Quote Originally Posted by Umar Al-Mokhtār View Post
Ken: I agree on your 75:25, I hope our planners see it that way as well and not the reverse. If this makes any sense, I think we would "see" a conventional conflict coming. In our last two out of three we had a long build-up time prior to, even though we failed to see the invasion of Kuwait prior to GW I. OEF was executed on our initiation so we saw it coming as well.
I'd submit that Korea was missed by the Spooks; Viet Nam was missed by the Army (in a broad sense); Grenada was not foreseen and while you're correct in saying the invasion of Kuwait was not foreseen, it should have been (we virtually invited him to do it). I disagree that OEF was foreseen (Sep to Nov isn't much foreseeing and the executed effort did not at all resemble the ConPlan) and, if you meant OIF, yep, we initiated it -- and totally missed WHAT was bound to happen (Well, WE didn't, a lot of folks knew but the folks in charge didn't want to hear that...).

That's not a very good track record on which to base what's likely to be next...

(quote)Yes, we lost aircraft in Korea and Vietnam to ground fire but those conflicts were set in an era absent the amazing standoff capability we currently have. FACs have nearly been replaced by Predators and even fast movers can "see" from a safer distance. Munitions are virtually pinpoint accurate. Plus detection and countermeasures have improved. So we traded quantity for quality, at a significant cost (wasn't it Stalin who said "quantity has a quality of its own").

Didn't mean ground fire, that's why I said ""Recall also that in both Korea and Viet Nam, proxy wars with small air forces for our opponents, the opposition managed to shoot down a lot US planes.""(emphasis added / kw) I specifically meant in air to air combat -- which is a part of the air superiority realm. In fairness to the AF (and Navy), once they realized they had an air to air problem, they fixed it rapidly but there were more initial losses than they liked. Air superority is pretty important.

Which is what the F22 is all about -- as for your precision attack, totally true -- and the F35 is optimized for just that.