A-X all over again - USAF pushes for A-10 replacement

[Scott Kenny]

IMOHO, A-10 are still useful. Not for their guns but because they are a fleet, adapted to the mission, trained, with appropriate ressources and sustainability chain.
They only need new employment concepts with more efficient weapons for the conditions they will face conducting the same mission they have done before.

It's just a classic upgrade that is needed. The new systems are high tech but that is about it.

They really need some (more?) DIRCM and better ECM, too.

 

[Josh_TN]

At some point you have to acknowledge the threat has outgrown the platform. The major asset to preserve to my mind is the community that handles the CAS role, not the aircraft. It would not matter that much what they flew, IMO, as long as there was a dedicated group of fly boy ground pounders.

 

[BlackBat242]

At some point you have to acknowledge the threat has outgrown the platform. The major asset to preserve to my mind is the community that handles the CAS role, not the aircraft. It would not matter that much what they flew, IMO, as long as there was a dedicated group of fly boy ground pounders.

USMC combat air.

 

[Josh_TN]

USMC combat air.

I don’t know if anyone’s posted it here yet but there was an A-10 driver who made a convincing argument for the community adopting F-18s. Never going to happen. Though I wonder if the USN wouldn’t be willing to part with some old Blk 1s and the USMC establish a joint unit like with the EA-6s, were it the USAF wanted (was congressionally forced) to spend some dough to maintain a CAS crew.

 

[Scott Kenny]

I don’t know if anyone’s posted it here yet but there was an A-10 driver who made a convincing argument for the community adopting F-18s. Never going to happen. Though I wonder if the USN wouldn’t be willing to part with some old Blk 1s and the USMC establish a joint unit like with the EA-6s, were it the USAF wanted (was congressionally forced) to spend some dough to maintain a CAS crew.

A-10 Pilot's Compelling Case For Replacing Warthogs With Super Hornets

An A-10 Weapons Instructor lays out how buying F/A-18E/Fs fits the Air Force's imperatives and keeps the A-10's unique braintrust intact.

www.thedrive.com

(It had been posted in my "designing the replacement for the A-10" thread. https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/designing-the-replacement-for-the-a-10.42114/ )

The argument against this is that apparently a Super Bug is as much as an F35C(!) once you include engines and radar. But in terms of addressing the primary complaints against the A-10 and being something in current production either Super Bugs or modified Block 20-25 F-16Ds are probably perfect. The Super Bug is definitely my recommendation for "Oh shit, China just invaded Taiwan, we need everything we can get RIGHT NOW!!!eleventy-one!" If there's slightly more time available I want to swap the 20mm for a 25mm. Oh, and this would be 100% 2-seaters, because you need a back seater for quarterbacking drones.

 

[Josh_TN]

The super bugs have more pylons and weapons options, and the entire blk1 force is relegated to training. As more F-35C becomes available, I was thinking maybe those high mileage Blk 1s could be freed up by Blk 2s and cascaded to a joint USMC/USAF ex A10 outfit. But F-16s would be fine too.

One thing that I do not think is necessary is a dedicated airframe. Almost all of the A10s sensors are various pods anyway.

 

[Scott Kenny]

The super bugs have more pylons and weapons options, and the entire blk1 force is relegated to training. As more F-35C becomes available, I was thinking maybe those high mileage Blk 1s could be freed up by Blk 2s and cascaded to a joint USMC/USAF ex A10 outfit. But F-16s would be fine too.

I'm not sure you want high mileage planes assigned to fly close to the ground. That's a very stressful flight regime.

But like I said, it's an excellent argument for a "war were declared, we need whatever we can get right frakking now" solution.

One thing that I do not think is necessary is a dedicated airframe. Almost all of the A10s sensors are various pods anyway.

Because there wasn't any volume inside the fuselage for them, which takes away an ordnance station or two. As is, the A-10s are set up with a pair of sidewinders on either 1 or 11 and an ECM pod on the opposite side, and those stations are wired out of the "emergency jettison" button. Leaving 9 available stations for sensor pods and ordnance. Slap LANTIRN on so you have night and bad weather flying capabilities and you lose two more stations. Now you're down to 7 stations for ordnance.

An A-10 Replacement should have night targeting and terrain following radar (better would be terrain avoidance radar) built in if at all possible, because winter in Europe only has clear skies about 1 day in 10.

 

[Josh_TN]

I'm not sure you want high mileage planes assigned to fly close to the ground. That's a very stressful flight regime.

But like I said, it's an excellent argument for a "war were declared, we need whatever we can get right frakking now" solution.




Because there wasn't any volume inside the fuselage for them, which takes away an ordnance station or two. As is, the A-10s are set up with a pair of sidewinders on either 1 or 11 and an ECM pod on the opposite side, and those stations are wired out of the "emergency jettison" button. Leaving 9 available stations for sensor pods and ordnance. Slap LANTIRN on so you have night and bad weather flying capabilities and you lose two more stations. Now you're down to 7 stations for ordnance.

An A-10 Replacement should have night targeting and terrain following radar (better would be terrain avoidance radar) built in if at all possible, because winter in Europe only has clear skies about 1 day in 10.

I don't think a replacement is necessary, and more over a replacement certainly isn't realistic. The most that can be hoped for is that the community and institutional knowledge are transferred to some second tier aircraft.

 

[Scott Kenny]

I don't think a replacement is necessary, and more over a replacement certainly isn't realistic. The most that can be hoped for is that the community and institutional knowledge are transferred to some second tier aircraft.

Which is highly UNlikely if the pilots are transferred to most any other fast jet in USAF inventory.

 

[Josh_TN]

Which is highly UNlikely if the pilots are transferred to most any other fast jet in USAF inventory.

Why?

 

[Scott Kenny]

Why?

Been demonstrated any time an A-10 driver gets transferred to F-16s or whatever. They stop focusing on CAS.

