"No A-10 for Afghanistan -- but Here's the Next Best Thing" Topic

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Nice.
The RCAF needs a squadron of those too I think.

Well, at least I can be sure this is in the *current* USAF budget that was negotiated years ago and counts as, "approved discretionary spending," for this fiscal year.

Otherwise it would be incredulous that the USAF was suddenly, "awarding," an air force to another country.

OK, nice plane, yea, and yes, I know they will be used to support American troops. Still, this smells.

$20 USD million USD for an aircraft less capable than a P-47, much less an A-1 Skyraider? But at least it's cheap to operate. Until you actually operate it.

@Rubber Suit theater: it's about as capable as a Sturmovik or Stuka, actually. Well, it'd need 20mm cannon in place of the .50cals to be a Sturmovik. But the Sturmovik and even the A-36A "Apache" (Mustang dive-bomber) only could handle ~1500 lbs of bombs.

The A-36A cost $49,000 USD in 1942 dollars. That's $710 USDk in 2014 dollars, though an A-36A will set you back more than $2 USD million today for a 1942 vintage bird.

$500 USD an hour does sound very reasonable.

However, just because you add the word "Super" to the aircraft's name, doesn't make it so, as in Super Tacano, or Super Hornet, neither of which are very "Super" in my book.

"Average" might be a better adjective.

I think at this level, if you can get secure comms, a drone of about that size, with a heavy ordnance load capacity would be better, so you don't risk losing pilots of these fairly fragile little aircraft.

Of course, "secure comms" is the real issue.

@Mako: the problem is that the drone has really poor situational awareness. That camera feed the pilot looks through has a very small field of view.

I'm actually kinda tempted to make a modern P38ish design for CAS. Twin engines in armored tubs for an extra bit of safety, and the original Lightning carried one hell of a bombload in addition to the guns. You'd need to add some IR baffling to the engines, though that's not a big deal if you know what you're doing. Also, that big central pod gives space for either a radar and/or other sensors, while still keeping a couple guns.

While I think a modern F5U "flying flapjack" would be awesome in terms of STOL performance, the big props make missiles problematic to fire. Regular or guided bombs, however, would not be a problem in the slightest. It'd still have to be propeller-driven, the aerodynamics just don't work without the prop vortexes hitting the underside of the "flapjack."

Looks like the plane from the Disney movie Planes. Wow a whopping 200 rounds of 50 cal and 1800 lbs of ordnance.
I think you would have to send 4 of these at a time to be useful.

I thought Super Tucano was COIN. ISIS type opponents are a bit above COIN IMO.

But NO to the A-10s – Why lose them when a base is over-run? Not IF.

@Grossman: That's actually pretty close to the typical load for an early WW2 fighter. P51s carried 270 rounds per gun for the outer guns, and P40s carried 235 rounds per gun. And as I mentioned before, 1800lbs of ordnance is about what the Stuka and Sturmovik carried. It's a little less than what the Hawker Typhoon carried.

1800lbs is actually more than a P51 carried! Almost double, in fact.

Yes, late-war fighters like the P47 or F4U Corsair packed a whole lot more gun ammo, but 1800lbs is a quite respectable bombload for a prop plane not designed as a bomber. It's actually pretty respectable for a prop plane designed as a bomber, since the SBD Dauntless and TBF Avenger only carried 2000lbs.

If we're getting into purpose-built heavy haulers, the F6F or F4U could carry 4000lbs, the Skyraider could pack 8000lbs, and the Cavalier Mustang III (PA-48 Enforcer) could carry almost 6000lbs.

But the Super Tucano isn't a purpose-built heavy hauler, it's a converted turboprop trainer.

Would it be more combat-effective to have a purpose-built, armored, well-gunned, heavy hauler COIN bird?

You bet. But purpose-built is expensive. And one of the points of a COIN bird is being INexpensive.

I thought Super Tucano was COIN. ISIS type opponents are a bit above COIN IMO.

The Super Tucano is COIN. The DAESHbags aren't exactly doing WW2-style warfare, so they're COIN by definition.

I wonder if there are any Skyraiders still in the bone yard to restore to operational status. Of course there are a hoard of SLUFs that could be brought back up to speed pretty easily. Fairly simple to maintain, good legs, and a boat load of odinance to boot.

Problem with the Spads is finding engines for them. Not too many parts for R3350s still in existence!

The SLUFs would be a much better option for a quick&dirty rebuild.

If I was going to build a dedicated heavy hauler COIN bird, I'd use a single engine from a C130 for massive availability, probably have to use a bent wing like the F4U Corsair or Stuka for prop clearance. And then you need to teach people how to fly a 4500hp taildragger without killing themselves!

The Air Force commander who warned fellow airmen that speaking positively of the A-10s performance to members of Congress could be considered "treason" has been removed from office, the Air Force announced Friday.
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Surprised it took as long as it did, 14Bore.