The most onerous thing that stuck with me
throughout the tour, and to this day, was
the nature of the “Rules of Engagement”
which so often imposed added risks to life
for our men in order to avoid collateral
damage to the enemy. We had to pass
repeated tests on the rules and the standing
joke on failure was the simple question,
“What do they do, send you home?” The
obvious was you passed, period! These were
just bottom of a hierarchy of orders and
resulting rules that killed the military in
Vietnam, unnecessarily. Beginning with the
concept of Measured Response to the NVN
actions.
The results of the political attitude was so
onerous that it resulted later in the
“Weinberger-Powell Doctrine” of 1994, in
which Gen. Colin Powell, Chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of the military, defined the
‘Necessary Conditions for Committing Troops’
in the future (which had been ignored for
Vietnam): Those conditions were stated as:
Vital national interest; Other options
exhausted; Commitment of sufficient force to
win; and Determination to finish the job.
Some, if not all of these have since led to
casualty avoidance of our military, but that
seemed not to be a serious concern in
Vietnam.
Sure, we have a few military goof-heads like
a retired Army Chief of Staff, claiming that
reducing American ground casualties by using
air power in Kosovo and Serbia in 1999 was
immoral, when Americans were there doing the
job and taking the risks for Europe’s
nations that requested us. And retired
Marine Lt. General Bernard E. Trainor wrote
abut that issue in the Boston Globe:
“Despite the accuracy of the air attacks,
too many civilians were killed while allied
combatants avoided risk. This turns a
principle of a just war on its
head...specifically, the obligation to
protect the innocent at the expense of the
warrior.” A small few (more candidly, few
“small’) ground force leaders were miffed by
their exclusion in those campaigns, but
their rationale is ridiculous: Defining the
humanity index of a war on the willingness
of a nations leaders to accept losses, which
I presume made Russian rights under Stalin
and Germany’s under Hitler, the most just
wars of modern history.
The very liberal “Human Rights Watch” put
the total civilian casualties at 500 in
Kosovo and Serbia, and we had no
casualties. Would thousands of ground
troops have reduced those 500, and even if
that had been certain, why should hundreds
or thousands of American youngsters have
been sacrificed, for campaigns taken on the
request of Old Europe?
The Vietnam War was conducted as Gen.
Trainor would have had it. Many rules were
ridiculous, for example, if we had hung
bombs in the most heavily defended areas we
had to carry them off to dump them, instead
of instantaneous emergency release. The
rule imposed a very high risk, especially
with one hung 3000-pound bomb. Imagine how
suddenly the Thud would roll over and crash
at 5 g’s, with an inertial weight of 15,000
pounds differential between the two wings,
one with a bomb hung half way out its
length. It forced a very gentle pull-up
from the dive to just miss the ground, thus
a deeper penetration into the flak and no
evasive opportunity for escape, until miles
away. And in almost every case, the
emergency ejection of a bomb on its rack
resulted in a dud. And the stated purpose of
such rules was to keep us from inadvertently
killing any of the North Vietnamese gunners
or their friends, relatives, or neighbors.
Unfortunately that administration’s rules
were not to endanger the enemy citizens if
the lives of young Americans could be risked
to avoid it.
Here’s an actual mission example of how a
few other of the many rules reduced our
ability to do great damage, when we got an
upper hand on the enemy. I flew on this one.
The target was an enemy truck park in
northern Laos, identifiable even at our
cruise altitude by the numerous dirt roads
leading to that jungle area. We had passed
by many times but never could attack
because, as scuttlebutt had it, the local
chieftains were bribed by NVN. We lost many
pilots going for less valuable resources of
the enemy, which had fierce defenses. Maybe
the NVN didn’t pay the parking permit that
day, because both Thud wings were suddenly
diverted from our scheduled strike force
attack to hit it. First we dropped our
bombs, then we took turns strafing with our
Gatling 20 mm cannon.
There must have been pandemonium in that
jungle area, which had been a sanctuary.
Huge explosions and fires erupted under the
trees, and trucks went flying into the air.
Obviously, there was great destruction but
probably only a small portion of what must
have been stored in such a large area of
many square miles, and we faced no
significant defenses. The mission didn’t
count toward our ticket home (100), but who
cared with such results, and we hurriedly
returned to base, confident we would rearm
and return to destroy more munitions headed
to the south, and expected that would
continue until darkness, or explosions
ceased. After all, by the next morning they
might have everything valuable moved away.
We did not return that day or ever again, to
this or any other of those areas, although I
believe we probably did more to disrupt the
war in the south on that mission than all
but a very few to the north. Apparently, the
NVN learned their lesson and paid the
Laotian politicians more!
What made these situations so hard to accept
was that on occasion we had weather aborts
and could have decimated places such as
this, and we knew where they were. Instead
we dropped safe tied bombs in the jungles.
RADAR FOLLIES
What happened to us for a while I could best
call folly created by national leaders,
though disaster might be more to the point.
