A-10 CAS Relevance

Indestructible and deployed against weakly defended targets equals plenty of missions.Typical would be those propaganda leaflet runs. Yes, you can make a lot of "bombing" runs under those conditions with great mission count stats etc. Under front line initial attack conditions the plane wouldn't survive anyway, so send it after individual trucks and convoys and stuff like that. Basically targets you'd send a cheap attack helicopter to if the chopper were in range.The

Yes but modern beyond visual range missile might do the same to current stealth platforms so one could argue that fighter jets as a whole is becoming obsolete for a lot of the missions that defines the air force as a separate branch.Where you still want a pilot in the loop is in A-10 territory where the role is to fly low and slow and work directly with local infantry commanders, and this means sustaining some level of damage mostly from "primitive" optically tracked weapons rather

It is unnecessary to have a manned CAS fighter doing strafing runs. A cheap Drone in the 1-5MM range could do the job better. Or rely on high altitude/stealth precision bombing.The A-10 was built for a war in Europe that never came. You can see how well the equivalent SU-25 Frogfoot fairs against Manpads in Ukraine today.

The new planes - they can't look out the window to figure who to shoot so well. Too high and fast.Drones - limited arms. Though they may be the future when they beef them up a bit.Apaches - the enemy machine guns them. Not protected enough.Here's a story from 2007 when the high end B1 screwed up, the Apaches were challenged and the A-10 helped save things:h

Yeah, apparently the problem with using high speed jets if they can't hang out close to look out the window and figure which people are the bad guys. Helicopters are too lightly armoured and get shot down and current drones are a bit lightly armed to hold off loads of enemy troops. Maybe in the future when the drones are more like http://youtu.be/zjympX1bxI4?t=18s retiring the A10 would make sense

are manned fighter aircraft even relevant anymore?

The A part of the F/A 18 means Attack. Usually Attack aircraft are capable of close air support, which is a huge and integral part of our military tactics.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close_air_supportWithout close air support, troops on the ground can't overwhelm enemies with firepower. Without air superiority, we don't provide close air support. Our strateg

the A-10 is actually the perfect "fighter mafia" plane aside from its weight.the fighter mafia basically wanted more maneuverability, cheaper planes and CAS than interdiction bombing. A-10 is all of those except light.they were vehemently opposed to optimizing planes for beyond visual range (BVR) combat like by improving sensors or stealth because they considered it "a fantasy."problem is missiles fired 100 miles away don't care what you consider fantastical.

1. There are not any UCAVs (unmanned combat aerial vehicle) currently deployed that have capabilities close to those of current-generation fighter aircraft. That is being worked on, though not at the level I would like to see.Current generation drones are (as far as I am aware) designed to be piloted remotely, and aren't really designed to shoot down other aircraft.2. With missiles that can strike an enemy from beyond visual range [1], it is often argued that dogfighting is no longer

The replacement for the A10 is the AC-130.F35 is the multirole fighter. You build it because you don't know if you are doing a stealth mission, a dogfight, CAS or wild weasel.F35 can do it all, but as a jack of all trades master of none.-------Consider the A10 in the current Ukrainian war: CAS is impossible because both sides have too much antiair. You need wild weasel (aka: anti-air defense) fighters right now.Eventually, one sides air defense will be destroyed to the point