For months, US Air Force officials have used the adjective "hard" to describe their decision to ground entire fleets of aircraft in response to budget cuts. But on 23 April, its chief of staff said a review of options vindicates a proposal to remove its Fairchild Republic A-10s from use. Gen Mark Welsh says the USAF evaluated a number of cost-cutting options against a "very detailed operational analyses" before making its decisions. "We came very clearly to the conclusion that of all those horrible options, the least operationally impactful was to divest the A-10," Welsh says. "It makes perfect sense from a military perspective if you have to make these kind of cuts."
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