Fighter jets are performing surveillance missions in Iraq!

[harlinchi]

Advanced, costly, prepared to fight the most sophisticated adversaries, fast and lethal, these jets are being used to complete missions for which they were not designed. The situation described in the article seems to be a monumental waste of resources, like swatting flies with sledgehammers. Since the jet had to leave the area prior to US forces getting on scene on the ground, how accurate would their info be? How likely would it be for a 'mistake' to be made which resulted in the deaths of non-insurgant Iraqis? It would seem that another 'round peg into a square hole' approach is being taken.

http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?storyID=123017788

I hear of sailors being retrained as infantrymen, of IRR reclassifications into a category more available to the order issuing authorities. How broken must the military be before they rise and shout their distress in great numbers?

[rodeodance]

1. umm.. used to be called 'spying"

surveillance missions in Iraq!

[RufusEarl]

2. You raise a serious question

I listened to Gen Sinni speak on CSpan the other morning and he's convinced that our military is in disarray, he wouldn't say broken but one could read between the lines.

I must have read the same article you did about Navy personal being trained as foot solders, and said to myself self we're in deep Dodo when we start using sailors to perform ground operations.

[Ready4Change]

4. I agree.

About the only exception might be security in the area of a seaport. Otherwise, it would be far better to use dedicated land fighters, and leave the Navy guys dealing with that for which they are trained, ie: ship board ops.

[TomInTib]

5. And snipers are driving trucks. nt

[Ready4Change]

3. F-15E is a ground attack version of the F-15 frame.

The original F-15 was a single seat, dedicated air-to-air fighter. Meant to take control of airspace. The F-15D continued that role, but added a rear seat, for use similar to that of the Navys 2 seat F-14.

The F-15E is a modification, changing the aircrafts role to a dual air-to-air and air-to-ground. The rear seaters role has been shifted to focus largely on ground attack, while the pilot pays attention to the air-to-air environment.

While, in my opinion, dual role aircraft are compromises, used properly, this can and has been done effectively. Many aircraft during WWII served admirably in dual roles, and a great number of aircraft designed for pure air-to-air became exceptional ground attack aircraft. The high speed they needed for interception missions is useful for getting into and out of threat zones quickly. Their weaknesses are usually an inability to loiter for long periods in order to support ground forces, light bomb loads, and fragility relative to the ground fire they often face.

In this particular instance, it looks like there was an immediate need to locate these people. The F-15E's were available in the area. They zipped in, found what they thought were the right guys, and handed the location off to a Predator team. The F-15Es, as you say, are expensive. So they moved on to other tasks and the cheaper, unmanned, Predator continued observation of these guys until ground forces could catch them.

In this case the F-15Es, with their high speed, filled in a time gap until the slower Predator could get into the area. If you're going to do this sort of thing at all, this was a good use of the equipment at hand, imho.