It is a rule of thumb in home repairs—and military procurement—that the cheap option proves anything but. So it is not surprising that the U.S. Air Force’s OA-X program has proven controversial.

The goal is to procure a lightweight, relatively cheap attack aircraft for low-intensity conflicts like Afghanistan, freeing up more sophisticated and expensive planes like F-35s for conflicts involving significant opponents like Russia or China. On the surface, the concept of a bargain-basement A-10 Warthog seems sound enough. Why waste an F-22 or an A-10 on bombing a drug lab in Afghanistan when a propeller-driven plane the size of a Cessna could accomplish the same mission for a fiftieth of the cost?

But the OA-X program, which the Air Force classifies as an "experiment," has been dogged by questions over whether the United States needs hundreds of these aircraft. The Air Force has narrowed the field from four propeller-and jet-powered contenders to just two: The Sierra Nevada/Embraer A-29 (Brazilian firm Embraer's Super Tucano) and the Textron/Beechcraft AT-6B. Congress has approved $300 million to procure an unspecified number of OA-X aircraft, plus $400 million to continue the experiment into the light attack concept.

Enter the perceptive but carefully non-partisan Congressional Research Service, which released a short but to the point brief on the OA-X. Here are nine questions that CRS says Congress needs to consider (read between the lines, and you can glimpse the controversies behind the OA-X project):

●      What is the value of adding this capability to the Air Force?

●      Is the Air Force the appropriate service to operate these aircraft?

●      How large of a fleet is appropriate?

●      Might this mission be better accomplished through other means, such as remotely piloted aircraft (“drones”)?

●      Does the presence of such aircraft in U.S. service assist in training and operating with partner nations? If so, what is the value of that to the United States?

●      Should the U.S. government be involved in promoting sales of similar aircraft to other nations, and if so, how?

●      Is a procurement restricted to two specified competitors fair and appropriate?

●      Is the use of “experiments” rather than a formal downselect process a useful innovation in streamlining acquisition, a circumvention of rules, or might it be described some other way? Does that judgment change when (as in this case) the procurement is intended for an off-the-shelf, rather than developmental, acquisition?

●      The Air Force has publicly stated it is experiencing a shortage of trained pilots. Would the creation of a light attack fleet exacerbate that shortage or assist in the training and absorption of new pilots?

The Air Force won’t like some of these questions, such as whether it really intends to fly light attack aircraft, or merely facilitate sales of a light attack aircraft to U.S. allies (for a good analysis, see this piece in The Drive).

But CRS raises the most interesting question: are drones a better option for light attack? After all, Reaper and Predator drones have been flying strike missions in the Middle East and Afghanistan for years.

It can be argued that in the sort of low-intensity conflicts that the OA-X is designed for, the eyes of a human pilot are needed to survey the battlefield and avoid bombing civilians instead of insurgents. On the other hand, designating an aircraft as “light” and “cheap” doesn’t change the fact that it still puts a human pilot in harm’s way. The OA-X is predicated on the assumption that it won’t face sophisticated air defenses. That can be a reasonable assumption, but never a guarantee (however, see this article by one of the originators of the OA-X concept, who argues the aircraft will be quite survivable).

If the OA-X is flown by other nations whose pilots will assume that risk, that’s one thing. If a U.S. pilot is shot down and captured, the American public may not be so forgiving.

Michael Peck is a contributing writer for the National Interest. He can be found on Twitter and Facebook.

Image: Wikimedia