Our Thuds had ground radar, but so limited
that they were not even effective for
navigation and absolutely useless for attack
in Vietnam. They were not even maintained
in working order. In their defense, they
could have done very well on finding a major
metropolis worthy of a nuclear weapon in
their intended design mission. The
following italicized facts written by Spence
Armstrong describes a prime example of the
extremes to which The Pentagon stretched to
satisfy political gains, no matter the
military risks. I can think of no one more
qualified since “Sam” as he is more widely
known showed his courage by flying more of
this dangerous and unrewarding missions as
any others of us. I have interjected
commentary between segments:
“About six months prior to my
arrival, the Air Force had responded to the
fact that the U.S. Navy A-6’s could use
radar to bomb North Vietnam when low clouds
prevented the Air Force from dive bombing.
The solution, approved by General Ryan the
Chief of Staff, was to direct the F-105F’s
to do single ship, night, level bombing
using the pitiful radar with which all
F-105’s were equipped—including our
F-105D’s. Since the EWO’s weren’t trained
in this radar delivery, pilots occupied the
rear seat for this mission. Newly arrived,
junior pilots found themselves in this
unenviable position. Several of these
aircraft did not return from their night
missions. We never did know what happened
to them. Bob Stewart, the number one
graduate of West Point ’56 and a friend of
mine in Primary Pilot Training, was a
casualty of these missions just before I
arrived. Since this mission was so patently
dumb, the crews called themselves “Ryan’s
Raiders”, a not too reverent reflection on
then Chief of Staff. They even designed a
shoulder patch, which depicted an F-105F
with a huge screw penetrating it from the
bottom.
The cessation of that abortive and costly
experiment was merely a hiatus until the bad
weather began to impede our strike missions,
once again. That time we began flying a new
kind of radar attack to Pack VI:
ground-radar controlled missions, whenever
weather would not allow us to attack
visually with the strike force. Small teams
of American airmen were moved into
mountainous areas of Laos and Cambodia and
set up ground radar sites. Those teams
lived in significant peril, some in areas
where international agreement denied it, so
they were offered little or no ground
protection. That decision was made to guide
our strike missions above the clouds under
radar control. This method was dubbed, “Sky
Spot”.
It seemed incongruous that we were flying
under rules of engagement that placed us at
added risks to protect the enemy from
collateral damage, yet we were dropping
bombs above total cloud cover in level
formation like B-17s in Europe. Especially
since we had been admonished by Washington
for putting NVN populace at risk, just a few
month before:
On the 5th of October,
all of the pilots were called to a briefing
in the Base Theater. Col. Ed (Red)
Burdette, our wing commander had just
returned from a mandatory meeting in Saigon
with General Momyer, the 7th Air
Force commander. The purpose of the meeting
was to relate to the wing commanders of all
of the combat wings the concern that existed
in Washington that civilians were being
killed in our bombing attacks.
Col. Burdette dutifully passed on
the admonition to be more accurate in our
bombing—he never alluded to the fact that he
had been instructed to make this speech
although we all knew this was the case. He
was true to the modicum that commanders
never alibi their directions on higher
headquarters.
The term Sky Spot itself was a deceit
although the bombs were dropped from a spot
in the sky, that’s obvious, but no one could
know where they would impact the ground.
Deceit was explicit in the certainty of huge
errors of maps and radar, leveraged by great
distances between radar and target, added to
the inaccuracies of high altitude releases
in level flight. All our worst dive-bombing
attacks in a month could never achieve the
risks to civilian population from 96 bombs
scattered over an unknown area in an
indeterminately broad pattern on a 16 ship
Sky Spot! Yet we were chastised for the
former ordered to do the latter.
And, the crowning blow was that we were
directed to be in tight formation over
target. This was like sending us a death
wish! When flying over cloud cover only our
ECM formation offered us any security that
the surface to air missiles might miss the
airplanes as they passed through that broad
formation. Not only was protection negated,
in tight formation, our ECM pods helped the
enemy by giving a better ‘paint’ of us and a
very high probability of a kill, by the SAM
crew merely selecting their proximity fuse
at launch!
Sky Spot missions were of absolutely no
military value, but allowed Washington to
continue adding to the tonnage count in
America’s newspapers, during inclement
weather. Bomb tonnage and enemy casualties
in SVN were the major indicators claimed as
measure of success by the Administration,
but meant squat militarily. Spence recently
read a book (which considering his
graduation from Annapolis is amazing) on
those missions: ‘One Day Too Long’ by author
Timothy Castle. Here is what Spence said
about the book and his own experience:
“It tells the story of the
clandestine radar site that was placed at
Channel 97 in Northern Laos. Since we were
signatories to the 1962 Neutrality Treaty
for Laos, we had to do things covertly. In
fact, we weren't even supposed to be bombing
there and Air America really didn't exist!
He talks about the Commando Club missions
run out of what was called Lima Site 85
co-located with the Channel 97 TACAN. I
think that I flew on every one that was
flown into Pack VI until we stopped that
fiasco after Col. Burdette was shot down.
The NVA scaled the mountain on March 10,
1968 and killed 11 Air Force personnel.
Some were lifted out by helicopter but the
folks in Saigon were reluctant to evacuate
the folks even though they were under
artillery attack from a sizable NVA force.
They had the stupid idea that the site was
directing the missions into Pack VI. There
were other radar sites that directed
Commando Club missions in the Lower Packs,
Barrel Roll and Steel Tiger in Laos…..I also
have a record in my log about being diverted
to Channel 97 (that's the way we referred to
it) on March 11. They had us strike some
targets a few miles from the mountain. I
know now that the folks were already dead or
evacuated at that time.”
