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The A-10C upgrade program seems to fly in the face of that. Really, the biggest problem with the A-10 right now is that the airframes are getting old, but that

The A-10C upgrade program seems to fly in the face of that. Really, the biggest problem with the A-10 right now is that the airframes are getting old, but that's a problem with our entire aircraft inventory. e.g., the F-15 having been grounded multiple times in the past decades because of airframes literally giving out and breaking up in training flights. The A-10 fleet is supposed to get rewinged to help with this; the USAF signed contracts with Boeing to build the wings before they started actively fighting spending money on anything that isn't the F-35.

astrodust 11y ago
The A-10 is the exact sort of airplane they need now, so it's absolutely baffling to see people even talking about phasing these out and replacing the with the flying turkey that is the F-35. As Iraq and Afghanistan proved, you need extremely close range support and sustained fire. The cannon on the A-10 is good enough for the sorts of targets they're dealing with, armor is rare, and it has significantly more mobility than the other best alternative, the AC-130. What use is the F-35 when it can't linger, has extremely limited bombing capability, and can't strafe when necessary? The A-10 is an extremely pragmatic solution to a messy problem.