388th Tactical Ftr. Wing, 34th
Squadron, Korat Thailand, 7/5/67 to 4/22/68
“We Are Going Downtown Today, working the
railroad ----- bridge northeast of Hanoi.
0230 briefing. 7th Air Force
Saigon issued target orders the previous
afternoon: target, route, flack and SAM *1
locations, tanker rendezvous, air rescue
orbit locations, fighter escort
coordination, electronic countermeasures.
Twenty-two aircraft will leave the Thailand
base: sixteen bomb carrying strike craft
(F-105s, Thunderchiefs and two spares, four
SAM suppression craft (Wild Weasels). Eight
air-to-air fighters (F-4, Phantoms) for Mig
protection will join us at the tanker
rendezvous.
Primary target: Hanoi vicinity. Weather at
target; marginally acceptable. Weather in
refueling area; fair. Intelligence briefs
the target: aiming point middle steel
girder span, fifteen degrees cross approach,
four SAM batteries in range plus heavy 37,
57 and 100 mm flak. Expect Mig 19s and 21s.
We lost two thuds yesterday on a target two
miles from this target. We average seven
losses a month. “There ain’t no way. Why
me? I’m golden! There’ll be snakes in the
grass in banana valley today! After all, it
is a counter!!!”
The commander briefs the flight. Take off
Weasels first, then Omaha, Ozark, Gunsmoke
and Winchester. Spares last. Five seconds
between aircraft, ten seconds between
flights. Because of the fog and drizzle, we
may have to stroke the burners during climb
for a visual. Follow radar vectors to the
tankers. Hook up rapidly and try to get a
second top-off prior to drop-off point.
We’ll leave the North station, then Black
River at the hook. Direct to the loop on
red River, direct to Thud Ridge. Southeast
along Thud to the northeast railroad. Right
turn to face the Mig airfield, as we come
off target. Rejoin in flight and egress
northwest over Thud Ridge. Expect Migs and
SAMs inbound, with intense flak at the
target, the same outbound. Post strike
refueling at points indicated. Take on 3000
pounds and head home.
Personal Equipment Shop. Zip on the G-suit
and survival vest with emergency radio and
38 attached. Pick up the chute with
beeper. Replace the bail-out oxygen bottle
with a small machete. Grab two pint plastic
bottles of fresh water and head for the crew
truck.
Fog and drizzle ___ everything wet. Up the
fourteen foot ladder to the cockpit, strap
in and signal to the chief for power. Hit
the shotgun start: tumble, smoke and RPM.
Quick systems check: electronics, radios,
IFF, radar, nav system and gun sight
__”Let’s taxi”
Rolling out of the revetment, I reach up
next to the windshield for my clipboard and
strap it on my right leg. The drizzle has
made most of the mission card illegible.
“Tower to Omaha Flight: cleared on and
off.” Run ‘em up light the burners, release
the brakes, hit the water alcohol switch.
Rolling, and airborne at 196 knots. Good
launch: twenty-two birds off in less than
two minutes. Good join-up in flights of
four, with only a couple of
‘stroke-the-burner’ calls.
On top at 16,000 feet headed for the air
refueling area. Lots of help getting to Red
Anchor orbit point with ground radar
control, airborne radar and forty-four
eyeballs. Tanker join-up, routine. Enough
daylight at 16,000, and we are mostly out of
the clouds, with just a few small bumpers
here and there. The Weasels check in on the
tankers: the Phantoms arrive.
“Omaha to Tanker Lead: drop us off at
nineteen degrees north.” Headed three six
zero toward North Station.
“Ozark four to Lead: primary hydraulic
system out.” “Spare One: Fill in for Ozark
Four. Spare Two: Escort Ozark Four home.”
Passed North Station, turning fifteen
degrees to the Black River. As we steer
right another twenty degrees for the Red,
the Weasels are twenty miles in front
snooping for SAM indications and checking
weather. We cross the Red River, headed for
Thud Ridge.
“Bandits! Bullseye northwest two angels.”
The Migs will play today.
