ROLLING THUNDER REMEMBERED 13 DECEMBER 1966

RIPPLE SALVO… #286… THE TRUTH HURTS… but first…

13 DECEMBER 1966… HOME TOWN HEAD LINES from the New York Times on a fair Tuesday with rain a’comin’…

Page 1: “Adventurer Francis Chichester at Half-Way Point in his solo around the world cruise in his 53-foot ketch Gypsy Moth IV. The 65-year old Briton arrived in Sydney, Australia logging 13,750 miles in 107 days. Ashore today after the longest non-stop solo sea voyage in history, Chichester downed a glass of beer and declared, ‘I shall go on.” The adventure began in Plymouth and Chichester sailed around Cape Hope then direct to Australia. He was in good physical condition but underweight, bruised and fatigued. He said he was disappointed that he missed his goal of 100 days for the first leg by a few days. The 100-day goal was the average time for Clipper ships of the 19th century to make the route.”… (HEY, DUTCH— THIS GUY MUST BE ON YOUR HERO LIST, EH, WHAT???)

Page 1: “GOP Survey Shows Party Widened Base for first time in 20 years. ‘We turned the popularity corner after 20 years of losing friends and influence,’ National Chairman of the Republican Party Ray Bliss reported. The number of voters who identified themselves as Republicans rose from 25% bfore the election to 29% after. More important than 4% is the fact the downward trend has been reversed.”… Page 1: “Hoffa Conviction Upheld In Jury Tampering Case by the Supreme Court. Hoffa will go to prison but question remains– when?” … Page 1: “Senator Edward Kennedy Defends Johnson on the poor. He calls the President a man of compassion. Senator Joe Clark of Pennsylvania on the other hand says the anti-poverty program has been starved by President Johnson.” …

Page 5: “Hanoi Said To Get 100 Soviet MIGs Doubling Air Arm”… “Saigon sources report aid includes some of the most advanced types of jete. With new planes foe may be less hesitant to fight U.S. raiders in North. Moscow shipped the jets to North Vietnam in recent weeks and the United Statews fighter pilots have been warned to expect a possible increase in air combat. Close to 200 MIG fighters are to be ready to battle U.S. fighter-bombers hitting targets near Hanoi and Haiphong. Other MIG fighters are across the border in China. At least 80 North Vietnamese pilots have graduated from a Soviet aviation school in Bataisk in Southern Russia. The NVN inventory of fighters now consists of MIG-17, 19 and 21Cs and Ds. The MIG-21D is equipped with an all-weather, day night search radar and a pair of air-to-air missiles comparable to the U.S. Sparrow (AIM-7). Thus far in the air-to-air war the U.S. has shot down 26 MIGs at a cost of 6 downed by NVN MIGs.” … Page 5: “The total of American planes and helicopters shot down over North and South Vietnam was now 826, of those, 442 planes and 4 rescue helicopters were downed in the North. The number of NVN coastal vessels destroyed since October 25 is about 665.” 

13 DECEMBER 1966…The President’s Daily Brief…CIA (TS sanitized) SOVIET UNION: The Supreme Soviet will open one of its two or three day semiannual sessions on Thursday. The economic plan and budget for next year will be the main order of business. This year the country’s economic performance has been mixed. Excellent results in agriculture have been offset by continued mediocre output in industry. The Soviets brought in a record grain crop and impressive harvests of outher crops, and achieved generally good results in the livestock sector. In indusrtry however investment showed the lowest increase since the war and construction was actually down from last year.

13 DECEMBER 1966… OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER… NYT (14 December reporting 13 Dec ops)… Page 2: “Targets Near Hanoi Struck”…”United States warplanes bombed three targets in the Hanoi area yesterday (13th). American headquarters said the jets struck targets five miles south and six miles northeast of Hanoi…planes from the Ticonderoga bombed and damaged the Xuanmai bridge 20 miles south of Hanoi. Air Force F-105 Thunderchiefs struck the Yenvien railroad yard six miles northeast of Hanoi in the afternoon. Pilots reported dropping 750-pound bombs and causing heavy damage to the railroad and setting off two secondary explosions. Fliers from the aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk in the Gulf of Tonkin attacked the Vandien vehicle depot south of Hanoi. Six flights of between 18 and 24 planes hit the depot with 500-pound bombs and rockets. Pilots reported damaging the complex.” “Vietnam: Air Losses” (Hobson) Three fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 13 December 1966…

(1) CAPTAIN SAMUEL EDWIN WATERS was flying an F-105D of the 421st TFS and 388th TFW on a major strike on the Yen Vien railway yard and after delivering his bombs was climbing and exiting the target area southwest of Hanoi when hit by an SA-2 missile. He continued flying east but crashed, apparently without ejection. No beeper, no voice calls. CAPTAIN WATERS was Killed in Action fifty years ago this day. Left behind?…

(2) LTJG C.O. TAYLOR was flying and A-4C of the VA-195 Dambusters embarked in USS Ticonderoga on a flak suppression mission and after attacking a SAM site 15 miles south of Hanoi was hit by ground fire and flew his damaged aircraft clear of the beach. He was streaming fuel as he headed for a rendezvous with a tanker and as he commenced his approach on the tanker drogue he flamed out and was forced to eject. He was rescued by a Navy ship.

