There's some interesting recent history involving the C-27 Spartan. The Army saw a capability gap between its CH-47 and the Air Force C-130 for intra-theater, t

There's some interesting recent history involving the C-27 Spartan. The Army saw a capability gap between its CH-47 and the Air Force C-130 for intra-theater, tactical lift in Iraq and Afghanistan, so it pursued the acquisition of this small fixed-wing cargo aircraft. There was another agreement for the Army to give that up in favor of the Air Force continuing the program, but the DoD / Air Force quickly reneged and canceled the program. The Army ended up relying on a lot of contract airlift support instead. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alenia_C-27J_Spartan#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alenia_C-27J_Spartan#United_St... Looking at the Indo-Pacific theater, I think it's clear to everybody that there's a serious shortage of capable airlift and sealift assets across the board.