Are we seeing the end of Close Air Support?

A-10 fanbois will claim that an A-10 can strafe more close than a grenade or missile can be dropped (safely).
I don’t think that’s a necessity. only Americans seem to feel this necessity somehow.

Instead, I claim that eyes in the sky will remain very useful even in CAS. We’ll see if drones will pull this off over contested ground against a capable enemy.

BTW, the M777 is a very poor choice of a launcher. all-round traverse SPGs are much better.

I think we could be getting close to binning FJ CAS, with things like excalibur, GMLRS and hopefully PG Mortars, coupled with javelin and exactor.

Mix it with AH and as long as your are within the bubble its reaction time is minutes rather than tens of minutes. Plus cost savings per round and logistics.

Keep the FJ doing what it dose best interdiction and CAP, with the odd small diameter bomb dropped in CAS when its really needed.

On the other hand, planes are immune to counterbattery fire and have a much longer range (80km for the MLRS), a single plane can cover more area than a battery of artillery. Add this to the fact that no one deploys artillery right on the front line, you can probably assume a reach into the enemy battle area of only about 40km. Aircraft also have the advantage in that MANPAD systems issued to infantry and armour are few and diffused on the forward edge of the battle area, only when they get deeper into brigade or division level areas will they start facing much more significant anti-air capabilities.

It was never an either or situation, but 2 systems complementing each other.

I can see this being the end of conventional gun artillery too. Guns are expensive but ammunition for them is cheap. Once the ammunition starts getting expensive (and a guided shell is going to be expensive) then Multiple rocket launchers start to look more and more attractive. The launchers are cheap and light and guided rockets are a hell of a lot cheaper and easier to make than guided shells.

‘It was never an either or situation, but 2 systems complementing each other’

At the moment yes but FJ numbers are dropping and they are getting more expensive with every generation (prohibitively so) why waste it moving mud on the FEBA when other assets could eventually do a similar job.

Aircraft are not vulnerable to counter battery fire, but they are vulnerable to counter attack, Bastion springs to mind immediately along with SCUD type missiles.

All hail the dawn of precision guided NGS…

Personally I like the AC-130 for CAS, maybe even just a cargo aircraft loaded up with missiles.

Do artillery barrels overheat?

I don’t know about overheat as in an LMG barrel but they are restricted to a certain number of rounds per minute for constant firing to prevent damage to the barrel.

Or go to the other extreme, a stealthy B-52++ that can drop 100 x 1000 lb dumb bombs, but accurately enough to wipe out an enemy force in its entirety in a given notional box.

Is that CAS or interdiction?

First I think we need to define what we class as CAS, myself its along the FEBA everything further out than that becomes interdiction.

Except of course when supporting CSAR and SF.

Artillery in all its guises is faster and more responsive to your call than aircraft, even if they are shooting and scooting its comparable to FJ times of reaction.

Considering the improvements in accuracy of these systems would it now be possible to reduce the number of airframes required for the CAS tasking and only calling on them when its getting desperate or for taking advantage of an opportunity?

Don’t forget FireShadow as well. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire_Shadow

Cheers WF & APATS,

RAF definition is just waffle personally CAS is calling on aircraft to destroy targets on the ground that were expected but locations not known, such as an advance to contact you are expecting something to be there you just don’t know what and where.

If the positions were known beforehand then you would hit them at the beginning of H hour and to my mind that becomes a planned target.

Danger close, first round at right 500, add 800, at my command, VT in adjust, spotter adjust, over!

@APATS

Not when it comes to operating aircraft, but
‘aircraft against hostile targets requiring detailed
integration with the fire and movement of friendly forces for targeting guidance and to
avoid fratricide’
Really they have to state that? if aircraft are used full stop does the airspace already need to be deconflicted, regardless? Avoid fratricide, so in all other cases they don’t bother?

@APATS,

‘CAS provides ground or amphibious forces with firepower in offensive and
defensive operations, by day and night, to destroy, suppress, neutralise, disrupt, fix or delay
enemy forces in close proximity to friendly ground forces’

So whats wrong with just saying that?

I have an ex-harrier (GR3A) pilot turned B767 captain friend who has always claimed that it’s only close air support if you can shower your own side with bits of the enemy….anything else is strike.

Really though, wouldn’t CAS be better defined by response time? i.e. an aircraft on standby just behind the the front, ready to be called in to what ever target is required by the ground force commander.

I can imagine that to the ground force commander, all that matters is how quickly the effect can be delivered. If that is by artillery, excellent. if greater effect is needed and ground force commander feels it needs to be by an aircraft, then so be it.

In all of this the ‘waffle’ from the RAF recognises that it has to be integrated with the ground forces.

Provided it uk troops were giving cas to. These systems aren’t what’s replacing fastjets in cas it reaper and the like that’s doing that. In afghan tornado responds over hundreds of miles from a single location you need lots of artillery and lots of logistics vehicles to support an equivalent. All of which matters little we have so few fastjets left there will be very few to do cas in a gulf war or afghan style operation so they had better hope this type of thing works as advertised.