Phantoms move overhead toward the Mig
intercept. Increase run-in speed from 480
to 520 at the northwest end of Thud.
“Weasel to Omaha: SAM indications at 11, 12
and 2 o’clock. The one at 2 looks like a
launch.”- - - - “Launch! Launch! Let’s
take it down.”
Weasel Two’s mike button is stuck open for
five seconds and we can hear the heavy
breathing. Everything seems to be in
order: Weasels attacking the SAM sites,
Phantoms covering the Migs, strike force
entering the Red River Valley.
Forty miles from target, moving ten miles a
minute. The 57 and 100 mm flak begins to
blossom in the formation. I’m concentrating
on navigating to the precise roll-in point.
Visibility about four miles.” I’ll see the
target twenty seconds prior to roll-in. No
time for corrective maneuvers, and even
thought I’d like to glance at the target
photo resting beside the windshield, I can’t
spare three or four seconds.
There it is ___ the bridge. “Omaha Lead
rolling in.”
In peripheral vision a SAM explodes just
ahead and level. I stroke the burner to
accelerate to 580, the ideal dive speed.
Out of burner, stabilize on speed, sixty
degrees and correct for a slight left drift.
“Look out! A Mig just passed me coming
straight up out of the target area ___
passed me canopy to canopy”
Release bombs and pull up right, seven Gs,
vapor over the cockpit, visibility at that
moment zero. All sixteen on and off of the
target in less than a minute: A tight,
precise maneuver. The 37 and 57 mm so thick
it looks like overcast. The bombs are all
over the bridge.
“Winchester Two is hit!”
“I have you in sight, Two. Looks like smoke
coming out. Two! Head for the Ridge!”
“There’s a Mig coming up on Two. Give us
some help.” Omaha Lead coming around left.
Where’s the Mig?”
He fired a missile --- missed Two --- and
headed down. I’ve lost him in the haze.”
Winchester from Omaha: steer 250 degrees for
North Station. I’ll alert the Jolly
Greens. Ozark and Gunsmoke: head out to the
tankers.”
“Winchester Two here. Flameout! I’m
getting out!” “Three here. You’re on fire
from the cockpit back.” Silence! Then the
beeper.
“Three here. He’s out. Got a good chute.”
The beeper continues: a heartbeat.
“Omaha to Winchester. Let’s head for home
Rescue impossible this location”
Only the beeper, as we turn toward the post
strike refueling area. We maneuver to avoid
more SAMs, and the Phantoms still cover us
against the Mig threat. Post strike
refueling is routine at 24,000 feet. We
head for home base at 0800 ---- a beautiful
morning with the sun still low, streaming
between the cumulous saddlebacks.
(Note: Winchester Two was taken prisoner by
the Vietnamese in August 1967. He was
released with the American prisoners.)”
Colonel Mervin Taylor, U.S. Air Force, Rtd.
That remembrance deals with one of the 118
missions Merv Taylor flew over North Vietnam
in 1967, and it was typical. I had flown
with Merv and his identical twin brother Irv
in my first assignment out of flying school,
the 1st Fighter Wing, 27th
Squadron. The twins and I went our separate
ways to combat in Korea.
 |
Merv Taylor and F-86 in 1950 |
One day the twins parted with a ‘See you
later” in the barbershop-hooch of a base in
South Korea as Irv went to the flight line
for another combat air mission of ground
attack in the F-80C jet. It was the last
time they would ever see each other: Merv
lost his other half that day.
Merv arrived at Korat Royal Thai Air Base,
Thailand ahead of me, assigned as Assistant
Wing Operations Officer, a non-flying job.
Insisting on flying combat, he wrangled
abbreviated F-105 training in Japan. In
spite of the extreme trauma of losing Irv in
combat and finishing his Korean tour, Merv
volunteered to fly combat again, this time
again in ground attack on the highest risk
missions in Vietnam. To him it was a call
to duty and an obligation. Merv Taylor
epitomized the pilots who took on that
daunting and hazardous task: men whom I am
so proud to have the honor of calling my
comrades. As good fortune would prevail, I
flew missions in the same squadron with Merv.