Don Hodge, an excellent Flight Leader,
recalls a mission he flew in an impossible
effort to protect those American’s, some
known to have been savagely executed:
“ I remember
Sandy (Forward Air Controllers in Laos)
spotting a target at the base of a sheer
cliff in the area of Channel 97. I dropped
my 6 /750 pounders on the smoke & made 20 mm
passes, about that time. Later read the NVN
Commander’s version of what happened that
day. He had an overwhelming force that
killed all of the Americans, however the
exact date was not disclosed in it.”
One victim of this ill-conceived political
scheme was Col. Burdette, sent to prison in
Hanoi, along with two other Thud jocks that
day. Ed Burdette died as a captive. His
downing made us all a victim because we
never got a replacement capable of Wing
leader in my tour, but it wouldn’t end
there. I’m not sure what finally brought
Sky Spot to an end, but a story persists
that 355th Wing Commander Col.
Giraudo, known for his fire and courageous
leadership, refused for that wing to fly Sky
Spot. If so, that is another of my reasons
for great respect of that man.
Those Sky Spot missions were an expediency
to continue supporting a con job on the
newspapers and ultimately the public, which
politically outweighed the lives of our
pilots. That political house of cards
finally failed but took with it the respect
for Vietnam veterans and a good measure of
our military’s deserved and excellent
reputation, both of which have finally
reemerged.
And Then There Were None
I never heard a bad word spoken of our wing
leaders: Col. Ed Burdette, Wing Commander:
Col. John Flynn, Wing Vice C.O.: And Col Jim
Bean, Deputy for Operations, who was a very
experienced fighter pilot. They were fine
leaders and courageous combat pilots. They
each started flying missions in early
October and John Flynn, after his serious
damage by AAA, was downed by a Surface to
Air Missile on 27 October, the last mission
I ever had the pleasure of flying with him.
Ed Burdette was downed on 18 November and
Jim Bean made it only to 3 January before
he, too, was brought down by AAA. That our
entire wing staff was lost to us in little
more than two months was a serious blow, but
the courage with which the squadrons
responded to that was a credit to all of our
flight crews.
There is one defining difference between
survival in aerial combat and in our Thud
tour. Ground attack is luck based, which is
a lot tougher on the psyche. If a pilot did
the job to the best of his ability, there
was nothing to influence his probability of
getting home, except his ability to avoid an
accident. One thing about chance is that
every occurrence stands on its own. Nothing
displayed the lack of associative properties
of probabilities, thus the uncertainty of
risks, more than our loss of that entire
staff within a few months of their arrival.
Shortly after I had arrived, Col. Flynn took
the big hit from an 85mm AAA battery that
allowed him to stand inside the wing for a
picture and I’d hoped, but knew better, that
gave some security to a very favorite
leader. Col. John and that particular Thud,
were both tough cookies and continued to fly
more missions, but chance has no memory and
he was downed and became a P.O.W. on 27
October 1967, less than a month after his
first mission. John Flynn endured the
terror and pain suffered by a lot of fine
and brave American airman in the “Hanoi
Hilton”. John has passed on but he will
remain in my heart and mind as one of the
finest, most courageous, most loyal and
honest commanders I ever had, and I had a
few great ones, and that’s more than one man
deserves in a career. There aren’t many who
endear themselves in such a short friendship
as John Flynn did.
Col. Ed Burdette, a fine officer and brave
leader, was lost on a Sky Spot radar
mission, a fool’s risk, and it was not he
but the planners in Washington who were the
fools. The Sky Spot radar control missions
were a travesty in practice and they were
implemented without principles, as
explained. He was shot down before
Christmas ’67 and was reported by the NVN to
have died in captivity, one of 18 of our
courageous countrymen who not just suffered
capture, but with it death.
Col. James E. Bean, joined the 388th
Wing just and was shot down on 3 January 68,
only about 4 months into his tour. I had
known Jim a long time before when he flew
the F-105 in the original TAC operational
testing at Eglin, in 1958/59, when I was
flying test there. Jim also got home, with
the survivors, released in February 1973.
That was seven terrible years that John and
Jim gave for their country and Col.
Burdette, faced the deprivations and finally
death.
The replacements for our top three wing
leaders were more titular than commanding,
as far as flying operations, for various
reasons. Col. Graham, the replacement for
Col. Burdette, was not qualified to fly
combat, proved to be a respected officer and
a kind man, but died of heart failure soon
after joining us. A temporary replacement
was flown in from Japan, and was hardly
noticeable. I can’t remember him, the
duration or even his name.
From that point on, we took care of
ourselves from the squadron level, because
the replacements for our leaders that we got
saddled with were neither replacements nor
leaders! It was quite some time before we
got the last Wing Commander, during my
tour. Col. Paul P. Douglas arrived as our
new Wing C.O. and I will never forget him,
but for all the wrong reasons. He was one
of the strangest Air Force officers I ever
knew with a cigar almost as large as the
man, himself, and he was little in every
respect. He was incompetent in the role and
downright dangerous flying and never led or
even flew on a strike force mission, and I
was damned glad of that.
