RIPPLE SALVO… #862… “JUST BEFORE CHRISTMAS (1970) THE FEW MEN STILL BEING HELD IN THE HEARTBREAK SECTION JOINED THEIR COMRADES IN VEGAS…. The excitement of Day, Fellowes, and Pollard at joining the large company in Vegas in late December was tempered by the awareness that three seriously ill compatriots they had spotted in Heartbreak during the summer were now nowhere to be found and had seemingly disappeared from the system… Earl Cobeil, Navy Commander Ken Cameron, and J.J. Connell languished for months at Heartbreak within range of the other three but were too physically and mentally impaired to effectively interact with their mates and one another….Connell was a casualty of the Zoo purge… With Cameron he had been moved into Hilton after spending the first half of 1970 at the shuttered Alcatraz. He, too, was eating and bathing erratically, acting paranoid, and resisting efforts by both the Vietnamese and the Day trio to resuscitate them”… “In early or mid October…Cameron, Cobeil and Connell were removed to a hospital, Connell after complaining of chest pains. None of the three (“…and the other so-called ‘Lonely Hearts’ who had dropped out of sight”…) were seen again.”… (Rochester and Kiley: HONOR BOUND, Pages 515-6, 523)… ON THE 52nd ANNIVERSARY OF LIEUTENANT COMMANDER JAMES JOSEPH CONNELL’s LAST FLIGHT — A Remembrance.
On 15 July 1966, LT J.J. Connell was flying and A-4E of the VA-55 Warhorses embarked in USS Ranger as one of four aircraft conducting an “Iron hand” mission along the Red River south of Hanoi. The flight encountered heavy conventional antiaircraft artillery and SAM fire as they attacked an SA-2 surface-to-air missile site. As the flight pulled off target one of the pilots saw a parachute on the ground and realized that Connell had been shot down. Shortly thereafter, Connell established that he was OK, having sustained only minor injuries during the ejection. Rescue efforts were impossible in this high threat area and it was taken for granted that he would be captured. He was. …..The NAVY CROSS… but first…
GOOD MORNING… Day EIGHT HUNDRED SIXTY-THREE of daily posts to recognize and remember the great brotherhood of warriors who carried the fight to the homeland of our enemy, North Vietnam, during the years of 1965-1968… It was called Operation Rolling Thunder…
HEAD LINES from The OGDEN STANDARD-EXAMINER (library misplaced the NYT microfilm) on 14 and 15 July 1968…
THE WAR: (14th)”BOMBS BLAST BORDER AREA OF CAMBODIA–Reports Resist Big Battle Shaping For Clifford Visit“… “U.S. B-52s laid a fiery carpet of bombs along the Cambodian border today, striking at enemy springboard camps. To the southeast, allied ground sweeps around Saigon sought to forestall a major attack on the capital expected next week. Some of the B-52 raids were less than two miles from Cambodia and 65 to 71 miles from, off limits to U.S. forces and a sanctuary for troops and war materials from North Vietnam. The enemy has base camps on both sides of the border. There was speculation that the war’s biggest battle may be shaping up to coincide with the visit of U.S. Defense Secretary Clark M. Clifford, starting today.”… (15th) “ENEMY UNITS PULL BACK–ALLEVIATE SAIGON PERIL–Clifford Gets Briefings During Visit”… “U.S. sources said today that some enemy units believed poised for an attack on the capital have pulled back and ‘There is no immediate major threat to Saigon. ‘The enemy has backed off,’ said one highly placed U.S. official. ‘They don’t have the capability to attack except in a very small way. there isn’t any forward movement at all. Some elements have physically pulled back…it is not a general withdrawal.’…GETS BRIEFING… “U.S. Defense Secretary Clark M. Clifford, in South Vietnam on his first visit since succeeding Robert S. McNamara, got a briefing from top U.S. commanders and presumably was informed of the fresh assessment.”…
PEACE TALKS: (14th) “COFFEE CHIT-CHAT MIGHT PROVIDE BREAK IN TALKS”… ‘U.S. and North Vietnamese negotiators have finally some serious talk on Vietnamese peacemaking issued during their private coffee-break meetings in Paris. These secret, informal and brief probings have so far failed to produce any opening toward a break in the deadlock on deescalation of the war in Vietnam…. Harriman said there were hopeful ‘straws in the wind’: the promised release of three airmen, the halt of denials tht North Vietnam has troops fighting in the south, and the fact that what Harriman calls ‘tea breaks’ go on.”… (15th) ‘HANOI JEERS LBJ PLAN FOR PEACE”… “North Vietnam today scoffed at President Johnson’s billion dollar plan for the postwar development of Southeast Asia, calling it ‘Bait’ to perpetuate the American pressure in Saigon. The Communist party newspaper Nhan Dan said the Communists would ‘build a life of plenty’ for the North and South Vietnamese people after the United States is defeated. ‘The Vietnamese people have clearly realized that the billion dollars promised by Johnson to the people of Southeast Asia is but a bait,’ the party newspaper said. ‘The stick-and-carrot policy of the United States is gong bankrupt. The stick has been broken and the carrot is rotten.’ “…