A 34th squadron party was held
when we arrived, to award some of those
nearing mission completion and welcome the
three of us.
We
hurried to the city of Korat, my first of
only two visits there, to acquire black
“formal flight suits” for that event, which
were adorned with the usual flair of
military patches, one especially pleasing
was to tell the leaders of North Vietnam to
shove it by choosing their favorite
expression for American Pilots, “Yankee Air
Pirates!” .
 |
Merv makes Full Colonel. TEN-HUT! |
Actually, I
found limited use for it after our dinner
with new squadron mates, as the tempo of
maximum effort strike missions had reached a
peak. Being my first contact with Merv in
16 years, it was a very happy reunion and it
was combined with a celebration of his new
rank of “Bird Colonel”.
The party was especially timely for us
to meet many of the 34th pilots
we were beginning to fly missions with and
to accept our first symbolic mark of
acceptance to the 34th.
A few squadron pilots were awarded the 34th
“Blue Max” after 90 missions, the point at
which each was declared “Golden”, signifying
they could decline the most hazardous
missions, if they chose, including George
Clausen, whom I replaced as squadron
commander.
 |
34th Sqd. Black Suit Party: Rows Left to Right,
Top Row: Hugh Davis, Harry Paddon, Dalton Leftwich.
Middle Row: Skeets Heinzig, Larry Hoppe, Maintenance Officer, Jim Daniels, Clyde Falls, Jake Schuler, Spence Armstrong, Red Evans, Dave Egleman, Dave Waldrop, Don Hodge, Sam Morgan, Irv Levine, Buddy Barner, Bob Crane.
Bottom Row: Bob Elliot, Bill Blakeslee, Ken Mays, John Flynn, Jim Bean, Dave Dixon, George Clausen, or, Rod Giffin, Bob Smith, Jim King, Ray Vissotsky, Billy Givens, Don Revers, Vern Ellis. |
 |
(G)olden guys with Blue Max and New Guys: L/R Back: Unidentified, Rod Giffin (G), George Clausen (G): Buddy Barner, Front: Don Hodge, Bob Smith, Jim Bean, Spence Armstrong. |
We new guys were awarded the “Snoopy”,
imaginary friend of the real life dog, our
Wing mascot Roscoe.
One of the pilots who happened to miss this
photo op deserves special mention.
Lieutenant Leonard ‘Lucky’ Eckman displayed
courage and lived up to his nickname by
finally recording the highest number of Thud
combat hours 460 while completing 153
missions in the process. I was unaware
until recently, that Lucky had been shot
down and rescued on 31 May 1966, so that’s
one Thud pilot who survived while flying
during the entire period of the highest Thud
losses during the war.
 |
Lucky Eckman checks CBU bombs
before Strike Force |
After arriving at Korat, I spent every day
of every week for the next seven months on
duty there, with the exception of two breaks
of 3 days each in Taiwan. The only
exception, some months hence, was a C-47
Gooney Bird round trip for an evening and
dinner in Bangkok to talk with an editor of
Aviation Week magazine for an article on our
combat missions. On that flight, I escorted
the casket of our squadron mate, Billy
Givens, for his final journey home. He had
been killed on a ‘go-around’ for landing at
Korat, after returning from a mission, so
like others was not counted in the combat
losses. The memories of my combat tours in
Korea and Vietnam both have the bitter,
sweet content of losses of friends and
comrades mixed with some of the most
exciting and challenging adventures and
camaraderie of my life.
Our Wing Commander, Col. Edward Burdett was
new to his job, as was his Deputy, Col. John
Flynn. They were both outstanding leaders
and brave gentlemen, with very different
personalities. Ed Burdett was very serious
and dry, making him difficult to relate
with. John, with whom I trained in Wichita,
was very jovial and open. John’s
introduction of me to my new Wing Commander
pointed out, with some admiration, I
suppose, that I didn’t fly with a G-suit,
and I had not for many years. Burdett said
to me, “Don’t you ever climb into one of my
airplanes without a G-suit!” and I never
did. The crew chief was always kind enough
to carry it back down the ladder to await my
return from the mission.