 

[Anduriel]

The best equipped Russian strike aircraft in terms of targeting ability etc. (the Su-34) is notable inferior than a bog-standard Air-National Guard F-16 with its Sniper targeting pod. And the average National Guard pilot has significantly more training experience/ hours of using those targeting systems effectively versus all but a tiny handful of experienced elite Russian pilots (essentially their instructor core of pilots).
Even in more permissive environments the Su-34 can’t accurately attack small and/ or mobile targets from anything other than low altitude because otherwise they can’t find/ see/ target it. Essentially the Russian airforce tactical doctrine is at least as shaped by its own targeting/ accuracy limitations as by the threats they are facing.

While you are correct, that Su-34 has inferior targeting ability, you look at this from a standpoint of US experience and doctrine in low-intensity Middle-East combat. The thing is, that the niche of targeting pods in Russian army is now firmly taken by UAV, such as Orlan10/30 and others.

This actually offers some boons over TPOD-equipped plane, as:
1. TPOD have limited lasing range, and limited target recognition range, especially in IR mode. UAV allows much more close contact with target, and much more loiter and observation time than TPOD-equipped plane.
2. It allows to fully use big range of such missiles as Kh-38ML, which is 40km. Not every TPOD have 40km laser, nor even see small target at such range. I wonder why Russians still didn't equipped their UMPK kits with cheap laser seeker from older KAB-500 or their small laser-guided UAV bombs. That will allow them to target moving objects.
3. It safer for munitions carrier - you have to be at Hi-alt only to launch missile/drop bomb.
4. More dangerous for enemy - the less time plane has to be at med-hi alt, the harder it to detect, and less time for reaction.
5. Loss of UAV is much more tolerable than TPOD with carrier.

This war is a drone revolution, and impacts all aspects of warfare, including aviation.

 

[Jeb]

Slap LANTIRN on so you have night and bad weather flying capabilities and you lose two more stations. Now you're down to 7 stations for ordnance.

An A-10 Replacement should have night targeting and terrain following radar (better would be terrain avoidance radar) built in if at all possible, because winter in Europe only has clear skies about 1 day in 10.

Congrats, you've just designed the A-7, which was replaced by everything that the F-35 is replacing now.

How about this...adjust the training regimen to keep focusing on CAS. Or, acknowledge that the only reason that the A-10s so intently focused on CAS is because they literally were incapable of any other mission, by design. Once you get an airframe that has more versatility, you start wanting to use it, but yeah, designate some squadrons to keep the Hog mindset alive, just like the F-16CJ guys (probably) keep the Wild Weasel mindset alive.

 

[Desertfox]

Ya'll keep trying to gold-plate a CAS platform, keep it small and simple, there's plenty of options out there: ARES, Scorpion, AT-802, AT-7A...

 

[FighterJock]

Good to see the Scorpion getting a mention Desertfox, it would make an ideal A-10 replacement platform. Just have the Avenger cannon in podded form on the centreline hard point. I can dream.

 

[Scott Kenny]

Congrats, you've just designed the A-7, which was replaced by everything that the F-35 is replacing now.

Nope, the A-7 or F-35 does Battlefield Air Interdiction. They do NOT do Close Air Support.

The A-10/Replacement needs to be able to do Close Air Support at night and/or in bad weather. Which requires many of the same sensors as the A-7 or F-35 but different flying qualities. More loiter time being very high on that list.

How about this...adjust the training regimen to keep focusing on CAS. Or, acknowledge that the only reason that the A-10s so intently focused on CAS is because they literally were incapable of any other mission, by design. Once you get an airframe that has more versatility, you start wanting to use it, but yeah, designate some squadrons to keep the Hog mindset alive, just like the F-16CJ guys (probably) keep the Wild Weasel mindset alive.

Then you'd better not train them on anything else, because there's only so much training time you have available. Having a plane that is marginally capable of the other stuff means that your training can afford to be focused on CAS and some basic self protection maneuvers.

 

[TomS]

Nope, the A-7 or F-35 does Battlefield Air Interdiction. They do NOT do Close Air Support

The A-7 certainly did. The USAF A-7Ds were bought specifically for CAS in Vietnam, to the extent that they replaced the A-1 in the Sandy role providing close support to combat SAR missions.

And conversely, the A-10 has flown a ton of BAI missions, especially in the first Iraq War. Largely the same target set and weapons, just not with troops in contact.

 

[Scott Kenny]

The A-7 certainly did. The USAF A-7Ds were bought specifically for CAS in Vietnam, to the extent that they replaced the A-1 in the Sandy role providing close support to combat SAR missions.

And conversely, the A-10 has flown a ton of BAI missions, especially in the first Iraq War. Largely the same target set and weapons, just not with troops in contact.

The A7 versus A10 study/competition showed that both planes did things that the other didn't, so the ideal option was to keep both in service. The A7 did BAI much better than the A10, it was faster and had all-weather capabilities (and built-in jammers!). The A10 did CAS much better than the A7, it could loiter while still carrying a large bombload and could still provide support when the enemy finally got within 50m of friendlies via the gun.

Same thing applies here.

The F-35 is absolutely awesome at BAI. It was basically designed for that type of mission, after all. It is terrible at anything involving "lots of ordnance dropped" if RCS still matters, and doesn't loiter worth a damn. It can only use APKWS when in Beast Mode. The F-35A has basically 2x gun passes worth of ammo, the -B and -C have 3 passes.

A modern CAS plane needs to be able to fly at night and in bad weather. This means it can and probably will have the same sensors as the F-35, so the plane will not be cheap.

It still needs to loiter, it still needs a large amount of cannon ammunition for when the bad guys get too close for bombs or rockets.

 

[eagle]

You said the A-7 does not do CAS. That's literally what it did in Vietnam. The A-10 having a longer loiter time does not change that fact.
The A-7 also had a gun for close encounters.

