Libyan Rebel Leader Admits to Al Qaeda Ties

H/T Instapundit

A Libyan 'Rebel Leader' admits to Al Qaeda Ties? I'm shocked! Shocked I say!
Ok, not really...
Hey Rubes! Told ya! (Which should have been a 'Captain Obvious' call)

Oh Those 'Tricky' Cost Numbers

(I await the day that Flight Global gets their ‘captcha’ feature worked out.)

In two back-to-back posts, Steve Trimble channels that doyen of defense malcontents, one Winslow Wheeler, yet AGAIN, on a defense topic near and dear to my heart: O&S costs. Using data acquired ‘somehow’ by Mr. Wheeler (now, ask yourself: where might a “I-know-defense-better-than-the-DoD”-cawing magpie who worked decades inside the Congressional Staffer Club ‘might’ have gotten a hold of such information, if real?  You get three guesses…), DEWLine presents graphics representing data we are not provided, and data I suspect that no one in Flight Global was qualified (who was also available) to interpret. In short, other than for its shock! value effect on the innumerate, the information is worthless as presented, and while it may raise a question or two, it answers NONE of them.

DEWLine blog notes:

Writing about "costs" is always tricky. Numbers can vary dramatically depending on what gets included. In this case, we're talking about operational costs. This includes operations costs, including fuel, parts and maintenance, as well as interim contractor support and manpower. It excludes modifications funded by procurement accounts. The total cost number is divided by the total number of flight hours flown by the fleet, and that is the operational cost per flight hour.

Steve Trimble nails the part about costs being ‘tricky’. It may be even said to be ‘trickier’ than he realizes. Here is the complete list of general O&S cost categories, with areas with the largest potential for huge confounding factors noted in red :

1.0 MISSION PERSONNEL
  1.1 Operations
  1.2 Maintenance
  1.3 Other Mission Personnel
2.0 UNIT-LEVEL CONSUMPTION
  2.1 Pol/Energy Consumption
  2.2 Consumable Material/Repair Parts
  2.3 Depot-Level Reparables
  2.4 Training Munitions/Expendable Stores
  2.5 Other
3.0 INTERMEDIATE MAINTENANCE (EXTERNAL TO UNIT)
  3.1 Maintenance
  3.2 Consumable Material/Repair Parts
  3.3 Other
4.0 DEPOT MAINTENANCE
  4.1 Overhaul/Rework
  4.2 Other
5.0 CONTRACTOR SUPPORT
  5.1 Interim Contractor Support
  5.2 Contractor Logistics Support
  5.3 Other
6.0 SUSTAINING SUPPORT
   6.1 Support Equipment Replacement
   6.2 Modification Kit Procurement/Installation
   6.3 Other Recurring Investment
   6.4 Sustaining Engineering Support
   6.5 Software Maintenance Support
   6.6 Simulator Operations
   6.7 Other
7.0 INDIRECT SUPPORT
7.1 Personnel Support
7.2 Installation Support

Aside from the plentiful catchall ‘Other’ categories, there is quite a bit more in this list than “operations costs, including fuel, parts and maintenance, as well as interim contractor support and manpower”. I think Mr. Trimble may want to revisit his ‘list’.

If one views the graphics provided with an eye towards ‘what is different’ between ‘comparable’ weapon systems, it should lead one to consider WHAT is driving these differences? Without the actual data in hand I am left with these questions:

RE: WC-135W O&S Increase in 2006. I have a feeling there is no mystery here, but how much did this spike have to do with preparation/upgrade/equipping then forward deploying the WC-135W forward to monitor the NoKo's nuclear testing debut? 

RE: VC-25 O&S increase in 2009. As overseas deployment of AF One involves a major logistics planning and execution overhead, how much of the 2009 bump was due to President Obama visiting more countries that year than a lot of Presidents do in four years? It is not as if no one noticed. Or were there upgrades on the bird that went into PDM that year? How much of the increased cost came from transitioning to a new support contract with Boeing Wichita?

RE: That 'Wild' B-2 O&S increase from about 2004. Yes, 2004. The charts ‘smoothing’ function combined with cyclical cost events tend to mask what could be the costs of implementing an upgrade program in PDM. What percentage of these ‘increases’ are (primarily) related to implementing the challenging yet wildly successful AHFM upgrade? I ask, because the ‘curves’ appear to strongly mimic the PDM AHFM upgrade implementation timing. I suspect some of the 2010 B-2 data also has all the costs involved to get the bird that caught fire in Guam in 2010 back home. Expect future depot costs to show up in the out-years for other upgrades.

Side question: How much does the B-52 still benefit from having the Attrition Reserve fleet collocated (if it is still) that enables the collocated operational wing to rotate hard-broke birds off the operational books for maintenance and rotate fresh birds from the Attrition Reserve pool into the unit?

RE: F-22 and V-22 O&S costs. This is my favorite. How much of the drop in F-22 O&S comes from the learning curve and Performance Based Logistics since the airplane went IOC late in 2005? And shouldn’t any numbers before IOC be excluded? How much of the rise in V-22 O&S comes from the fact that it is a little more expensive to operate in Iraq and Afghanistan than CONUS?

These are just a few of the most obvious questions raised, but I would be remiss if I did not also warn the reader against the world-class ‘chartsmanship’ contained in the DEWLine graphics. I particularly enjoy the use of the ‘smoothed’ line function that make ‘Highs’ seem ‘higher’, ‘Lows’ seem ‘lower’, and the swings between the two seem more dramatic. The use of line vs column is a minor nit, but it promotes the idea that the data is continuous instead of in discrete annual snapshots. Most egregious of all is the use of non-zero baselines which amplify the differences in the data within each chart.

If I had to offer one piece of advice to the Flight Global crew it would be to stop hauling the mail for Winslow Wheeler and CDI. Winslow may look like the Tech-savvy engineer of the future Montgomery Scott (i.e. “Scotty”) on Star Trek, but to these eyes (ie IMHO) he operates more on the level of Harcourt Fenton Mudd. 

F-89 : A Much Underappreciated Weapon System

I 've been fascinated with the F-89 Scorpion for years. Partly because of its history with the 57FIS, my old F-4E outfit in Iceland, and my late Father-In-Law having flown the F-89 in the same unit 20+ years earlier. Part of my fascination is because it was an all-weather fighter/interceptor and was so different than any of its day-fighter contemporaries such as the F-86 and F-94, which are far better known (especially the beautiful F-86).  But the F-86s and F-94s did not actively serve on the front lines for the United States nearly as long as the F-89 did, which really only was pulled from Air Defense duties after the F-101s, F-102s, and even the F-106s were active in numbers. Finally, the last interesting thing about the F-89 was how advanced and complex it was compared to its contemporaries, yet it has been labled as not being very 'innovative'.

I will expand on the topic later, but for now, what I want the reader, especially one who has never seen an F-89 in person, to take away from this post is just how BIG the F-89 actually is. Here is a scale graphic comparing the F-89 to the perhaps better-known jets developed closest to the same timeframe:

Another comparison can be shown illustrating the relative sizes of the F-89 and the F-102 and F-4 - the planes that replaced the Scorpions between 1960 and 1982 in the 57FIS.

 And for the younger among us who haven't seen an F-102 or F-4 with a good scale reference, here is the F-89 as compared to the F-22:

The F-89 was truly unique, and had an amazing, if largely unknown operational service history.

