Close Air Support in the CF: Bring back something like the CF-5 or introduce something with props?

[WingsofFury]

I'm not intentionally being obtuse here, but isn't what a similar reason?  ???

A FAC can't control something like a Predator (UAV) when it's being called in for a strike, so if they aren't granted permission to operate the firing systems on an unmanned UAV then why would they be allowed to operate firing systems on a manned aircraft?

 

[alexgold]

I don't know where this Max guy gets off saying he owns the world, but the relationship between OPERATIONAL pilots in Afghanistan (A-10s,F-16s, F-18s) and the JTACs is great.  We work together in a discussion to get the bombs on target and neutralise the enemy.  Its not a pissing contest between the two as to who gets to pick the ordnance. If I as the JTAC pick an ordnance that he doesn'T agree with he'll let me know.  And most likely I will probably agree with him, but if say I am worried about collateral damage so I choose a strafe for a particular target, the pilot might disagree and suggest another ordnance for better weapons effects, but he doesn't have the full picture up there.  Again though its the JTACs job to make sure he/she has all the info.

 

[alexgold]

And the JTAC does control predators and reapers when they strike, he doesn't the plane physically but the ordnance and Mandatory Attack Headings are all determined by the FAC.

 

[SupersonicMax]

I don't know where this Max guy gets off saying he owns the world, but the relationship between OPERATIONAL pilots in Afghanistan (A-10s,F-16s, F-18s) and the JTACs is great.  We work together in a discussion to get the bombs on target and neutralise the enemy.  Its not a pissing contest between the two as to who gets to pick the ordnance. If I as the JTAC pick an ordnance that he doesn'T agree with he'll let me know.  And most likely I will probably agree with him, but if say I am worried about collateral damage so I choose a strafe for a particular target, the pilot might disagree and suggest another ordnance for better weapons effects, but he doesn't have the full picture up there.  Again though its the JTACs job to make sure he/she has all the info.

Yes, the way it is now, its great. I just cant see JTACs, FACs taking physical control over the plane and weapons.

And the JTAC does control predators and reapers when they strike, he doesn't the plane physically but the ordnance and Mandatory Attack Headings are all determined by the FAC.

Yes, and thats fine.  The final decision to drop or not once down the wire and cleared hot should be left to the pilot(the way it is now). And unless thereisa drastic change in regulations, Ibelieve it will remain that way.

 

[OldSolduer]

I've been watching this thread and while I know very little about what weapon drops off what aircraft, I can tell you this:

If I have a C7 rifle and all I do is carry it, while some guy in a building actually can fire it.....I as the weapons platform guy ain't gonna like that. Niether will a tank commander who has no control over when they can fire the main gun.

I agree wiht Max....the final call has to be up to the person actually operating the weapons platform.

 

[Loachman]

Some people need to go back and actually read what some other people are actually saying, without letting emotion cloud their interpretation.

Two links describing the Swiss Cheese Model fore those unfamiliar with it: http://www.coloradofirecamp.com/swiss-cheese/introduction.htm and http://wikiofscience.wikidot.com/science:accident-causation-model.

The Tarnak Farm "Friendly Fire" tragedy is another sad illustration of this model.

There was far more at play there than simply two "cowboy" F16 pilots, and it is my belief that they were let off so lightly despite the severity of their charges in order to protect all of the other cheese slices from public examination and embarassment.

Good analogy, Jim.

 

[Journeyman]

Good analogy, Jim.

Bad analogy, Jim -- for two reasons:

1) If you're carrying the tripod for a .50, are you actually firing the weapon or merely part of the team supporting the system? In this example, the USAF is developing a system in which a pilot carries the munitions to the objective and someone else in the system pulls the trigger.

2) You're saying that the guy carrying the weapon "ain't gonna like it." Neither you nor I have to refer to our watches when discussing time in; the military has on many occasions had us do things we didn't really like. Did it change anything? No. We did it.

While everyone has a role to play, perhaps this new generation expects the chain of command to consider their feelings when acquiring weapons or developing SOPs.