Serious head on

Yes, I know, unusual for RT.

CAS is critical when you need it. I’ve called for CAS a dozen times in a hot shooting war.

I could not give a crap where it came from, whether Army, Navy, RAF, or as in a couple of times in Gulf 1 from the USMC.

Does it work? Can you speak the same language in terms of grid references or do you need to convert to Lat Long? Can you get it to me NOW! as opposed to wait for ten minutes?

A little now is better than a lot later.

What matters is the C2 arrangements and rapidity of effect, not whether it is delivered by plane or rocket. You can’t much tell the difference on the ground.

Really though, wouldn’t CAS be better defined by response time? i.e. an aircraft on standby just behind the the front, ready to be called in to what ever target is required by the ground force commander.

Agree with you there.

In all of this the ‘waffle’ from the RAF recognises that it has to be integrated with the ground forces.

Do they really have to state that? its called close air support.

Panic over – BMD was reissued in 2011. It’s now a fraction of the size of the old one and a lot clearer. Fewer pictures though :-(. It’s now called JDP 0-10 instead of BR1806 and has been aligned much more closely with existing Joint, Land and Air doctrinal publications. Specific definitions such as CAS have been removed and instead AAP6 is used. The AAP6 definition is:

close air support / appui aérien rapproché
CAS
Air action against hostile targets which are in close proximity to friendly forces and which require detailed integration of each air mission with the fire and movement of those forces.
Related terms: immediate air support; indirect air support; on- call mission; preplanned air support; tactical air support.
01 Mar 1973

I don’t think this spells the end of aircraft for CAS but it may be able to use other assets more frequently to allow the airframes to do other taskings. If Tornado is replaced by F35 then that means a multirole aircraft will be replacing one that is purely air to ground. The multi role aircraft will be required to do other missions as well as CAS/Strike.

Could we have maintained our air contribution to Herrick if the aircraft were required to do other missions in addition to CAS on a constant basis.

Lets also not forget that most weapons dropped by FJ for CAS are pretty large pieces of ordnance, I’d rather hit a tree line with a few rounds of precision guided airburst artillery or mortars than a 500lb paveway.

Would be nice if we had something like Netfires NLOS as well – palletised self-operating missiles in boxes. No heavy logistics tail required, can be moved by any airframe or ground vehicle, crew requirement of zero.

I can easily see UCAVs taking over more of the CAS role, but only if we can assure a completely friendly sky and EW environment; present-day UCAVs can’t survive against hostile FJ or, really, any sort of air defences.

The reality is, though, that FJ CAS is going to be around for a long time yet, because we have all these FJs fitted for CAS and what else are we going to do with them?

Fireshadow was canned. The British Army purchase of guided 155mm projectiles. cargp 155 projectiles with smart AT submunitions and the long range rocket (ATACMS) were also either cancelled or postponed indefinitely. There may well be a guided or course corrected 81mm mortar round at some stage, but AFAIK none has even been trialled by the BA and in service systems elsewhere are 120mm or larger which the BA does not employ.

APATS, so yet more evidence then that the Army and RAF are incapable of thinking outside their own boxes?

@Obsvr Thanks that was very informative. I was under the impression that the main problem with moving your artillary was the logistics train moving up resupplies of ammunition. I may be wrong but does artillary not use alot more ammunititon than the rest of the force? It probably varies with the types of conflict. However I had not considered that alot of the ammunition heavy tasks for the artillary are going to be unrealted to the CAS mission they are replacing, in which case they could keep their precison guided rounds in reserve while using conventional rounds for normal bombardment. This way even if the logistic train got streched the artillary could still be relied apon for a CAS type role. (I realize that artillary has probably being doing the CAS type role long before aircraft, I only use the term to differentiate from the role artillary ussally plays, and the role it might play if it was using precsion gudided weopons in such a way that the CAS aircraft became unneccasrry).

@SR, APATS
I think it more demonstrates that the Army and RAF are at least singing off the same hymn sheet, unlike the Navy…….

Obsvr, is that tube or rocket artillery? Tube yes, one bound behind, but I was under the impression that the 155s were deployed even further back from the tube artillery. The 60km range estimated is probably correct though. 20km behind the FEBA, 10km behind the traditional tubes.

Now if only we can get a manpack radio with an 80km range, most I know only hit 40-50km. Vehicle sets can carry a booster, so their range is longer, but the poor recon are already overloaded enough that asking them to lug a booster pack along might be too much. They get by this by dropping a rebro station mid way between the objective and their company HQ.

Not mutually exclusive.

Sometimes there are moving targets.
Sometimes you need the earth moving capabilities of air dropped bombs.
Sometimes merely the presence of fast-air will deter the enemy.