F-35 Jobs & Logical Fallacies

Steve Trimble has a little blurb up on the Commerce Dept numbers for F-35 job creation and closes with the following:

"This doesn't mean that 127,000 people will suddenly lose their jobs if the programme goes away. Using the same methodology, Lockheed warned two years ago that 100,000 jobs would be lost if F-22 production was not extended. The F-22 line is scheduled to shut down next year, but Lockheed is actually adding jobs in Marrietta, Georgia, as other programmes, including C-130J, C-5M and F-35 ramp up."

Trimble is better than this.

"It Does Not Follow"
This makes absolutely no sense. The first sentence is not supported in ANY way shape or form by the rest of the paragraph.

I am dying for Flight Global to fix their 'Captcha' widget. I'm a direct approach kind of guy and this feels too much like skulking around behind someone's back. But if I were "Emperor of the World", Columbia and all other J-Schools would have to have a series of courses on Logical Fallacies and not just as a section in the odd Technical Writing class,

There are some serious aspects to this story not brought up by Mr. Trimble, or for that matter anyone I am aware of, but I'm tired and it is late.  Maybe later.

Question of the day

Here.
(The comments were great.)

Answer: Yes. Yes it is.

Full disclosure: I am of the school that the best choice is the one you are most likely to have with you.

Another F-35 and V-22 'Two-fer'

First, 'Hat Tip' to Steve Trimble at DEW line for a link to a V-22 editorial that, aside from the same sort of minor technical faux pas that kept me from buying the Editorialist's book 'new', drives home the point that the Marines know Best Value when they see it.

Then, direct from Steve Trimble: "F-35 grounding explained by Australian Aviation". Factual. Attributed quotations, Snark-free. Hope some other blog folks are taking notes.

Bipartisanship Ain't What It Used to Be: F-35 & V-22 Edition

“The word bipartisan means some larger-than-usual deception is being carried out”
In this case, it includes the article 'covering' the claim.

I had a bifurcated response to Steve Trimble’s latest post “The vast bipartisan conspiracy against F-35 & V-22”

My first response focused on the use of “Bipartisan”:
In my head I replayed Inigo Montoya: ” You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

Then I remembered a favorite George Carlin quote: “The word bipartisan means some larger-than-usual deception is being carried out”

After I really studied Trimble's post, I decided the latter response was most applicable.

Within his post Trimble iterates (Warning: English-English spelling ahead):
“Our review of eight budget reduction proposals by a hodge-podge of centrist, leftist and libertarian think tanks reveals a startling insight: All of them agree that two military aircraft programmes should be terminated or scaled back, and all of them agree those two programmes should be the BellBoeing V-22 and the Lockheed Martin F-35.”

My next thought was someone needed to tell Mr. Trimble that the opposite of ‘leftist’ isn’t ‘libertarian’. Do you see what is missing from that “centrist, leftist and libertarian think tanks” list? That’s right: “Conservative”. If we are talking spectrum of priorities on ‘defense thinking’ conservative is to ‘approve’ as leftist is to ‘disapprove’ as to libertarian is to ‘ambivalent’. [A ‘centrist’ BTW is just voting ‘present’.]

I won’t pick the nit that ‘bipartisan’ involves ‘two parties’, and only bing it up to prevent any grammar police showing up in the comments and counting coup.

ONLY after leading us down a fabulous ( in the 3rd and 4th definition of the word) definition of ‘bipartisan’ at the end of his post does Mr. Trimble mention the ‘on the other hand’:  
There remain some -- such as the Heritage Foundation, American Enterprise Institute and House budget committee chairman Rep Paul Ryan -- who oppose any significant budget cutbacks beyond those already identified in former Secretary of Defense Bob Gates',,,

Ah! The ubiquitous ‘some’ of the more conservative bent finally appear.

Now…..About the ‘substance’ of that list of ‘bipartisan’ groups:

1. RE: Fiscal Commission co-chairs?
AKA “Democrat Tool and a RINO Fool.” Those findings weren’t exactly embraced ‘bilaterally’ were they? Wasn’t Paul Ryan on the Commission as well? I’d say he is a lot more representative of the ‘conservative’ half of the ‘bipartisanship’ here.

2. RE: Debt Reduction Task Force plan?
The one from the so-called “Bipartisan Policy Center” founded in 2007 “by former Senate Majority Leaders Howard Baker, Tom Daschle, Bob Dole and George Mitchell”?
Yeah THAT Tom Daschle and THAT George “I’ve been trying to slash the military for decades” Mitchell. Call this RINOs and Radicals Part II

3. RE: Galston-MacGuineas Plan
Well this is one I’d never heard about, but as I suspected, it is just repackaging the ‘same-o sam-o’ ideas from the ‘same-o same-o’ people.

MacGuineas is an apparatchik of the New America Foundation, a leftard organization masquerading as ‘moderate’. It is where ‘Progressives’ go when they don’t want to be seen as such. Note that at the NAF link we find a story where George Mitchell above used a BS poll to try to pressure Israel into giving up even more concessions that they were willing to make in the 'peace' talks with Palestinians.  

Galston is now a Brookings (left-leaning and used to be farther left) Institutition operator, currently working on “designing a new social contract and the implications of political polarization” and (of course) is also a Clintonista.

4. RE: Center for American Progress?
Oh C’mon! they’re a front for the Democratic Party

5. RE: Cato Institute.
Libertarian. They like defense as long as it is cheap or free and runs towards believing America should have a passive voice in the world. If they were stronger on defense, I could be a Libertarian, but if they were, then they would be good Conservatives.

6. RE: Roosevelt Institute.
“Carrying forward the legacy, values, and spirit of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt” . I especially 'enjoyed' their ‘campus network’ page: “A national student initiative that engages new generations in a unique form of progressive activism that empower young people as leaders and promotes their ideas for change”.
Oooooo ‘big’ ideas. Ask them about The Forgotten Man.
sheeesh - frickin'  'retreads'.

7. RE: Economic Policy Institute
Another Leftard organization posing as ‘non-partisan’. Ask George Soros how much they cost.

8. RE: Sustainable Defense Task Force
OK, this one comes from the Project For Defense Alternatives, which given their record, translates into Project For Alternatives TO Defense. Who is the ‘task force’ (besides the basically one-half of a two-man PDA shop of Carl Conetta) ?

Carl Conetta, Project on Defense Alternatives
Benjamin H Friedman, Cato Institute
William D Hartung, New America Foundation
Christopher Hellman, National Priorities Project
Heather Hurlburt, National Security Network
Charles Knight, Project on Defense Alternatives
Lawrence J Korb, Center for American Progress
Paul Kawika Martin, Peace Action
Laicie Olson, Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation
Prasannan Parthasarathi, Boston College
Miriam Pemberton, Institute for Policy Studies
Laura Peterson, Taxpayers for Common Sense
Christopher Preble, Cato Institute
Winslow Wheeler, Center for Defense Information

Recognize any organizations we have already covered? It is easier to list the ones we haven’t. How about that eternal weapons program denouncer Winslow Wheeler? And I just KNOW I want ‘Peace Action’ on the front lines of defense recapitalization (Not).

PS. If that d***ed 'captcha' feature of Flight Global worked with modern security software, I would have commented at the post.

