RIPPLE SALVO… #562… Humble Host has absorbed the first two episodes of “The Vietnam War” and is hooked… but first…
Good Morning: Day FIVE HUNDRED SIXTY-TWO of a reviving memories from 50 years ago when our country lost its will to win…
19 September 1967… A FEW HEAD LINES from The New York Times on a warm Tuesday in downtown Manhattan…
Page 1: “Mideast Gets High Priority For U.N. Assembly Today”... “The fifth emergency session of the General Assembly voted unanimously today to place the Mideast issue first on the agenda of the 22nd regular session, which opens tomorrow, as a matter of high priority. The emergency session, summoned June 17 at the request of the Soviet Union to win the Assembly’ condemnation of Israel as the aggressor in the six-day war and to demand that Israel withdraw her troops, ended at 12:15 P.M. One Western delegate described the session as a fiasco of Soviet policy. However, the same delegate used the closing minutes of the session, which had been in recess for two months, to assail Israel and the United States.”…
Page 1: “WAR VOTE SLATED IN SAN FRANCISCO–CALIFORNIA HIGH COURT BACKS PLACING ON BALLOT THE ISSUE OF VIETNAM WITHDRAWAL”… “The city of San Francisco was ordered by the California Supreme Court today to put on its ballot in Nov ember 7 the question of whether the United States should withdraw immediately from Vietnam. thus San Francisco became the first of several cities in which the same request is pending to offer the issue to the voters on its municipal ballot. Last year the city of Dearborn, Michigan carried a Vietnam question on a local ticket and 41% of those voting expressed disapproval of American participation in the conflict. Citizens For A Vote on Vietnam obtained more than 22,000 signatures–more than twice the number required–to obtain the approval of the Registrar of Voters to place the question on the ballot. Challenged by the City of San Francisco, the California supreme Court has ruled in favor of the people.”…
Page 2: “80 Americans Urge U.S. To Seek Mideast Peace–16 Nobel Peace Prize Winners Join in Plea to Johnson to Pursue Goal Inside and Outside U.N.”…”…to bring about direct peace negotiations between Israel and the Arab States. The central issue is security and peace…Israel’s security is bound up with our own…Without peace we are only storing up fuel for new outbreaks, with no assurances that a new encounter can be contained to conventional weapons or to regional states.”…
19 SEPTEMBER 1967… NEW YORK TIMES (20 Sept reporting 19 Sept ops)… Page 15: “U.S. JETS BATTLE MIGs NEAR HANOI”… “Eight North Vietnamese MIG-17 jets fought a short-range cannon battle with four United States F-105 Thunderchief fighter-bombers near Hanoi today… although the engagements were the sharpest in many weeks, neither side suffered any losses. The battle was joined when the Soviet-built jets attacked the American planes as the Americans were finishing a bombing run against a barracks area 17 miles south of Hanoi…. An F-100 Super Sabre crashed into a barrack at Bien Hoa. Five persons were reported killed, including the pilot. Fifteen were injured.”
“Vietnam: Air Losses” (Chris Hobson) There were two fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 19 September 1967…
(1) MAJOR L. BOOTHBY and a second aviator (unk) were flying an F-4D of the 435th TFS and 8th TFW out of Ubon on a strike on railway sidings at Thang Quang on the rail line northeast of Hanoi. After completing the raid, en route home to Ubon, the aircraft was hit in the starboard wing by a 57mm shell 10 miles north of Phuc Yen. MAJOR BOOTHBY was able to fly his damaged Phantom to within 35 miles of Udorn before the pair of aviators were required to eject. They were rescued to fly and fight again.
(2) CAPTAIN CLYDE WALTER CARTER was flying an F-100D of the 90th TFS and 3rd TFW out of Bien Hoa and in an approach to a landing at the field the aircraft exploded killing the pilot. the cause of the explosion was not attributed to combat action. The aircraft came down in a barracks area on the base killing four and injuring 15… 50 years ago today…
RIPPLE SALVO… #562… Humble Host will be watching the Ken Burns version of the Vietnam war. The review I went into this 18-hour, ten-session commitment with, warned me that “the series promises to be compelling to watch… that doesn’t mean it tells the truth.” Two episodes have confirmed the conclusion that it is a compelling production. In addition, the Kennedy years of the war were covered as straight forward and honest as any I have seen. Both Kennedy and McNamara come off full of warts and the strips of film where JFK admits to errors in judgement with respect to the coup and assassination of Diem is telling. So far, “it tells the truth.”…
While this series is occupying my evenings, along with house guests, the RTR will be bare bones… I will make it up later…
RTR Quote for 19 September: SAMUEL JOHNSON, Rasselas: “Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful.”…
Lest we forget… Bear