The F-35 may have to beat the A-10 in a flyoff before replacing it

Congress aims to pit the A-10 against the F-35 in a series of weapons system tests related to close air support (CAS) before the Air Force can retire the Warthog, according to Aviation Week. The proposal would require the Pentagon's chief weapons tester to conduct comparison tests of the two planes in the A-10's primary rolls, which AviationWeek outlines as "close-air support of soldiers in the heat of battle, combat search and rescue, and airborne forward air control."

Photo: Getty + Paula Bronstein

Outlined in the proposed defense policy bill for 2017, the move would effectively prevent the retirement of the A-10 from starting until 2019, and perhaps much later. In addition to the A-10 vs. F-35 flyoff, the pending $618.7 billion bill also requires completion of the F-35's final testing period, known as initial operational test and evaluation (IOT&E), before retirement of the A-10. Although the F-35 Joint Program Office (JPO) plans to begin IOT&E in early 2018, Aviation Week reports that the testing period could be pushed back to 2019.

The F-35 has been advertised as a catchall replacement for all of the Air Force's legacy combat jets, but concerns about the new fifth-generation fighter's capabilities abound, from engine fires to computing malfunctions. The F-35 Lightning II certainly isn't the heavily armed and armored A-10 Thunderbolt II, which carries the massive 30 mm GAU-8 Avenger rotary cannon with an ammo capacity of up to 1,350 rounds, compared to the F-35's 25 mm GAU-12 Equalizer cannon with a maximum ammo capacity of 220 rounds on the F-35B and C variants".