The A-7 vs. A-10 fly off was rigged towards the A-10 btw. The USAF wanted to get rid of the A-7 and so they did, relegating the second most capable strike fighter in the inventory (after the F-111) to ANG duty.

 

[Scott Kenny]

You said the A-7 does not do CAS. That's literally what it did in Vietnam. The A-10 having a longer loiter time does not change that fact.
The A-7 also had a gun for close encounters.

Huh, so it does actually have enough ammunition for that job (1012rds). Thought it was one of the usual BS sub 500 rds magazines, I obviously misremembered.

The A-7 does BAI much better than the A-10 can do. The A-10 does CAS much better. Two different roles, even though they need much of the same avionics these days. BAI rewards having better speed, but doesn't care about loiter anywhere near as much. CAS wants loiter but doesn't care as much about speed. Designing an aircraft for speed tends to compromise loiter capability. Hanging drop tanks on an A-7 means sacrificing at least 1/3 of its bomb load to gain about 30 minutes loiter time, sacrifice another 1/3 bomb load to gain a total of about an hour.

The A-7 vs. A-10 fly off was rigged towards the A-10 btw. The USAF wanted to get rid of the A-7 and so they did, relegating the second most capable strike fighter in the inventory (after the F-111) to ANG duty.

Yes, it was biased towards keeping the A-10, which was the new hotness the USAF had been working on and not yet another frakking Navy plane. The results showed that the A-7 did BAI better than the A-10 could, and the A-10 did CAS better.

The ANG squadrons were specifically BAI and other strike as their missions. Just like there were (and maybe still are, I don't remember where the F-16CJ squadrons are) dedicated ANG Wild Weasel squadrons.

 

[uk 75]

There seems to be a clear divide between what the Skyraider did in Vietnam (COIN) and what the A10 does in killing enemy armour.
Events post Cold War have seen insurgents using armoured vehicles and getting access to anti aircraft weapons.
Developments in accurate stand off weapons since the Mavericks used on the A10 also have to be taken into account.
Going in harm's way on a battlefield as Su25s are finding in Ukraine is pretty risky.

 

[Ainen]

Going in harm's way on a battlefield as Su25s are finding in Ukraine is pretty risky.

But ... even basic Ukrainian Su-25s with adjusted tactics are still alive and well after 1.5 year of conflict, despite lacking any modern survivability tools.

It's high flying aircraft going too close to FLOT that aren't OK. Even standoff is a mixed bag - Russia is currently abusing (temporary?) glaring lack of survivable SAMs with sufficient range on Ukrainian side, and Ukraine with JDAM-ERs can hit what it can (information about strikes is scarce), but not really what it wants.

We already saw how once Ukraine did have a sneaky LRSAM to spare - safe stand off bombing ended up in a disaster.

 

[Kat Tsun]

But ... even basic Ukrainian Su-25s with adjusted tactics are still alive and well after 1.5 year of conflict, despite lacking any modern survivability tools.

It's high flying aircraft going too close to FLOT that aren't OK. Even standoff is a mixed bag - Russia is currently abusing (temporary?) glaring lack of survivable SAMs with sufficient range on Ukrainian side, and Ukraine with JDAM-ERs can hit what it can (information about strikes is scarce), but not really what it wants.

We already saw how once Ukraine did have a sneaky LRSAM to spare - safe stand off bombing ended up in a disaster.

Su-25 is a vastly superior ground attack aircraft than A-10, to be fair, as it's a whole decade newer.

A robotic aircraft like a Predator drone, loaded with internally carried Small Diameter Bombs, and controlled via microwave datalink to a JTAC or something, is probably the best genuinely modern CAS aircraft. If you were going to clean sheet a new CAS jet, a Kratos Q-58 or Boeing Q-28 would be a decent starting point, because there probably won't be enough JSFs to do this job.

Ya'll keep trying to gold-plate a CAS platform, keep it small and simple, there's plenty of options out there: ARES, Scorpion, AT-802, AT-7A...

"Gold plating" in this recruiting environment (or demographic-economic era) is "any manned aircraft" tbh.

Low radar observability is necessary to even get close to the battlefield, as Ukraine's Su-27s and MiG-29s prove. Helicopters can survive long enough to lob rockets at long range while Su-25 is built tough enough that it can survive things that would kill an A-10, which are typically things like Rolands, Strela-10s, and Iglas. It might be worse at surviving AAA, but that's not a significant threat in the modern battlefield, because the A-10 was designed to survive AAA and is relatively less protected against fragmenting warheads.

A robotic aircraft flying at medium altitude (>15,000 ft) with internal carriage of ordnance and low radar observability can just show up, kill things, and leave, without being attacked by long range interceptors like MiG-25 (or J-20) and without being hit by MANPADS. It would want to be small and lightweight to allow it to use well developed turbofans from business jets and reduce the amount of specialized equipment, like ladders, cranes, and catwalks, needed to service it.

It being robotic and composed of mostly commercialized components, presumably the most expensive element would be the airframe itself and the bomb shackles, you can afford to throw it into the fray as a disposable unit. You can't do this with a manned aircraft, because you have a pilot, and the American air forces are squeamish about losing those willy-nilly nowadays. You can credibly treat it less like a JSF or a F-16 and more like a reuseable cruise missile.

If you're low radar observable, which at this point is a fairly trivial and highly developed technology, you can pretty much motor around all you want above the ceilings of most MANPADS or short range air defense systems, but without any of the intense structural or redundancy requirements that make CAS aircraft increasingly unaffordable. This is a good thing.

CAS only needs to go low when it is unable to defeat radar detection through VLO design. A decent strike UCAV of this type would probably cost somewhere in the $40-50 million range, about as much as an attack helicopter (new manf. H-64E), but much more survivable in practical terms. A Grey Eagle is something like $20 million, which is about the cost of a remanufactured attack helicopter, but not super survivable.

