AC-130J 105 Removal?

[Sua Sponte]

https://news.yahoo.com/us-air-force-may-remove-171141507.html

[Danger41]

Interesting. At the interest of being called a heretic, I don't think it's a bad idea*. The 105 is a cool weapon, for sure, but it's easily one of the most overrated in the inventory. It's responsiveness is great compared to PGM's, but the accuracy and lethality against targets (including pax) isn't nearly as good as folks think. I've seen many times where they just hammer away with the gun for round after round and folks keep on trucking.

The article discusses and alludes to using AC-J's as something beyond traditional CAS with cruise missiles, etc. which I think is a phenomenal idea. The most challenging part of this will be getting through to the Gunship culture to accept a new mission set beyond CAS via left hand wheel. That's much easier said than done.

 

*If the scenario is outside of dominated air space with permissive conditions, wheeling up and hammering away isn't a great idea. If you have that, it's a good tool in the toolbox.

[disgruntledemployee]

From the article..

John Venable, a former F-16 pilot and senior defense fellow at the Heritage Foundation think tank, told Defense News the AC-130J would not survive a war against China and that the command is right to rethink its mission.

 

Dear John,

Fuck you!  Now go point at your asshole and tell us how much it's worth.

[MCO]

“We don’t want to pigeonhole ourselves in strictly special operations”- Air Force Special Operations Command official

[Swizzle]

12 minutes ago, MCO said:

“We don’t want to pigeonhole ourselves in strictly special operations”- Air Force Special Operations Command official

https://www.choosingtherapy.com/identity-crisis/#signs-of-an-identity-crisis

"Altering your values or inclinations frequently to match your environment or relationship"

Note: AFSOC is undisputedly great at several things 

[Lawman]

We’ve seen what launching an SDB on an M26 rocket can achieve.

I wonder if somebody has looked at how much extra push you could swing by mounting something like an old sparrow motor to the back of one and just telling it to climb to space with a 10-18k foot head start.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[FlyingWolf]

2 hours ago, Lawman said:

We’ve seen what launching an SDB on an M26 rocket can achieve.

I wonder if somebody has looked at how much extra push you could swing by mounting something like an old sparrow motor to the back of one and just telling it to climb to space with a 10-18k foot head start.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

*Small Cruise Missile has entered the chat*

[Lawman]

*Small Cruise Missile has entered the chat*

Who knew how much you could accomplish with 7.5 to 8 inches…..

Somebody needs to get Yeet into any brief on said concept.

Still I think there’s something immediately applicable with SDB and a rocket engine that could be translated later to something like the air launched effects project working in the Army. I think we need to look at some form of common “standoff shuttle” that can handle a family of effects types over what appears to be JASSM in a smaller package with the same costs.


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[brabus]

US acquisitions process - where good ideas go to die. Good luck gunship bros. 

[tac airlifter]

Whatever happened to the gunship lasers?  

[mcbush]

They’re all attached to sharks instead.

[RegularJoe]

Why not replace the gun with a pallet of Rapid Dragons?

[FourFans]

10 hours ago, Lawman said:

Who knew how much you could accomplish with 7.5 to 8 inches…..

Somebody needs to get Yeet into any brief on said concept.

Still I think there’s something immediately applicable with SDB and a rocket engine that could be translated later to something like the air launched effects project working in the Army. I think we need to look at some form of common “standoff shuttle” that can handle a family of effects types over what appears to be JASSM in a smaller package with the same costs.
 

I have no doubt someone, somewhere in the test world is/has already started and/or completed the testing of an SDB with a rocket boost.  Imagine the amount of highly accurate hate a B-52 or B-1 could deliver from over the horizon...

[Danger41]

3 hours ago, tac airlifter said:

Whatever happened to the gunship lasers?  

They got naked gunner hugged to death.

[StoleIt]

7 hours ago, mcbush said:

They’re all attached to sharks instead.

...it's about the sharks. When you were frozen, they were put on the endangered species list. We tried to get some, but it would've taken months to clear up the red tape.

[bfargin]

what about sea bass?

[ClearedHot]

On 11/7/2023 at 11:55 AM, Danger41 said:

Interesting. At the interest of being called a heretic, I don't think it's a bad idea*. The 105 is a cool weapon, for sure, but it's easily one of the most overrated in the inventory. It's responsiveness is great compared to PGM's, but the accuracy and lethality against targets (including pax) isn't nearly as good as folks think. I've seen many times where they just hammer away with the gun for round after round and folks keep on trucking.

The article discusses and alludes to using AC-J's as something beyond traditional CAS with cruise missiles, etc. which I think is a phenomenal idea. The most challenging part of this will be getting through to the Gunship culture to accept a new mission set beyond CAS via left hand wheel. That's much easier said than done.

 

*If the scenario is outside of dominated air space with permissive conditions, wheeling up and hammering away isn't a great idea. If you have that, it's a good tool in the toolbox.

Tell me you don't do CAS without telling me you don't do CAS. 

