Legend of the A-10 Hog and the Avenger [Mythbusting]

[molnibalage]

Detailed explanation of the Cold War A-10A and the Avenger.

95% Cold War related content 5% post Cold War COIN.

 

 

[Sturgeon]

I would like to introduce the idea of the A-10 Threshold:

This is a concept to determine what technological threshold the A-10 Thunderbolt II occupies. We have determined that it's clearly worse than an A-4, arguably worse than an F-100D, and probably worse than an A-26 Invader. 

Discussions are ongoing as to whether it's inferior to the SBD Dauntless.

[Domus Acipenseris]

24 minutes ago, Sturgeon said:

I would like to introduce the idea of the A-10 Threshold:

This is a concept to determine what technological threshold the A-10 Thunderbolt II occupies. We have determined that it's clearly worse than an A-4, arguably worse than an F-100D, and probably worse than an A-26 Invader. 

Discussions are ongoing as to whether it's inferior to the SBD Dauntless.

Is it around the level of the A-1?  The AX program originated when the A-1 was in use but the end of the line for the A-1 was in sight.  The SBD can dive for accurate delivery.  Can the A-10 do that?

 

The link is broken but I saw a claim that the expected life of the A-10 was 2 missions on the Central Front.

[Sturgeon]

10 minutes ago, Domus Acipenseris said:

Is it around the level of the A-1?  The AX program originated when the A-1 was in use but the end of the line for the A-1 was in sight.  The SBD can dive for accurate delivery.  Can the A-10 do that?

 

The link is broken but I saw a claim that the expected life of the A-10 was 2 missions on the Central Front.

 

Oooh, good point. Confirmed: The A-10 is inferior to the Spad.

[Sturgeon]

11 minutes ago, Domus Acipenseris said:

The link is broken but I saw a claim that the expected life of the A-10 was 2 missions on the Central Front.

Central Front would have been thick with ZSUs, it would have been lucky to survive insertion.

[Sturgeon]

One of the best FailHog pills is to realize that this is a large load by operational A-10 standards:

[Jeeps_Guns_Tanks]

Did it ever kill a tank in anger that wasn't on its own side with its gun?

[Toxn]

14 hours ago, Sturgeon said:

I would like to introduce the idea of the A-10 Threshold:

This is a concept to determine what technological threshold the A-10 Thunderbolt II occupies. We have determined that it's clearly worse than an A-4, arguably worse than an F-100D, and probably worse than an A-26 Invader. 

Discussions are ongoing as to whether it's inferior to the SBD Dauntless.

Where does the Frogfoot sit in all of this?

[Toxn]

14 hours ago, Domus Acipenseris said:

Is it around the level of the A-1?  The AX program originated when the A-1 was in use but the end of the line for the A-1 was in sight.  The SBD can dive for accurate delivery.  Can the A-10 do that?

 

The link is broken but I saw a claim that the expected life of the A-10 was 2 missions on the Central Front.

That makes sense. I've also heard that the lifespans of things like Harriers were expected to be measured in minutes once they got into the Soviet air defence envelope.

[Sturgeon]

42 minutes ago, Toxn said:

Where does the Frogfoot sit in all of this?

Substantially better than the A-10, for one thing it's circa 240 km/h faster.

[Sturgeon]

1 hour ago, Jeeps_Guns_Tanks said:

Did it ever kill a tank in anger that wasn't on its own side with its gun?

AFAIK no.

[Sturgeon]

1 minute ago, Sturgeon said:

Substantially better than the A-10, for one thing it's circa 240 km/h faster.

I detail how superior the Su-25's gun is in this article: https://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2017/09/15/russias-10-warthog-su-25-rook-attack-jet-gun/

[Sturgeon]

The Su-25 is also substantially smaller, and cheaper to operate.

[Toxn]

So... what I'm getting from this is that someone needs to shoop the SU-25 and the A-10 into the matrix "red pill, blue pill" meme asap.

