US CAS rethinking going on

I was pleased to read that the A10 is now to remain in service until at least 2021.

http://www.defensenews.com/a10%20retirement%202021

In a further development, the US Air Force’s top general on Wednesday indicated he would be supportive of purchasing low-end attack aircraft to ease the pressure on state-of-the-art fighters deployed to the Middle East.

In a white paper published Monday, McCain, the Republican leader of the Senate Armed Services Committee, proposed procuring 300 inexpensive, off-the-shelf fighter aircraft, 200 of which could be acquired by fiscal 2022.

“The Air Force should embrace a ‘high/low mix’ of fighter aircraft. Very expensive fifth-generation technology is not needed in every scenario,” McCain wrote in the paper. If the Air Force purchased additional planes to supplement its current inventory, “these aircraft could conduct counterterrorism operations, perform close air support and other missions in permissive environments, and help to season pilots to mitigate the Air Force’s fighter pilot shortfall.”

http://www.defensenews.com/articles/air-force-chief-lends-support-to-light-attack-aircraft-buy

Has this new approach got anything to do with the new president? It seems suspiciously sensible, too much so to have been thought up by the military. Does this also augur well for the Scorpion? Hope so.