On Tuesday, September 22, 2015 at 10:26:50 PM UTC-5, John B. wrote:
On Tue, 22 Sep 2015 19:23:14 -0500, Tim Wescott
wrote:

On Tue, 22 Sep 2015 19:54:53 -0400, Ed Huntress wrote:

This is an interesting article that may explain why the Air Force
decided to drop the A-10 Warthog:

http://arstechnica.com/information-t.../09/air-force-
fighters-will-carry-laser-cannons-cyber-weapons-by-2020/

To my knowledge, with few exceptions the air force -- even when it was
part of the army -- has had little enthusiasm for ground support.

Current doctrine is that the army gets to play with rotary wing craft but
doesn't get to fly fixed-wing. So, by that doctrine the Air Force gets
the A-10. But by their own leanings, they don't want to do what it does,
so they've been trying to rid themselves of it for years.

But -- I'm a life-long civilian, so what do I know?

I'm not sure that is correct as the A.F. has been engaged in ground
support for it's whole existence. The entire purpose of the armed
C-47's (Puff the Magic Dragon) was ground support and I was even
bought several beers by Army guys when they found out that I was in
the organization. Our big brag was that if we got there before They
got through the fence that we never lost a camp.

But I might add that the Army was very jealous of their helicopter
rights and privileges. We built two Hueys with twin mini guns and
rocket pods at Nha Tang and had to go to the Army for help in adding
the rocket pods and the fact that the Air Force was "building armed
helicopters" went all the way to headquarters MAAGV.

( We got to keep our armed Hueys because the were labeled "for "Air
Base Defense" :-)
--
cheers,

John B.

The Marines flew Harriers, presumably for CAS. I think the Harriers are being phased out. Maybe they should transition to the A-10