"Hammering away"...I don't even have words other than thanks "SEAL of the Sky" for your input.

Removing the 105MM is nothing more than moronic payback from two herbivore AFSOC/CC's that hate the gunship community.  There is a story about how this all started and it had NOTHING to do with anything related to combat, rather Slife wanting to harvest manpower for a pet project and being told no because they had to keep X number of gunners on the AC-130J to man the 105MM.

As a dude who has shot bad guys 27 meters form the friendlies, advocating for BVR CAS is one of the dumber things I have ever read on this forum.  Slinging a Small Cruise Missile  (SCM), at GPS coordinates is not CAS, doing it in a dynamic fight is Fing stupid and dangerous.  As for "accuracy not being as good as folks think"...the advertised unclassified accuracy of the AC-130 is two mils. Again as a person who flew it once or twice, techniques like two-shot bring that much lower.  The hammering away and they keep running scenario mentioned above is a function of poor employment or training, not the damn gun.  Come on over some time, I'll pour you a glass of brown liquor and show you a couple hours of video 33 pound projectiles filled with 6 pounds of Comp B pissing-off all the virgins in Jannah because thanks to me "hammering away" with the 105MM, they are about to be overrun with business.

Rather than guard core capabilities AFSOC leadership is grasping at straws trying to remain relevant in this pivot to peer/near-peer, the Air Force is feeding that mantra as we slowly walk away from what should be a fierce dedication to those on the ground, reference insert A-10 retirement as further proof.  I am not opposed to adding SCM to the gunship arsenal, it would add a great stand-off capability to suppress semi-permissive threats in CORE SOCOM mission sets, but if having 30 gunships with SCM is the key to the fight against China, we've already lost. 

 

 

[busdriver]

1 hour ago, ClearedHot said:

.......remain relevant in this pivot to peer/near-peer, the Air Force is feeding that mantra.......

I've been thinking the current climate must be what it was like watching the F-105 get fielded as TAC went whole hog into everything nuclear.

[Biff_T]

19 hours ago, bfargin said:

what about sea bass?

ill tempered sea bass

[Danger41]

15 hours ago, ClearedHot said:

Tell me you don't do CAS without telling me you don't do CAS. 

"Hammering away"...I don't even have words other than thanks "SEAL of the Sky" for your input.

Removing the 105MM is nothing more than moronic payback from two herbivore AFSOC/CC's that hate the gunship community.  There is a story about how this all started and it had NOTHING to do with anything related to combat, rather Slife wanting to harvest manpower for a pet project and being told no because they had to keep X number of gunners on the AC-130J to man the 105MM.

As a dude who has shot bad guys 27 meters form the friendlies, advocating for BVR CAS is one of the dumber things I have ever read on this forum.  Slinging a Small Cruise Missile  (SCM), at GPS coordinates is not CAS, doing it in a dynamic fight is Fing stupid and dangerous.  As for "accuracy not being as good as folks think"...the advertised unclassified accuracy of the AC-130 is two mils. Again as a person who flew it once or twice, techniques like two-shot bring that much lower.  The hammering away and they keep running scenario mentioned above is a function of poor employment or training, not the damn gun.  Come on over some time, I'll pour you a glass of brown liquor and show you a couple hours of video 33 pound projectiles filled with 6 pounds of Comp B pissing-off all the virgins in Jannah because thanks to me "hammering away" with the 105MM, they are about to be overrun with business.

Rather than guard core capabilities AFSOC leadership is grasping at straws trying to remain relevant in this pivot to peer/near-peer, the Air Force is feeding that mantra as we slowly walk away from what should be a fierce dedication to those on the ground, reference insert A-10 retirement as further proof.  I am not opposed to adding SCM to the gunship arsenal, it would add a great stand-off capability to suppress semi-permissive threats in CORE SOCOM mission sets, but if having 30 gunships with SCM is the key to the fight against China, we've already lost. 

 

 

You're welcome for the input. And I chose my words poorly with "hammering away". I'll replace it with "30 minutes straight of misses to eventually have an MQ-9 do it." My bad. But that was a U model crew and I know the H models flown by you would never do something like that.

Everything you said is valid, btw. Which is why I said in my original post that I think it's a "good tool in the toolbox" if used in the right conditions. AFSOC seems dead set on moving away from the aforementioned right conditions (semi-permissive) and getting involved in MCO. If the writing is on the wall for that, I think removing the 105 isn't stupid. I think that decision is moronic and wish someone would give me odds on some other conflict outside of China that Gunships will be perfect for popping off, but Vegas won't hook me up. I honestly don't understand why AFSOC is trying so hard to fit into that fight where the other SOCOM components are getting more back to their roots while growing from there to find ways to affect a peer competitor. I'm not even in AFSOC anymore so maybe my outsider view is wrong but I don't see it.

And I'll definitely take you up on that offer next time I'm in your neck of the woods. I should be in your phone under "Sky SEAL 01"

[nsplayr]

On 11/8/2023 at 7:06 AM, mcbush said:

They’re all attached to sharks instead.

