From: Los <los@c...>
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 1999 16:33:48 -0400
Subject: Assault lander philosophy
After last weeks debate on assault landers and should they be dual role (attack and transport alal aliens) or single role I thought I'd ask two buddies, both are currently serving pilots one an attack pilot (scrump) flying cobras in the USMC the other magic a coast guard SAR pilot/former 82d slick pilot. Thought I'd pass this along. What I wrote them: Anyway we are talking about conducting assault landings on planets from orbit. We had two issues. One was whether to go with bn or company or platoon sized landing vehicles. I maintained that we should stick with platoon (chinook sized) landers or smaller since you don't want to lose a whole company or bn in one shot. I think we've reached consensus on that one. The second is whether the assault landers should be dual role (attack/transport) or single role dedicated transport and dedicated attack assets. I'm strongly for dedicated assets sort of like it is now in the USMC primarily due to mission requirements, training etc more so than the technical ability to construct such craft. I also got an opinion from a slick pilot (you remember Bob Makowsky) so I figured it only fair that I get one from an attack pilot too. Your thoughts please? Thanks... > From Magic: This is exactly true. Look at the marines again. They have dedicated ground attack aircraft. Dedicated attack helos and dedicated troop carriers. The skills for all of them are not mutually exclusive but it would be the rare pilot who could excel at all without extensive (and expensive in time/$ crosstraining). The other thing about it is that you want your Assault lander pilots concentrating on getting their cargo to the ground. If you give them ground attack ordinance they are going to start thinking they are fighters and forget the primary goal is to get troops on deck. All pilots would be glad to take ordinance but only the attack guys should have it. They can concentrate on destroying things that the grunts ask them too. (And help defend the landers). The landers should be armed for self defense but only with arms that the crew can use. This is another thing that was not shown in Aliens. You ALWAYS have a Flight Mechanic/Loadmaster that is in charge of everything aft of the pilot seats. These guys are the ones that will suppress as you go into a hot LZ and they will tell you where the threat is. (Generally the pilots do not have alot of choice if they are going in in an assault. The LZ is prolly full and you have to mostly hold your place in line and land where you are expected to. You can displace a little to avoid junk on the ground but if you displace across the LZ you are going to cause a midair.). I like the idea of assault landers but they are dedicated for getting things on the ground not destroying things. That is the job of attack. <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< And now from Scrumpy our resident attack chopper expert: > . Gotta have dedicated attack assets. No two ways about it. Your dissertation is correct. A pilot could be trained to excel at both, however the concern is that not so much of the pilots competence/leadership within multimission roles, it is the fact that each AIRCRAFT is designed to conduct a single type of mission at any single time. Example, the AH-1W+ is a multimission aircraft, we are trained in many type missions, escort, fac(a), close air support, TRAP, TAC(a), etc. However, we only do one mission at any given time. Also I have no knowledge of any multimission aircraft that share a transport AND attack role, except MAYBE the AC-130 and that's stretching it. I really think that your concern right now is that of an airframe limitation vice a aviator limitation. Hopefully I have answered your question. <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Hope you guys found that interesting. Cheers...