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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: unclewest who wrote (25738)	4/17/2002 7:15:53 AM
From: LindyBill	Respond to of 281500

in country I agree with the fact that we did not need anybody above a Light Bird to command the troops, but I am uncomfortable with the command being totally run out of Florida, with no local "In Country" Headquarters. I think we still need the top commanders to have a local feel for what is going on. Setting at a TV screen in Florida doesn't cut it, IMO. If Frank and his people had "Face Time" the the Northern Alliance people, I think things would have been done differently. This is a new type of warfare, and I know the command structure will have to change. We know from reports that Rumford had to "knock heads" in the Air Force command structure to get the local control needed. I just got through reading "Strange Victory: Hitler's Conquest of France," by Ernest May. His conclusion about the use of Air Power during the defeat of France was the the Germans had their Air Force committed to ground support, and the British and the French Air Force did not. They wanted to spend their time doing strategic bombing. If the French Air Force had been doing close air support during the first few days of the war, they could have stopped the Germans dead in their tracks in the Ardennes. The weather was perfect for Air support, and the Germans could not believe their luck when they were not attacked by air. They were busy bombing the hell out of the French. This ties right into the problem we have had with our Air Force almost since the time of General Billy Mitchell. They have always wanted to spend their time with strategic bombing and Fighter command. Ground support has always been a stepchild that they got their second-rate money, support, and people. In WWII, Korea, and Vietnam they never did the job they should have done, IMO. Even during the Gulf War, the use of their "Tank Killer", the A-10, was really over their "dead body". They have constantly tried to retire this plane. The reason the Army has all close support Helicopters instead of fixed wing is not by choice. They have tried, again and again, to introduce "Fixed Wing" aircraft into their mix, but the Air Force won't let them have them. The "Mohawk" used during Vietnam was a good example. The Army originally got the Marines to order it so that it could sneak the "Hard Points" for weapons on the wings past the Air Force. It was one hell of a great surveillance and close support plane, and the Army would have loved to have had more of them. Here is the URL to a page on the history of the use of the Mohawk in Vietnam: ov-1.com An updated version of this plane could have been of great use in Afghanistan, and in wars to come like it, but the Air Force does not want to build this type of plane, and they won't let the Army do it. We will may end up with the CIA running more of these type of wars, simply because they do not have a command structure problem with them.