Tarnak Farm is a tangent. What we're discussing here is an ordnance delivery system. Assuming such a system were introduced into the CF, we'd use similar procedures as the Americans are developing. Yet we have a CF pilot without enough time-in for a CD but apparently knowing more about weapons than the entire USAF, suggesting he would disobey a lawful order to use that equipment.

And that, Zoomie, is not dog-piling, it's multiple people calling BS simultaneously.

 

[Old Sweat]

I think, JM, is what he is claiming, that based on current Air Command orders, he can refuse to use the developmental technology. Well, gee, in my career I learned about all sorts of technical advances, many of which came to nought. I was not expected to go any use them in the field based on stories in the print media, but that appears to be what he is assuming here. That he managed more of less concurrently to p... off all sorts of people with intemperate statements is unfortunate.

What is more unfortunate that none of us, on any side of the argument keyed on the point that before something like this enters general service, there are beaucoup issues to be resolved. Fortunately the opinions of very wet behind the ears pilots do not rank very high on the list.

 

[DexOlesa]

1) If you're carrying the tripod for a .50, are you actually firing the weapon or merely part of the team supporting the system? In this example, the USAF is developing a system in which a pilot carries the munitions to the objective and someone else in the system pulls the trigger.

No, you are right. The guy carrying the tripod isn't firing the weapon. The guy carrying the weapon (which would be the pilot) is firing the weapon. This analogy is much worse than the C7 one.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

meanwhile

Top Aces Interim Contracted Airborne Training Services Standing Offer Extended. Offer Covers Training for Canadian Army FACs

http://communities.canada.com/ottawacitizen/blogs/defencewatch/archive/2011/01/27/top-aces-interim-contracted-airborne-training-services-standing-offer-extended-offer-covers-training-for-canadian-army-facs.aspx

 

[SupersonicMax]

but apparently knowing more about weapons than the entire USAF

I assume you have never seen a new development or idea and think "Jebus, that doesn't make any sense". 

suggesting he would disobey a lawful order to use that equipment.

I re-read what I wrote and I cannot find where I suggested that.  Please don't put words in my mouth.  I said the idea doesn't make sense and provided reason why I tought that.

Yet we have a CF pilot without enough time-in for a CD

Of course I will never have enough experience to have a legitimate opinion on anything in the military.  If I had a CD, it would be "Yet we have a CF pilot without enough time-in for a CD2".

UAVs are made for this exact scenario.  No need to take control over a manned aircraft or its weapons. 

 

[Fishbone Jones]

This little bun fight needs a time out.

Milnet.ca Staff

 

[Kirkhill]

Now that time has passed, and hopefully emotions cooled, I would like to post this article

It is about the validity of the piloted turbo-prop in Close Air Support as compared to fast movers, high altitude bombers and UAVs.

Some highlights:

“The A-10 is the best ‘close attack’ plane ever made, period,” Sprey tells me. “But the Air Force hates that mission. They’ll do anything they can to kill that plane.” He says retiring the iconic A-10, a twin-engine attack jet with 30-mm cannons that hit with 14 times the kinetic energy of the 20-mm guns mounted on America’s current fleet of supersonic fighters, became an article of faith among high ranking Air Force officers, generations of whom had been raised to believe in the redemptive power of technological innovation.

So if the A-10 was never going to be around in enough numbers, what could be done? Only one group had enough distance from the Air Force and enough independent money to consider a viable alternative: buying a cheap, lightweight attack plane on their own. That was the Navy SEALs. A group of them met with the Secretary of the Navy in 2006 to tell him about the problems they faced with getting good enough air support.

Like other American combat troops in Afghanistan, the SEALs sometimes found that high-tech gear couldn’t reliably get the job done, or that cheaper, lower-tech solutions worked better. This is how the US military almost adopted the A-29 Super Tucano, a $4 million turboprop airplane reminiscent of WWII-era designs that troops wanted, commanders said was “urgently needed,” but Congress refused to buy.

