This plane was our Blessing in disguise! When we heard that 7 barrel 30mm cannon/Gatlin gun come to life, we knew that we were safe. And, it was a VERY bad day for the enemy! 
A-10 Warthog-AKA-Thunderbolt II-Tank Buster
- Thread starter BlueOvalFitter
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Let me start by saying I have never flown a plane and chances are never will. Way back in the day when people went to book stores and I was a small kid my mother would drag me to Barnes and Noble. I always went to the mountain bike magazines and the coffee table books. Yes, before someone throws it out there, I'm a picture kinda guy My favorite coffee book subject was modern military aircraft.
I was always taken aback by the A10 and the SR71. If I was told pick any aircraft to fly I think it would be the A10. Coming in low with that kinda payload and the machineguns are amazing clearing a battlefield has to be an incredible feeling.
My favorite coffee book subject was modern military aircraft. I was always taken aback by the A10 and the SR71. If I was told pick any aircraft to fly I think it would be the A10. Coming in low with that kinda payload and the machineguns are amazing clearing a battlefield has to be an incredible feeling.
Great close air support for sure. It looks like we’re going full circle on close air support. It appears that our military will be going to a prop driven replacement. Do you remember the A-1 Skyraider? You can bet that the Russians won’t be giving up their SU-25 any time soon.
Jackson_Slugger
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The proper will be a COIN aircraft and wouldn't last in a sustained armored thrust. The A-10 enjoys a significant political constituency on both sides of the Isle and I don't think it will go away anytime too soon and the Army is adamant they don't want a mix of F-35's and small turboprops being relied on to kill tanks in a potential near-peer war...
The A-10 is a dead duck in a near peer war. Won't survive. But it is great for blowing up insurgents and folks with much less sophisticated air defenses. The troops will be very glad to see the F-35 in a near-peer war. But they probably won't see it. They'll just see the enemy getting blown to hell.
I thought that helicopters were generally pretty good for that sort of thing. I heard that the A-10 was expected to suffer a ridiculous loss rate in a near peer war.
Jackson_Slugger
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It will if air superiority in achieved and SAM systems are suppressed and driven back. Granted, it is not the first strike aircraft sent in, but if well supported it will more than survive. The SU-25 is already has been used in contested airspace and is effective, but yes they take losses...
That's a big IF in a near-peer war. Until that is achieved, the F-35 and F-22 are the only things flying in the contested airspace.
Jackson_Slugger
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Near peer is relative. The Russian Air Force, for instance, isn't really that big in comparison. The SAM systems are the real problem of area denial, but any aircraft will have to contend with that. I would argue the A-10 may have a much better survival rate against some SAMs as does an F-16 of F-15E...
The A-10 flies close to the ground and is extremely maneuverable and has countermeasures. They won't be going it alone BTW...
Wasn't there a report saying the something like 7% were expected to be lost per week in a conflict with the Soviet Union?
Jackson_Slugger
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Probably. But as opposed to what? Apaches/Super Cobras? F-16's? All would have suffered heavy casualties initially even in the best, most optimistic projections. I think 7% might sound great to the guys on the ground...
Back in the late 80s I went with a Boy-Scout trop on a bus field trip that included touring an Airforce base. Among other things, we were privileged to see the wart-hog and some of the laser guided arms it carries up close. That machine gun with depleted uranium tank busting rounds is one mean gun. They pointed out that the pilot sits in a titanium bulletproof bathtub, and the controls are redundant.
While it is slow, and very manurable, and slow compared to fighter aircraft, it is built to take a beating from small arms fire from the ground, where it does it fighting, and to keep on fighting. Sure it is a sitting duck if the other side controls the air, but in a situation when that is not a problem it gets the job of sweeping up enemy tanks done fast and effectively. As Timex use to say "built to take a licking and keep on ticking."
I remember years ago there was talk of mothballing them, and then when tank busting was needed they were again called on and served very well.
While it is slow, and very manurable, and slow compared to fighter aircraft, it is built to take a beating from small arms fire from the ground, where it does it fighting, and to keep on fighting. Sure it is a sitting duck if the other side controls the air, but in a situation when that is not a problem it gets the job of sweeping up enemy tanks done fast and effectively. As Timex use to say "built to take a licking and keep on ticking."
