The CAS Mafia Thugs

Okay, let's get one thing perfectly straight: Warthogs Rock The World.

For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, the A-10 Thunderbolt II, affectionately nicknamed The Warthog for it's extreme ugliness, is the premier Close Air Support (CAS) plane in the world. The design originated with a gun that nobody could figure out how to use. They knew it was a great gun, but it didn't fit with the ground armor plans and there was no plane on earth that could fire it. So Fairchild-Republic wrapped a flying tank around it, a plane that had more armor than a light tank, engines designed to be blown off, a "titanium bathtub" for the pilot, a flight capability that was very close to a glider, a "load" capability that was like a bomber and the ability to stand on end with its wing-tip barely a foot off the ground. The Warthog is an aerial behemoth of armor and guns, capable of shredding enemy tank (or Toyota Truck) columns like nothing else. It's a bunch of mean, wrapped up in one of the most maneuverable, slowest and most stable attack packages ever created by an air-force.

I mention this because it turns out that the "pure" fighter mafia types do not, apparently, read the New York Post. (They probably read the Washington Post and the New York Tim es, boning up for the day when they'll have stars on their shoulders and have to know all the right lingoes and mantras.) On the other hand, the mafia thugs that drive Warthogs do.

Lets clarify the difference here. In the movie Casino, the mafia would be represented by DeNiro. While the mafia thugs are the guys who actually beat Joe Pesci to death. Guys like that are important in any serious organization. You tell dem dere's a problem an' den you just fuggedaboudit!

Well I give! I didn't mean that CAS was unimportant! Sort of.

Close Air Support is defined as air-to-ground support that is delivered close to friendly troops. Starting from the "back" of the enemy territory, there is strategic bombing, which is designed to take out enemy production facilities. Then there is "interdiction" bombing which is designed to take out stuff headed for the battlefield. Then there is Close Air Support which is designed to take out bad guys that are in actual contact with good guys.

What is happening is that by using bombers and non-CAS planes in what is effectively a CAS role, the place of attack birds like the Warthog is being squeezed out.

Now there is some question whether the Warthog would have been a better choice than a B-52 in Afghanistan . I'm not going to speak aye or nay. What I will say is that the Warthog wasn't given the first chance. That's because it gets down where even the Taliban can shoot it and the General Jumper didn't want his boys getting shot down. I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt; I really think his first thought was for the pilots and not for the "ratings." A Warthog can take a lot of damage, they have come back with half of one wing blown off and a single engine, but they can be shot down. And they fly slow and looooow. The Warthog drivers want to get down in the mud and wrestle with the Taliban pigs, but Jumper and Franks don't want to be attending their memorial services. So they had to stay home.

And this is the heart of the discussion. When I said "there's another group, CAS, but it's so unimportant it doesn't rate a mention" I meant politically. Show me the officer who "grew up" in CAS and is now making decisions on what weapons to fund. Show me the officer who "grew up" in CAS and is now making decisions on what weapons to deploy. Show me the officer who "grew up" in CAS who has more than two stars on his shoulders.

I doubt that the CAS drivers can do that. "Pure" CAS drivers end up getting passed over at major. Some make bird colonel. A few might make major generalSin a staff position. But when it comes time to decide who is going to be the Chief of Staff, it's the guy with 6,000 hours in an air-to-air bird or a bomber, not the guy who spent his entire career in Warthogs. They're out flying United.

I was a grunt. I LOVE Close Air Support. I love watching those planes come in and lay steel on target. I love watching the smoke billowing back from their guns and hearing the "UUUUUUURP!" a few seconds later. Seeing the hilltop billow in smoke as they lay in the cluster-bombs. I'd give much to be 19 again and watching it in Tora Bora.

But I'm not. And I'm not sure we're going to see it any time soon. The Air Force has already called for new, smaller, guided munitions. Along with racks to go in B-2s (although not ­1s and ­52s, which is idiotic.) And they're probably ordering more B-2s (which is also stupid, who needs more hanger queens.) As PGMs, like Have Pats and JDAMs and GLUs, become more common, smaller (so you can get closer to troops), cheaper and "dialable", "Close Air Support" will mean a bomber loitering at 30-50,000 ft (yes, I know it's not 65,000, thanks) and dropping a stream of PGMs.

Am I happy about this, no. Am I sure it's a good thing to get rid of the ability to go low, slow and precise? No. Do I think it's a fight that is winnable? No.

So I find myself in the position of a major CAS proponent who has looked at the future and gone "well, I really like battleships, too, but I don't put them up against carriers."

Sorry, guys, but I'm afraid we might be the real "battleship admirals."