In support of the Pentagon’s efforts to keep the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas from sparking a broader regional conflict, the USAF has scrambled additional A-10C Thunderbolt II ground attack aircraft and F-15E Strike Eagle multi-role strike fighters to US Central Command’s (CENTCOM’s) area of responsibility (AOR).
Ten A-10Cs from the 354th Fighter Squadron (FS) ‘Bulldogs’ – a component of the 355th Fighter Wing (FW) at Davis-Monthan AFB in Arizona – arrived at Al Dhafra Air Base (AB) in the UAE on October 12 as part of a long-planned deployment. These newly dispatched ‘Warthogs’ were intended to replace ten A-10Cs from the 75th FS ‘Tiger Sharks’ – a part of the 23rd Wing at Moody AFB, Georgia – which were already deployed to the region when the war between Israel and Hamas broke out, bringing the total number of attack jets in CENTCOM’s AOR to 20 aircraft.
Given the ground attack pedigree of the A-10C, the increased ‘Warthog’ presence in the Middle East indicates that the US is bolstering its forces to counter any enemy ground offensive in defending Israel. Due to the outbreak of war in the region, the 75th has extende…