F35B Agitprop ala Sweetman

Bill Sweetman ran what I would characterize as an ‘opposition propaganda’ piece yesterday (Ares Blog: A Cat is Not a Dog). He bemoaned the Marine’s touting of the F-35B program as their 21st Century solution for the “Air” half of their Future Air-Ground Task Force as “propaganda”:

“The Marine propaganda offensive in support of the F-35B, carried on through events like last Friday’s media visit to Patuxent River, and through Marine-friendly websites, pounds relentlessly on the advantages of short take off and vertical landing.
It has to, because that’s the only respect in which the F-35B is not inferior to the F-35A and F-35C. Avionics are identical. The weapon load and range are less and it is (according to the UK) the most expensive of all the versions.“

Sweetman was taking what turned out to be a fairly gratuitous swipe at the F-35B’s raison d’être. Gratuitous, because he immediately changed the subject for the rest of the post with an awful(ly) lightweight critique of the ‘LHA/D-as-aircraft-carrier’ idea. I won’t dwell too much on what turned in to the main thrust of his agitprop in this post. Instead, I’d like to focus on his ‘damning with faint praise’ sucker-punch on the B’s STOVL capability as quoted above.

Comparing the F-35B STOVL to the CTOL (A) or CV (C) Models is a Red Herring.
The relevant comparison is the one that was NOT made by Mr. Sweetman: that of comparing the capabilities the F-35B brings to those of the plane it is replacing – The AV-8B. Could that have been because the disparity in total performance between the F-35B and AV-8B is the greatest of all in the F-35 vs. ‘legacy’ comparisons, with the F-35B blowing away the AV-8B ? In combat configuration the F-35B is supersonic, low observable, network-centric warfare capable, AND easy to land vertically for starters. The AV-8B is… ‘none of the above’.

About that ‘most expensive’ assertion Mr Sweetman then makes (and cites the UK as the source). We’ll assume that is true from a unit cost POV, but how do you account for the net equivalent combat power of a B model with forward basing vs. an A or C model staged more remotely?
Fortunately, this is an easy one to answer. The difference is found in the Sortie Generation rate KPPs of the three variants: The F-35B, as it is planned to be operated, will be capable of generating 4 sorties/day in a surge which is 33% more ‘surge’ sorties per the specification than either the A or C model as they are planned to be used. In a sustained operating environment the B model will be providing 50% more sorties per aircraft per day than the CTOL (F-35A) or CV (F-35C). The Marines, by operating ‘forward’ get a lot more 'Bang' out of their F-35 'Buck' than if they operated an A or C model from the big deck carriers or a main operating base farther from the fight.
    
This ‘forward operating’ capability advantage is not simply hypothetical. From an Armed Forces Journal article last year, as object lessons we find three conflicts with instances of the Marines exploiting ‘Forward Basing’ (emphasis mine).

Desert Storm
During Operation Desert Storm in 1991, shore-based AV-8B Harriers initially operated from a 10,000-foot runway at Sheik Isa Airbase in Bahrain. This resulted in a 45-minute transit to Kuwait with in-flight refueling, yielding a 30-minute time on station. The aircraft then moved to King Abdul Aziz Airstrip, a 4,000-foot asphalt runway 90 miles from Kuwait. With the addition of a flight line made of AM-2 matting, this forward operating base (FOB) housed 60 AV-8Bs for eight months. It was often referred to as “the soccer stadium” since the Marines set up headquarters and billeting in the adjacent stadium; from there, the transit to Kuwait was reduced to 20 minutes, yielding the same 30-minute time on station without aerial refueling. This reduced the burden on tanker aircraft, increased sortie generation rates and allowed these aircraft to be more responsive to ground forces.

Operation Iraqi Freedom
During the first phases of the war in Iraq in 2003, Marine Harriers were the first aircraft to conduct sustained operations from an airfield inside Iraq and the only tactical air aircraft to conduct combat operations from a road. In the first two weeks of the conflict, Marines established an FOB on the remains of the Iraqi airstrip at An Numinayah, just 60 nautical miles south of Baghdad. Damage to the runway rendered it unusable to other tactical fixed-wing aircraft. The FOB at An Numinayah facilitated forward positioning of aircraft to stand ground alert as well as a forward arming and refueling point for Harriers supporting combat operations in and around Baghdad. Eliminating the need for Harriers to reserve fuel for a lengthy return flight to ships or bases in Kuwait, the FOB at An Numinayah allowed the AV-8Bs to extend time on station without placing a logistical burden on aerial refueling assets. With an airfield in such close proximity to the forward edge of the battle area, Harriers stood a credible ground alert and reduced response times from one to two hours to less than 15 minutes.

Operation Enduring Freedom
The war in Afghanistan is the most recent example of the effectiveness of STOVL operations. In the last year, Marine AV-8Bs have routinely operated from FOB Dwyer, a 4,300-foot expeditionary airfield built by the Marine wing support squadrons. Just a few miles from the town of Marjah, FOB Dwyer was constructed to facilitate rapid logistical support and fire support for Marines operating in the southern Helmand River valley. Launching from their main base at Kandahar, Harriers recovered to Dwyer after completing a time on station and were able to quickly rearm and refuel while talking to ground commanders. A basing option in such close proximity to the supported unit enabled longer times on station and rapid ordnance reload capability, in addition to reducing the burden on airborne refueling assets.

Basing AV-8Bs at FOB Dwyer during the fight for Marjah resulted in 65 percent of their sortie duration being spent on station. In comparison, aircraft based at Kandahar spent 55 percent of their sortie duration on station while aircraft operating from a carrier spent only 25 percent of sortie duration on station. Over the service life of an aircraft, the real benefit of STOVL aircraft is more time in support of ground forces with less time in transit to and from the fight.

As they say on the big blogs, read it all here.

In the meantime, the Marines will keep leaning (and basing) forward.

Centennial of Naval Aviation #3

1926 'Bare Base' Naval Operations
Here's a post for the "maintainers". I know it might be hard to believe for some, but Hawaii was once a 'frontier', where all the trappings of modernity were not available when and where they might be needed. This must have presented challenges, especially when dealing with the 'high tech' of 1920's aviation. 85 years ago, this was what 'bare base' operations looked like:

Photo taken by my Grandfather, Machinist's Mate on the USS Langley, taken in 1926 while the Langley was operating out of Hawaii. The caption in the photo album reads: "Naval Aviation Camp".
It is actually printed backwards in the original print. I flipped the image for this post.

Here's an interesting detail I extracted from the original (click to enlarge):

Nice 'hangar'-- (and check out the living quarters in the background).

-Photos Copyright SMSgt Mac at www.elementsofpower.blogspot.com

Debunking The Close Air Support Myths: Part 6

CAS, the Air Force, and the A-10
Part 6: A-10s 'Forever' ?
(scroll down for links to Parts 1-5 and 'Sidebars)

As noted previously, the A-10 design was from the very start designed to be operated in a ‘permissive environment’. This limitation had been a concern of AF planners since the A-10’s inception, and its vulnerability to weapons larger than those it was designed to encounter became more of a concern with the advent and proliferation of Man-Portable Air Defense Systems (MANPADs) such as the SA-7 (and successors) as well as increases in numbers and types of larger mobile systems that filled the gap between short range low-altitude MANPADs and longer-range high-altitude fixed site systems (SA-2/3s and successors). Before the A-10 was even out of flight test, evidence that the battlefield was getting a lot nastier was seen in the 1973 Arab-Israeli ‘October War’:

Egyptian SAMs (SA-2s, SA-3s, and SA-6s) along with 23-mm ZSU23-4 antiaircraft cannons destroyed some 40 Israeli aircraft in the first 48 hours of the war, or 14 percent of the frontline strength of the IAF.3 In contrast, only five Israeli aircraft were destroyed in air-to-air combat during the entire conflict. Coupled with the high number of aircraft lost to ground-based air defenses in Vietnam, the results of the October War prompted some analysts to ask whether tactical aircraft had outlived their usefulness on the modern battlefield.(link)

Air planners saw the world’s Integrated Air Defense Systems (IADs) evolving at an alarming rate and anticipated that flying low-and-slow would soon be a poor survival strategy. 
Other developments were also occurring that would influence AF attitudes and decisions concerning future CAS capabilities:

1. Israeli successes with the F-16 in the Osirak Reactor Strike (air-to-ground) and the Bekaa Valley (air-to-air) “reenergized proponents of fast multi-role fighters”.