[Toxn]

5 minutes ago, Sturgeon said:

The Su-25 is also substantially smaller, and cheaper to operate.

The load carrying fraction also appears to be about the same, although comparing empty weight to MTOW is not the most useful metric ever devised.

[Toxn]

Another thing to note (apologies for all the combo posting): isn't there an argument that the biggest success of the A-10 as a program was in allowing the USAF to keep denying the army fixed-wing assets on the basis that it was providing CAS? By that metric it was stellar - the army got beaten back all the way to only being allowed rotary-wing aircraft and has never managed to successfully bring up the issue again.

[Jeeps_Guns_Tanks]

11 minutes ago, Toxn said:

Another thing to note (apologies for all the combo posting): isn't there an argument that the biggest success of the A-10 as a program was in allowing the USAF to keep denying the army fixed-wing assets on the basis that it was providing CAS? By that metric it was stellar - the army got beaten back all the way to only being allowed rotary-wing aircraft and has never managed to successfully bring up the issue again.

 

 

Yeah it's crazy there was an actual inter-service war over this, with the Marines mixed in because the Army was secretly giving them money for the Bronco program if I recall right. The Army had to hide it was looking into arming helicopters cause the Air Force was going to go apeshit when they found out. Crazy shit. 

[Toxn]

4 minutes ago, Jeeps_Guns_Tanks said:

 

 

Yeah it's crazy there was an actual inter-service war over this, with the Marines mixed in because the Army was secretly giving them money for the Bronco program if I recall right. The Army had to hide it was looking into arming helicopters cause the Air Force was going to go apeshit when they found out. Crazy shit. 

Yeah, inter-service stuff is generally crazy when seen from the outside, but perfectly sensible and in line with incentives from the inside. And it gets worse the more politically powerful each branch is (witness Imperial Japan).

[Toxn]

On 9/18/2021 at 8:30 PM, molnibalage said:

Detailed explanation of the Cold War A-10A and the Avenger.

95% Cold War related content 5% post Cold War COIN.

 

 

For all the people who want to reward the creator of this video: go get in on the comment dogpile and drive that engagement metric. It's classic YouTube tier and therefore very much good for light entertainment.

[Jeeps_Guns_Tanks]

Yeah, its crazy, we passed laws saying the Army couldn't have armed aircraft... And then people in the service pushed things and got changes. I mean it does make sense, it was the right thing to do from the Army's perspective, because the Air Force had very little interest in CAS. The Fucked up CAS for the Korea war once they got control of all the air assets in country, including the MAWs, in Korea, taking them away from Marine control. It was a shit show. Throw Key West into that, making it so the Army had to depend on the Air Force, while the Marines got to keep all their toys... It was a crazy time.  Maybe its just always been crazy... 

[N-L-M]

The Key West Agreement and its consequences have been a disaster for Army Aviation.

[Jeeps_Guns_Tanks]

Yeah, the Army would have handled fixed wing CAS better than the Air Force for sure.

[Lord_James]

10 hours ago, Sturgeon said:

I detail how superior the Su-25's gun is in this article: https://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2017/09/15/russias-10-warthog-su-25-rook-attack-jet-gun/

The blog and my phone don’t want to cooperate, considering “a problem repeatedly occurred” 4 times before I had read the first paragraph. 

[Sturgeon]

14 hours ago, Toxn said:

The load carrying fraction also appears to be about the same, although comparing empty weight to MTOW is not the most useful metric ever devised.

 

Yeah it is, the Su-25 is a much smaller bird, more appropriately sized.

It's... kind of just better, as an airframe.

[Sturgeon]

14 hours ago, Toxn said:

Another thing to note (apologies for all the combo posting): isn't there an argument that the biggest success of the A-10 as a program was in allowing the USAF to keep denying the army fixed-wing assets on the basis that it was providing CAS? By that metric it was stellar - the army got beaten back all the way to only being allowed rotary-wing aircraft and has never managed to successfully bring up the issue again.

 

Yes this is correct.