John was one of the finest individuals I
have ever known and because he admired my
flying in training, he assured that I was
reassigned from our sister wing, the 355th
at Takhli to the 388th at Korat.
I was given command of the 34th
Fighter Squadron, one of the two attack
squadrons. The other was the 469th,
while the 44th, a smaller unit
than strike, was assigned strictly for
surface to air missile (SAM) defense.
Traditionally combat fighter pilots came
directly from TAC fighter assignments, but
that source dried up with the new A.F. goal
for no pilot to have a second tour before
others had their first. We had four
lieutenant colonels assigned to and flying
in the squadron, two of them senior to me,
but I was selected as squadron commander,
because of experience. That never was a
problem, for me and I don’t believe it was
for them either, in fact they could get on
with combat flying and without the added
responsibility for a 350 man organization.
I never worked so hard or slept so little in
my life as I did for those seven months.
There was a great difference between
experienced fighter pilots and the
increasing number of others that were
novices or lacking in pertinent flying, some
limited to copilot experience in B-52s, a
long reach to unique fighter skills. It
required more courage to face the rigors of
combat without the security of confidence in
yourself and your aircraft. That
increasingly greater problem of inadequate
experience became a source of many
difficulties and dangers in conducting our
missions.
The problems were exacerbated by the fact
that the tempo of combat operations was too
great to permit any training, flight or
ground school. Maintenance test hops were
the only non-combat flights, solo and for
the experienced. One of the fine leaders in
the 34th was Major Roger
Ingvalson, who became an excellent
Operations Officer was valiant,
but was shot down and became a prisoner of
war. Roger was an excellent and experienced
fighter pilot with 4000 hours in fighters,
1600 of them in the F-105. He recalled an
example of a typical mission and the
difficulties for the unskilled and
inadequately trained and it’s outcome:
“I guess that my most emotional
experience as Operations Officer was dealing
with a pilot from my cadet class in 1952.
He was enthusiastic but a very weak pilot.
He stayed in trainers, and performed well as
a “Mosquito” pilot, flying hazardous forward
air control missions in the Korean War. But
he yearned to be a fighter pilot, all those
years, though never got a chance.
As the need for replacements grew
he was able to fulfill his wish by
volunteering for the F-105 school and a tour
in Vietnam. After six brief months of
limited flying, like too many others, he was
sent to join us, under some of the most
trying conditions of weather and combat
tactics. It had been nearly 16 years since I
saw him and he couldn’t wait to relate his
life-long dream coming through. On his third
mission, typically in an area of light
defenses at that stage of his tour, he was
returning to good weather at home plate.
They encountered some weather
enroute to Korat and he made a cardinal sin
when he fell out of formation and failed to
turn immediately away from formation. In
attempting to rejoin, they had a mid-air
collision and he bailed out above a
thunderstorm. He died in friendly
territory. The leader landed safely with
four feet missing from his right wing.”
We
had more than enough fine officers killed as
a result of direct combat to make seemingly
unnecessary sacrifices very difficult to
endure, and the risks were imposed on the
whole team, not just the unskilled.
Because of the demands that two major combat
missions daily placed on us, especially
those pilots who had significant management,
there was little time for anything but
work. For all, nightlife was curtailed, as
we were up shortly after midnight for
morning missions and finished debrief after
dark for the afternoon strikes. The old
movie vision of heavy drinking fighter
pilots was not to be found. Ground crews
worked around the clock and I assure you
that you have never suffered mosquitoes like
those on the flight line all night, in
Thailand. And the greatest attractor for
them is jet fuel, JP-4! Just visiting them
on occasion made me wonder how they put up
with that! They not only did it, but I have
never found aircraft more excellently cared
for and serviced.
Weather permitting, we flew two maximum
effort strike missions to the heartland of
the enemy each day, plus individual flight
and element combat sorties to lower threat
parts of North Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.