 

[BlackBat242]

Su-25 is a vastly superior ground attack aircraft than A-10, to be fair, as it's a whole decade newer.

But made by a nation that was 10-15 years behind in materials, structure science, and electronics design - and the A-10 has been updated recently (although the US is now only 5-10 years ahead in the above areas, except in low-signature composites where they are still up to 15 years ahead).

 

[Kat Tsun]

But made by a nation that was 10-15 years behind in materials, structure science, and electronics design

It's okay because the A-10 was 25 years behind the rest of the U.S. Air Force's frontline aircraft, whatever that means.

What I'll say about the rest is that "n years behind" is a bad brainworm of an idea that doesn't apply as a blanket term. That's not how economics work.

The USSR had strong comparative advantage in submarine building to the point that the U.S. is just now approaching what the USSR was doing in the 1980's, strong comparative advantage in titanium working to the point that the U.S. used it to build a spy plane, and relatively weak comparative advantage in microelectronics after the mid-1970's which was long after the A-10 had materialized in the aluminum anyway.

The F-15C is driving around with digital stores in 1979, and F-18A never had analog stores computers, in a time when the A-10 doesn't get these very basic features until the 2000's or 2010's. Bad look for the Warthog. Su-25 may not have had the fancy human factors elements but it can deliver rockets accurately, and more importantly, it won't die to Iglas or Strelas because of the way its armor is laid out.

YA-9 would probably have offered similar missile resistance, at least had the wings been strong enough, to compete with Su-25. On the other hand, given how weak the YA-9's engines were, it's doubtful it would be able to carry enough armor to matter. Which might be why the YA-9 lost, tbh.

There are literally videos in Ukraine of Russian (and Ukrainian) Su-25s surviving MPADS strikes on the engine pods, which is something the A-10 can't really do, because the A-10 has no armor between its engine pods. MANPADS were the single largest killer of A-10s in Iraq and Desert Storm. Unlike the Su-25, which has a massive 400(?) kilogram titanium bulkhead of about 20 mm in thickness separating the engine bays, there is only air, and fragments like air because it lets them propagate to damage systems.

Simply put, no fragmenting warhead that can be carried by a soldier can penetrate the Su-25's engine protection reliably, while an A-10 might lose both engines to a single rocket strike pretty consistently.

On the other hand a cannon shot will punch through one side of a Su-25 and out the other, especially if it's some sort of SAPHEI round, while the same cannon round will struggle to do the same against the A-10's widely separated engine pods after exiting one of them.

Different threat scenarios resulted in different armor schemes. The USSR's threat analysis was simply better, both at the time and today, as flak guns and larger caliber 35-57mm cannons (which the A-10 has no protections against) are re-proliferating now. If you're going to fly into the jaws of the air defense, it is helpful to be able to survive the threats, and the primary low altitude air defense threat is a Stinger, not a ZSU-23-4.

 

[Scott Kenny]

A robotic aircraft like a Predator drone, loaded with internally carried Small Diameter Bombs, and controlled via microwave datalink to a JTAC or something, is probably the best genuinely modern CAS aircraft. If you were going to clean sheet a new CAS jet, a Kratos Q-58 or Boeing Q-28 would be a decent starting point, because there probably won't be enough JSFs to do this job.

Disagree, drones have very poor situational awareness. And if you slap the F-35 DAS/EOTS on a drone, it's suddenly not that cheap anymore.

Low radar observability is necessary to even get close to the battlefield, as Ukraine's Su-27s and MiG-29s prove. Helicopters can survive long enough to lob rockets at long range while Su-25 is built tough enough that it can survive things that would kill an A-10, which are typically things like Rolands, Strela-10s, and Iglas. It might be worse at surviving AAA, but that's not a significant threat in the modern battlefield, because the A-10 was designed to survive AAA and is relatively less protected against fragmenting warheads.

Citation needed, please.

 

[yasotay]

Manned or unmanned is irrelevant. As much as I can tell both sides in the ongoing European conflict have reduced there cross "line of contact" operations with SU-25, or any manned platforms for that matter, to a minimum and have used them exclusively to fly very low and "survive long enough to lob rockets at long range". Both sides are ramping up the use of long range precision munitions in order to stay away from threat air defenses. However neither side is using the precision munitions for tactical CAS targets, instead using them on operational high value targets (ADA, Rocket Artillery, logistics hubs, and HQ). Unmanned systems have a huge wastage rate, cited by the RUSI recently as being 7 to 10 thousand a month, at least for the Ukrainians. One can assume that the Russian's are also loosing a significant number a month as well. To my knowledge neither side has been operating larger UAS, Turkish or otherwise, anywhere near the front lines. Loitering munitions used in conjunction with disposable UAS are likely to become a mainstay for CAS. All of the major militaries are scrambling to devise this capability. The most significant drawback to this methodology is that these systems are much more restricted by poor weather conditions and heightened winds.
Attack helicopters as well are extending the range of their attack vector with extended range missiles. The Russians have seen more success with several missile types for both Ka-52 and Mi-28N that can engage at much more extended ranges. More long range missiles like the Israeli Spike ER are most assuredly in the works along with "guided" ~80mm rocket types that reduce the CEP to something smaller that a square kilometer.
Passive, mobile, and tactical directed energy weapon systems should be expected in the coming decades. At first they will be used to protect high value targets, but as the technical cost are reduced they will become more prevalent in field armies. This will lead to the full development of the "swarm{s}" of small, relatively inexpensive, random flight path missiles to hunt the directed energy systems.

This argument of course only applies to conflict where both sides are capable of fielding large well trained technologically modern and equipped field Armies and Air Forces.

 

[Kat Tsun]

Disagree, drones have very poor situational awareness. And if you slap the F-35 DAS/EOTS on a drone, it's suddenly not that cheap anymore.

