The ongoing battle for the future of the A-10 ‘Warthog’ close air support aircraft represents the latest in a history of backroom battles between military leaders and their political oversight bodies. Specifically in this instance, the decision of U.S. Air Force commanders to decommission the platform wholesale has been met with little short of a congressional veto. Armchair generals and political hawks alike openly baulk at the plans laid out by the USAF high command, questioning the wisdom of removing an asset which can not only claim an exceptional operational record in both Iraq and Afghanistan, but also, some argue, (although frankly with far less certainty) claim a unique capability role within America’s strategic air power arsenal.
Frankly, many of the criticisms of USAF commanders’ sequestration strategy on the removal of the A-10 are misguided and miss the real priorities that must be considered when discussing defense cuts of any scale. The mantra of “costs versus capabilities” has come to define the recent significant defense cuts to American, British and other NATO armed forces. The need for publicly palatable actions compel governments, lumbered with the necessity of making deep and painful military cuts while simultaneously burdened with preserving their political approval, to do their utmost to preserve publicly visible warfighting assets above all else. Disastrously, this often leads to neglect in the less visible aspects of military effectiveness and capability, which few outside of the inner circle of military command and experience would be likely to recognize or consider.
Suggestions that the necessary savings could be made through the elimination of frontline squadrons from across different fleets, as opposed to the total removal of a fleet wholesale, fail to comprehend the financial nature of fleet readiness and maintenance. The most significant expenditures for any fleet of combat aircraft are present not at the frontline, but in the often overlooked maintenance and overhaul pipelines. The number of combat squadrons to be decommissioned would have to be significant, more than likely to strategically unacceptable levels, in order to bring about the significant savings demanded by Capitol Hill.
The simple fact of the matter is that one cannot cling to much-loved relics of former wars and simultaneously plan for the next.
The same can be said of reductions in allocated flight hours per squadron. Modern combat pilots are required to hold a number of wide-ranging capabilities in order to remain combat effective in today’s battlespace. Maintaining required levels of combat effectiveness in the piloting community requires the capacity to not only preserve existing skillsets, but also practice and develop new ones. Cut the flying hours available for everyday operations drastically and combat effectiveness is severely depleted. Large fleets of first-rate, even 5th-generation aircraft are rendered redundant without enough first-rate crews to operate them.
Those who doubt the words of commanders and, indeed, the Secretary of Defense, who insist the A-10 is unlikely to remain as effective a platform in America’s foreseen future conflicts as it has been in Afghanistan and Iraq, would do well to learn from the lessons of others. The Georgian-Russian conflict of 2008 has provided a chronically overlooked case study for what a future conflict against even a mediocre belligerent, armed with aging and highly familiar anti-aircraft weaponry, will likely look in the aerial context.
Generally, Russia’s air force performed poorly in South Ossetia. But this was in no way a reflection on the capability of its aircrews. The Russian equivalent to the A-10, its own SU-25 “Frogfoot” (an aircraft, incidentally, of the same age and general aviation capability), proved utterly ineffective in the face of air defense systems with which Russian forces should have been familiar, given that they designed and built them. The loss of three Russian SU-25s over Tskhinvali before August 8 2008 forced overstretched ground units to engage Georgian forces without any air support whatsoever. Russian SU-25s were rarely present over the frontline from that point onwards, and were completely unable to fly at night for the remainder of the conflict.
The fact that the A-10 has proven so successful in an uncontested aerial environment provides no insight whatsoever into its potential utility in a contested environment. Given that the A-10 is a 40-year-old airframe, the assertion from military and defense decision-makers that the Warthog will prove unacceptably vulnerable to adversaries’ defense capabilities should hardly be surprising. As an armored platform, the A-10 certainly has survivability as a “low-and-slow” platform against insurgent opponents lacking in any form of dedicated anti-aircraft weaponry. But the simple fact of the matter is that one cannot cling to much-loved relics of former wars and simultaneously plan for the next. America’s future opponents have as much say over the way in which wars will be fought as congress. It is strategically unacceptable for the world’s sole superpower to rest on its laurels and assume the weapons and systems of yesteryear will be able to save the day in the future.
Given that congress have essentially vetoed the retirement of any fleet, or for that matter the closure of any further bases, commanders will be forced, once again, to draw vast sums away from personnel and welfare budgets. For America’s armed forces, this could not have come at a worse time. To argue that welfare and strategic capacity are unrelated concepts is an incredibly short-sighted assertion. Any officer, from the most junior of lieutenants to the highest echelons of command, will make clear that effective warriors are mentally comfortable and well-adjusted warriors. A military with first-rate technology but second-rate personnel support will be second-rate operationally when the time for action comes. The case of Pfc. Manning illustrates this well. Whether his actions were right or wrong is frankly inconsequential to military commanders. Even the greatest of military apparati can be laid bare and left embarrassed by the actions of a single confused, deeply unhappy soldier largely ignored and unsupported by the Army.
Military leaders are charged with maintaining both first-rate capabilities and personnel. The axing of an aging, likely strategically inconsequential aircraft is a small price to pay in order to maintain top-flight armed forces for America’s future. The White House has stated it will veto any bill from congress which military commanders cannot themselves condone. For the sake of the future of America’s extremely capable, battle-hardened and above all professional armed forces, one must hope this is a subject on which President Obama will be willing to make an impassioned stand.
[Photo credit: NSDK]
