August 21 was a very busy day in the Red River Valley. Captain Dick “Brownbear” Schaffert spent a memorable 40-minutes ‘chumming’ and dodging, then attacking and dodging, then doing it again, all within sight of downtown Hanoi. And all in support of a pack of Walleye sharpshooters. Mighty Thunder is honored to post this account of one of his 231 Rolling Thunder missions…

Chumming SAMs in the Heart of the Heartland

ORISKANY DAY #267 ON THE LINE

It all started with Old Salt Skipper Bryan Compton’s theory of how to provide a “quieter” (relative term only) moment in combat for his guys to put their head in the cockpit, concentrate on the Sony scope, and lock their Walleye on target. It morphed into an “all hands” effort on 21 August ’67, with the Air Force and our three carriers hitting 7 targets in the Hanoi area, with coordinated attacks only a few minutes apart. For the Navy, Intrepid had the Hanoi Army Depot, Constellation had the rail yards, and Oriskany had the Walleyes for the power plant.

Magnolia’s (Bryan Compton) theory included giving the NVN SAM sites other juicy targets to consider, while his Walleye shooters were in their runs and heads-down on the scopes. We Iron Hander’s called it “trolling for SAM’s.” Cool Hand (Rock Hodges) and I did that for Magnolia too many times; like orbiting for 20 minutes, under constant fire, while he took some handheld photography of Phu Ly (even though a courageous Crusader “Photo Beanie” already had the BDA). You saw the photos in Time/Life.

For Oriskany’s 21 August ’67 Hanoi TPP Walleye effort, we four Iron Handers (believe the other section was Bob Rasmussen and Denny Weichman) rendezvoused with Magnolia’s six A4E Walleye shooters and four F8 TARCAPs over the “O” boat. As the strike group later neared the coast, we broke away, went feet dry over the Red River delta, and trolled “straight up the gut” for Hanoi. Magnolia proceeded farther north and lead his Walleye shooters and TARCAP near the crotch and down the ridge line before he turned for Hanoi.

I guess it worked? There were 150 recorded SAM launches during the one hour that we Iron Handers were doing our thing. I had the impression those Air Force Wild Weasel guys did a good job on the SAM sites northeast of Hanoi. They were on target a few minutes before us. We saw an initial volley of those “telephone poles” heading west for the Doumier Bridge area, not southeast for our Walleye guys.

We “chummed”, and dodged, a few SAM’s coming up the Red River, but Cool Hand was saving his Shrikes for what we knew would come from the numerous hardened SAM sites southwest of the city. He wasn’t disappointed! We had our IFF gear (which we believed the Gomers were monitoring) set on a code to falsely identify us as strike (Walleye) aircraft. About 20 klicks out, it looked like a Nebraska prairie fire as three of the southwestern SAM sites launched a couple missiles each. They came at us in a line abreast formation. It was a wild couple minutes; but Cool Hand managed to lock a Shrike on a Fansong guidance radar, pull his A4E up into a loft maneuver, and launch his weapon. We followed the Shrike and picked up the firing site visually. Rock leveled at about 12,000 feet, and I knew he’d be delivering his MK-82 on the missiles still on the launchers. I was about 500 feet off his right wing, when he rolled inverted and dove for the site. I checked armament switches for my dual Zuni rocket pods and followed him down. Out of the corner of my left eye, I suddenly saw those four streaks of fire coming up for us, about 45 degrees left of our dive for the SAM site. I keyed the mic and transmitted (read screamed) “Pouncer Three, Abort! Nose up! Barrel roll left! NOW!” Thanks, God, he reacted immediately. The 4 SAMs were obviously still heavy with fuel, and they couldn’t perform the tight climbing turn required to knock us down. Take a deep breath … tell Cool Hand he’s got the lead back … and we turned for another run on the site. I could see smoke from where Rock’s Shrike had probably hit the Fansong trailer. We were in a steep dive as he released his MK-82. I adjusted my gunsight picture and fired one of my Zuni packs at the missile and launcher on my side of the site. It continued with a wild fight that never seemed to end, but finally we were Winchester with all Shrikes, MK-82s, Zunis, 20MM, and most of our liquid oxygen, expended.

Reportedly, none of our Walleye guys were hit by a SAM. Unfortunately, the more deadly threat over Hanoi was always the hundreds of 37/57/85MM barrage and radar tracking AAA sites. Magnolia had, appropriately, not scheduled any flak suppression aircraft. Over Hanoi, it would have been a misuse of assets. There were too many guns, it was “mission impossible;” often stated as like opening your canopy in an attempt to pressurize the world.

When our six Walleye shooters went into their glides, and flew into that heavy cloud of orange flashes and grey/black smoke enveloping Hanoi, the inevitable happened. Dean Cramer and Jim Busey both got hit, hard! Incredibly, Busey was able to complete a successful run. Cramer was not. Overcoming his catastrophic aircraft damage was compounded by several SAM firings at him as he fought his way back down the Red River to feet wet. Thanks to God, and probably several Angels, he was able to make Oriskany, as was Jim Busey.

Oriskany’s Walleye guys really did the job! It was probably dark, and hopefully too warm, in Ho Chi’s Palace for a couple weeks. Navy Crosses and Silver Stars all around for the Walleye guys. A couple DFCs, but mostly Air Medals and sour grapes for the Iron Handers, who’d been over Hanoi in the fight at least three times longer than any Walleye shooter. But you mentioned that situation earlier. So geht das Leben.

V/R Dick Schaffert