a plane that came out five decades ago.

Even when the gun is working, the A version is only going to have 120 rounds. Which is three seconds worth of ammo.

[engi_nerd]

180 rounds for the A variant gun. Doesn't impact your point at all, just advising on the correct number.

[vonmoltke]

2019

That said, the decision to declare Initial Operating Capacity with a software load that only has 89% of the aircraft's functionality is some politicized bullshit by the USAF.

[mikeash]

That must be one fancy-pants cannon if it takes three years to write the software to drive it. How is that even possible?

[gozur88]

Because you don't engage manually any more. As I pointed out in above, the A (air superiority) version has only 120 rounds of ammo, which is three seconds worth.

If you're using the gun you tell the computer "I want to shoot that guy", at which point you try to get him onto the pip on your display, which is going to move around depending on your relative velocity and distance. The computer actually fires the gun when it decides the round will hit. If you had to do it manually you'd most likely run out of ammo before you hit anything.

The air-to-ground system is similar.

So the software isn't just firing the gun. It's integrating data from all its sensors to figure out when to fire based on what you're trying to hit. I assume they have cut-outs friendlies as well, so you don't accidentally shoot your wingman.

[ceejayoz]

Cannons have substantially nastier failure modes than the latest Twitter clone, and as such have much longer software development and testing cycles.

A look into a similar process with NASA: http://www.fastcompany.com/28121/they-write-right-stuff

[the_ancient]

Yea, they are producing a non-functional aircraft, that under preforms, and can not keep pace with aircraft 20 years older than it...

Yea USAF....

the F35 is terrible plane...

[PhasmaFelis]

In that case, if the design itself is still viable, it seems like it would make more sense to just produce more A-10s. Tooling up won't be cheap, but it might be cheaper than throwing yet more money at a wastefully expensive replacement.

(Also, I think that a bunch of the A-10s in service were recently overhauled, which according to the article added "many decades of service life". I don't know if that's literally true, but it does seem like a thorough rebuild of a military airframe might be more economical than doing the same for, say, a mass-produced civilian car.)

[gherkin0]

> In that case, if the design itself is still viable, it seems like it would make more sense to just produce more A-10s. Tooling up won't be cheap, but it might be cheaper than throwing yet more money at a wastefully expensive replacement.

One hiccup to that idea is that apparently the original A-10 blueprints were "lost" over the course of several defense-contractor mergers. I don't think that should be a huge hurdle to overcome though, since they've been able to modernize the planes and design and build major replacement components for them (like new wings). However, the Air Force brass would probably make a big deal out of the missing plans in their smokescreen.

I think they should just transfer the close air support role (along with the planes, personnel, and all associated budget) to the Army.

[ceejayoz]

The newest B-52 is more than 50 years old, and they're expected to serve into the 2040s.

[ams6110]

Airframes can last pretty much indefinitely with proper maintenance. 32 years is not anywhere close to the limit.

[dredmorbius]

Stress cycles and aluminium are your limitations. The A-10 flies a pretty dynamic mission. Now B52s, which mostly fly high and straight, are a different story (takeoff-landing cycles affect wings). The newest B52s were build in the early 1960s. They'll be flying through 2040, an 80 year lifespan.

Ultimately it's wing fatigue that takes them down.

[msbarnett]

And, again, as the article points out the A-10 fleet has literally just been rewinged, extending their expected lifespan to ~2040

[dredmorbius]

The key words in the post I was replying to being "indefinitely" and "proper maintenance". Yes, if you rebuild your Ship of Theseus, it may well last forever. But that raises other questions which have been debated for some time.

Aluminium has specific concerns in that when it fails it has a strong tendency to do so catastrophically and with no warning, unless you've been very closely examinging for developing stress fractures. I've had personal experience with this, and there's a rather well-known video sequence of a fire-suppression air tanker undergoing an unscheduled dewinging above California a few years back.

Cumulative entropic stress throughout the airframe does ultimately raise concerns over predictability of structural integrity. The more dynamic your flight patterns, the greater those stresses are, and more unpredictable.

[dv_dt]

I suspect the problem has been that the AF doesn't want to give up the ground supt role (or maybe just the budget associated with it), but they do want to give up the plane.

[tired_man]

The Air Force wants the cash to help make up for the abysmal F-35 program. The USMC and Navy should have control of ground attack resources. Let the Air Force play with their missiles and laser death rays.

[Scramblejams]

Or, I'm gonna go out on a limb here -- how about open up fixed wing close air support to the Army? The Marines are already free to run whatever they want, but they've banked on the F-35 as well.

Since the end of the USAAF and the formation of the USAF, it's been sacrosanct that the Army isn't allowed to do fixed wing aviation. It may be time to look at changing that.

[GunboatDiplomat]

The Army is allowed to do fixed wing aviation, but only with a dry weight of 5000 lbs. or less.

[hga]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_West_Agreement most often called the Treaty of Key West in my readings.

[iofj]

I bet that will turn out to be a massive tactical misjudgment by the air force once we really start switching to drones, at which point 5000lbs or less is no longer a limitation at all.

[engi_nerd]

Interesting opinion. The usual interpretation of USAF history is that it never really wanted CAS aircraft at all. Flying high and fast is what the USAF has prized as a general rule. CAS is necessary and important but not sexy or what you want to fly if you hope to climb the rank ladder.

[nerfhammer]

Wouldn't the Marines want the aircraft to be carrier-based, which the A-10 is not?

[gozur88]

Well, LHA and LHD-based, anyway. And also short improvised landing strips. The marines wouldn't have anywhere to base the A-10. They'd have to fly out of Air Force bases.

[engi_nerd]

...What about all those lovely Naval Air and Marine Corps Air Stations?

[gozur88]

We tend to not have those were we need them. Is there a Naval air base near A-stan?

[engi_nerd]

That's not what you said originally though. You said that the Navy or Marine Corps would be forced to use Air Force facilities.

And there can be an air field within striking distance of Afghanistan, if necessary, as I'm sure you know. A CVN or an LHA.

[gozur88]

>That's not what you said originally though. You said that the Navy or Marine Corps would be forced to use Air Force facilities.

Yes... and if there's no naval base near the theater you're interested in, then...? We're not fighting wars in San Diego.

>And there can be an air field within striking distance of Afghanistan, if necessary, as I'm sure you know. A CVN or an LHA.

You know better than that. You're not going to base A-10s on a ship.

[grillvogel]

chair force amirite