this post was submitted on 03 Apr 2026
107 points (100.0% liked)

World News

55306 readers
1663 users here now

A community for discussing events around the World

Rules:

Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.


Lemmy World Partners

News !news@lemmy.world

Politics !politics@lemmy.world

World Politics !globalpolitics@lemmy.world


Recommendations

For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
top 31 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] ShinkanTrain@lemmy.ml 19 points 1 day ago (1 children)

crashed

What could have possibly caused this. What a mystery

[–] umbrella@lemmy.ml 13 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] boonhet@sopuli.xyz 2 points 1 day ago

Well, some of them are built so that the front doesn't fall off at all.

[–] lennybird@lemmy.world 18 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (3 children)

Extremely rare. This thing is like a tank in the sky.

I also thought they Warthogs were antiquated as CAS? Fucking dipshit Kegsbreath (Epstein War aside)

[–] UnspecificGravity@piefed.social 13 points 2 days ago (1 children)

They are great for fighting wars against goat herders who live in caves, which apparently is the only military we can fight.

[–] Salamanderwizard@lemmy.world 9 points 2 days ago

This. We got so use to fighting farmers with guns and rpgs that we have no experience fighting an actual army.

I really don't look forward to when we actually throw hands with a really powerful military. I feel we will see a lot of American troops dead.

[–] frongt@lemmy.zip 14 points 2 days ago

They're old, but still the most effective in that role. At least when they don't have the threat of being shot down.

[–] gnutrino@programming.dev 9 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Extremely rare.

Not really, A10s have the highest loss rate of any post-Vietnam US aircraft.

[–] AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

Hunting warthogs has always been popular...

[–] lennybird@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Are you factoring in as a percent of combat sorties and proportionality? Because when taking this into account, I'm not sure that's right.

And has numerous incidents of being blown to bits and still returning to base. The pilot themselves is literally inside a "titanium bathtub".

Keep in mind finally that the nature of this aircraft is not to engage from a stand-off distance but rather be up close. Ultimately I'm really curious what brought this bird down.

... The V-22 Osprey on the other hand... Look at it wrong and she falls out of the sky.

[–] gnutrino@programming.dev 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

F-16s flew a little over 13,000 sorties during Desert Storm with fewer losses and (importantly) a higher mission success rate. Also Chuck Horner was on record as saying that he kept A-10s away from anywhere the Iraqi Republican Guard was operating as they had access to actually functional air defenses that would have shredded the A-10s.

Basically A-10 pilots bragging about Desert Storm is like someone being sent to go wrestle some toddlers and coming back with a bloodied nose and broken bones and bragging about how tough and resilient they were not to have bled out.

Not to mention it is no longer 1991 and the A-10 is even less useful on a modern battlefield.

[–] West_of_West@piefed.social 11 points 2 days ago (2 children)

I thought the A-10 was decommissioned...?

[–] Agent641@lemmy.world 16 points 1 day ago

He was ONE day from retirement!

[–] vaultdweller013@sh.itjust.works 18 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I think they've been trying to phase out the damned things but who knows whats going on with the back end shit. Wouldn't even be surprised if kegsbreth specifically kept them in commission because the look kool.

[–] ZombieChicken@reddthat.com 11 points 1 day ago (2 children)

The Army wants to keep them. F-35s can't do the A-10's job properly, and the A-10 has a reputation. However, they are old with no replacement even in the works because the Air Force only wants bombers or fighters.

[–] freeman@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The Army wants to keep them. F-35s can’t do the A-10’s job properly, and the A-10 has a reputation. However, they are old with no replacement even in the works because the Air Force only wants bombers or fighters.

Which job is that? Killing hiluxes and insurgents with no air defense capabilities? Because against everybody else the A-10 throws stand-off munitions from medium altitude, when it's not banned from entering hostile airspace.

It's no coincidence nobody wants to operate it. Not any foreign air force, not USAF that is stuck with it and not the US army that was offered it(they are fine with USAF paying for it).

F-16s can do anything useful the A-10 can and much more.

[–] crimsonpoodle@pawb.social 0 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Well it all depends on what you’re doing. The A-10s can carry more ordinance, longer loiter times, more heavily armored than something like the f35.once you establish air superiority you need trucks to dump munitions as fast and cheaply as possible.

