U.S. Army ground artillery units recently conducted a test in which they destroyed a mock air defense system based on targeting information from a U.S. Air Force F-35A Joint Strike Fighter. The tactic allowed the joint force to destroy a mock threat while allowing the F-35 to remain in its most stealthy mode and not reveal itself by engaging it directly. This is a concept of operations that could be extremely valuable for U.S. forces in a future large-scale conflict against an opponent with dense integrated air defense network and one that could easily expand to include other assets, including unmanned aircraft and new, longer-range artillery and tactical missile systems.
Yes, I pointed out that opportunity which separating the shooter from the F-35 sensor can provide. And aircraft firing ground-based missiles is pretty cool. I've noted the suppression of enemy air defenses mission, as well.
I will say that if the pilots are trained to do it, F-35s carrying nothing but air-to-air missiles could conduct close air support using Army ground weapons.
Although that just leads to the question of whether the Army could simply deploy small stealthy spotter drones to fire Army ground-based weapons. That would be a nice addition to a new Army Air Corps, eh?