After Jim Bean was lost he was replaced by
Col. James Stewart, who was a lieutenant in
the 1st Group, attached to fly
with us in the 27th squadron at
Rome, NY. I was delighted to see him and
took him on my wing on his first strike
mission to the heartland of the enemy. We
encountered typical defenses and some added
85 mm AAA on the way home, from the place we
called the gunnery school, near Dien Bien
Phu. We thought nothing of that, and a bit
of jinking protected us from their
individual sites.
One burst hit in his general vicinity, no
real threat, and he overreacted like someone
in panic. The sight was surreal and,
frankly, when it was over I was laughing, as
we flew safely away, because it was such a
humorous sight to see his obviously panicked
and unusual gyrations while we made gentle
turns. Compared to any attack in Pack VI
this was incidental. After that first
mission, he began selectively choosing
missions. It seemed that whenever we had a
strike mission to Pack VI he would discover
that he had a job that kept him from flying
and his antics required last our squadrons
last minute rescheduling. I insisted he meet
our schedule or fly with the other squadron.
Over the years I have received letters from
some of our pilots and the comments on both
of these “Leaders” have been very
disparaging of their performance,
capabilities and integrity. What a great let
down from the three we started with.
I expected there would be some payback on
that matter, since Stewart would write my
Officer’s Evaluation Report for my entire
tour, and there was. I must have been the
only combat Squadron Commander in history to
receive an Air Force Cross and Silver Star
but not an outstanding officer evaluation.
It really held no importance to me, because
I decided before I volunteered for Vietnam
that I would retire soon after returning
home, upon reaching 20 years, because he
wasn’t the first colonel that I had bucked!
There were a couple others, in earlier
times. Like those other two, he was smart
enough to give me magnificent praise in the
prose, but a rating number so low that no
promotion board would ever see it.
I could not abide any combat pilot who would
not try to share the load, and worse yet one
who refused to fight, and there were only a
few in my two war experiences. Early in my
tour I heard a lieutenant colonel in the 44th
Wild Weasel Squadron of our wing had quit
flying for fear of combat and was being
reassigned. My thoughts went back to a
young F-86 pilot, second lieutenant, who did
that in Japan as we were being readied by
the 4th Wing to start our combat
tour in Korea. He was the first and only
coward I saw there, and I felt prison should
have been the least of his punishment.
Apparently, here was a guy who lived the
good life for 18 years and would likely be
allowed to get out of flying duties and
continue to retirement. I took that very
personally, in light of the young flyers I
was responsible for. I requested from Jim
Bean that he be transferred to the 34th.
I would put him in the back seat of an F
model and fly him on my strike missions,
until he chose to return to full combat duty
or resign his commission. I figured to fly
only one mission that way, and get the
closest view of Hanoi that anyone but the
natives ever had, no matter the risk. I
figured he’d resign on just one try, or
maybe at briefing. My suggestion didn’t fly
nor, I suppose, did the lieutenant colonel,
but I hope he somehow never reached
collection of retirement benefits.
In comparison, I had a young pilot come to
me when we were going on almost every
mission into Pack VI, who asked to be
relieved of flying. He would throw up
before each mission and was truly panicked
by the threat, but was doing the job. I
told him that I would take steps to get him
off flying, but dismissed from the service,
if that was what he chose. I told him:
“You’re a young man with a long life ahead.
Think about what I am saying and come back
tomorrow with your decision. You have
yourself and your wife, and some day
children. If you quit now you will look
into the mirror every morning when you shave
and know for the rest of your life that you
are looking at the face of a coward! It’s
the same face they will look at. That
decision will determine what it is you
really can’t stand.”
He came back and chose to continue flying
combat. A couple of months later I had to
assign an experienced F-105 combat pilot to
move to 7th Air Force HQ in
Saigon, the only such instance during my
tour. He was not yet finished his tour, but
had flown a fair number of very tough
missions and I honestly believe, under his
circumstances he displayed courage. I
transferred him to Saigon.
I had started this tour delighted with the
attitudes, professionalism and courage of
the top echelon in the 388th
Wing, but with three losses in less months
the rest of my tour I found that then there
were none!
In War There Was Hope
 |
Col. Graham, Wing Commander, acting, presents F-105 model to Bob Hope as he entertained troops as Korat for Christmas |
During WW II and from Korea we learned that
Bob Hope was synonymous with Christmas to
troops at war. That holiday was right
around the corner, though things changed
little if any during holidays, as even days
of the week tended to be a vague concept.
Imagine the excitement of troops when we
were notified that Bob Hope’s annual
Christmas Show would come to us at Korat.
Col. Graham, greeted Bob Hope on behalf of
the 388th and our Army neighbors.
The excitement had peaked with the arrival
of the troupe and the show was a great
success. We commanders, who were escorts,
dined with the entertainers and Bob Hope was
very pleasant and enjoyable. The two
performers that I especially impressed me
were Les Brown who was famous for his Band
of Renown and Barbara McNair, the
attractive, friendly and unassuming black
singer. They were both such unassuming and
down to earth people that it was wonderful
just to talk with them and be in their
presence.
On the other hand, I was assigned as
personal escort to actress Raquel Welch, who
was a pleasure to look at and a pain to
listen to, singing or talking. Except for
the World’s most famous Aviatrix, who
probably earned her right, Raquel was the
master of first person pronouns and was well
practiced in their use…. I, my, me, myself
and mine... flowed from her lips like wine!