Super Tucano’s tight turning radius and low stall speed meant pilots could maintain constant visual contact with ground forces and instantly shift from surveillance and reconnaissance to attack. And after dark, an A-29 could use night vision and thermal sensors as sophisticated as those on any fighter jet.

“It’s a great plane,” says recently retired Air Force Lt. Col. Shamsher Mann, an F-16 pilot who has flown A-29s. “Pilots love it. It handles beautifully, sips gas, and can go anywhere. If you want to get into the fight and mix it up with the guys on the ground, the Super T is a great platform.”

Another former fighter pilot tells me that the Super Tucano provided the “low-end” air-to-ground attack capability the United States simply never had in Afghanistan—a capability the Pentagon’s F-35 could never hope to replicate.

Soon after 9/11, the pilot said, Army Special Forces famously rode horses into the Hindu Kush, but carried laptop computers and sophisticated targeting and communications gear with them as well. “Super Tucano is almost a mirror image of that in the air,” he said. “The low-tech combined with the high-tech.”

In Afghanistan, US troops didn't need airplanes that could evade detection from enemy radar; they needed planes that flew low enough for pilots to see the enemy eye-to-eye. They needed bombs dropped close enough to hurt them, bullets shot from the sky landing just out of arm's reach and into the enemy. They needed the Taliban dead.

In response to the SEALs’ request, the Navy committed Pentagon heresy by going backwards in airplane technology. Instead of jet engines, they found a propellor-driven plane worked better.

Navy and Air Force pilots jumped at the chance to volunteer. Upon selection, pilots simply disappeared from their regular units. They started working with SEALs trained to call in airstrikes. This was a special operations mission, and this was a specops plane. On paper, they now worked for the Navy’s Irregular Warfare Office on Imminent Fury.

In Nevada, they shot 50-caliber machine guns mounted in the A-29’s wings. They dropped small laser-guided and GPS-guided bombs. They fired thousands of 2.75-inch rockets, some of which had laser-guidance upgrades. These were the types of weapons best suited to the war in Afghanistan. And for self-defense, the A-29 could even fire the same Sidewinder air-to-air missile used in their previous lives as jet pilots.

Obligatory Sky Raider reference....

Hukee often had to fire rockets or shoot his four 20-mm cannons on a target, and because of his A-1’s slow speed he could adjust his point of aim and fire again before zooming overhead and turning around for another pass.

That’s impossible to do in a jet aircraft. Hukee says the F-4 jet pilots’ motto in Vietnam was “One Pass, Haul Ass,” meaning they’d typically drop 500-pound or larger bombs only once and then zoom off. But for Skyraiders, they’d come in low, slow, and pound the target—sometimes making a dozen or more passes before having to refuel.

More than four decades later, the tests at Naval Air Station Fallon, in western Nevada, showed that the Super T was the closest thing yet to the Skyraider’s capabilities. The A-29 was capable of flying and fighting from less than 1,000 feet above the ground. An armed Tucano has a loiter time of up to four hours, far better than fuel-hungry fighter jets which would usually stay overhead for as little as 20 minutes at a time before needing to refuel.

Typical fighter jets could only fly loose, three- or four-mile radius circles around a fight, but the Super T could remain as close as 500 meters to the target area. Perfect for responsive air strikes.

A few years after 9/11, those F/A-18s were going into Afghanistan loaded with just one laser-guided 500-pound bomb, one GPS-guided 500-pound bomb, and one AIM-9 air-to-air missile for self-defense. All of which a Super T can likewise carry on long-duration missions. The only difference is the Hornet’s internal 20-mm cannon, which is significantly larger than a Super T’s wing-mounted .50-cal machine guns. But an add-on 20-mm gun pod can be mounted underneath the A-29 fuselage, essentially matching the F/A-18’s typical weapons load and lethal capabilities.