EOTS is an internal Sniper XR pod. You're telling me that isn't cheap? Better call the USAF then, they have tons of those. F-35 is expensive because of a lot of reasons but not because it has a built-in weapons pod. Better call the U.S. Army actually, because they're getting a nifty little SAR for their Grey Eagles, too.

A CAS aircraft simply doesn't need situational awareness. Just don't get shot at? It's not that hard, considering MQ-1s did it all the time against ISIS a decade ago, and presumably this drone would be VLO, which denies the ability of long range air defense systems like S-300PMU and MiG-31 to attack it easily (not that they could anyway).

You can probably produce an actually useful, radar stealth assault drone carrying 2-4 Small Diameter Bombs or ~2 500 lbs JDAMs (the only CAS weapons that matter nowadays) for less than $40 million. Which is about as much as an attack helicopter, and eminently affordable in large quantities, to be stockpiled as needed.

Make sergeants fly it instead of needing actual pilots and it will work just fine. This is beyond the bureaucratic-political capacities of the U.S. Air Force but probably not the PLA or Turkey.

Citation needed, please.

The Iraq War and Desert Storm.

Manned or unmanned is irrelevant.

Absolutely not, considering unmanned aircraft have sortie rates and turnaround times two or three times higher than manned aircraft. Attrition rates of 2-3%, which are unsustainable for manned aircraft, have been doubled against TB-2s with no noticeable effect on the operating tempo of the robotic aircraft. If we include loitering munitions, the attrition rates climb to 80-100% routinely, obviously not workable for a manned aircraft like an A-10, which would barely be able to handle a 3-4% attrition rate at its peak.

It won't be survivable, able to defend itself from aircraft, or particularly flashy. Mostly because it would look like a Kratos Q-58. Eliminating the pilot, and all the associated redundant safety features which are expressly designed to keep him alive, it is the only way to get a cheap CAS aircraft these days.

That is, if we define CAS as "dropping a bomb on a designated target provided by a ground controller and returning to base for rearming" of course. Because what else is CAS? If you're just calling in a rocket and watching it hit a target, it's the Artillery Branch's problem.

...or you could have a few hundred or a thousand ground attack aircraft built by a more advanced and ancient civilization I guess.

To my knowledge neither side has been operating larger UAS, Turkish or otherwise, anywhere near the front lines. Loitering munitions used in conjunction with disposable UAS are likely to become a mainstay for CAS.

I think you're getting caught up in the different levels of drones.

Platoon and infantry section drones like DJI Phantoms aren't relevant here. It's about a aircraft that can be lost like the A-10 was expected to be lost, and the only demonstrated way to break that 3-4% attrition rate "barrier" of manned jets is by having a relatively simple robotic aircraft, stripped bare of anything besides a GNSS, VHF link, possibly a SATCOM, autopilot, FLIR turret, and bomb shackles.

Ukraine’s TB-2 Drones Are Back In Action. That’s An Ominous Sign For Russia.

Months after virtually disappearing from Ukraine’s skies, the Ukrainian armed forces’ Bayraktar TB-2 drones are back in action.

www.forbes.com

With Turkish drones in the headlines, what happened to Ukraine's Bayraktar TB2s? - Breaking Defense

Analysts tell Breaking Defense that there has been a shift in how Ukraine uses its TB2 drones, as the direct result of Russia's change in air defense tactics over the course of the war.

breakingdefense.com

Ukraine's TB-2 force is back in action. It didn't stop because it wasn't survivable. This is because Ukraine literally ran out of parts and money to pay Bayraktar for more, but they will get a factory eventually. Because Ukraine is used to simply begging for free stuff, they didn't want to pay for them, but now they can. The Russians have since altered some of the calculus by changing tactics, but not enough to stop a regenerated TB-2 force, because drones are genuinely tough to stop.

This is a drone which is not very advanced though. A more advanced version might be powered by a turbofan or shrouded propfan engine for commonality with commercial platforms, internal carriage of weapons and relatively higher tolerances in manufacturing to reduce radar signature, and autonomous systems to allow it to operate in heavy EW environments. All of that stuff is either well understood now or becoming commercialized, which will keep costs down. 30 years ago a $40 million dollar CAS jet would be obscene. Nowadays, it's the price of a new build AH-64E.

Expensive things like ELINT packages, RWRs, high performance GMTI, and wide angle, long-range staring FLIRs aren't required. If you want a radar, use a Longbow, or a derivative of it, or a more advanced commercial radar like the NanoSAR (developed for fisheries protection).

Most importantly, a little cheap robot plane will free up always limited quantities of F-35s/F-22s to do things like offensive counter-air and SEAD. CAS is a relatively meaningless mission for air forces as long as their airbases aren't in danger, after all, because it eats up pilots and manpower that can be better used fighting the enemy's air and artillery troops.

The main issue is that people think of drones like they think of manned aircraft and attack helicopters, when they should think of drones like they think of cruise missiles or artillery shells, and not be afraid to lose them. Even manned aircraft and attack helicopters are units of ammunition to a corps commander, though those guys don't do their jobs very often these days.

This is a symptom of fighting wars where the stakes of losing the war are less than the stakes of looking bad in a Congressional hearing.

 

[Scott Kenny]

EOTS is an internal Sniper XR pod. You're telling me that isn't cheap? Better call the USAF then, they have tons of those. F-35 is expensive because of a lot of reasons but not because it has a built-in weapons pod. Better call the U.S. Army actually, because they're getting a nifty little SAR for their Grey Eagles, too.

I said DAS, too. Since the DAS is what gives the full spherical view for situational awareness. Pretty sure that's not cheap.

And a CAS plane also needs a radar. Several, honestly, including one that can ID very small and theoretically low RCS objects like power lines, as hitting those will take down the plane. Pretty sure the SOAR has one figured out for helicopters.

You can probably produce an actually useful, radar stealth assault drone carrying 2-4 Small Diameter Bombs or ~2 500 lbs JDAMs (the only CAS weapons that matter nowadays) for less than $40 million. Which is about as much as an attack helicopter, and eminently affordable in large quantities, to be stockpiled as needed.

