F-16 Replacement

[Cole]

The reason why is because we have a production line for the AT-6 and Super Tucano, both of which can do the same job. There are some advantages to having a turboprop vice a prop.

The USAF is currently working procurement of the Light Attack And Reconnaissance aircraft- there's a briefing on it scheduled for 27 Oct at 1230 at CGSC for those who are in the neighborhood.

LAAR will give the USAF a COIN optimized light attack capability that our 6 SOS folks can use to build partner capacity as you suggest.

Go beyond that and use the same aircraft that all airmen use in initial flight training as the light attack version. Then any airmen can be tasked to fly it just as any can be tasked to fly Reaper/Predator.

Believe light attack aircraft also can be used for homeland defense, counterdrug, and search and rescue. For instance, F-22 airmen in the Florida panhandle could augment scarce fighter flight hours flying light attack missions guarding offshore oil wells, looking for drug runners, and deploying to Afghanistan. Alaska F-22 drivers would augment their hours flying search and rescue and patrolling the pipeline. Langley F-22 drivers would watch for small planes and cargo ships with possible cruise missiles and nukes. If artillerymen are being forced to operate as infantry, it follows that F-22 airmen can contribute to the war in a light aircraft in between white scarf duties.

The air threat in the current NSS is the same as the ground and sea threats- we need to be able to do full spectrum from peacetime engagement to COIN to the high end.

Hence having F-22 drivers flying light attack aircraft.

The high end threat is the Su-30MKK, F-11, and F-10- soon to be PAK-FA. The other issue is advanced EA. See the report on China's military power:
Last year's report, but the picture is pretty grim. This threat is real, and the other problem is their numbers vs ours.

However few THREAT nations have large quality fighter inventories, those that do are deterred by nukes, and none have true 5th generation stealth aircraft that allies will have thousands of in a few years. The USAF and friends have priced air combat out of reach of most threat nations and the same level of training is still out of reach in Russia and China. Most of China's and Russia's aircraft are so old that their quantity has little quality of its own. Russian aircraft in Georgia were shot down by MANPAD and friendly fire so we could probably expect similar results in China, whereas allied IR and radar countermeasures and experience would be highly effective.

Agree that the F-35 with internal ordnance will be a highly effective CAS provider during week one and beyond and even better with external stores. The Russians lost several Su-25 in Georgia so S-300/S-400 threats would also hinder use of A-10C...but not F-35....which is coming out 20% cheaper than original government estimates for Lot 4. There is nothing wrong with F-35s that hasn't been wrong with all other aircraft types in their early years. The superior air-to-ground capabilities of F-35 make it preferable to more F-22s...even if restoring more parts for it assembly line was cost feasible.

As MG(Ret) Scales wrote recently, during WWII, being a bomber or submarine serviceman was as dangerous as being an infantrymen. That has not been the case for 65 years because excessive funding has gone to air and sea supremacy at the expense of the average G.I. Joe who still dies and get maimed in the thousands for every 10 Airmen and Sailors that perish or are legless. Only SEALS and JTACs experience remotely comparable risks.

Yes, but we only have 189 F-22s and the last is being built- China is building more of everything mentioned above. F-22s only have 8 missiles - eventually numbers matter. OBTW not all 189 Raptors are available for use...

That's what F-35 and F/A-18E/F and EA-18G are for. Not every enemy aircraft needs to be shot down by an F-22. AWACS and satellites will know where the good stuff is originating. Ground and sea-based air defense systems will get their share as well.

The only reason we can deter a threat like China right now is our training- and eventually even that will be eclipsed by numbers - even if we match our Korean War 10-1 kill ratio, that still means we could lose everything pretty quickly...

Our numbers of 5th generation stealth aircraft are climbing faster than their zero.

Even in the Korean war with war-experienced Russian pilots augmenting Chinese, a 10:1 ratio in nearly identical aircraft was the norm. The war experience of Chinese and Russian pilots today, not to mention DPRK or Iranian is essentially non-existent. An F-22 assisted by F/A-18E/F and EA-18G with experienced crews would have much higher ratios because they are much better aircraft and pilots, and will continue to be until plenty of even better allied F-35s and unmanned aircraft exist. Even WVR there would be little to lock onto and F/A-18 and F-35 helmet-mounted displays, F-35 DAS, and clean configuration would prevail when F-22 are arming/refueling. Why haven't we figured out how to do air-to-air rearming with missile pods into internal F-22 and F-35 bays!

The missions are Air Superiority, DEAD, INT, Strategic Attack- but you need Air Superiority first to enable the rest- so unless you feel like conceding our great-power status, we can't really drop the mission.

Yet the USAF air superiority crowd always ignores the capabilities of Patriots and Naval air defense missiles, let alone the other fighters of other services and allies that won't have to fly from Guam.

Strategically we can drop supporting Taiwan, but that doesn't help - we still need to be able to deter China. I think that conflict with them over Taiwan is highly unlikely. However, we can't predict what would happen if a serious disruption took place in China's economy, or if the social contract (Chinese Communist Party rule in exchange for economic prosperity and keeping the PLA happy) broke down.

If we can't deter China, a lot of folks (especially Korea, Japan, and Australia) would need to either accommodate China, develop their own militaries, or quickly develop nukes...

Just having lots of F-35s from all services, JASSM-ER fired from B-52, Tomahawk-launching subs, and an offensive missile fired from vertical launch cells, and figuring out how to fix the Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile future problem would be sufficient to fix China. Increased dependence on selling to Walmart and the U.S. would fix the rest.

I submit that our ability to project power is a big part of why we haven't seen a great power war since WWII... if we lose that ability (which is highly dependent on air and sea superiority) we are in trouble.

In other words, the small wars may not stay small.

Agreed except the area where ability to project power is suffering the most is ground power. The USAF has the most intertheater airlift in the world by a wide margin and yet the US Army wants new GCVs that will hinder ability to use airlfit to deploy or threaten to deploy credible, sustainable heavier armor until sealift arrives.

All the Russians had to do in Serbia was airland airborne forces to deter NATO. Putting a small HBCT combined arms battalion augmenting an airborne brigade on the east side of Taiwan would be sufficient to deter an amphibious assault in the preparation phase.

Strykers alone in the narrow passes of South Korea near the border would be decimated by North Korean infiltrators and stay behind forces with handheld RPGs and ATGMs. And the sealift distances to South Korea are so excessive that airlift and prepositioning are the sole rapid options. But heavy armor without fuel only is effective a few hours. Clearly, a DPRK strategy would be to destroy our fuel tankers with stay behind forces and artillery, and SOF.

I see that the Army is buying more Joint High Speed Vessels which would help in both the Pacific and Persian Gulf. Great unless you buy a fleet of 50+ ton GCVs and future variants of it for the heavy BCT that will quickly eat up a JHSV's 600 ston payload.

All just my opinion, as always.