So, after supplying the Mujahideen in the Soviet–Afghan War with Stingers, the US wasn't prepared for this type of weapon to be used against the A-10?!
When the A-10 was proposed, when the project was funded and procurement started, and until well after the flight of the YA-10 prototypes, the Russian MANPADS threat was the SA-7 and the vehicle mounted IR threat was the SA-9. The turbofans of the A-10 would have been very difficult to track with the SA-7 or 9, the engagement range would have been very short, a small fraction of the weapons maximum range of ~3.7 - 4.2 km, and it would only have been able to engage from behind the aircraft.
In short, the threat to the A-10 from the SA-7 was very, very, small. The planned technique of timed flare releases in high threat areas was more than adequate. There was no need include a system to detect and defeat a virtual non-threat.
In 1974 the Russians came out with a new system, the SA-14 (the SA-9 replacement, the SA-13, came out in 1976). They now had a much higher probability of tracking the engines of the A-10 in all aspects, not just tail shots. However, it was still relatively easily defeated by tactics as planned for the SA-7.
It was not until 1981, well after the A-10 had been in production and only a couple years before the last A-10 was produced, that the Russians introduced the SA-16. And the SA-18 in 1983.
Basically the threat matured after the aircraft was designed and already in production.
Hindsight is 20-20. How could one predict an ally in 1988 would turn agaiinst us in 2001?
There is no indication that a US supplied Stinger (as part of Operation Cyclone) has ever been used against US forces. There have been a few suspected Stinger shots and in general no one can say for sure where those weapons came from (see an exception at the bottom of my post here). But the vast majority of the MANPADS shots on US forces have been non-US missiles. Looking at the videos that are released I can't ever recall seeing a Stinger in use. "Stinger" has kind of become the catch-all media phrase for a MANPADS, however the videos I see with yells of "Allahu akbar" in the background all seem to show non-Stinger types, regardless of what the talking heads and banner captions may say.
Some, I would say many, sources state that the Stingers supplied as part of Operation Cyclone were old stock, how old has never been confirmed. The missiles themselves have a limited shelf life, but they don't all turn into pumpkins on their check dates. By 2001 they were all probably well past that shelf life but most were probably still usable. More importantly, the BCU's, Battery Coolant Units, have a much shorter life, and they would have been well beyond that life. Indications are that the BCU also has a higher failure rate and is much more likely to actually fail within a relatively short time after that shelf life is reached.
All of that means that while a very few old Stingers, vs other types of MANPADS, may have been fired on US or Coalition forces, it is very, very, unlikely that any were from units supplied by the US to fight the Russians.
On a more sobering note, and unrelated to Stingers provided to fight the Russians in the 80's, other Stingers have, indeed, been fired at US forces.
On July 25, 2012, a US CH-47 was fired on and struck by a MANPADS. The debris revealed that it was a Stinger. A serial number indicated it was of recent manufacture, and may have been supplied by the US to the Qataris in 2011.
How the Taliban got their hands on modern US missiles | New York Post
This image is indeed of Stingers, and at least one source claims these are ISIS combatants:
http://www.dailystormer.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/stinger1.jpg
T!
There is no doubt that these systems are World class. There is little or no doubt that these, and the Chinese versions of them, are potentially the biggest threat to enemy aviation forces in the arsenal of anyone so equipped. But they are a different world from MANPADS, different application, and threats to different platforms. For example, one would seldom think of the S400 as a threat to helicopters. Although I am sure it is perfectly capable of hitting one, the system should never really have line-of-site to one in a combat situation. By the same token, a MANPADS is no threat to a B-52.
