If only:
Most of the Air Force will be thrown back to tactical air support for the Army — the role it least likes. None should forget, however, that the military services, their missions and budgets, exist for the country, not vice versa.
How cute! Bureaucratic bodies know they exist for the country!
Not to pick on the Air Force. Any bureaucracy has a self preservation instinct that would impress Charles Darwin.
But even without space duties, the Air Force will view air superiority and deep strike missions as their preferred missions and not embrace tactical air support for the Army. Losing space won't make the Air Force love the ground.
The Air Force is right that sending aircraft in low over the battlefield is very dangerous for the plane and crew. And the planes are increasingly expensive and fewer in number making losses a problem. The question is whether air support for ground troops can be provided solely from high altitudes.
Heck, the question is also whether controlling the blues skies protects the troops below. Can high-flying planes can even control the skies low over the ground troops.
Rather than thinking stripping the Air Force of space duties will make the Air Force focus on ground support, I want the Air Force to be stripped of ground support missions in order to aim high and view the blue skies and black space as a single "high ground" that must be controlled for navies and armies to operate under their umbrella.
I still think the United States Aerospace Force is the way to go. A true Space Force should wait until we move beyond the Earth-Moon system.
