While it’s “the right thing to do” for top Air Force leaders to explore a possible cheap-to-buy-and-operate cost close air support aircraft for “permissive environments,” Air Combat Command chief Gen. Hawk Carlisle isn’t so sure such a program would be a good investment. “I wonder,” Carlisle told reporters at the Pentagon on Tuesday, whether “in five-seven-ten years … will there be any such thing?” as a “permissive environment.” He said that Russia’s loss of multiple helicopters? in Syria to unsophisticated weapons is an indication of “where we’re going.” State-sponsored terrorists, he said, “have access to state-sponsored weapons,” and a low-tech CAS airplane might arrive just in time to be irrelevant. He also said he “doesn’t have the money to spare from other priorities” at the moment to invest in a new fleet of CAS aircraft, relatively inexpensive though they might be.
In a rare letter to the entire force, Chief of Staff of the Air Force Gen. Kenneth S. Wilsbach is telling Airmen to stay ready to support Operation Epic Fury, the massive U.S. operation against Iran.