Make sergeants fly it instead of needing actual pilots and it will work just fine. This is beyond the bureaucratic-political capacities of the U.S. Air Force but probably not the PLA or Turkey.

So, you want a "CAS" plane that is incapable of actually supporting troops in close contact with the enemy.

Noted.

The Iraq War and Desert Storm.

Really? While there were A-10 losses in each, there were also more'n a few A-10s shot to hell that made it back to an airfield to be repaired.

Absolutely not, considering unmanned aircraft have sortie rates and turnaround times two or three times higher than manned aircraft. Attrition rates of 2-3%, which are unsustainable for manned aircraft, have been doubled against TB-2s with no noticeable effect on the operating tempo of the robotic aircraft. If we include loitering munitions, the attrition rates climb to 80-100% routinely, obviously not workable for a manned aircraft like an A-10, which would barely be able to handle a 3-4% attrition rate at its peak.

It won't be survivable, able to defend itself from aircraft, or particularly flashy. Mostly because it would look like a Kratos Q-58. Eliminating the pilot, and all the associated redundant safety features which are expressly designed to keep him alive, it is the only way to get a cheap CAS aircraft these days.

That is, if we define CAS as "dropping a bomb on a designated target provided by a ground controller and returning to base for rearming" of course. Because what else is CAS? If you're just calling in a rocket and watching it hit a target, it's the Artillery Branch's problem.

What happened to having a gun so that you have a weapon with a Danger Close range under 100m, for those times when the bad guys are THAT close?

Expensive things like ELINT packages, RWRs, high performance GMTI, and wide angle, long-range staring FLIRs aren't required. If you want a radar, use a Longbow, or a derivative of it, or a more advanced commercial radar like the NanoSAR (developed for fisheries protection).

Strongly disagree, how else will you have any CAS in bad weather?

Most importantly, a little cheap robot plane will free up always limited quantities of F-35s/F-22s to do things like offensive counter-air and SEAD. CAS is a relatively meaningless mission for air forces as long as their airbases aren't in danger, after all, because it eats up pilots and manpower that can be better used fighting the enemy's air and artillery troops.

The main issue is that people think of drones like they think of manned aircraft and attack helicopters, when they should think of drones like they think of cruise missiles or artillery shells, and not be afraid to lose them. Even manned aircraft and attack helicopters are units of ammunition to a corps commander, though those guys don't do their jobs very often these days.

This is a symptom of fighting wars where the stakes of losing the war are less than the stakes of looking bad in a Congressional hearing.

That I can agree with, though it may be a symptom of the USAF needing to be it's own branch and not wanting to support the Army.

Marine air seems to spend a lot more time on CAS.

 

[Kat Tsun]

I said DAS, too. Since the DAS is what gives the full spherical view for situational awareness.

You don't need DAS if you don't have a pilot. Multiple cameras might be useful but they would be pretty cheap. We're good at making microelectronics now, as the same technology that goes into silicon computer chips goes into CCDs and FLIRs.

So, you want a "CAS" plane that is incapable of actually supporting troops in close contact with the enemy.

All it has to do is drop a bomb.

The JTAC controls the drone remotely and queues it onto a target either by talking to the controller or pointing it out on a ROVER datapad. Or if the JTAC is dead, the operator takes full control, and bombs the thing that killed him. That's how all CAS works. Even in the A-10C.

Really? While there were A-10 losses in each, there were also more'n a few A-10s shot to hell that made it back to an airfield to be repaired.

Yeah. Shot.

Shot.

With guns.

Specifically KPVs, NSVs, and ZPUs.

14.5mm and 12.7mm.

Not missiles, because missiles kill A-10s pretty reliably, when they can be fired and when they can hit.

Su-25 has pretty verifiable images of coming back to base in Chechnya, Afghanistan, and Ukraine with obvious missile impacts on the side fuselage. It was lost a lot in Afghanistan to missiles, actually, kind of like the A-10. This is because the armor was insufficient to stop fragments from the engine and missile from damaging both engines (much like the A-10!). Then Sukhoi adds the thick 20mm titanium bulkhead and that problem was solved.

If the A-10 were a T-tail twin jet it might workable, but it isn't, so it can't be done.

The USSR didn't predict the lethality of modern missiles, it merely adapted to it, in an effective and robust manner. It underestimated their lethality, but recognized they were the superior threat to cannons, so it went with the Su-25 in layout. Perhaps Starstreak, because it combines aspects of missiles and gunnery, is still a dangerous threat. An Igla or a Stinger? Not so much.

What happened to having a gun so that you have a weapon with a Danger Close range under 100m, for those times when the bad guys are THAT close?

Then you die, I guess?

Hopefully your battalion, brigade, or division will learn from your mistakes and not die next time. People die in wars, and in large wars that matter, the consequences of a single plane bombing a single tank to protect a single platoon are not significant.

In wars where the greatest threats to life and limb are in the halls of Congress instead of the battlefield, then this type of drone plane, because it is disposable and carries a low weapon payload, would be bad. But those wars are stupid.

Strongly disagree, how else will you have any CAS in bad weather?

With a camera? How did they do CAS in 1975 with the A-10 in bad weather, I wonder.

That I can agree with, though it may be a symptom of the USAF needing to be it's own branch and not wanting to support the Army.

No, it's because in modern American wars, the leaders in charge get punished for treating drones like the disposable ammo they are.

CAS is not a particularly important mission in practice. The main purpose of such a cheap drone, like the Q-58, would be to allow either the U.S. Army or the USAF to avoid dedicating actual combat aircraft to the job. A JSF or ATF is genuinely wasted on CAS because it's such a minor job. Even an F-4 or F-16 wasn't really good at it, which is why the USAF made the A-10: a cheap, disposable plane designed to be thrown into combat so the Air Force wouldn't need to waste expensive F-16s and F-15s on the job.