(3) LCDR CHARLIE BARNETT was flying an A-4C of the VA-195 Dambusters embarked in USS Ticonderoga and made a rocket attack on the same SAM site that LTJG TAYLOR had hit a few minutes earlier, the SAM site at Xuan Mai Bridge. Clearing the target he was hit by a SA-2 from another site. He was able to fly his disabled and heavily damaged aircraft back to the Ticonderoga using manual backup hydraulics to control the plane. However, damage to his ailerons and very low fuel state precluded an attempt to land the aircraft and LCDR BARNETT ejected near the ship and was rescued by one of Tico’s helicopters…

RIPPLE SALVO… #286…  A few words from the Pentagon Papers (pgs 136-37) to summarize the 1966 ROLLING THUNDER program.  I quote:

“…1966 drew to a close on a sour note for the President. He had just two months before resisted pressure from the military for a major escalation of the war in the North and adopted the restrained approach of the Secretary of Defense only to have a few inadvertent raids within the Hanoi periphery mushroom into a significant loss of world opinion support. He was in the uncomfortable position of being able to please neither his hawkish nor his dovish critics with his carefully modulated middle course.

1966 Summary…

“ROLLING THUNDER was a much heavier bombing program in 1966 than in 1965. There were 148,000 total sorties flown in 1966 as compared with 55,000 in 1965, and 128,000 tons of bombs were dropped as compared with 33,000 in the ten months of bombing in the year before. The number of JCS fixed targets struck, which stood at 158 at the end of 1965, increased to 185, or 27 more, leaving only 57 unstruck from a list of 242. Armed reconnaissance, which was still kept out of the northeast quadrant at the end of 1965, was extended during 1966 throughout NVN except for the Hanoi/Haiphong sanctuaries and the China buffer zone, and beginning with ROLLING THUNDER 51 on 6 July was even permitted to penetrate a short way into the Hanoi circle along small selected route segments. Strikes had even been carried out against a few ‘lucrative’ POL targets deep in the circles.

“The Program had also become more expensive. 318 ROLLING THUNDER aircraft were lost in 1966, as compared with 171 in 1965 (though the loss rate dropped from .66% of attack sorties in 1965 to .39% in 1966). CIA estimated that the direct operational cost of the program (i.e., production cost of aircraft lost, plus direct sortie overhead cost–not including air base or CVA maintenance or logistical support–plus ordnance costs) came to $1,247 million in 1966 compared with $460 million in 1965. …

“The program in 1966 had accomplished little more than in 1965, however. In January 1967, an analysis by CIA concluded tht the attacks had not eliminated any important sector of the NVN economy or the military establishment. They had not succeeded in cutting route capacities south of Hanoi to the point where the flow of supplies required in SVN was significantly impeded. The POL attacks had eliminated 76% of JCS-targeted storage capacity, but not until after NVN had implemented a system of dispersed storage, and the POL flow had been maintained at adequate levels. 32% of NVN’s power-generating capacity had been put out of action, but the remaining capacity was adequate to supply most industrial consumers. hundreds of bridges were knocked down, but virtually all of them had been quickly repaired, replaced or bypassed, and traffic continued. Several thousand freight cars, trucks, barges, and other vehicles were also destroyed or damaged, but inventories were maintained through imports and there was no evidence of serious transport problem due to equipment shortages. The railroad and highway networks were considerably expanded and improved during the year….damage had disrupted normal military practices, caused the abandonment of many facilities, and forced the widespread dispersal of equipment, but overall military capabilities had continued at a high level.

“The summary CIA assessment was that ROLLING THUNDER had not helped either reduce the flow of supplies South or to shake the will of the North:  

    “The evidence available does not suggest that ROLLING THUNDER to date has contributed materially to the achievement of the two primary objectives of the air attack–reduction of the flow of supplies to the VC/NVN forces in the South or weakening the will of North Vietnam to continue the insurgency . ROLLING THUNDER no doubt has lessened the capacity of the transport routes to the South–put a lower ‘cap’ on the force levels which North Vietnam can support in the South–but the ‘cap’ is well above present logistic supply levels.

“The bombing had not succeeded in materially lowering morale among the people, despite some ‘war weariness.’ The leaders continued to repeat in private as well as public that they were willing to withstand even heavier bombing than accept a settlement on less than their terms.”…

Tomorrow: the response of Admiral Sharp to the CIA conclusions…

Lest we forget…        Bear          -30-