2. The emergence of the Army’s Air-Land Battle doctrine which “envisioned a faster and freer-flowing battlespace without a traditional battle line”. This was a doctrine that clearly favored use of a faster aircraft and operations that were less reliant on air-ground coordination.

3. The discovery that the A-10’s structural design life was significantly less-than-specified, and that would require remedy either via an extensive and expensive modification program and/or replacement of much of the A-10’s structure or the development of a replacement aircraft far earlier than anticipated.

All these factors contributed to the Air Force considering an A-10 replacement that was a ‘fast mover’ and viewing an F-16 variant as a good candidate for that replacement. Making aspersions that the Air Force ‘doesn’t want to do Close Air Support’ because it has sought (and seeks) to perform the mission using resources more survivable than a relatively ‘low and slow’ platform such as the A-10 says more about the ignorance of what is necessary in performing the CAS mission by those making such accusations than anything else. 
If one were to make a list of all the things that the A-10 brings to the battlefield that make it a good CAS platform, none of them are directly dependent upon the ability to fly ‘low and slow’ : its ability to fly low and slow enables it to provide timely and effective CAS in  many cases...in a highly permissive environment, but timely and effective CAS can be provided in any number of different combinations of weapon systems and tactics See here and here for examples. 

General Chuck Horner, the 'Air Boss' in Desert Storm, gets to have the last word on whether the A-10 or an A-10 'like' platform qualifies as the 'best' CAS tool in the future (LINK):

Q: Did the war have any effect on the Air Force's view of the A-10?
A: No. People misread that. People were saying that airplanes are too sophisticated and that they wouldn't work in the desert, that you didn't need all this high technology, that simple and reliable was better, and all that.
Well, first of all, complex does not mean unreliable. We're finding that out. For example, you have a watch that uses transistors rather than a spring. It's infinitely more reliable than the windup watch that you had years ago. That's what we're finding in the airplanes.
Those people . . . were always championing the A-10. As the A-10 reaches the end of its life cycle-- and it's approaching that now--it's time to replace it, just like we replace every airplane, including, right now, some early versions of the F-16.
Since the line was discontinued, [the A-10's champions] want to build another A-10 of some kind. The point we were making was that we have F-16s that do the same job.
Then you come to people who have their own reasons-good reasons to them, but they don't necessarily compute to me-who want to hang onto the A-10 because of the gun. Well, the gun's an excellent weapon, but you'll find that most of the tank kills by the A-10 were done with Mavericks and bombs. So the idea that the gun is the absolute wonder of the world is not true.

Q: This conflict has shown that?
A: It shows that the gun has a lot of utility, which we always knew, but it isn't the principal tank-killer on the A-10. The [Imaging Infrared] Maverick is the big hero there. That was used by the A-10s and the F-16s very, very effectively in places like Khafji.
The other problem is that the A-10 is vulnerable to hits because its speed is limited. It's a function of thrust, it's not a function of anything else. We had a lot of A-10s take a lot of ground fire hits. Quite frankly, we pulled the A-10s back from going up around the Republican Guard and kept them on Iraq's [less formidable] front-line units. That's line [sic] if you have a force that allows you to do that. In this case, we had F-16s to go after the Republican Guard.

Q: At what point did you do that?

A: I think I had fourteen airplanes sitting on the ramp having battle damage repaired, and I lost two A- 10s in one day [February 15], and I said, "I've had enough of this." ....

The Air Force Tried to Give the A-10 to the Army?
One of the most recent episodes fueling the “Air Force Doesn’t like CAS” myth often pops up in real and virtual discussions on the subject as a form of 'proof' or evidence is the simplistic claim that “the AF tried to give the A-10 to the Army”. This argument has its roots in a singular event after Desert Storm, when General Merrill McPeak, shortly before his retirement as Air Force Chief of Staff, proposed a radical change in DoD and Service responsibilities based upon his particular view of “roles and missions”. The A-10 ramifications were collateral damage in the scheme of things. It was McPeak's view that such a restructuring would reduce redundancy and exploit each Service’s strengths to the most effective level.

Per 'Learning Large Lessons' (p.197), McPeak asserted:

In my view, modern land warfare can be seen as containing four “battles”—the rear battle, which includes all the base and supporting elements; the close battle, in which the main opposing ground forces engage one another; the deep battle, which includes hostile territory well beyond the line of contact; and the high battle, the arena of air and space combat. . . . The rear and close battles should be the responsibility of a ground forces commander, an Army or a Marine Corps officer. His forces should be capable of relatively autonomous operations—they should be capable of engaging the enemy in the friendly rear and immediately in front of them, without a lot of outside help. True, the ground commander has a deep and abiding interest in what goes on overhead in the high battle or over the horizon in the deep battle and he may even have some capability to get into these fights. But, his forces are not the most effective for the high or deep battle. Air assets provide the best, most often the only capability to operate in these parts of the battlefield. . . . [T]his approach to dividing battle space provides a logical starting point for identifying unnecessary overlap and duplication. If you accept the scheme I just laid out, it follows that the commander with responsibility for the close battle does not require systems or capabilities that reach across the boundaries into the deep and high battles. If there are such systems in the field or on the drawing board, they might be good candidates for retirement or transfer to another service. Alternatively, the commander with responsibility for the deep battle does not need forces that are configured for direct support of close combat operations. If there are any, they too could be transferred out. 

McPeak called for the Army to give up the ‘deep battle’, the Air Force to give up ‘close battle’, and called for, among other things, the other services to get out of ‘space’ operations. His proposal (thankfully) went nowhere with the other services nor anyone else in the Air Force. Thus, the ‘give CAS to the Army’ was the idea of one man – now long gone and most definitely ‘not missed’, as part of a complete realignment of service roles and missions, essentially dictated by geography of the battlespace.

There were very large problems with inter-service cooperation and conflict that McPeak saw and was trying to solve. The challenge was real, but his solution would have created as many problems as it would have solved, even without entrenched interests subverting such an effort (and there would be). Desert Storm experience, if it did nothing else, clearly exposed the Army’s parochial and incorrect view that Airpower is nothing more than a support element. When in reality it should be viewed as a maneuver element.
Updated and expanded references 7/28: Some excellent papers on differing Airpower-as-manever-or-support views (large .pdf files at links):

Thunder and Lightning: Desert Storm and the Airpower Debates (1995)
Airpower and Maneuver Warfare (1994)
Integrating Joint Operations Beyond the FSCL (1997) (Army POV with AF POV Intro)
Unity of Effort: Crisis Beyond the FSCL (1999) (Army POV on resolving ambiguities in Joint Doctrine)

Conclusions

Thus we have found:
 
1. The Air Force supports the CAS mission better now than when it was part of the Army.

2. The Army was the primary antagonist in creating inter-service friction over CAS post-WWII and in it's Army-Centric way of war it continues to generate friction to this day.

