Fancy that:
The U.S. Air Force has revived an original mission for the A-10 ground attack aircraft; destroying small boats. Experiments have been conducted recently and, while no details were made public, the tests were considered successful. There were basically two tests. One had had experienced civilian boat operators in typical (for Iranians and others) small boats with a dummy heavy machine-gun mounted on it, sent out to use typical Iranian swarming tactics while A-10s (and some other aircraft) make simulated attacks. These attacks were electronically recorded for later analysis. The other tests had the A-10s firing training (non-explosive) ammo at remotely controlled boats.
The Navy is surely happy to have this kind of help from land-based air power.
I hope that the Navy also learns the lesson that naval air power can be based on land even when an aircraft carrier is not available.
Fancy that.