I wrote to Martha that I tucked Raquel in
bed! Actually, while she napped, I sat and
talked with her husband and ‘manager’, a
nice young guy whom I pitied and she soon
divorced.
Tactics and Techniques
I had never been a member of a tactical
squadron that had air-to-ground attack as a
mission. A couple flights of dive bombing
in my F-5 test program was my only related
experience, before training for NVN. Those
of us who had a lot of fighter experience
got a lot out of our dozen dive bomb
training sorties; 48 drops, but wished for
more. And I had a big leg up because I
started with an excellent ability to achieve
dive angle due to an unusual opportunity in
flight-testing gained 10 years before. That
angle was a primary parameter for accuracy
and quite difficult to achieve very
accurately. Use of the attitude ball seems
feasible, but if that’s what one relied on
he was not accurate.
The accuracy of bombing has made a quantum
leap in recent years. Now the need to dive
bomb, at great risk, has passed into
history, replaced by electronics and guided
gravity bombs that have an error of 10 to 20
feet even when standing off from targets at
very high altitudes, and at night and
weather. Capabilities not dreamed of in my
time.
Gravity bombs dropped by the B-17 in WWII
had a circular error probable (CEP) of 3,300
feet. Fighter-bombers of that era were
pretty good and better if at low speed and
low altitude release, but those errors grew
with the high speed of jets, necessary as
defenses improved. In the Vietnam War,
according to an Air Force Association
magazine article the CEP was 400. I would
judge it at less than half that bad,
averaging the experience level, because one
bad bomb has a large impact (no pun
intended) on error averages. It would be
interesting to find out who estimated that
figure, because no one outside the base paid
attention to our strike films, in almost all
cases, and too few folks on the base worked
that issue. Furthermore, we didn’t have
strike cameras on some aircraft. As I will
describe, CEP was a meaningless measure in a
large percentage of the more important
targets.
Considering the defenses we faced in Route
Pack VIA, and the number of unqualified
flyers, we couldn’t expect excellence, on
average. Some who were experienced fighter
jocks did very much better than 400, but
there were many fighter novices who could
not. I noted that problem on my earliest
Strike Force missions when I looked at the
results of our bombing on the photos from
our KA-70 strike cameras. I expected a lot
of real bad bombs from the inexperienced but
saw far too few really good bombs and was
disappointed to see so few bombs on target.
I felt that the damage to us by the enemy
demanded that we punish them appropriately.
Not withstanding the fact that many of the
targets seemed unworthy of the loss of one
pilot, it was our duty, we would do it, so
do it well.
Success was surviving the mission for one
day, repeated 100 times, and with the rules
we faced for that campaign, their could be a
lot of rationalizing. We had our hands tied
by many shortcomings, but one we certainly
could overcome was any lack of determination
to improve. It didn’t take Einstein to
assess the futility of our efforts there,
but that was not germane for professionals.
From the first mission, I was amazed we had
about an hour total briefing (wing + flight)
before every strike force mission, filled
with great detail on standard procedures.
After 10 missions we knew those facts in our
sleep and only had to get the changes of the
day. Not for one second did we address the
attack, aiming points and the dive bomb run,
where the explosives hit the road, so to
speak. And we didn’t address results
afterwards. We needed commitment to
bombing and measure of it!
I appointed a Battle Damage Officer and for
Commitment adopted a form on which
each pilot sketched the target and his
planned “sight picture” at bomb release, a
30 second task. This was during an added
attack analysis of the mission, just before
ending the final brief and departure to the
aircraft. The form showed the pilot’s
intended sight picture at bomb release, thus
was his commitment. I
requested one-day service on the first frame
from each attacker’s sight film. Since the
film started the moment the bomb button was
pressed, the first frame showed exactly what
the pilot saw in the sight when he dropped
his bombs, our measure of his commitment;
therefore his measure. Neither
was perfect, by far, because both had to
assume the pilot was capable of meeting the
other critical bombing parameters at moment
of bomb release: correct dive angle,
release altitude, airspeed and stabilized
flight at bomb release, no small task for
any pilot, least of all the inexperienced.
But from those two indicators, he proved he
was concentrating and trying and both those
traits assured quantum improvement. I
reviewed the results, and posted noteworthy
(good or bad) observations with them, on our
bulletin board. Having the pressure of our
reviews did not make experienced bombers,
but would force the effort to try, assuring
best results.
Visualizing the critical bomb release
“picture” gave the best possible chance to
hit a target, even for a skilled bomber. In
training, I had worked exceedingly hard at
visualization and concentration on dive bomb
runs, which stuck with me in combat. I
learned from my first strike missions that
deep concentration nearly eliminated fear
during the most hazardous part of our
missions. Even the sights and sounds of
anti-aircraft bursting near the windshield
went unregistered, as if stored in the
sub-conscience, to emerge when clear of the
target after escape.