Most of the time, those Hornets landed back on the carrier with all bombs still attached and guns unfired. The Hornet’s cost per flight hour? $25,000 to $30,000, according to official Navy figures. It’s estimated the F-35 costs anywhere between $31,900 to $38,400 per hour to fly. As for the Super T? $600 per hour, according to the Sierra Nevada Corporation, manufacturer of the A-29.

But the “8-minute rule” standard breaks down when you talk to veteran pilots and air controllers.

“Getting there in 8 minutes sounds accurate, but what you do then is a completely fucking different thing,” says an active-duty Army Special Forces air controller who also wished to not be named. “It might take 10 minutes to dial-in the fast mover,” the controller, who’s completed multiple combat tours, says, noting the time required to orient a jet pilot to the situation on the ground upon arrival.

He says dealing with unmanned aerial systems like the vaunted Predator and Reaper drones is even worse, taking twice as long to get dialed-in as the jets do. The reason is that drone pilots are only looking through their sensors and targeting pods.

“They can’t look out the canopy and see me, and then see the enemy,” the soldier explains. The pod, he says, “just doesn’t show you much of the ground, and so it can take a long time to make sure the pilot knows where I am, where the enemy is, and to make sure we’re both talking about the same thing. I won’t let him fire until I’m sure of both.”

The merits of a Pratt and Whitney based solution.

Perhaps a Reserve heavy capability based on Tucanos and Twotters - low cost training and low intensity warfare.    The Twotters supply a cheap transport solution for small formed bodies of troops to remote locations.

 

[Loachman]

What makes you think that training would be cheap, and within the realm of part-timers?

How would we benefit from a niche aircraft with very limited capability?

 

[daftandbarmy]

Now that time has passed, and hopefully emotions cooled, I would like to post this article

It is about the validity of the piloted turbo-prop in Close Air Support as compared to fast movers, high altitude bombers and UAVs.

Some highlights:

Obligatory Sky Raider reference....

The merits of a Pratt and Whitney based solution.

Perhaps a Reserve heavy capability based on Tucanos and Twotters - low cost training and low intensity warfare.    The Twotters supply a cheap transport solution for small formed bodies of troops to remote locations.

The Pucara didn't fare too well in a modern air combat environment in the Falklands... and that was wayyyyyy back in 1982:

 

[dimsum]

Perhaps a Reserve heavy capability based on Tucanos and Twotters - low cost training and low intensity warfare.    The Twotters supply a cheap transport solution for small formed bodies of troops to remote locations.

Training/currency for airplanes is definitely more than is feasible for a Class A reservist doing one night a week and one weekend a month.  Unless the proposal is for more Class C folks - in which case, might as well give these to the Reg F.

 

[MAJONES]

Training/currency for airplanes is definitely more than is feasible for a Class A reservist doing one night a week and one weekend a month.

Not really, we keep class A reservists current on the Gonzo; should be quite doable on a Twin Otter.  As for the Tucano, it should be doable to; the USAF ANG does it with their fast air.

 

[blacktriangle]

How about we focus on acquiring a capable RPA? And sustaining our critical capabilities?

 

[Loachman]

400 Squadron expects its Res F aircrew to attend a minimum of six full days per month. That permits them to maintain currency, but not profiency. Adding tactical currency, beyond basic nav and handling skills, and weapons currency to that is not feasible.

There is nothing that a cheap aircraft can do that an F35 cannot. The F35, however, can do much more and carry much more, and it can do it in real war conditions.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

It would allow you to keep your pilots that are leaving connected and fairly current, as well as doing CAS training with the army. I have argued for a lighter airframe for this role before, prefer something like the armed Hawk. Also means that your pilots can still get flying in when your main fleet gets grounded for some safety reason, which I can bet will happen with the F-35 as it seemed to have happened with pretty well all jet fighters introduced in the last 30+ years. Not to mention that even though availability will go up, the real number of air frames is going to go down. It's entirely possible that air frames will get significant flight hour restrictions to make them last. A cheaper to run air frame will allow your pilots to practice many of the skillsets without incurring those hours on the main air frame.