Even the latter could not be taken for milk
runs, accounting for the loss of large
numbers of F-105s and crews. Only missions
to NVN were “counters”, 100 missions
counters being the ticket home. A week on
Rest and Recuperation, except for a few in
leadership, affected pilot availability.
The relished brief flight-line celebrations
of tour completion, 100 Mission Parties, led
to the frequent arrival of replacements. And
the lack of fighter experience with many of
the new arrivals provided a challenge in
scheduling combat sorties and especially in
developing the necessary teamwork at a
flight level. Thus, the face of the
squadron was in constant change, and without
the opportunity for training. I hadn’t been
there more than a couple of months when we
added a squadron sign in front of our hooch
area and many new faces appeared in a
photo. Only the names of “old heads” from a
few months before are underlined, to give a
sense of the impact of change. And with
each group of new guys the percentage of
fighter experience declined.
 |
Front L to R, Bill Thomas, Jim Barr, Clancy Langford, Dave Igleman, Ed Hartman, John Murphy, Ben Fuhrman, Jack Brooks, Bob Moore, Monty Pharmer, Roger Ingvalson, Darrell Aherens. Back Row, L to R, Jim Metz, Bill Blakeslee, Jim Ross, Carl Light, Don Hodge, Gary Durkee, Larry Bogemann, Bob Smith, Mel Irwin, Joe Sechler, Bill Shunney, Ken Everett, Ivor Goodrich, Sam Bass |
I cannot properly recognize each of the
young heroes in the earlier photo who helped
me get up to speed in a few weeks. For all,
there was only “on-the-job training” because
of a heavy combat schedule. Sometimes I
learned on their wing and sometimes with
them flying mine. One of those was Clyde
Falls, who was very aggressive, which I
liked in fighter pilots, if they had skills
to go with it, as he did. His wingmen on
his 100th mission told how he
“hung it out” going very low in his attack
on trucks with this 20mm gun. As he parked
after the mission to his celebration,
crewmen were surprised at a hole in his bird
where a 37mm shell had come up through the
belly and didn’t explode and then went right
up through the cockpit and out the canopy!
Sadly, Clyde was killed in an F-106, about a
month after returning to the States.
One of the newcomers, Bill Thomas carried
courage to the top, after we left, flying
200 missions. He survived to surpass Capt.
Karl Richter’s 198, but luck was unkind to
both and Bill, a gentle man, as well a super
jock, was killed in an operational accident
in an F-105, like Karl also was, before he
secured that amazing number. Karl Richter
and Bill Thomas epitomize the courageous
young fighter pilots. Karl earned special
recognition by downing an enemy MiG early in
his tour, at the ripe old age of 23.
 |
Lt. Karl Richter with wingman
Lt. Fred Wilson, after MiG kill |
In the first two months of my tour, 35 F-105
crewmen were downed. That introduction to
combat put the odds of getting shot down in
100 missions as a near certainty. And my
squadron’s loss of three of our 16 pilots on
one of my earliest missions in a way made
the tour easier by virtue of accepting that
risk early on. Time proved the cause of that
extreme loss rate, was that almost every
sortie was on strike missions to the highest
threat areas twice daily. As weather
patterns and political targeting decisions
from Washington targets varied so did that
equation of death, and we endured our
highest risks right at the beginning.
Significant risk was always there.
Every person at Korat played a vital role in
our mission, but none worked harder and
under more trying conditions than our flight
line crewmen. The around-the-clock activity
was 365 days a year, and summer days could
be unbearably hot, but it was nights that
were torture. Mosquitoes abound in Thailand
and they love three things greatly:
Nighttime; Aroma of Jet Fuel; and Human
Blood. Those crew chiefs, weapons and
systems specialists, refueling crews etc, on
the line at night paid in very hard work,
under terrible conditions. And daytime was
no picnic.
