Quote Originally Posted by carl View Post
So I take that an off the wall idea I considered for about 10 seconds to illustrate the kind of thinking that might have to be done in an emergency should become an immediate national defense priority then do you. And here I thought I'd get a six figure consultants job out of it. Darn.

You got any ideas?
I gave you an alternative in my response. If it would work for an opponent uit would work for us. Use a bunch of cheap shipping (not sure whether the mothball fleets still exist, if they do they'd be a source for the platforms) equipped with SAMs to provide a seabased AD umbrella as the equivalent of a CAP for the mission aircraft transitting/orbitting overhead. Much easier to protect the KC fleet than the basic C- aircraft as they tend to fly in fixed orbits vice long laps. Mix this with combat aircraft that attack the bad guys tanker fleet to limit the ranges at which US aircradft would need to be protected by the shipping. BTW, the AD assets on the freighters also provide self-protect from attack by enemy aircraft. Give them some anti-ship missiles and maybe a few cruise missiles (modified SLCMs) and you have a multithreat platform for both attack and defense. Prtobably won't float though as who wants to resurrect an old rust bucket when they could spend a bunch of bucks on some more Aegis cruisers.