"puttster" wrote in message
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Chad Irby wrote in message
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In article ,
(puttster) wrote:

Then let me ask why the Marines need the V/Stol capability. I cannot
get a good picture of a mission where the marines would need 400+ of
them with all the support for them but still not have a decent runway!

Why are you limiting the situation to needing 400+ at once?

The situation is more like "we need a dozen for this small brushfire war
in a place where there are no good airstrips," or we need to put a small
landing force in at this area, and the bad guys have a few planes, so we
need a little fighter cover from the LHDs."

Well that was my question, if the biggest mission that con be
realiatically conjures is a dozen, why order 400+?

Because (a) ordering 12 would be extremely expensive on a unit cost basis
(obviously), (b) you'd run out of hours on those 12 airframes rather quickly
(remember that those 400 will actually be ordered over a spread of years),
and (c) when you need 18 and only have 12 you are in a world of hurt. They
are replacing both their AV-8B's and their F-18C/D's with these aircraft, so
400 is not unrealistic.


How (why?) were their Harriers used in Iraq?

To support Marine actions on the ground, without having to go through
the other services as much. They've been flying off of the USS Bonhomme
Richard.

Overall, Iraq hasn't been a good test of what we'd need the Harrier for.

I heard that adfter the fighting was over the marines moved the
Harriers onshore, but of course that was politics.

"Politics"? Operational advantage had nothing to do with it, huh?

By then they had
their pick of runways and did not need VSTOL.

Hardly the case, IIRC. They did use the VSOL capability to hit FARP's, thus
reducing drastically the time between CAS sorties. Imagine a scenario where
we have to seize both a beachhead and a subsequent airhead from a hostile
force. As part of the preparation for the assault, we naturally closed down
their local airbase--maybe a few 2000 pound JDAM's punching up the runway.
It takes a while to do the repairs, and until they are done you can't
operate anything but maybe a C-130 on a MLS (minimum landing strip), along
with F-35B's doing their STOVL thing. You can now push maybe 36 F-35B's onto
the strip, to add to the dozen or so you have operating from offshore that
can now join them. Having 48 fixed wing platforms supporting your force
while you struggle to get the runway up and operational for later CTOL
assets could be very valuable. You set up a FARP on the highway a few klicks
to the rear of the FLOT, and now your F-35B's can provide continuous CAS,
rotating through the FARP to rearm and refuel.

The STOVL capability makes sense--that is why the USAF is apparently now
going to switch part of its planned A model buy to B models.

Brooks