 |
Around the clock+ Hanoi special 2 + munitions. |
The squadron strength was well above normal
manning because of the endless efforts,
averaging about 350 members. Changing
personnel was the norm, but we gathered,
with the available squadron pilots on the
wing, and available day shift of line
personnel for a photo tribute to all those
who worked so hard with so little
recognition. I stood in the cockpit,
alongside the available pilots standing on
the wing, thin and tall with optical
distortion from the wide-angle lens. A
representative group of our day crew from
the flightline joined us in front. I have
had both pilots and crewmen contact me, even
recently, as they learned of the photo
through the grapevine.
 |
34th Tactical Fighter Squadron, Early 1968 |
The F-105, Thunderchief was an airplane that
had endured much maligning in its early
years, including my own jibes, when my buddy
Howard Leaf was nearly killed while testing
one at Eglin AFB. So many examples of that
old bird’s durability tell a tale of saving
pilots, and both sometimes returning to
fight again.
The
two strike Squadrons each had about 30
F-105D and the Wild Weasel squadron about 15
two seat F-105F. I might add that the
picture of Maj. Bill McClelland standing up
in the hole in his wing was almost
duplicated by another heavy AAA round in the
wing of an F-105, which Col. John Flynn also
brought safely home on one of his first few
missions, and like the others they went
right back to war; pilots the next day and
airplanes with a new wing and patches
elsewhere.
 |
Maj. Bill McClelland inspects 85 mm AAA shell damage |
The F-105D was the only fighter in our
arsenal that was capable of the required
long-range conventional bombing sorties,
with its payloads and durability. Though
not the original intent, the capability
existed in spite of its being designed as a
Mach 2 nuclear fighter-bomber, with an
internal bomb bay. It was capable of
supersonic speed on the deck. That kind of
speed was out with external stores, but high
speed was treasured on bombing dives and
exiting the target areas. The Thud offered
versatility of multiple weapons stations on
the wings allowing: two 3000-pound bombs,
midwing, or the capability to carry six
750-pound bombs on a belly-mounted Multiple
Ejection Rack, added to combinations of
external jamming pods, air-to-air missiles,
or air-to-ground missiles on additional wing
stations. The D could also carry two
anti-SAM Shrike missiles, fired on Weasel
command when escorting anti-SAM Wild Weasel
airplanes. And we carried two 450 gallon
wing-mounted fuel tanks with the 750s or a
650 gal. belly-mounted tank with the 3000s.
The nuclear bomb bay was converted for more
internal fuel.
 |
Munitions line crew loads
20 mm Gatling cannon ammunition. |
Its integral, 6000
rounds per minute, 20 mm Gatling cannon had
limited use for our primary missions, but
was valued to protect downed pilots and the
chopper crews extracting them from the
jungles, and also downed a few Mig fighters
along the way. It protected downed flyers a
few times and
also served to destroy MiG
fighter aircraft and I found it a great
hunting gun, for enemy fuel and supply
trucks, on the way home from our primary
missions to Hanoi.
A two-seat version, F-105F, upgraded to
G-model in the last part of the war, were
two seat aircraft with a specialist in the
back, equipped to detect and locate surface
to air missile (SAM) sites and deter their
effectiveness or destroy them with radar
seeking missiles and standard munitions.
Two F’s flew with two F-105Ds to form Wild
Weasel flights, which escorted our strike
missions. That bird, at 50,000 pounds, was
as heavy on take-off as a fully loaded B-17
of WW II, carried as much weapons tonnage,
but with one crewman and one engine.
“Thud” gained endearment from its pilots in
Vietnam, a war that ended its life, as well
as the lives of many of its crewmen. That
bird had one Achilles heel, where the dual
hydraulic control systems merged below the
rudder. Barring a major hit there or in the
engine, it could often fly home seriously
wounded, sometimes to fly again.
The fact that many downed pilots returned to
fly again says a great deal about their
courage and even more about the guts and
skills of our Air Rescue crews, who faced
great risks to extract downed flyers,
whenever the environment was not so bad that
recovery was impossible or the distance out
of range. They willingly risked death or
capture if there was the a chance of saving
crews. But the distance was too far, and the
odds were too impossible in the heartland of
North Vietnam (NVN).