I remember years ago there was talk of mothballing them, and then when tank busting was needed they were again called on and served very well.
When I was in the 5th grade my class went on a tour of Naval Air Station Alameda. If you saw Star Trek IV, it was where they kept the "nuclear wessels".
We didn't get to see any weapons though. Heck - we were told not to take any photos of any radomes. And the only planes we saw were ugly-looking A-6s and KA-6s. We thought they looked like big tadpoles. Managed to see one plane on the way out, although our guide (Journalist 2nd Class) said we weren't likely to see one.
As far as the A-10 goes, it certainly does the job when one side can pretty much eliminate any comparable air power and SAM installations. I understand it might be able to survive shoulder-fired missiles. But by its very nature, it's supposed to hang around in a hostile environment for a long time. However, I heard it wasn't likely to last very long in the environment for which it was designed. The Eastern Bloc was very protective of their tanks. This was the article I was looking for (you're going to have to reassemble since it has a problem with Medium links):
https://medium.com/ war-is-boring/an-a-10-pilot-could-hope-to-last-two-weeks-against-the-soviets-1ebff9bfa4df
Obviously these days they're not going to put American pilots in any situation where they're sitting ducks. The A-10 is pretty good against overmatched opponents like insurgents.
SAMs are great for shooting down big bombers, and planes like F14, 15, 16, 18, etc. But an A10 at 30' AGL is not an easy target for a SAM to even see, much less target lock, and shooting it down is difficult. A faster fighter has a good chance of getting shot down by an A10 also, because they don't do so well when the fight becomes low and slow. Different aircraft for different missions, the A10 is basically in a league of its own, and so superior in many ways, even all these years later. An A10 pilot is not going to mix it up with a few fighters at 30,000', they are going to get them to come down to 30' and dodging hills and terrain. Slow that fast fighter down to 150 knots and it is utterly useless, and has to accelerate and start to climb. The A10 turns and points the nose up and shoots down said fighter with ' THE GUN' as its known as. My Dad was born in the USA and is ex military, he always said that nothing else would he rather fly on this earth if he had to fly fixed wing, instead of rotary.
Any fighter pilot in a faster aircraft who allows the confrontation to get "low and slow" would be crazy. Why would any competent pilot give up the biggest advantage?
Don't under sell the capabilities of the F16, F15, and F18
Yeah...no.
First of all, it's not flying at 30' all the time. When it's high, it's slow, can't turn, and cannot even keep up with a tanker. It's a sitting duck when out of its element. An easy kill.
Next, even at 30', it's visible on radar and can get wacked by a 4th gen fighter pretty easily.
I had zero problems getting a lock on an A-10 well below me. He's low, slow, and completely vulnerable. He is no threat to me when I'm high above him and he can't get his nose on to shoot back.
Picture a gun fight, in which one opponent is walking through the floor of a mountain pass, and cannot look up, cannot raise their gun above horizontal, and the other sits on the top of a mountain pass, and can look down, and shoot down, all day long. It would really suck to be the one that can't shoot back, and that's the A-10 against nearly any modern fighter.
I'm not dumb enough to leave my mountain pass advantage and even up the odds for that idiot.
He can't point his nose far enough up, with enough lead, and sustained energy to really threaten a fighter. He just can't. A-10s don't go straight up for long, and the amount of lead that would have to be pulled would bleed his airspeed off to stall very rapidly. I respect that big gun enough that I wouldn't let him use it.
If A-10s are in the air, real fighters have very little chance of being shot down by them. The A-10 is slow, stuck at low altitude, can't bring his nose to bear in the vertical, lacks the acceleration and climb rate to catch the fighter, and lacks long range weapons. Even that big gun has a max tactical range against a fighter. It's a quite easy to remain outside that range. The A-10's best chance for a kill is an IR guided missile, not the gun. Longer range, better lethality, but the fighter would have a similar weapon, along with much longer range radar guided weapons.
A fighter that makes a gross error, that doesn't see the A-10, that lets the A-10 sneak up on them, is really the A-10's only chance at an air-air kill against a fighter.
But you would have to be an awfully weak fighter pilot, against an awfully lucky, smart, A-10 pilot for that to happen.
Usually a radar plane in the area helping guide an A10, and they fly in groups sharing intelligence. But you are entitled to your opinion.
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