To be fair, aircraft like that have been very successful in the COIN role and it's actually better than the aircraft they would have used for CAS in WW2, Korea and other wars in the 1950s.
However... as indicated by you, the number of 12.7mm and 14.5mm machineguns on armoured and non-armoured vehicles and the autocannon on various IFVs/MICVs these days let alone the proliferation of SAMs/ManPADS really does call into question the survivability of such an aircraft... that turbo-prop exhaust would run hot enough for even older heat-seekers to lock on to (the Brit SAS had success with a Stinger versus IA.58 Pucara during the Falklands stoush and back then those Stinger IR seeker heads were 1970s technology).
Last edited by StainlessSteelCynic; 08-17-2017 at 06:38 AM.
Reason: I spelt "back" as abck... grrr... still, at least it was in alphabetical order...
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