It might have been originally designed to kill tanks, but it's incredibly well suited to current asymmetric warfare.
- Massive Payload capacity; it's a missile truck, 5x what a reaper can bring.
- Cannon can hit infantry in closer quarters than any explosive missile/bomb.
- Armoured and extremely tough, designed to survive small arms fire, loss of wing, loss of engine.
AC-130 might be the king of CAS but it's also crewed by 13 people and has a top speed half that of a hog... which is important when people need support _now_.
The US airforce don't like the A-10 because it's a platform that primarily does grunt work for the army and they'd rather spend that money on their own missions.
- Massive Payload capacity; it's a missile truck, 5x what a reaper can bring.
- Cannon can hit infantry in closer quarters than any explosive missile/bomb.
- Armoured and extremely tough, designed to survive small arms fire, loss of wing, loss of engine.
AC-130 might be the king of CAS but it's also crewed by 13 people and has a top speed half that of a hog... which is important when people need support _now_.
The US airforce don't like the A-10 because it's a platform that primarily does grunt work for the army and they'd rather spend that money on their own missions.