Ground troops do love the A-10 but there's plenty of reasons the brass has decided to retire it. The A-10 was specifically made for CAS against Soviet armor. I

Ground troops do love the A-10 but there's plenty of reasons the brass has decided to retire it. The A-10 was specifically made for CAS against Soviet armor. It's essentially a 30mm cannon with wings. The nature of warfare has made that role much less feasible, though; armor is more effective, anti-aircraft weapons are more deadly, and detection methods are more accurate. There isn't a lot of room for big, slow, low-flying planes like the A-10 in modern warfare. Nowadays it obviously isn't used against mass formations of Soviet armor. Drones are capable of delivering the same kind of support that the A-10 is used for, just not necessarily the drones the US military uses today.