Modern drone aircraft aren't A-10s though. They don't need survivability features to keep their attrition rates below 4%, which is what the A-10 did, because any attrition rate at or around 4% provokes a halt to manned air combat operations historically. Drones can conduct combat effectively with attrition rates approaching 10%, perhaps higher, perhaps not. This is because they can fly more often, are easier to maintain, and don't need to keep someone alive at 10,000 feet.

That last part is the important part. The main reason aircraft have redundancy, triple backup controls, etc. is due to people being in them. Eventually the only aircraft with such features will be things like airborne command posts, transports and large tankers, and maybe some bombers.

Q-58 is basically a Air Force DASH drone, but obviously more reliable, and carrying Stormbreaker instead of LWTs.

 

[Scott Kenny]

You don't need DAS if you don't have a pilot.

Looking through the Sniper pod is looking through a soda straw.

All it has to do is drop a bomb.

The JTAC controls the drone remotely and queues it onto a target either by talking to the controller or pointing it out on a ROVER datapad. Or if the JTAC is dead, the operator takes control, and bombs the thing that killed him. That's how all CAS works. Even in the A-10C.

Again, the gun exists to provide extremely close range CAS. SDBs still have a 200m Danger Close range.

Use nothing but SDBs and all the enemy has to do to negate your CAS is get within 200m.

Yeah. Shot.

Shot.

With guns.

Specifically KPVs, NSVs, and ZPUs.

14.5mm and 12.7mm.

Not missiles, because missiles kill A-10s pretty reliably, when they can be fired and when they can hit.

Su-25 has pretty verifiable images of coming back to base in Chechnya, Afghanistan, and Ukraine with obvious missile impacts on the side fuselage. It was lost a lot in Afghanistan to missiles, actually, like the A-10. Then Sukhoi adds the thick 20mm titanium bulkhead and that problem was solved.

The USSR didn't predict the lethality of modern missiles, it merely adapted to it, in an effective and robust manner. Perhaps Starstreak, because it combines aspects of missiles and gunnery, is still a dangerous threat. An Igla or a Stinger? Not so much.

Seen several pics of A-10s with the entire tail section full of holes from a missile proximity fuzed explosion. Still made it back to base to be fixed.

How did they do CAS in 1975 with the A-10 in bad weather? I wonder.

They didn't.

CAS is not a particularly important mission in practice. The main purpose of such a cheap drone, like the Q-58, would be to allow either the U.S. Army or the USAF to avoid dedicating actual combat aircraft to the job. A JSF or ATF is genuinely wasted on CAS because it's such a minor job. Even an F-4 or F-16 wasn't really good at it, which is why the USAF made the A-10: a cheap, disposable plane designed to be thrown into combat so the Army would be quiet.

Modern drone aircraft aren't A-10s. They don't need survivability features to keep their attrition rates below 4%, which is what the A-10 did, because any attrition rate above 3% provokes a halt to manned air combat operations in general.

Drones can conduct combat effectively with attrition rates approaching 10%. This is because they can fly more often, are easier to maintain, and don't need to keep someone alive at 10,000 feet.

What was the attrition rate for F-105s again?

 

[Kat Tsun]

Looking through the Sniper pod is looking through a soda straw.

Now you know why CAS is directed by ground troops in the first place...

Again, the gun exists to provide extremely close range CAS. SDBs still have a 200m Danger Close range.

Why are you using SDBs at 200 meters? Do you not have MBT-LAWs or M72s?

If you want an actual cannon, ask a helicopter pilot. Helicopters can still work in the FLET for the most part, provided the threat is heat seekers and not laser guided systems like Starstreak or RBS-70.

Use nothing but SDBs and all the enemy has to do to negate your CAS is get within 200m.

Yeah, and if the enemy can get that close to a trench, they can have it. I'll be waiting another 800 meters behind in a fallback position.

Seen several pics of A-10s with the entire tail section full of holes from a missile proximity fuzed explosion. Still made it back to base to be fixed.

So have I. It's so rare, the ones that survive missile strikes get saved in museums, apparently. If it were banal it wouldn't go in a museum.

They didn't.

Considering both the A-1 and A-7 did in Vietnam and the A-10 did exactly that in Desert Storm, I dunno about that.

Bad weather is historically quite good for attacking and I don't know why a robot plane would suffer in it. Robot planes don't get dizzy or disorientated for one thing. They may not like flying in a sandstorm or whatever but it can be done provided they can get over it. F-15s were regularly hitting things through oil field smoke plumes with Paveways too.

"Bad weather" also changes depending on the technology of the time. It used to be just clouds and rain preventing visual acquisition of targets. Nowadays, SWIRs and LWIRs are getting cheap enough we can put them on soldiers' heads and let them see through fog and sand. A robot plane in the future might have something like a hyperspectral sensor and multimode radar that lets it fly in the dark and see through sand and smoke, and still be under $40 million or something. F/A-50 does it.

That said, if you can't fly your planes, neither can the enemy, so it's not a big deal.

What was the attrition rate for F-105s again?

Yeah my mistake, the projected loss rates for A-10A were around 7% in a hypothetical Central European WW3. No hard answers on how that would affect combat operations in real life: after the Package Q strike the USAF stopped doing daylight raids despite suffering a mere 2.5% attrition rate on that sortie. The Karbala raid was something like 3.2% because a single Apache got shot down and the entire theater stopped doing deep raids.

The TB-2 suffered 7% attrition rate in Syria, with no noticeable effects on combat operations, in a much smaller timeframe than Vietnam (and possibly Desert Storm) though. Same in Ukraine, the TB-2s suffered major losses (possibly as high as 40% attrition) with no major changes in tactics until the Russians got their EWAR working. The Turks also lost a pair of helicopter gunships to Pantsirs or something and decided that they were done with helicopter gunships in that theater.

