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Old May 8th 04, 04:26 PM
Kevin Brooks
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"Henry J Cobb" wrote in message
...
http://www.military.com/NewContent/0...042804,00.html
Will the Air Force fulfill the Navy requirement for simultaneous
refueling capability and, if so, when?


-HJC


Henry, you need to be a bit more careful in your citations (nothing new
about that...). Note that the article indicates: "Naval air forces,
including the Marine Corps' 72 F/A-18D fighters, require tankers to refuel
more than one fighter jet at a time with the hose reel system." Hogwash.
"Require"? How many USN tanker aircraft can feed two receivers at once? The
S-3 in tanking mode? Nope. The F/A-18E in tanker mode? Nope.

Your article also tries to gloss over the fact that numerous USAF tankers
are indeed capable of refueling USN aircraft--all of the KC-10's and
whichever KC-135's are fitted with the hose/drogue attachments. The tankers
the USAF needs to buy/lease *now* are needed to replace the older KC-135's;
their introduction into the force without an initial hose/drogue capability
will not be of serious detriment to the USN's capabilities, as the KC-10's
and the KC-135R's with hose/drogue will continue to fly missions.

Maybe you need to address this in a different manner...perhaps asking if it
might be more fair if the USAF agreed to support *all* USN tanking
requirements at such time as the USN agrees to actually support all of the
USAF's airborne jamming requirements (you seem to have missed the fact that
the USN recently cut one of its EA-6 squadrons, despite a continuing
shortage of that joint asset...). But you also are missing another
factor...if the land-based tankers are so ctitical to USN aviation
capabilities, why do you need the CVN's in the first place? If you can get
land based tanker support into the fray to support the USN strikers, you are
also within range of getting the USAF strikers into the fight, especially
the heavies...

Brooks