"Douglas Eagleson" wrote ...

a square plug can go supersonic nicely


It may come asa great shock to you, Doug, but there are a few here who over
decades, recent and past, have been intimately involved with naval
avaiation, AAW in a marine environment, air intercept controlling, CAP and
several other subjects of which you are currently less than adequately
informed.

Re-engining A10s, even with giant fuel-sucking AB equipped hardware, will
not allow them the operate at M1.5 (unless the wings separate quickly at a
very high altitude and even then the period of flight above Mach 1 will be
mercifully brief) The airframe was neither designed for not is it suited
for controlled flight at Mach 1 or even approaching Mach 1.

The A6, offering the distinct advantage of carrier-basing, even stopping in
for an arrestement and launch to refuel and rearm, a major convenience in a
pretracted conflict/threat situation, was considered (seriously and at
lenght, for employment in a manner similar to what you seem to envision.
The concept was dropped when the nature of potential future threats became
more clear, that (as with the F14/Phoenic combo, a fine fighter a/c equipped
with a missile designed to reach out and touch an oncoming attacker at long
range) the "perching" of a/c with long range AAMs in the skies above was no
longer the optimal appoach to fleet air defense, and that far greater
versatility was required.

While many of us may view the F/A18 series as less than perfect, I doubt
that any with any experience in a fleet environment would choose any
possible upgrade or refinement of an A10 as any more than an unrealistic (if
not ridiculous) proposal. Sadly, all those surplus S3 Vikings gone to the
graveyard would have been many times more effective in such a role than all
the A10 airframes in the world (and many times more effective would not be
effective enough to be suitable).

Shucks, I suspect a better case could be made for employing a B737 series
a/c ....a little slow in the turns, but capable of hauling about a vast
electronics bay jammed with all sorts of gear, a gen-u-wine rotary missile
launcher, a big radome, a decent time on station, room for an underbelly ASM
or two, and amazingly a radar cross section not much larger than the return
from a slab-sided old Warthog....

So, go on back to rec.aviation. Any better reception you might receive
their must be on account of the variety of prescription drugs employed by
the posters there.

TMO