Sunday, January 17, 2016

Four New A-29 Super Tucanos for AAF

Photo: Resolute Support HQs, Jan 15, 2016
Four A-29 Super Tucanos touched down at Kabul's international airport in mid-January 2016. It has taken a long time (years) to get to this stage but Afghanistan has finally got some fixed-wing aircraft so that the Afghan Air Force (AAF) can provide air support in its counterinsurgency fight against the Taliban. The A-29 is a light-support aircraft capable of conducting close air support, aerial escort, armed overwatch, and aerial interdiction. The first Afghan A-29 pilots completed over 300 days of flight training at Moody Air Force Base in Georgia, (U.S.) in December 2015. The pilots and their aircraft should be combat-ready in April. The AAF is expected to receive 20 a-29s in the next few years. Watch a short video (1 min) posted by Resolute Support hqs on YouTube.com on January 16, 2016 entitled The Afghan National Airforce gets four new A29s

On a related note, one of the two missing Afghan airmen who disappeared in the United States in December 2015 has been located. The two were part of a group of 14 undergoing maintenance training for the A-29 aircraft at Moody AFB. One of the men was an AAF lietuenant while the other was a senior master sergeant. They went missing one week prior to their scheduled graduation and return to Afghanistan. (ABC News, Jan 14, 2016).

1 comment:

  1. It will be interesting to see the effect this capability and its operational employment affects events on the ground. The question is whether their spin up training will create a demand to slide into a warfighting role early.

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