Leaderboard

Yes, the A-10 is not an air-to-air God. It is slow, it is underpowered, it doesn't have a radar, and it can't maneuver vertically....which is why so many of our high speed, pointy nose cousins get shot by them. Bad assumptions lead to bad decisions followed by embarrassment. There is no good reason any high speed, pointy nose type should ever be shot by an A-10 yet it happens. My personal favorite was going 2v4 against F-15s out of Langley during their ORI. All I had was a TOT and 30 flares. Nothing like seeing that on a schedule thinking WTF??? Already had flares loaded but managed to get the remaining dispensers filled with chaff (420 bundles), found an E-3 that would be working nearby, worked a comm plan, and launched for Dare county range. Inbound to our target, we killed the first two Eagles (2000 feet AGL, line abreast, against a gorgeous clear blue sky) and proceeded to put bombs on target. The second two ship killed my wingman as we egressed. They assumed they could get a look down AIM-9 face shot while forgetting we carried the same but were looking up. Oops.

Was it also limited to level turns?

Not exactly an F-15 suggestion, but along the lines of the post-flight write-ups... U-Tapao, 1974: Pilot (Big John, not Tall John) lands his U-2, debriefs with the crew chief and writes in the forms "Aircraft flies sideways" (actually meaning out of trim and flies with a slight yaw), then closes the book and leaves. Thirty minutes later, back at the trailers where we all lived, the Lockheed tech rep (Travis Mason, I believe, a great guy but not much patience and a poor sense of humor) storms in frothing at the mouth, looking for John, yelling loudly something about airplanes not being able to fly sideways and how can he clear such an idiotic write-up. John was conveniently absent so after about 10 minutes of frustrated yelling he left. I think the maintenance super cleared it by writing " Straightened aircraft" or something similar. I have to add that Big John was not Travis's favorite pilot to start with. Earlier in the tour he noticed several of the older guys wearing similar black watches that looked nice (actually some early Japanese digital watches they got cheap in Bangkok). Upon asking, they told him that they were "Lockheed U-2 watches" given by Lockheed to pilots who had flown operational missions. They told him to see Travis to get one. Of course, there was no such deal from Lockheed, and Travis didn't know anything about the joke, but for weeks John bugged Travis about getting his watch. The other guys told him that Travis did have the watches, but was just slow to respond and you had to bug him a lot to finally get one. Then came the "flies sideways" write-up and the Travis/Big John relationship went downhill from there. Big Jonn didn't really care, but Travis almost wouldn't stay in the room or talk with John by the end of the tour.

The regs may say they're the same, but MAWS is essentially an NCSC elective that adds two months to NCSC whereas the other three schools are 11 months and entirely distinct from an IDE program.

Most of us weren't around back then. Good to see you still remember it like it was yesterday.