Accurate delivery of unguided bombs in
diving attacks was the most difficult art in
flying that I ever tried to master, far
exceeding air-to-air gunnery, because of the
excessive and large variables. I searched
hard for some simplifiers. As a sample, one
of many critical requirements was absolutely
no variation from a perfectly smooth glide
at moment of bomb drop or the result would
be like shaking a rifle while trying to hit
a target more than a mile away. That is
enough of a challenge in level flight, what
with gusts, etc. but in the dive bomb run
there was need for continuous sharp, often
violent and extreme motions to force the
airplane quickly to the proper point in
space and correct attitude to make a
successful bomb run become precise and
smooth at the critical split seconds before
release. We learned, practiced and were
measured from the center of circles, thus
CEP and that became the forest in the trees
we didn’t see.
One thing about our targets stood out,
immediately. Many were very long and very
narrow: Runways, railroads, bridges, etc. A
change in technique could eliminate three of
the five major variables which made accuracy
so difficult, leaving only the need to glide
without control inputs just before release
and correcting for crosswind drift as error
factors, for those targets. The really tough
ones of dive angle, airspeed and altitude
were individually difficult and worse, they
interacted, but they could be ignored simply
with a change in mental approach.
By forcing the mind to think of the dive run
on such targets, as a landing approach to
them, a simple and excellent dive run was
possible. There are two ways to make a final
approach, first is to crab thus fly straight
on the centerline throughout the approach.
That would make it absolutely impossible to
aim a bomb, which would jump toward the crab
wind at release. But the other, which is to
drift with the wind, while the airplane axis
remains parallel to the centerline, would be
perfect. If the airplane is diving so that
it will hit somewhere on the centerline, so
will the bomb, even drifting free in the
same wind when release. All those other
factors necessary on a circular target only
affect how short or long the bomb travels in
relation to the airplane. With a long
target, any point on it is a good hit and
with 12 strike airplanes probabilities take
care of dispersion along the length. It was
this last fact that troubled me when we were
briefed to hit an exact point on a runway,
which returned us to the circular target
mentality. All that was left was making no
flight control changes just before bomb
release.
Assuming no control movements at bomb
release, only two things demanded attention:
1. Adjust left/right position from
centerline (strictly for cross-wind) so as
to “float” (dive) to the proper release
altitude for the bomb to drift in the wind
to the centerline of the target after
release, just as the aircraft would in the
imaginary landing. 2. Maintain parallel
alignment of the x-axis of the airplane with
target centerline as the bomb release
altitude is approaching, flying with as
little control inputs as possible,
especially approaching bomb release. At the
planned altitude (if in doubt be lower) be
extra smooth and release bombs..... Break,
pull g’s and get out of there.
Whether you were low, high, fast or slow
they only affected the bomb by the small
difference in sideways drift of the bomb due
to longer or shorter fall time, so you hit
the target if you were smooth and got 1 and
2 right, guaranteed! I adopted the
philosophy that, if you could land on it you
can bomb with it!
Soon, my time was too full of other duties.
It was never practical to get even a
majority of our pilots in a briefing, so my
hope was that my early interest in strike
photos and bombing accuracy would transfer
through flight and element leaders. The
flight leaders and their pilots lived
together, went on R&R together and had time
for discussions, hopefully they would often
address the subject of accurate bombing, not
only the requirement in mission briefs.
5 November: Improvement showed with our
efforts, not only in my own attacks, but
others’ as well. I was Strike Force
Commander to Phuc Yen Airport for a return
match with the enemy, on 5 November, just a
couple weeks after our first attack there.
This time our job was to hit the runway,
which had been assigned to the 355th
wing on our first strike there. We had made
strides in paying more attention to our
attacks and the results were evident in our
strike photos.
At that early stage, I found time to
annotate a map with some of my strike
mission notes and write home to Martha to
share with her some of what we were doing,
none of which was classified. That was a
practice I quit as a result of the
increasing demands on my time. From that
mission, I included a series of three strike
camera shots of our attack, which I had
annotated.
I had been pleased, when the KA-70 strike
photos confirmed that my six 750’s hit
squarely on the very middle of the runway,
but more excited about the improving results
by the flight. The outcome was far better
than before, encouraging me in our efforts
to improve weapons delivery.
Before sending the photos I had annotated
the first: “Phuc Yen, 5 Nov, I was 1st
in, these are my bomb explosions (with
arrow)”. The bombs show on that
frame at the moment of impact. I also had
circled seven 85 mm radar controlled gun
positions with a note to the effect. Those
are impossible to overlook, because of their
geometry, with the radar in the middle of a
circle of five or six rapid-fire, long range
cannon. The firing repeated around the
circle, one shell from each gun, until
fire-out of seven rounds each (if my memory
serves me). The extremely rapid cycle
looked like some kind of a firework circle,
though I never noticed guns during an
attack, only when watching for them while
withdrawing, when defensive jinking was
possible ... No use looking for trouble you
can’t affect
The second photo was great because number
two missed by only the width of the runway.
Although ‘a miss is as good as a mile’ that
was good bombing, far better than in the
past, and my element leads bombs all hit
dead center a thousand feet down the runway
from mine. That frame was annotated with an
attack direction arrow and the Note: “These
are sites (85’s) at the other end of the
runway, of which 10 were identifiable.”
Thus there were at least eighty
radar-controlled guns in spitting distance
from the runway.
The third photo added the results of the
second of our three flights of bombers and
showed that two and maybe three of that
flight were also dead-on the runway. Old
craters from a 6-bomb string near a long
thin structure along the narrowest of the
two taxi strips and parallel to the main
runway, can be seen from the first Phuc Yen
attack. Those were more than 1000 feet
right of the runway, showing that the 355th
Wing suffered the same problem with bombing
accuracy as our wing, since they had done
the previous bombing of the runway.