@ Obsvr,

Many thanks for your pertinent and accurate observations on the RA. I gain the impression that we probably overlapped in serving, as what you say fits exactly my memory. I’ve got great affection for the RA (and specifically, 1st RHA) who provided FOOs and FACs to my recce regiment and who dug us out of the shit several times when we got really stupidly brave. Good boys, all of them.

Re rebros, you could do this several times over. I had a personal PRC 349 that I “found” which I outfitted with a bodged Cougarnet covert headset that inexplicably returned with me from a tour of West Belfast. I used to link that to a 351 manpack carried by my gunner a couple of hundred yards behind when he and I went on close target recces, and he’d be linked to the 353 in my wagon in the troop hide. Signal / Noise attenuation was atrocious, but still workable.

Of course, we’d do it with mobiles now.

ROFL, that was exactly what happened to us the last exercise I went to RT. “Can’t get the rebro station, anyone got their number?” ” Hold on” *takes out hand phone* “Sergeant, we can’t get you on comms, can you move closer to us?” “No, still no reception, ah hell, I’ll just read out my report on the phone.”

It was embarrassingly hilarious.

I would like to point out other aspect in the dispute artillery vs CAS. How much does average 155mm shell weight? 50-75 pounds? Consider the fact that a single bomb weight’s 500-1000 pounds, or even more. And please compare penetration of 155mm shell and 1000 pound bomb. It would be hard to destroy heavilly fortified forward command point with artillery strike.
Usage of CAS or artillery support depends on many factors, such as:
1) How big “bang” is needed.
2) How much penetration is needed.
3) Time factor (time required for execution of cas or artillery strike).

Both forms of frontline support complement each other on the battlefield. There are other factors like for example their logistical footprint, but the real question is: Can British Armed Forces afford to resign from either method of fire support in foresable future? I don’t think so.

Cheers,
Mike.

P.S. Sorry for my bad English, I’m still learning.

Michael, maybe you should do research first, and skip the guesswork.

155 mm HE shell is usually at 42-47 kg, which is roughly 90-105 lbs. Most howitzer HE shells 149-155 mm are or were somewhere in this range.

Bomb weights are notional. AFAIK no bomb weights exactly 500 or 1,000 lbs. The basic Mk 82 versions are several per cent heavier than its notional weight.

There are no “heavily fortified forward command points” anywhere but maybe at the Korean DMZ, in Israel or in Singapore.

Artillery would have no more trouble dealing with a bunker than an air strike. It’s merely a question of missile sizes.

Artillery can take out anything that CAS can take out.

CAS is not interdiction. It’s not about striking bunkers, bases, area air defences, depots and so on either. The typical CAS targets are deployed (dispersed) ground combat troops; armoured vehicles, artillery, infantry, engineers, anti-tank troops concentrations. None of this requires a particularly heavy kind of ammunition. A 70 mm rocket does the trick in CAS if it hits. Only attempts to neutralize minefields are a bit more tricky.
____________________________

Some context; German army’s doctrine about CAS, paraphrased:
Infantry battalion commander; don’t expect artillery support. Artillery is probably busy supporting the Schwerpunkt as designated by some of your superiors.
Rely on your mortars (which you don’t have by TO&E if you are a Panzergrenadier commander, but then your odds of being at the Schwerpunkt are a bit better) instead.
Close air support? What’s that? Gold-plated luxury of an even higher order than field artillery!
———————————–

I criticized the mortar issue repeatedly, but I think it’s perfectly healthy to expect little fire support, especially little support that can be moved to faraway places as easily as CAS effects.
Don’t submit to the American disease of expecting gold-plating all around you.
Some Vietnam War-era tactical vignettes from their professional journals looked like caricatures: ‘As a company leader you got mortars, artillery, helicopters, Skyhawk fighter-bombers, other bombers and heavier artillery available on call. You got 15 minutes to arrange the fire support to win your battle with AKM-wielding peasants. What are your calls?’

This is insanity, and I’m not making this up, just paraphrasing.
Ever since, they’ve been infected and rotten with this excessive dependence on fire support. Afghanistan repeated this; a platoon in contact with a few ragtag weekend jihadists had often more fire support on call than a Kampfgruppe commander in 1944. And then they whined that said support takes a couple minutes to arrive.

This is madness.
The white-ish anglophone countries are fully exposed to this infective madness because they lack a protective language barrier – unlike most Europeans.

The opposite – smeared as ‘human wave tactics’ or glorified by 3GWers as (semi-imaginary) ‘Hutier tactics’ isn’t the way to go either, of course.

Nurture and bet on your organic fire support – both direct and indirect fire.
Make sure the army’s artillery is fine and capable of area destruction, quick reaction, precision, moving target interception, mobility-reducing, sustained smoke and sustained suppression effects.
CAS is a theatre-level asset that’s bound to only be relevant in small wars, at the Schwerpunkt or at crisis locations. It has no place in battalion-level considerations. It’s for corps level operational planning.
The same applies to quite long ranged artillery, such as GUMLRS or ATACMS, LORA missiles et cetera.