Non-Subscriber Extract
Upgraded A-10C will help US ground troops in Iraq, says USAF general
By Caitlin Harrington
24 August 2007
The deployment of the newly upgraded Fairchild Republic A-10C Thunderbolt II bomber-attack aircraft in Iraq next month will make it easier for the US Air Force (USAF) to provide close air support to ground troops, according to the commander of USAF's Air Combat Command, General Ronald Keys.
However, more extensive upgrades are still needed to keep the aircraft on top of its game, he said.
General Keys said the USAF's modernisation plans for the A-10 'Wart Hog' have been held back from their full potential by bureaucratic wrangling and congressional resistance.
"This is not the super Hog we envisioned but this is a better-than-average Hog," Gen Keys said during a ceremony to announce initial operational capability of the A-10C at Langley Air Force Base in Virginia on 21 August.
"The hardest wars we fight are not on the battlefield but the wars we fight in the halls of Congress, they are fought in the Pentagon, they are fought in these programmes, to make sure the money is paid and eventually the programme is operating."
Despite voicing frustration with the overall pace of A-10 modernisation, Gen Keys said the USAF was off to a good start with the USAF's Precision Engagement programme, which aims to upgrade all 356 aircraft to the A-10C configuration by 2011.