14 and 15 JULY 1968… OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER… Ogden Standard-Examiner…(14th for 13th ops): “Over southern North Vietnam, Air Force fighter-bomber crews reported knocking out 21 antiaircraft sites in heavy raids Saturday 25 miles north of the Mu Gia pass.” (15th and 16th) No coverage of air operations north of the DMZ…
VIETNAM: AIR LOSSES (Chris Hobson) There were three fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 14 and 15 July 1968…
(1) 14th CAPTAIN J.T. PINES was flying an F-100D of the 612th TFS and 37th TFW out of Phu Cat on a close air support mission 25 miles southwest of Hue employing napalm. On his second run while flying at 1,500 feet he was hit by 37mm antiaircraft fire and was forced to eject almost immediately. He ws rescued by a USMC helicopter to fly and fight again…
(2) 14th 1LT WARREN K. BROWN was flying an F-100C of the 174th TFS and 37th TFW out of Phu Cat on the same target an hour and a half after Captain Pines was downed and rescued. 1LT BROWN was not so fortunate. On his second Napalm run at 200-feet he was hit by intense automatic weapon fire and, while he was able to eject, he was too low for the parachute to fully deploy. He was the first of six Air National Guard airman to lose their lives during the deployment of their F-100 squadrons to Vietnam.” Fate is the hunter… 1LT BROWN died very young fifty years ago this day, sacrificing his life for his country… So young… So brave…
(3) 15th MAJOR GOBEL DALE JAMES and CAPTAIN LARRY EUGENE MARTIN were flying an F-105F Wild Weasel as #2 in a section of Thunderchiefs of the 44th TFS and 388th TFW out of Korat on a strike on a suspected SAM site seven miles northwest of Dong Hoi. The site was unoccupied and the flight conducted an armed recce in the area until reaching a fuel bingo at which time they attacked a road intersection with their bombs. As they were recovering from their bomb run, they were hit by 37mm antiaircraft fire. MAJOR GOBEL turned the damaged aircraft toward the Gulf of Tonkin. Their luck ran out short of the water when the aircraft became uncontrollable. MAJOR GOBEL ordered CAPTAIN MARTIN to eject and a few seconds later as the aircraft nosed down sharply and accelerated he ejected. In 2013 COLONEL told the Phoenix press the rest of the story…
“I was on my 34th mission,” he remembers vividly.”Our job was to destroy surface-to-air missile sites.” There were none. “And we were getting low on fuel so the lead aircraft said, ‘Let’s go down and bomb that road intersection and go home.’ So I dove in and dropped my bombs and as I pulled off the target, the aircraft was hit by anti-aircraft fire.” The warning lights on his dashboard lit up the cockpit. “I had no control over the airplane at all,” the Colonel said. However, he did manage to get the wings level and the nose up to feel the aircraft climbing. That’s when he said the Thunderchief’s long nose dropped below the horizon and headed toward the ground. “I had a man in my back seat–CAPTAIN MARTIN–and I told him to eject first,” to avoid clipping canopies, “and I waited a few seconds. When I ejected, I was going 450 to maybe 500 knots.”
The sheer blast broke his left knee and dislocated it as he drifted by his parachute 3,000 feet in the air. His chief concern was MARTIN “I called the lead aircraft and he had seen me eject.” COLONEL JAMES said. His lead saw only one parachute. “Captain MARTIN’s remains were returned to the United States in 1988 and I will never know, “Did He get out of the aircraft safely? Was he hit by enemy ground fire in the air?” Colonel JAMES still wonders. While he was looking skyward, hundreds of North Vietnamese eyes were on him, prepared to make another F-105 pilot their prisoner of war. Still, COLONEL JAMES was thankful. “I believe to this day that if there had not been a well-disciplined military group that captured me, I wouldn’t be alive,” he credited the soldiers who saved him from a mob of angry villagers working on nearb rice fields and swinging razor sharp circles. Still, there was brutal abuse.
“One man hit me in the head with a rifle butt,’ COLONEL JAMES said. Officers stripped off his flight suit before they took him on a homemade stretcher to an underground room. “I sat there –what seemed like the entire village– hit me in the head with their fists, pulled my hair and with great delight, two women stomped on my injured knee.” It continued, he said, until the sun went down 45 minutes later. The worst was yet to come when COLONEL JAMES and two other U.S. airmen were loaded on a truck headed for Hanoi….
End quote (from a 4 November 2013 article by Holliday Moore)… After a ten day trip covering the 300 miles to Hanoi, then MAJOR JAMES began his 1,703 days in prison.