3. CAS is a mission NOT a platform.

Post Script: 
There were a lot of sub-topics we could have pursued and I was/am tempted to further explore the effects of organizational culture and tendencies of the services on the CAS debate, but I fear that will drive the discussion down a ‘rabbit hole’ from which there may be no return. There are also some interesting dynamics now changing the Army’s way of fighting that could lessen the perceived friction between the services, but I am content to simply monitor them for the present time. I could have also expanded greatly on what makes up 'Effectiveness' for a CAS mission. Finally, the Marines insistence on being the primary provider of CAS as an organic USMC function is another topic for another time.

Update 7/27/11@~19:45hrs: Added part of a response that Gen Horner made in the Q&A above that had been dropped in copying the file from a word document to Blogger.(Now the answer makes sense.)

Part 1: The “Big Two” Close Air Support (CAS) Myths
Part 2: Those "not so good old days”
Part 3: Vietnam and the Rise of the “No-CAS Air Force” Myth
Part 4: Origins of the A-X Program
Part 5: Defining a New CAS Platform: the Evolution of the A-10
CAS Myths Sidebar: The A-10 and the 'Cult of the Gun'
CAS Myths Sidebar: Army-Air Force Views on CAS and Airpower
Second Edition: 
Part 7: Sourcing AF Hates A-10 Nonsense
Part 8: The AF 'Had To" Buy a CAS Plane?

CAS Myths Sidebar: Army-Air Force Views on CAS and Airpower

(scroll down for links to Parts 1-6 of CAS Myths and another 'Sidebar')

The current (IMHO myopic) Army view of airpower persists in relegating the AF to a permanent supporting force, and is highlighted by an incident just before the Desert Storm ground campaign kicked off (boldface emphasis mine):

A few days before the ground war commenced in February 1991. . . he [General Schwarzkopf] met with his subordinate commanders to discuss the land offensive. General Horner explained his Push CAS modus of flowing airplanes to the battlefield twenty-four hours a day (rather than keeping them idle while sitting alert). When General [Frederick] Franks ignored what Horner had said and demanded that VII Corps be allotted hundreds of CAS sorties per day (whether needed or not), the airman angrily disputed the allocation of air power in that manner and reiterated his Push CAS procedures. Horner believed it important for unity of command to let his anger show as he vehemently rejected Franks’s claim for so much unfocused air power. He remembered his outburst having no effect: “Everyone looked at me and said, ‘Well, he fell on his sword; isn’t that quaint.’” General [Walt] Boomer jumped in and requested as many dedicated sorties for his Marines, and General [Gary] Luck joined the “run on the bank” and demanded as many CAS flights for his XVIII Corps. The ground commanders argued for their sorties, but after a while Schwarzkopf called a halt to the debate, reminding all present, “You people don’t understand. It’s all my air, and I’ll use it any way I please.” “That ended the argument,” Horner recalled, “and we maintained centralized command.” The CINCCENT [commander in chief of Central Command] depended upon his JFACC to ensure that all the ground commanders received adequate air support.  

But having failed to divide Airpower into subordinated chunks prior to the ground war, after the ground offensive kicked off Army ground commanders insisted on placing their Fire Support Control Lines so far ahead of their forces that it hindered the Air Force’s ability to engage interdiction targets once the ground war started (source: Revolution in Warfare: Airpower in the Persian Gulf, Thomas A. Keaney and Eliot A. Cohen (1995), pp. 133–134 and partially cited in “Learning Large Lessons”):  

FSCL, Coalition aircraft could attack only under direction from ground or airborne controllers. This procedure could cost time to coordinate the actions and required suitable weather conditions and the presence of a controller to execute the attacks: far less weight of fixed-wing air power could be brought to bear under such circumstances. . . .

Because the FSCL definition said little about coordination of weapons employment beyond the FSCL the corps commanders considered supporting fires beyond the line as “permissive,” requiring no further coordination. That is, they resisted any restrictions on employing missiles or helicopters beyond the line and saw attempts to include such strikes in the ATO as efforts to put their organic firepower under JFACC control. To avoid JFACC control, XVIII Airborne Corps advanced the FSCL well north of the Euphtates River on 27 February and thus reserved an area for attack helicopter operations unconstrained by any requirement to coordinate with the JFACC. The effect of this was to hamper air power’s ability to destroy escaping Iraqi ground forces until the FSCL was finally pulled back after several hours.
Corps commanders at times set the FSCLs for their respective corps at different distances. which sowed confusion and complicated air-ground coordination. This practice continued until Gen Horner established a Desert Storm operation-wide FSCL that approximated the distance that corps commanders could effectively engage the enemy with their indirect fires including the MLRSs.       

The Army POV of the FSCL and its placement was of course quite different and focused on the limitations imposed on them prior to the kickoff of the ground war:   

....[b]ecause the Air Force absolutely would not fly short of the FSCL before G-Day, we kept the FSCL in close to facilitate air attack of division and corps high priority targets. This caused two problems. Every [artillery] fire mission or AH-64 [attack helicopter] attack beyond the FSCL had to be carefully and painstakingly cleared with the Air Force. Even counterfire required this lengthy  process. Equally bad, air sorties beyond the FSCL were completely the domain of the Air Force. VII Corps could nominate targets beyond the FSCL, but could never be sure they would be attacked.

Two points of view. One takes into account the entire battlespace and the other is centered on the individual corps forces. The corps commander's focus on their responsibilities is perfectly understandable..to a point. I leave it to the reader to decide which POV holds the greater effectiveness and potential for victory.
Part 1: The “Big Two” Close Air Support (CAS) Myths
Part 2: Those "not so good old days”
Part 3: Vietnam and the Rise of the “No-CAS Air Force” Myth
Part 4: Origins of the A-X Program
Part 5: Defining a New CAS Platform: the Evolution of the A-10
Part 6: A-10s 'Forever' ?
CAS Myths Sidebar: The A-10 and the 'Cult of the Gun'

CAS Myths Sidebar: The A-10 and the 'Cult of the Gun'

The A-10 and the 'Cult of the Gun'
(scroll down for links to Parts 1-6 of CAS Myths and another 'Sidebar')

The AGM-65 Maverick missiles launched by A-10s were one of the most effective weapon combinations in Desert Storm.  This point should come as no surprise within the A-10 community, but again we are fighting against human notions and human emotions. During TASVAL 79, where the A-10's fundamental operational concepts and tactics were born, 57TFW (Tactical Fighter Weapon Center)  pilots initially tended to prefer attacking with the GAU-8 gun over the AGM-65 Mavericks. The short story is: They DIED...alot. TASVAL scenarios were very intense: realistic fluid battlefronts, and real and simulated threat systems that drove nap-of-the-dirt maneuvering, usually pop-up engagements, and coordinated attacks either with a four-ship A-10 flight, or a similar force working with Army attack helos. Towards the end of the deployment, experienced pilots would advise the replacement pilots to press with the Mavericks against the Air Defense first, use their missiles up THEN press with the gun. When they followed the old hands advice they lived. When they followed the 'Cult of the Gun' they were the only A-10 drivers 'killed'.