Meanwhile, the USAF once lost a $20 million drone over Yemen and subsequently retired an entire fleet of drones over this. Do I need to remind you that a UH-60M costs about $25 million? It would be like the U.S. Army crashing a Blackhawk and proceeding to chop up all its utility helicopters, instead of just writing off the airframe as a loss and moving on with its life.

It's a bit silly, to say the least.

Simply put, SABA or Alpha Jet (or perhaps more prosaically, Textron Scorpion and L-M F/A-50) aren't realistic solutions to the modern CAS problem. Anything manned is going to be an issue, as in peacetime you will have trouble finding pilots, and in wartime you will have trouble surviving, which means it should probably just be a robot so the survivability question becomes moot.

The only reason people make aircraft survivable is to bring the pilot back.

Q-58 is quoted by Kratos as costing around $5 million per unit with 50 airframes per year, and $2 million with 100 airframes per year, but it might be quadruple that in both cases. Which isn't bad for a stealthy bomb truck. You could probably buy 3 or 4 Q-58s in reality for the price of a single JSF, which frees up several JSFs to be doing important things that aren't babysitting ground troops or dropping SDBs, like attacking airbases or destroying SAM installations or C3I bunkers.



Add a few relatively inexpensive things like a small FLIR, or a radar, maybe a slightly larger engine, and bomb bay for 4 SDBs, or a single 2000 lbs bomb. Reserve space for an autonomous flight computer, and you get a neat little machine that can do the job of half a JSF for probably a third the actual flyaway price, or not much more than a helicopter gunship, at around $40 million or so (AH-64E new build).

In reality, it might even end up coming in at the cost of an MQ-1 Predator, at around $15-20 million or so, assuming Kratos is right about their cost estimates for a basic Q-58 being $2-4.5 million if it hits serial production, once you throw in the sensors and the SATCOM for OTH control.

It's a $5 million F-117, controllable by a JSF, for all intents and purposes at the moment. It could easily be something better though.

 

[Scott Kenny]

It's a $5 million F-117, controllable by a JSF, for all intents and purposes at the moment. It could easily be something better though.

I'm not convinced that any single seater aircraft will be capable of wrangling drones. It's why I fully expect both USAF and USN 6th gen planes to be 2 seaters.

And F-35s don't have space for a second seat.

 

[Foo Fighter]

"The only reason people make aircraft survivable is to bring the pilot back".

The aircraft is a very expensive asset, that might have a bit to do with making it survivable.

If you can get by using dispoosable assets, drones are much cheaper.

 

[Scott Kenny]

"The only reason people make aircraft survivable is to bring the pilot back".

The aircraft is a very expensive asset, that might have a bit to do with making it survivable.

If you can get by using dispoosable assets, drones are much cheaper.

I'm not sure that the VLO bomb bus @Kat Tsun is advocating for is going to be significantly cheaper than an F-35.

VLO is not cheap, and requires special care and handling during maintenance.

I think the only way we're going to get a cheap CAS plane (drone or manned) is to accept LO shaping with minimal RAM use.

 

[quellish]

Not missiles, because missiles kill A-10s pretty reliably, when they can be fired and when they can hit.

SA-16 hit, DESERT STORM:



MANPAD hit, DESERT STORM. AC made hard landing back at base.



There are a number of other examples like this.

Missiles do not kill A-10s reliably.

 

[quellish]

VLO is not cheap, and requires special care and handling during maintenance.

VLO does not make any sense for the CAS mission supporting TIC.
VLO is more than shaping and materials. It is tactics. VLO aircraft are low observable from certain angles. Aircraft such as the F-117, B-2, etc. optimize their survivability by showing their most LO angles to threats.

In a CAS environment ordinance must be used from specific angles, directions, etc. to ensure the safety of friendly forces. This would prevent a LO CAS aircraft from being able to present optimum LO look angles to threats.

In a CAS environment ordinance is often employed from low altitudes for a number of reasons (situational awareness, dangers to friendly forces, etc.). This would limit the effectiveness of RF low observables against ground based threats.

 

[Desertfox]

Can an aircraft survive a gun run in a modern AA environment at the frontline? That is the real question. If they can't no reason to have them, spend the money on a different system, say artillery for example.

For the record the Su-25 has survived in Ukraine, but they aren't doing gun runs.

 

[Scott Kenny]

VLO does not make any sense for the CAS mission supporting TIC.
VLO is more than shaping and materials. It is tactics. VLO aircraft are low observable from certain angles. Aircraft such as the F-117, B-2, etc. optimize their survivability by showing their most LO angles to threats.

In a CAS environment ordinance must be used from specific angles, directions, etc. to ensure the safety of friendly forces. This would prevent a LO CAS aircraft from being able to present optimum LO look angles to threats.

In a CAS environment ordinance is often employed from low altitudes for a number of reasons (situational awareness, dangers to friendly forces, etc.). This would limit the effectiveness of RF low observables against ground based threats.

I agree, but @Kat Tsun is wanting a medium altitude bomb truck. And medium altitude bomb trucks need to be VLO all around, like the Tacit Blue, just to survive.

Can an aircraft survive a gun run in a modern AA environment at the frontline? That is the real question. If they can't no reason to have them, spend the money on a different system, say artillery for example.

For the record the Su-25 has survived in Ukraine, but they aren't doing gun runs.

The Su-25 was never really intended to do gun runs as the primary attack. It was always a rockets&bombs plane with a gun for emergencies. Only has 250 rounds for the guns, though that is enough for ~5sec of firing.

 

[Foo Fighter]

What I was on about is the ability of the aircraft to survive is NOT solely about the pilot/aircrew. In order for the aircraft to perform its role, it must survive long enough to do so and hopefully a lot more than once.

If you want a suicide drone (I know, crap description), you can get those just about anywhere for the price of a toilet seat on Air Force One.