Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!att!cbnews!military
From: cperlebe@encad.Wichita.NCR.COM (Chris Perleberg)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re:  A-10 Thunderbolt -- Who /really/ flys them?
Message-ID: <10174@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Date: 13 Oct 89 02:39:42 GMT
References: <10085@cbnews.ATT.COM> <10139@cbnews.ATT.COM>
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From: cperlebe@encad.Wichita.NCR.COM (Chris Perleberg)

In article <10139@cbnews.ATT.COM> dela@ee.rochester.edu (Del Armstrong) writes:
>
>For what it's worth, I think they traded one liability (slow speed) for
>a bunch of liabilites (poor survivability, poor loiter capability, poor
>accuracy?, need for long runways). With luck, we'll never know for sure
>whether it was a good trade or not.

I agree whole-heartedly.  I think the USAF just figured that a sub-sonic
aircraft that could only move mud wasn't "neat" enough.  Wouldn't wow
'em at air shows.  And anyway, the F-15 Strike Eagle was going to destroy
all the bridges and POL depots, so the Army wasn't going to need ground
support anyway.

>It seems to me that the Air Force is trying to replace some of it's 
>single mission aircraft with variants of it's current fighter fleet. 
>The F-111 is going to be replaced with the F-15E, and the A-10 with the 
>F-16. I can only imagine that this is a response to the current budget crisis.
>
Could be, but on the other hand the A-10 costs less than an F-16 (and would
have cost a lot less today if they had kept producing 'em).  And remember,
the whole point of the A-10 was to destroy tanks cheaply.  If you keep
slinging $500,000 Maverick missiles to knock out $300,000 tanks (or worse,
$30,000 trucks), you're losing the war.

---------------------------------------------------------
Chris Perleberg
cperlebe@encad.wichita.ncr.com