AMONG THE BRAVE… EXCEPTIONALLY MERITORIOUS CONDUCT… COLONEL GOBEL D. JAMES… the LEGION OF MERIT with VALOR V… NORTH VIETNAM…
CITATION… “The President of the United States of America takes pleasure in presenting COLONEL GOBEL D. JAMES, United States Air Force the Legion of Merit for distinguished and exceptionally meritorious conduct in the performance of outstanding service to the United States of America as Prisoner of War in North Vietnam during the period July 1968 to February 1972. His countless efforts by a continuous showing of resistance to aan enemy who ignored all international agreements on treatment of prisoners of North Vietnam, demonstrated his professional competence, unwavering devotion, and loyalty to his country. Despite the harsh treatment through his long years of incarceration this individual continued to perform his duties in a clearly exceptional manner which reflected credit upon himself and the United States Air Force.”…
Among COLONEL JAMES’ other combat awards are the Distinguished Flying Cross, Bronze Star with V device and four Air Medals.
RIPPLE SALVO… #862… REMEMBERING one of OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER’s most courageous: LIEUTENANT COMMANDER J.J. CONNELL, who rests in peace, glory gained, duty done… Humble Host’s short post for 14 July attached the incredibly moving CADE MARTIN PHOTOGRAPHY portrait essay “OVER WAR”. One of the Thunderchief warriors feature in the essay was COLONEL THOMAS LOCKHART, who completed his 100 missions over North Vietnam in 1966. His combat awards included the Silver Star, four awards of the Distinguished Flying Cross and fifteen Air Medals. He contributed the following comment to the Cade Martin portrait project… Tom Lockhart: “I remember at the time thinking, I’d rather be killed than captured. We heard about what they did to the guys taken prisoner. I’d rather die than go through that. Now, I wonder how many of my friends are dead because Washington shared our targets.”… Among the thousands who died carrying the fight into the homeland of our enemy was J.J. CONNELL. How and when he was downed 52 years ago this date, and his fatal treatment as a Prisoner of War is noted in the introduction to this post. He was reduced to a “lonely heart” and decimated human being under the sustained mistreatment of the North Vietnamese. Treatment every Rolling Thunder warrior knew could be his fate if downed and captured. The position of TOM LOCKHART was shared by most, including me. The ordeal of incarceration at the hands of animals was carried to the extreme in the case of LIEUTENANT COMMANDER JAMES JOSEPH CONNELL, an ordeal that was carried out with EXCEPTIONAL HEROISM… The Citation for his NAVY CROSS, second only to the Medal of Honor for recognition of bravery in combat, reads:
“FOR EXTRAORDINARY HEROISM AS A PRISONER OF WAR IN NORTH VIETNAM FROM APRIL 1968 TO JUNE 1969. Under constant pressure from the North Vietnamese in their attem[pt to gain military information and propaganda material, he experienced severe torture with ropes and was kept in almost continous solitary confinement. As they persisted n their hostile treatment of him, he continued to resist by feigning facial muscle spasms, incoherence of speech, and crippled arms with loss of feeling in his fingers. The Vietnamese, convinced of his plight, applied shock treatment in an attempt to improve his condition. However, mhe chose not to indicate improvement for fear of further cruelty. Isolated in a corner of the camp near a work area visited daily by other prisoners, he established and maintained covert communications with changing groups of POW’s thereby serving as a main point of exchange of intelligence information. By his exceptional courage determination, and resourcefulness in this most difficult line of resistance, he reflected great credit upon himself and upheld the highest traditions of the Naval Service and the United States Armed Forces.”…
From “The Virtual Wall” … “When the POWs were repatriated in February 1973, Jimmy Connell ws not among them; he had died in captivity, reportedly on 14 January 1971. His remains were not repatriated until 06 March 1974. Lieutenant Connell’s Navy Cross Citation speaks to both his treatment while a POW and his response to that treatment. He was kept in solitary confinement several years and was subjected to repeated and severe physical and mental abuse by his captors. His fellow POWs were in a position to judge LCDR CONNELL’s response, and it was their judgement and first person testimony which led to the award of the NAVY CROSS.”
LCDR CONNELL’s name is on The Wall at Panel 9E, Line 22. “Leave a Remembrance” for him at “The Wall of Faces“. The same opportunity has been made available for any fallen warrior in the Vietnam War at any time. You can also donate to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund. Humble Host notes that on this day 15 July 2018 a replica, virtual Vietnam Wall was dedicated in Layton, Utah in a new Vietnam Veteran’s Park with pomp and circumstance… The VVMF is “getting it done.”… oohrah…
RTR Quote for 15 July: LIEUTENANT COLONEL JOHN PIOWATY, USAF (Retired), Over War portrait essay by Cade Martin: “We have since learned that our target list was shared through Switzerland with the enemy to ensure no civilians were harmed. Well, that’s no way to win a war. The enemy would move out and set up somewhere else, ready to hit us on our way in and out. And, sometimes … Chiefs of Staff would send us in 5 days in a row.”…
Lest we forget… Bear…