Close Air Support III: The Keyhole

Close Air Support: Table of Contents

The keyhole CAS template allows for flexibility while providing de-confliction between multiple aircraft and ground fire support elements. It is no longer necessary to lay down pre-determined IPs for different target areas in the AO. IPs can now be referenced from the target itself. The primary benefit of the keyhole CAS template is that it provides FACs and JTACs with maximum flexibility when selecting the FAH.

Maj Frey, James W. USMC, “Keyhole CAS for Modern Warriors.” Marine Corps Gazzette, May 2008.
Via Captain BT Taggart “An Argument for the Keyhole Template for Close Air Support on the Urban Battlefield”.

The distance from the Echo point to the designated position is expressed in nautical miles for fixed-wing CAS assets, and in kilometres for rotary-wing CAS assets.
Note that FW aircraft should hold outside the designated point, unless otherwise specified. By means of the Keyhole, the Controller can assign an orbit or holding point by simply specifying the letter representing the cardinal and a number for the range. However, the radial from the Echo point can be used as well.

Examples

JTAC: “Stang 11, proceed to Alpha 8, Flight Level 150, report established.”
CAS Player: “Stang 11, established Alpha 8, FL 150.

JTAC: “Stang 11, proceed to the 240 at 8, Flight Level 150, report established.”
CAS A/C: “Stang 11, established 240 at 8, Flight Level 150.

JTAC: “Stang 11, your holding ECHO two four zero, zero eight, block 20-22, report established.”

JTAC: “Stang 11, your holding ECHO Bravo Charlie eight, block 20-22, report established.”

Update 07/20/2026

After a chat with always brilliant AssafB, he added more useful notes:

I [..] realized there might be two additional tricks that are worth mentioning:
“STANG11, establish overhead, block 20-22” – meaning, approved to overfly ECHO and around it at 20-22
“STANG11 establish ECHO 6, block 10-12” – meaning: approved to orbit echo BUT don’t come closer than 8nm (block 10-12).
The last one is useful when you want to keep a low-block flight like A10s with good freedom to orbit the target but yet “clear out” the way for a higher flight to release bombs from higher block or dive for an attack and then elevate up back to their block.
Overhead is obviously ideal when a permissive environment and you want to allow constant observation of the target area. You can have a flight in the overhead in a high block doing sensor taskings and other flights on lower blocks moving in and out for attacks.

132nd.AssafB