I never knew for certain if the 'lessons learned' from TASVAL had been carried forward until Douglas Campbell wrote about it in his (~9575%) definitive book [10/28/13: Just finished dissecting Campbell's thesis the book is based upon and now have serious reservations concerning the quality and selectivity of his sources] on the history of the A-10 "The Warthog and the Close Air Support Debate". His book has the first references I've ever read of  TASVAL (other than an Army Mental Health paper on the extraordinary divorce rates among Army participants at Fort Hunter Liggett) and confirms the lessons DID go forward.

But though the lessons went forward, so did the Cult of the Gun. Using the 'Gun' is visceral. I had conversations on this topic with my late Father-in-Law who flew the first F-4Es in SEA out of DaNang. He flew with the 4th TFS 'Fuujins' , then with the 366th TFW "Gunfighters". His favorite air to mud configuration was 20mm centerline and 2 more 20mms on the wings on top of his 20mm cannon in the nose. He likened the satisfaction of attacking with the gun to reaching out and touching the target.

I believe some of the same feeling he conveyed can be found in this C-Span Video interviewing Eric 'Fish' Salomonson and his wingman John 'Karl' Marks (Segment starts about 1:30 into the clip). These pilots 'killed' 23 tanks (and 10 damaged) flying three missions in one day. I remember watching this video the first time it aired. The 'pool' reporter asks some hilariously stupid questions at times so the whole video is pretty entertaining. At first I thought that the kill mix was 12 'gun' and 11 'missiles' because Salmonson mentions he had a 'bad Maverick' (~7:41) on the last sortie, but less than 10 seconds later he's asked about the mix and Salomonson tells the reporter the ratio was 17 kills with the Maverick and 6 kills with the gun. Keep that in mind as you watch the pilot's reaction at the ~11:20 mark when the reporter asks what it looks like when 'a Maverick hits one of the tanks' and listen to their comments: "huge explosion", "turret blew completely off", "spinning through air" etc. Then about the reporters ask (about the ~21:17 mark) about the effect of 'the cannon' and get in response: "not quite as big a boom", just "see flashes", "usually a little bit of a delay if it does light off"... etc ,,and then about 30 seconds of commentary on how it's harder to use (takes more skill).  But when they get asked (~21:54) about "of all the weapons" which weapon do they they prefer?

Lt Marks closes his eyes, smiles and then Salomonson says: "The Gun".

 Salomonson elaborates further including closing his eyes for a moment as if to relive the feeling in his head as he says....

"There's nothing like it."

There's no better example of the visceral power of 'the gun' than this interview. 16 (oops) 17 certain nearly instantaneous kills with missiles vs. 6 'slow cookers' and 10 'possibles' with the GAU-8...and they prefer the gun.

We're such irrational beings aren't we?

Part 1: The “Big Two” Close Air Support (CAS) Myths
Part 2: Those "not so good old days”
Part 3: Vietnam and the Rise of the “No-CAS Air Force” Myth
Part 4: Origins of the A-X Program
Part 5: Defining a New CAS Platform: the Evolution of the A-10
Part 6: A-10s 'Forever' ?
CAS Myths Sidebar: Army-Air Force Views on CAS and Airpower

Debunking The Close Air Support Myths: Part 5

CAS, the Air Force, and the A-10
Part 5: Defining a New CAS Platform: the Evolution of the A-10
(scroll down for links to Parts 1-4,6 and 'Sidebars)

As a result of the 1966 study, the AF immediately launched an effort to field a dedicated CAS aircraft that would replace the (believed to be) best CAS aircraft of the time: the A-1 Skyraider. The A-1 was a naval strike aircraft developed towards the end of WWII and fielded too late for combat. It was used in Korea as a capable bomb-truck, and was re-invented for counter-insurgency warfare. An important planned improvement seen as needed in a Skyraider replacement was a better capability against ‘hard targets’, and this requirement dominated the replacement effort. The replacement program went through two major rounds of capability and mission analyses and numerous minor tweaks before the final A-X requirements were issued. All of these events were ‘fast-tracked’ by any contemporary definition of the term, which only highlights the point that the AF was NOT dragging its feet in bringing into existence a better CAS platform.

Epilogue: Ironically, a showdown on CAS between the Cheyenne and what was to become the A-10 was avoided -- as the Cheyenne program sank by the weight of its own technical requirements and ambitions.

A-10: An Aircraft Developed for a Milieu
As mentioned above, one of the requirements for a new CAS platform was more capability against ‘hard targets’. The ‘A-X’ Requirements Action Directive was issued for a specialized CAS aircraft, heavily armed, that could loiter for extended periods, and escort slower-moving aircraft. It was to have a crew of one, be comparatively ‘light weight’, and low maintenance. Although it was to provide armor protection to the pilot and critical systems, it was to be designed for operation in a ‘permissive environment’. According to the Air Force Center for Systems Engineering Case Study on the A-10:

Although the intended operating scenarios stressed a permissive environment, the CFP was to consider the feasibility of incorporating a limited air-to-air missile capability as a defensive measure. Survivability from ground fire was an essential characteristic for the A-X. Structural and system design would need to provide inherent survivability, to include self sealing fuel tanks and, if power flight controls were used, a manual backup system would be provided. The pilot and critical flight systems would be protected from 14.5mm projectiles (common Soviet Anti-Aircraft shells). The aircraft was to "incorporate maintainability characteristics which will make it possible for this system to meet its combat operational objectives with a minimum of maintenance effort and expenditure.

The definition of ‘permissive’ may be somewhat vague, but given what the threats were at the time, and the above paragraph statements we can safely presume it meant something similar to the circa 1966 South Vietnam environment: Small arms fire, some light anti-aircraft weapons and at least local air superiority. It was most definitely not conceived to face MANPADs or to go toe-to-toe regularly with ZSU-23 'Shilka' systems.

Initially, the ‘best’ A-X configuration was conceived to be turboprop powered, but by 1970 progress with high-bypass turbofan technology prompted the A-X program to direct potential contractors to examine using turbofan configurations. This change in plans created some interesting configurations to be submitted for development. Some of the concepts are illustrated below.

These were two of the early turboprop design concepts submitted to the Air Force:

General Dynamics Turboprop Concept

Northop Turboprop Concept

Here are the two turbofan concepts selected for prototyping and the so-called “fly-off” competition.

The Fairchild Republic A-10 ‘won’ the fly-off (another complicated and not all that clear-cut story for another series of posts sometime) and was put into production.

The twisted path of procurement, deployment and employment, modernization, life-extension, and ownership for the A-10 could fill several books, but this summary from an Air Force Case Study Report (in which the authors themselves somewhat ‘buy into’ Air Force CAS myths) is a fairly good and concise synopsis:

The A-10 aircraft had an inauspicious beginning for an Air Force that many have suggested only wanted the Air force to keep the Army from 'taking over' the CAS mission. The Air Force always believed that a fast multi-role fighter was a better choice for the feared war in Europe, but agreed to procure the A-10 for contingencies and “limited wars” like Vietnam. For its part, the Army seemed to like the A-10 as long as it did not threaten its own development of attack helicopters, and on several occasions the A-10 did appear as a political threat to continued funding for those helicopters. Despite these challenges, the Air Force did embrace development of the A-10 and produced a specialized CAS aircraft that would prove effective in a variety of operations throughout the world (fortunately for mankind in the 20th century, a shooting war between NATO and the Warsaw Pact never erupted, and it never became necessary to prove the A-10’s mettle against the armies and air forces of Eastern Europe). Close attention to key mission characteristics (lethality, survivability, responsiveness, and simplicity) allowed concept formulation and subsequent system design to result in an effective CAS aircraft, and design-to-cost goals kept the government and contractor focused on meeting the critical requirements at an affordable cost. The A-10 did not meet all its cost goals, but it came much closer to them than most major defense development programs did in that time frame or since then.