One other thing that mission and the photos
of the 85 mm sites confirmed, was that the
enemy understood Washington and knew that
future bombings of this airport would follow
the first one in short order. We had 12
SAMs to deal with on that flight and none on
the first attack.
I made another change in tactics, which I
employed leading strike missions, but never
tried to promulgate, simply because of the
lack of opportunity to train. I did offer
the idea to my counterpart in the 469th,
Lt. Col. Bill Decker, but his Operations
Officer, a product of the Fighter School at
Nellis AFB NV, who had flown as my backup
for an aerial gunnery demonstration in the
World Congress of Flight, was adamantly
insistent on tradition. Bill, a wonderful
guy made it to one month shy of his 80th
birthday, before he passed on after a severe
stroke, in May 2002. He is one of so many
wonderful memories of an otherwise miserable
war.
Traditional approach to a target was from 90
degrees off the attack line, then a wide
turn while commencing the dive onto a
straight line toward the target. The
advantages in training were similarity to
base leg and turn onto final in a landing
approach, but it proved to have great
liabilities with extreme defenses over NVN,
in part because the turn of a high speed jet
aircraft takes much more time and space,
than a P-47 Jug of WW II and the lethal
defenses.
It was obvious that tradition put us in
range of SAMs and radar-controlled 85 mm AAA
for an extended period. Just one trip on
that long base leg at altitude and the
extended 90 degree turn on roll-in to dive,
all under fire when no evasion was possible
was enough to make me open my perspective.
The time spent in that diving turn was over
a minute for each attacker, and the entire
pattern was predictable for the enemy,
giving away the target from the leaders
roll-in. Multiply that by 16 F-105’s and
the enemy was provided time for many more
rounds of effective AAA or SAM. We were
facing density of defenses, day in and day
out, which fighter-bombers had not faced
before and procedures from the past seemed
flawed under those circumstances. Our ECM
formation exaggerated risks because it was
widely spread, offered absolutely no
latitude for maneuvers, and put everyone but
the strike leader in poor position for dive
alignment and dive angle. It was no way
near the close formation and quick echelon
roll-in of the fighter movies about prior
wars. Thus it not only adversely affected
survival but bombing results, too. We were
wide spread, screwing up both dive angle and
attack heading for all but the mission lead,
both of which decreased accuracy, especially
on many of our most critical targets, which
I will explain in a bit.
I gave it much thought and decided to try an
alternative that might provide more
latitude. Obviously, the quickest and most
direct path into any steep dive is a Split
“S”, from level flight: A rapid roll to
inverted flight, a high g pull to desired
dive angle and a roll-out to upright flight
in the dive. That also keeps the airplane
aligned with the target’s line, but requires
being able to see the target approaching it
in level flight for a bombing attack.
There was a large concrete runway in the
Thailand jungles north of Korat, I expect
American made, but unoccupied and without
buildings. On a few missions, I had my
flights take on a few pounds of extra fuel
on our way home to give the idea a trial.
I was surprised that with our high altitude
at roll-in-to-dive it was practical to come
almost straight at the target in the level
flight necessary in the ECM formation, and
keep target in sight, over the nose, then do
a semi-split S directly onto the dive path.
Our mission ingress and dives started so
high and far from the target. With tries I
learned that it only took about 20 degrees
off of the attack line in level flight to
keep the target in sight until even a 60
degree dive could be attained, and never
lose sight of the target. As the angle off
of the target line increased to 45 degrees
the idea of split S became more of a
descending barrel roll, which worked
exceptionally well. For example, coming in
on an angle from the left side of the attack
line required a left half roll while
increasing the g to get the desired
combination of turn and dive angle to the
continue the roll to final alignment and
angle, or conversely for approaching a
target on the right. That technique proved
as easy as a rolling dive down onto the tail
of an airplane while getting aligned with
its line of flight to run up the rear end.
The roll to inverted position proved far
easier to accurately align with the target
than the conventional approach and to get a
steep angle; required for bombing accuracy,
plus advantageous for survival. Wingmen
could roll in toward the target line and
choice of roll out direction (left or right)
more easily adjusted alignment and dive
angle from the inverted view. Thus wingmen
on either side of leader could roll in the
best direction for their position toward the
target to achieve attack line. Continuing
the last half of the 360 roll in the most
practical direction took care of final
alignment. The pendulum effects of rapid
“in and out” corrections were easily
avoided. That maneuver gave a better
insight to the real dive angle and made easy
late corrections that were impractical with
the 90-degree entry. Lastly, it eliminated
the irrefutable flaw in roll-in from 16
ships in wide spread ECM formation, which
influenced succeeding airplanes toward
shallow dive. Finally, it began and ended
very quickly without warning to the enemy,
and required no advisory to wingmen in
spread formation, and it was their job to
spot the target before roll-in no matter the
tactics. When a leader rolled in on a dive
run he accelerated so fast, while his
wingman waited for his turn that wingmen
were on their own from that moment until the
attack was completed and the wingmen
rejoined, many miles away.
