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Air Force to keep A-10 flying

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Secretary of Defense Ash Carter this week confirmed what had been rumored for months: The Air Force's ground attack jet, the inelegant but well-armed and well-armored A-10 Thunderbolt, nicknamed the "Warthog," will not face retirement until at least at least six years. "The budget defers the A-10's final retirement until 2022, replacing it with F-35 Joint Strike Fighters on a squadron-by-squadron basis, so we'll always have enough aircraft for today's… (www.cnn.com) More...

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canuck44
canuck44 9
Good news for the grunts. Amazing how the DND make it sound like this was all their idea rather than Congress, both parties, got it right. The second message: we might have the F-35 working by 2022.
patpylot
patrick baker 9
time to consider where to build the next 250 of these magnificent warbirds, because the need will persist well beyond 2022. The ones on non-flying status ought to be remanufactured and re-engined and sent back to work. Many sit in desert dry storage and every one of them is a candidate for rehabilitation and re-entry into the fray, either as parts or flying status. Does any sane person truly think Afghanistan, iran, iran, Libya or other desert localities will be pacified anytime soon, or anytime at all? hence the need for this weapon. No F-35 will ever exist than can do this work, so quit kidding about that,
canuck44
canuck44 2
When you get right down to it the A-10 doesn't need many improvements for its current and future role. Avionics and air ground communications can all be placed on the current airframe as can new engines when needed. The Air Force just needs to upgrade the storage birds then begin to rotate them with those flying in a continuous upgrade and restoration program.
fabere
fabere 5
Nice to see the DOD finally realzing what everyone else knew....the A-10 is a tank drivers worst nightmare and deserves to continue doing what it does best - ruin tank driver's days! And then giving them a smokin' hole to die in!
ddeckner
To bad the Marines don't have something like this to back them up. So far the F35 is a bust. Biggest waste of money, besides congress, that we have.
TWA55
TWA55 3
Amen, one hell of a punch.
clars
Bang for the buck sums it up. Keeping the old birds flying makes sense with all the low tech conflicts these days.
tcmarks
Tim Marks 1
As Patrick stated, there are dozens of A-10s sitting in storage at Davis-Monthan in Tucson, the majority of which can be made operational again using sacrificed parts from their sister ships sitting next to them. And he is also correct that the jihadi-thing will not be going away soon either, making the need for the A-10 all that much more important into the foreseeable future. Here's an idea, restart the A-10 production line with some design improvements for the avionics and weapons compatibilities in place of building a portion of the 1200 or so F-35s the Pentagon wants to procure. These A-10s would replace the Lightning 2s that will not be as capable of fulfilling the CAS role, since a couple of BBs will take it out of action, not like the Warthog which can be full of holes and still keep flying.
spdmrcht
Ron Lorenz 1
Is or has the A10 ever been Carrier launched??
canuck44
canuck44 3
Certainly if there was something like it, Iranian speedboats would be trying to outrun Uranium enriched 30 mm cannon shells. However as a CAS weapon its relatively slow speed and combat radius of around 250 miles would mean a carrier would have to be close to the enemy to make it effective. Besides we now have the F35 which can scare them with their price tags.
joelwiley
joel wiley 2
The software to launch the price tags isn't working yet.
canuck44
canuck44 1
Damn. Must be hard to make tags with numbers that big.
spdmrcht
Ron Lorenz 1
Their on computer chips!

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