My only problem with the above paragraph is that it discusses how ‘well’ the program was run to meet cost and performance objectives in a manner that divorces the ‘qualitative’ from the ‘quantitative’ aspects of the A-10. To assess how well the program REALLY worked out we have to be aware of some of the A-10 ‘challenges’ that are not mentioned. Two paragraphs after the above, some caveats to this glowing appraisal were presented:

Alas, no program is perfect, and the A-10 provides no exceptions to that observation. Overlooked problems associated with production readiness and contractor financial stability did not go away and had to be resolved far too late in the development program. More significantly, the original structural design proved inadequate for the design life, and even fixes during production were inadequate for all but the latest aircraft produced.

Not mentioned above was the difficulty the designers had in de-bugging and integrating the 30mm cannon into the airframe, including getting past the gun’s tendency to ‘jam’ and engines ingesting the gun gases that eventuated with the loss of a test aircraft due to a double-engine flameout and a seriously injured test pilot as a result. Yet the program marched forward, as the ‘need’ was seen as pressing and real.

Part 1: The “Big Two” Close Air Support (CAS) Myths
Part 2: Those "not so good old days”
Part 3: Vietnam and the Rise of the “No-CAS Air Force” Myth
Part 4: Origins of the A-X Program
Part 6: A-10s 'Forever' ?
CAS Myths Sidebar: The A-10 and the 'Cult of the Gun'
CAS Myths Sidebar: Army-Air Force Views on CAS and Airpower

Debunking The Close Air Support Myths: Part 4

CAS, the Air Force, and the A-10
Part 4: Origins of the A-X Program
(scroll down for links to Parts 1-3,5,6 and 'Sidebars)

In June of 1966, the AF Chief of Staff directed a study to determine if the AF was providing satisfactory support to the Army in Vietnam. By August the results were reported: The Army was generally satisfied with AF support, but in performing survey and decoding the results, the AF found that the Army, in the course of their ongoing experimentation and development of Air Assault and Air Mobility doctrines, were actually EXCLUDING the AF from certain missions and for 'fulfillment' by helicopters.

The survey also found that [due to the needs of the new Air Mobility concepts] the AF lacked the capabilities to 'perform helicopter escort and suppressive fire roles'. Thus, given the changes to Army operational doctrine, the finding meant that the multi-role platform approach (i.e. using aircraft such as A-7D for CAS when needed) wouldn't satisfy the perceived need for helicopter ‘escort’ and ‘fire support’ roles as the missions were then conceived and conducted.

Most remarkably, the 1966 discovery of the ‘exclusion’ of the Air Force from supporting Army missions was not even the first time it was ‘discovered’, nor was it the first time that the Air Force made an attempt to improve the situation. There is strong evidence that this schism between the services on CAS was driven by the Army’s aggressive ‘Airmobile’ aspirations appeared even long BEFORE the US began engaging in major ground combat in Vietnam.

According to “The United States Air Force in Southeast Asia 1961-1973” (Office of Air Force History, 1977) Army ‘Airmobile’ adherents were attempting to develop and expand their ‘Airmobile’ modus operandi without an AF fixed-wing aircraft support even before the Air Force (the American one anyway) was a major player in Vietnam:

Meanwhile, U.S. Army advisors were working to develop ARVN airborne helicopter assault tactics, using equipment of two U.S. Army companies which had arrived in Vietnam in late 1961. Almost at once a problem arose over fixed wing/air-ground coordination. According to directives issued by the newly organized U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (USMACV), all helicopter operations into areas where enemy opposition was expected were required to have fixed-wing tactical air cover. U.S. Army corps advisors who controlled helicopter usage, however, tended to ignore the requirement.
In April 1962, during a visit to South Vietnam, General LeMay learned that Army advisors were not calling for fixed-wing air support, that only about 10 percent of ARVN heliborne operations were accompanied by VNAF aircraft, and that the Air Support Operations center at Ton Son Nhut frequently were not informed of such operations. Concerned about this situation, LeMay subsequently obtained permission to assign air liaison officers (ALO’s) to all ARVN corps and division headquarters and USAF forward air controllers to augment VNAF liaison squadrons…,(pp 16-17)

Thus we see that as early as 1962(!), the Army was already pushing the Airmobile ‘way of war’ using ARVN operations as their laboratory, and the Air Force was already proactively seeking to support the ground forces in Vietnam as much as possible. Yet four years later the formal study findings showed that the Army was still pursuing a ‘go it alone’ Airmobile approach. It is therefore clear that a more reliable case can be made for the statement that the Army “did not want” Air Force CAS than there is for stating the Air Force “did not want to” perform the CAS mission.

This exclusion of the Air Force from missions generated by Army planners must have created a mistaken impression concerning AF ‘interest’ in CAS for a far larger number of men completing the mission on the ground who were not involved in mission planning who might have wondered ‘where was the Air Force?’ when they really would have preferred to have the AF overhead. One wonders how this misperception of the Air Force interest and support might have been exacerbated even more by the limitations placed on Army escort and fire support helicopters as the Army-Air Force conflict deepened. The big question is:

How many times were the men on the ground on the ‘losing end’ of the CAS conflict because the Army "couldn’t" support while the Air Force "wasn’t even asked"? 

When this author began asking the question ‘why’ the Army excluded the Air Force from mission planning, there was a range of possibilities to consider. One rational explanation as to why the Army was excluding the Air Force from some force packages might have been that Army mission planners perceived the task of integrating the faster-moving AF assets with slower helicopter forces as ‘too difficult’. After researching the issue in some depth, I have to conclude that at the root of the problem, was Army Airmobile advocates wanting to prove their concepts as much as anything else. But this does not tell us exactly ‘why’ they wanted to prove them. Without knowing ‘why’ it was important to the Airmobile advocates to promote the self-escort and fire support to the detriment of Air Force support and cooperation, we can never know exactly the reason others within the Army chain of command did not solicit the Air Force for ideas on the subject, if indeed there really was a problem. It is difficult to believe that the men working CAS at the lower levels weren’t acutely aware of the ‘problem’ and easy to see that their frustration had to have been great.

To support the force packages (where the Air Force was being excluded) the Army was using armed helicopters for escort and suppressive fires, and decided the solution was to seek larger, more heavily armed helicopters as a solution to correct their shortfalls. It is anyone’s guess how an alternative history would have unfolded if the Army planners had chosen to seriously seek a joint solution by working with the Air Force instead of persistently planning the Air Force out of the solution. Some alternative histories are plausible based upon what the players were doing at the time. For instance, the Air Force was trying to field new precision capabilities at the time that could have benefitted the CAS mission and vice versa: such cooperation might have brought precision strike capabilities to fruition a decade or two earlier than it actually occurred. This is not to make the point that such a capability would have been developed, but that there were developments that could have been employed that did not require development of a new class of aircraft or possibly even weapons, ‘if only’ collaboration had been sought.

Part 1: The “Big Two” Close Air Support (CAS) Myths
Part 2: Those "not so good old days”
Part 3: Vietnam and the Rise of the “No-CAS Air Force” Myth
Part 5: Defining a New CAS Platform: the Evolution of the A-10
Part 6: A-10s 'Forever' ?
CAS Myths Sidebar: The A-10 and the 'Cult of the Gun'
CAS Myths Sidebar: Army-Air Force Views on CAS and Airpower

Debunking The Close Air Support Myths: Part 3

CAS, the Air Force, and the A-10
Part 3: Vietnam and the Rise of the “No-CAS Air Force” Myth
(scroll down for links to Parts 1,2,4-6 and 'Sidebars)

Update: DefenseTech has a thread going now that couldn't be a better example of the Power of Myths.

