I get the impression you haven't ever actually been an officer in any branch of service, no disrespect intended. Really, your theoretical 20 Marines make a piss-poor argument for a plane like the Raptor that's so costly you'd have to scrap about a squadron of A-10s to afford to buy each extra F-22, and for a mission that a plane a lot less capable than an A-10 could handle for that matter.
When you figure out how to get airplanes to hold ground or persuade local chieftains to support you and rat out the insurgents, be sure to let the Air Staff know, they've been desperately and unsuccessfully looking for that strategy since the days of Billy Mitchell.
You may have taken my statements out of context.
The way I look at the air force is that it is a deterrent towards major military threats like North Korea and China.
With threats like that -our fighter pilots, bombers, and missile defenses become our primary weapon. With ground troops doing the clean up and holding ground.
With an insurgent/urban warfare --the air force takes on a different role which is based mostly on supply lines, surgical air strikes
with Specter Gunships and A10's, and reconassiance with predator drones. It becomes a supportive combat role--but still a very important supportive combat.
I don't think we disagree here.
Even in an urban messy warfare like Iraq, the Air Force has the important role of finding and dismantling I.E.D's. A very dangerous job and #1 most important combat supportive role since I.E.D.'s are the number one killer of U.S. ground troops.
If for some reason an international incident brought China or North Korea to declare war on us, I guarantee we would have been grateful that we bought a few extra hundred more F-22 Raptors. In a war like that, if we could not secure air dominance, we would already lose the war. As powerful as our marines, soldiers, and special forces are--they will be facing a million Asian infantry in each scenario. We can at least do them a favor and bomb the enemy to reduce American casualties.
Our air dominance assures our military safety when we cannot be everywhere at once. Do we really have the time or interest to invade countries like Libya and Somalia? Nope, unless they attacked us, it is just better to just bomb them to the stone age without putting a single trooper on the ground with exception of special forces.
When I say that our Air Force is our smartest and arguably most important branch , that doesn't mean they are our best branch.
And I finally want to add that the Air Force has been saying for years that they do not have enough F-22 Raptors.
Why stop production of them? Why did we stop production of the comanche helicopter?
Are we supposed to shut down programs of buying the most advanced weapons available?
We can buy just a couple at a time, we don't have to shut down buying them all together!
Also want to add that I was willing to join the air force as either a commissioned officer( if I got accepted--I have a BFA in Fine Arts) or enlist. But I have a serious medical condition preventing me from joining. They won't take me, even if I took meds.