[–] freeman@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

That's not the F-35's role, that's the F-16's role for the USAF (and most western air forces) and carries as much ordinance, has better range since it's not hampered by armor.

It also actually has performed low-level attacks against AAA, something the A-10 was banned from doing in Desert Storm, despite having armor for that specific task.

Which is the issue, the A-10's core concept is flawed. Armor does not provide suitability to aircraft, not even against AAA, never mind SAMs. Compromising performance (speed, range), forgoing capabilities (A2A radar) makes the plane practically useless.

[–] ZombieChicken@reddthat.com 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

You seem to forget that the A-10 is only about 50 years old. The armor, redundant controls, and flight capabilities (such as being designed to fly while missing half a wing, half the entire tail, and an engine) are there to keep the pilot safe. They have landed after being hit more than once, and entirely due to it's design.

The A-10 isn't an air superiority fighter; it's an attack craft and does that job well enough than any grunt on the ground is disappointed when a request for air support is answered by anything BUT an A-10.

It needs an update, sure, but it is far from useless.

[–] freeman@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 day ago

You seem to forget that the A-10 is only about 50 years old. The armor, redundant controls, and flight capabilities (such as being designed to fly while missing half a wing, half the entire tail, and an engine) are there to keep the pilot safe. They have landed after being hit more than once, and entirely due to it’s design.

Yeah, it was also designed to kill tanks with the gun which it doesn't do. As for flying with missing half a wing, it hasn't happened with an A-10. An F-15, an unarmored plane, has landed missing a whole wing in real life. Many planes, all unarmored, have taken hits and survived.

The A-10 isn’t an air superiority fighter; it’s an attack craft and does that job well enough than any grunt on the ground is disappointed when a request for air support is answered by anything BUT an A-10.

Grunts have no clue. Literally, they listed the A-10 having a copilot as a reason why they prefer it.As in they misidentify aircraft as the A-10.

The A-10 also only did that during low-intensity, counterinsurgency operations. Against infantry with technical. The M-61 is perfectly capable of destroying technicals. Go lookup a video of it in action and tell me it's not capable and you need the GAU-8.

Yes it can do the job, it doesn't do it better than multirole fighters that you are going to have anyways. It actually does it worse. It was restricted to 20nmi from the border in Desert Storm during day time. It was assigned to destroy enemy vehicles with standoff munitions from medium altitude, to keep it safe from AAA. Meanwhile F-16 did low level attacks with unguided bombs on SAM units that had organic AAA defenses.

In any case the US has a huge military budget so wasting money on the A-10 is not an issue.

[–] kubok@fedia.io 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Maybe I am cynical, and I am by no way a military expert of any kind, but I would figure that an A-10 is more expendable than a F-35.

I am in the 'A-10s are cool' camp, but I do not think that they are particularly useful anymore on a modern battlefield.

[–] ZombieChicken@reddthat.com 1 points 1 day ago

The GAU-8 they built the A-10 around is a heckuva gun. It can also weather AA fire. An F-35 can only fire missiles (which, due to it's internal weapons bays, are limited), and isn't going to eat a flak around and still get home safely. It wasn't designed for the same enviroment.

[–] 6stringringer@lemmy.zip 6 points 1 day ago

It’s not like you can hear them coming or anything. Pretty stealthy aren’t they? 🤦

[–] magnetosphere@fedia.io 9 points 2 days ago (3 children)

Warthogs are extremely cool. I’d end this comment with “fight me!”, but honestly I’m not that invested.

[–] fartographer@lemmy.world 5 points 2 days ago

No they're not. (It's on)

[–] flubba86@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

One of my favourite DOS games back in the day was A-10 Tank Killer. It was a surprisingly good flight sim for its day and relatively accessible for a kid playing on a keyboard and mouse. I played that game so much, I've got a soft spot for the old A-10.

[–] Nindelofocho@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

You should check out nuclear option. Its sorta strangereal esque where they have near future style craft in a modern theater. Smack in between Ace Combat and DCS in realism. Theres an A10 replacement that has turboprops

[–] flubba86@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

Nice, never heard of it, sounds like I'd like it.

[–] Salamanderwizard@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago

They're cool, but from what I have read, they are shit for the most part.

[–] imjustmsk@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] Blackmist@feddit.uk 1 points 1 day ago

A10 goes BRRRRRRRRR.