The entire force was aware of the initial
heading for attack and the actual attach
heading, so were ready to then roll toward
the attack line as the target passed under
their nose in their level flight. Finally,
they rolled out onto the dive path in the
best direction to be on attack heading. I
used it when I led strikes, thereafter, and
believe we put more bombs on target and we
spent less time getting shot at. Quite
frankly, there was a domino effect and if I
attacked that way the rest of the formation
was forced into the desired response.
Sometimes they felt they were too steep,
only because they never had been diving with
the correct angle before.
19 November:
I led a Strike Mission near Thueng Thuy,
within the limits of Hanoi city and on the
west bank of the Red River, just 6 miles
upstream from the Doumer bridge. Our target
was alongside one of many SAM sites in that
area. Starting well before we got near the
target the enemy launched 34 SAMs, a number
only matched one other time in my missions.
I suspect that the number was sometimes an
over-count, but can’t be sure. In any event
there were plenty to go around for 20 of
us. That number, in spite of the protection
from the usual Wild Weasel flight. Our flak
suppression flight attacked a SAM site
adjacent to our target, which was a
shipyard. Because of our assigned refueling
and the target location it was necessary to
revert to a traditional attack, in this case
the attack was to the right.
Ray Vissotzky, one of our most qualified
flight commanders, was scheduled to lead our
suppression flight, but he switched places
with his number three, Sam Morgan, who was
nearing end of tour, to give Sam one last
lead. Don Hodge was on Morgan’s wing and Ken
Mays flew number four on Ray. They elected
to protect us from that surface to air
missile site, near our target, by direct
attack. The missile site was between the
target and downtown on our left side and
Morgan swung his flight ahead and left to
attack it.
Almost simultaneously, Ray was hit by a SAM.
He tried to make it as far as possible but
both hydraulic flight control systems failed
in short order, putting his Thud out of
control and he had to bail out near Hanoi,
where he spent the rest of the war as a
prisoner, returning home in February 1973,
sacrificing more than 6 years of his life in
terrible conditions, with cruel captors.
Recovery of a downed pilot in that area was
out of the question. Ken made it safely
home and completed his 100 missions in
exemplary fashion. He remembers his brief
chase of Ray:
“I
will never forget chasing Ray
Vissotzky out of Hanoi after being hit by a
SAM. Looked like an atlas rocket, but he
stayed with it hoping to get to the hills,
however the controls finally went and he had
to punch.”
One of our strike Thuds, manned by a 469th
squadron pilot, Capt. H. Klinch, was shot
down on the bombing attack and we were
uncertain how far he got, so I took the
flight back for fuel and we searched for him
unsuccessfully, along the planned exit
corridor. We had to accept that our chances
of being rescued on Pack VI missions were
zero, unless we could get out to the Gulf of
Tonkin, near our ships, or back to the lower
route packs of NVN or parts of Laos, but
many of those Laos areas were extremely
hostile, and should rescue fail the
situation could be far worse even than POW,
and the same held for Cambodia. I carried a
loaded clip and one in the chamber of my
Smith & Wesson automatic plus a seven-clip
shoulder belt, mostly for those wilder
areas. Fifty-six rounds for the bad guys and
one for me! It was clear that
hands-in-the-air was the best signal for NVN
but I felt a fight to the finish was
preferable in some other areas. What we
learned afterwards of the suffering and
hardship, interspersed with tortures and
finally slow death of captured folks dragged
through the jungles, validated that notion.
In my first month I completed 17 missions in
25 days, a big majority in strike formation
and was very comfortable with Strike Force
command, and looking forward to every
mission, not fearlessly, but fervently. That
was followed with 13 missions in November,
but only 8 on strike force. Then December
weather forced us to fly more lower pack
missions and I got only 6 of 15 to Pack VI.
After that, the number of monthly missions
remained fairly steady, however, the tougher
and more exciting missions came and went at
the whim of weather and Washington.
Not only did strike force missions involve
hazards, because many F-105’s were lost on
individual strike flights, which were the
majority of the missions over the seven
years of the air war. Strike flights
entailed the highest risk per mission,
however, resulting in the greatest Thud crew
losses, which occurred in 1966 and 1967.
Although Rolling Thunder continued long
after I left, the number of Strike Force
missions was erratic and reduced after my
first three months, when I had completed 54
missions. The total number of combat
sorties remained high but less were in
strike formations and fewer were to Pack VI,
so our odds of getting home improved, but
with it the excitement declined and the time
passed more slowly for me.
That is not to say that some of the missions
to lower packages were not dangerous and
exciting, but after strike forces they just
seemed tame. I can’t recall the
circumstances of our mission and having
bombs over Laos. I remember rolling in from
below 10,000 feet, very little to play with
in that hill country, because of overcast
with very slow speed to allow time to get
into the dive and aim. The target was a 37
mm gun position that I couldn’t even see in
the jungle. The Forward Air Controller, in
a prop driven AD had called for help and the
gunfire he had taken was too intense for him
to mark the site, but he described the
location in detail for me. I met their
fire, head-on, all the way through my dive
and pull out, until my bombs impacted,
dead-on according the FAC, who had asked for
help. He was ecstatic because the gun had
kept him from his mission. The ground
gunners had the advantage in such a
scenario, but in this case they failed by a
big margin ..... 7 X 750 #s!!