Update 2 (6 Feb 12) DoD Buzz has another thread going that couldn't be a better example of the Power of Myths.

Because the Vietnam War would be a war fought quite unlike those before it, the 'lessons learned' from earlier conflicts proved to be less than ‘completely’ helpful in Southeast Asia. It is not that Vietnam could not have been fought much like WWII, or even Korea, but that the lessons were less than useful because Vietnam was not fought as wars before it. Political exigencies and choices made by the US civilian leadership to NOT risk escalation through more 'vigorous' execution minimized the impact of the past lessons learned. It is well documented, that when North Vietnam risked its forces with more exposure through more conventional military operations their forces were dealt with decisively by air interdiction and ground forces, and that when we chose to pursue aggressive strategic bombing and mining of the North, such efforts (as in 1972’s ‘Linebacker II’) produced decisive military results.

Changes in Army Operational Doctrine Gives Rise to the CAS Dispute
As outlined in Andrew Krepinevich’s 1986 book “The Army and Vietnam”, the conflicts and issues between the ‘Regular’ and ‘Airmobile ‘Army factions in the early 1960’s can be viewed as the factors that essentially forced the greater conflict with the Air Force. The Airmobile advocates (such as General Robert R. Williams) really wanted to prove their concept in a higher-intensity conflict arena than Vietnam and feared that proving the concept in Vietnam would not be enough to convince the non-believers in the Army that Airmobile Forces were desirable in a more conventional role. But the ‘Regular’ Army adherents would not entertain the conversion of heavy forces to airmobile forces for conventional warfare purposes. It was only due to pressure coming from the OSD that compelled the Army to do ‘something’ and form the first airmobile division. In “The Army and Vietnam” Krepinevich appears to address these internal and external conflicts as separate issues, yet much of how we recounts the history unfolding virtually screams to this reader that it was Army Airmobile ambitions and internal friction that fueled the push for organic winged (albeit ‘rotary’) fire support, and it was this push that fueled the Army-Air Force conflict on the same subject. I believe this perspective is reinforced by known events and actions leading up to (for the lack of a better term) ‘major ground involvement’ in Vietnam.     

By 1965, the Army, in the pursuit to improve their attack helicopter capability to support their air assault concept, had been increasing the spending for upgrading armament on the existing ‘interim’ AH-1 and was well along in working towards fielding something called the Advanced Aerial Fire Support System. Readers will more likely know it as the AH-56A Cheyenne if they know of it at all. Existing DoD doctrine in 1965 allowed the Army to pursue rotary wing solutions to providing ‘suppressive fire’ support that could augment but not replace CAS. The Army was thus developing its ‘Airmobile’ doctrine and sought to expand acquisition and use of both rotary and fixed wing aircraft to support it. In particular, the Army's effort to acquire more Caribou and Mohawk aircraft was seen as trespassing into AF missions and the effort was shot down at the SecDef (yes, ‘McNamara’) level and NOT at the Air Force level. Lest one assume this was due to some ‘anti’ army-aviation bias on the part of Secretary McNamara, it should be noted here that it was McNamara who supported the Air Mobility advocates within the Army in standing up Aviation Brigades. McNamara’s support was given in opposition to the positions of the more conventional warfare advocates, up to and including supporting the diversion of funds from heavy divisions to acquire Airmobile capabilities, and such support was given years before America moved beyond the ‘advisory’ stage in Vietnam.

The 'fixed wing expansion' attempt shot down by McNamara, combined with the Army's efforts to field the Cheyenne (the roots of which also reach back to circa 1962 before major involvement in Vietnam) was seen by some in the AF as proof of the Army's intent to expand beyond the 'suppressive fire' mission and into the CAS arena. This was due to the quantum leap ahead in rotary-wing capabilities (high speed, advanced avionics, 30mm gun, grenade launcher/mini-gun, etc) that the Cheyenne represented.

Lockheed AH-56 Cheyenne (US Army Photo)

Indeed today, the Cheyenne is often thought of as a ‘hybrid’ (helo-fixed wing) design. This apparent attempted ‘mission creep’ on the part of the Army did nothing to reduce tensions between the AF and Army.

There were Congress-critters taking sides (largely the Army’s) in the debate, and one in particular, U.S. Representative Otis Pike, played a major role in bringing things to a head. He convened a hearing in late '65 and his committee’s findings released in early 1966 criticized the AF for not being more “serious” about fielding a better CAS capability. These findings were in spite of the on-going AF effort to field an interim platform (The quite effective ‘fast-mover’ A-7D) while searching for a more permanent solution. IMHO, Pike’s background as a WWII Marine aviator probably ‘poisoned the well’ on the issue, since Marine Aviation’s sole reason for existence during WWII was to support the Rifleman on the ground. Like many of my ground-dwelling brothers-in-arms, Pike probably confused/confuses CAS with Airpower, instead of recognizing the first as a subset of the second. As it will be noted later, in reality the Army was generally happy with the AF’s CAS capabilities with the only exceptions related to helicopter escort operations, so it appears that ‘someone’ was overstating the case against the AF on CAS for reasons that are anyone’s guess.

There was a behind-the-scenes cooperative effort at the highest levels that occurred within this highly politicized environment to resolve -- or at least lessen--the ‘CAS’ friction between the Army and Air Force. In the Spring of 1966, the Army Chief of Staff General Harold Johnson and Air Force Chief of Staff General John McConnell “met secretly to resolve air support differences that the Vietnam War had aggravated” (Douglas Campbell, “The Warthog and the Close Air Support Debate”). They arrived at a compromise agreement that changed the criteria for dividing responsibility from aircraft weight to aircraft type. The Army was thus allowed to provide helicopter fire support and the Air force retained the CAS mission. As in all compromises, no one was completely happy.

A cynic would assume that the Army, or at least nefarious members thereof, were consciously attempting a turf takeover to support their Airmobile aspirations. But a more likely (to me) explanation is that the situation at the lower levels of command was more along the lines of the Army Airmobile commanders wanting to control as much of their own destiny as possible by making as many of their ‘fires’ as organic as possible and at all times, including when in contact with the enemy. This desire has appeared to have been pursued with single-minded purpose since the earliest days of Vietnam to the modern era, without too much concern for the unintended consequences to the overall ability to eliminate the enemy, or reducing his capabilities PRIOR to contact. [I believe Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom operations and AF-Army friction during give some validity to the second explanation.] Pick your own root cause, but all the evidence suggests Army commanders have consistently demonstrated an insular and expansionist tendency that clearly flags them as the chief instigator of friction between the services on the CAS issue. I assert that what will follow is some fairly strong evidence of the Army’s culpability in fostering the ongoing interservice conflict over CAS.

Part 1: The “Big Two” Close Air Support (CAS) Myths
Part 2: Those "not so good old days”
Part 4: Origins of the A-X Program
Part 5: Defining a New CAS Platform: the Evolution of the A-10
Part 6: A-10s 'Forever' ?
CAS Myths Sidebar: The A-10 and the 'Cult of the Gun'
CAS Myths Sidebar: Army-Air Force Views on CAS and Airpower