I wish I had the drawing but one day during a long set of briefings I drew up a sketch for an AC-130S, the S stands for Shark. Holding tanks to keep the sharks alive, smaller breeds that fit in the common launch tubes already installed in the door, plunge the sharks out the ass of the airplane and of course you have frikin' laser beams on their foreheads. If I were king for a day we'd buy at least a dozen.

[Lord Ratner]

9 hours ago, Danger41 said:

I honestly don't understand why AFSOC is trying so hard to fit into that fight where the other SOCOM components are getting more back to their roots while growing from there to find ways to affect a peer competitor.

Because in the absence of a real, and active threat, the military is a vanity project for the general-caste. You are led by those who have been fantasizing about being generals since they were in elementary school. 

 

Yeah, I know, there are some good ones. But obviously not many, or we wouldn't have the military we have right now.

[Biff_T]

I heard they are replacing the 105 with a hot dog launcher.  

Edited November 10, 2023 by Biff_T

[tac airlifter]

2 hours ago, Biff_T said:

I heard they are replacing the 105 with a hot dog launcher.  

Gunners would love it but you'd have a real issue with fratricide.

Kidding aside, I'm sure CH and other old school gunship warriors did amazing things with the 105.  But since I arrived on station in 2009 they take about a dozen rounds to get on target.  Unless it's containment fires in which case they kill the squirter first shot, lol.  And that's fine when you're responding to a TIC with barricaded HMG ambushing eagles out on patrol... but it comes at the cost of other things which might occupy that real estate.  Things that SOCOM wants more, given there aren't many eagles being ambushed on patrols, not to mention SOCOM wants out of that game permanently.

 I understand the frustration with herbivores leading the command, but 3 stars work for 4 stars.  This didn't originate in AFSOC without coordination between the two 4-star commands who rule them.

Since numbers were given above I'll mention: I've dropped PGMs during CAS at 7 and 15 meters from friendlies (granted the 7 meter shot had a Hesco protecting falcons); with low yield, time of fall at 20 seconds, and 1m CEP there are highly responsive options outside of a giant cannon flown so low targets break contact before you can kill them.  Which, like it or not, is the gunship story during the final years of AFG.

[Mark1]

9 hours ago, tac airlifter said:

Gunners would love it but you'd have a real issue with fratricide.

Kidding aside, I'm sure CH and other old school gunship warriors did amazing things with the 105.  But since I arrived on station in 2009 they take about a dozen rounds to get on target.  Unless it's containment fires in which case they kill the squirter first shot, lol.  And that's fine when you're responding to a TIC with barricaded HMG ambushing eagles out on patrol... but it comes at the cost of other things which might occupy that real estate.  Things that SOCOM wants more, given there aren't many eagles being ambushed on patrols, not to mention SOCOM wants out of that game permanently.

 I understand the frustration with herbivores leading the command, but 3 stars work for 4 stars.  This didn't originate in AFSOC without coordination between the two 4-star commands who rule them.

Since numbers were given above I'll mention: I've dropped PGMs during CAS at 7 and 15 meters from friendlies (granted the 7 meter shot had a Hesco protecting falcons); with low yield, time of fall at 20 seconds, and 1m CEP there are highly responsive options outside of a giant cannon flown so low targets break contact before you can kill them.  Which, like it or not, is the gunship story during the final years of AFG.

20 seconds time of fall after 10-20 minutes of coordination necessary to satisfy all parties with weapon release.  As opposed to 5-10 seconds to get a round away. 

You were asked to drop a PGM at 15m as a matter of convenience.  It's a testament to the engineering of the weapon that they trust its accuracy and effects so implicitly that they will accept the risk of weapons employment in relatively mundane scenarios, but I assure you the gravity of the situation that required CH to employ at 27 meters was in a different universe by comparison.

Also, while your hyperbolic description of gunship employments doesn't reflect reality, a concept that the point-and-click 'CAS' community lacks understanding of is that suppression now is almost always 1000x better than a kill in 5 minutes.

Pylon turn employment comes with its survivability and other minor idiosyncratic downsides, but in a permissive environment it's the greatest CAS force multiplier on the battlefield.  There is no other platform in the inventory with this benefit to include rotary wing.  No run-ins, no maneuvering to an IP, no 'i was off-aspect when shit kicked off'.  Just ready to go, always.

The fact that Air Force Special Operations Command is thinking of divesting itself of a specialized capability so as not to be left on the sidelines in a conventional conflict tells you all you need to know about the competency of those running the place for the last while.  Especially when adding a dime-a-dozen capability to the gunship platform results in a second rate implementation of that capability, when plenty of others can already do it more effectively.  Precision munitions are great as a complement.  Hang as many as you can the airframe, but not at the expense of the cannons.

It's hard to 'get through' the gunship culture, as Danger41 suggests, because they know better than those who are trying to get through.

Edited November 11, 2023 by Mark1