Who Will Replace the A-10 Warthog?

TEXTRON'S SCORPION JET COMES LOADED FOR BEAR. IMAGE SOURCE: TEXTRON.

Motley Fool: Who Will Replace the A-10 Warthog? Textron Has a 2-in-3 Chance

Textron's secret weapon: The only jet fighter in this competition.

Few aircraft in the U.S. Air Force's arsenal attract as much support as the A-10 Thunderbolt II Warthog.

In a fit of martial poetry, Mother Jones describes the A-10 as "an unstoppable commercial Learjet with a full-automatic cannon in its nose and an iron bathtub surrounding the cockpit." More laconic, Foxtrotalpha simply states that the A-10 is "the best CAS [close air support] platform mankind has ever designed."

Good as the A-10 is, however, even its supporters acknowledge that it must one day be retired. In anticipation of that day, the Air Force has been spooling up a "capability assessment" preparatory to acquiring a new ground attack aircraft that could, possibly, fit the bill. It's call the OA-X competition, and one year after it was announced, OA-X could finally be entering its final innings.

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WNU Editor: It looks like the fix is in.

Today's Insurgencies Are Changing The Market For Military Jets

How ISIS And Boko Haram Could Change The Way Countries Purchase Air Power -- Clay Dillow, Fortune

Textron’s Scorpion recon and strike jet offers cash-strapped countries air power on the cheap. Global events are making it more attractive.

Like spaceships and sports stadiums, military strike jets typically aren’t the kind of things that companies build—much less sell—off the shelf. Take the Pentagon’s new F-35, for instance: Two decades and $400 billion in the making, the F-35 had nine committed customers lined up to buy thousands of aircraft (at between $80 million and $110 million per copy) before Lockheed Martin LMT 0.63% ever started bending metal in earnest. Rarely does a contractor fully develop a military jet on spec.

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My Comment: The A-10 does a very good job in providing support for ground forces .... and it is a hell of a lot cheaper than a F-35. But the above military jet shows that the market is big enough for more "players" .... especially if the military jet is cheap and easy to maintain.

A Look At America's Newest Jet Fighter That You’ve Probably Never Heard Of

There’s a New American Jet Fighter You’ve Probably Never Heard Of -- Dave Majumdar, War is Boring

Will anyone want Textron’s Scorpion?

The newest American jet fighter is small and lightweight. It’s designed to be cheap and easy to build, repair and fly. It’s optimized for low-intensity warfare.

It’s called the Scorpion, and you’ve probably never heard of it. It’s equally doubtful anyone will want to buy it.

Textron AirLand just completed building the prototype with Cessna’s help and has begun taxi-trials of the new aircraft. If all goes well, the privately-developed warplane could make its first flight before the end of the year—just as Scott Donnelly, Rhode Island-based Textron’s chief executive officer, predicted in September.

Textron and partner AirLand Enterprises released a video of the taxi test on Dec. 9.

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Update: Scorpion light attack jet in Wichita, ready for first flight -- Wichita Eagle

My Comment: I wish them the best.