RIPPLE SALVO… #502… “THE GUTSY LITTLE A-4″… and a brilliant bit of airmanship… but first…
Good Morning: Day FIVE HUNDRED TWO of thinking about the great guys who carried the war to the heartland of North Vietnam, including Senator John McCain, who is back in the ring with another tough foe as of today…
20 JULY… HEAD LINES from The New York Times on a puffy cloud Thursday in New York…
VIETNAM: Page 1: “Rusk Says Foe In Vietnam Is Hurting Badly”... “…but cautioned that there was ‘still a long, tough job ahead’ before Hanoi would be willing to talk seriously about peace. At his first press conference in four months Mr. Rusk presented a generally encouraging picture on the course of the war in Vietnam and political developments in South Vietnam. He dismissed the suggestion that a statement was developing in the war, argued against any change in the current United States policy on negotiations and held out hope that a continuation of the present military pressure would eventually drive the enemy to a negotiated settlement... ‘I don’t see a stalemate there. I see military progress as well as economic and political progress.’
“Once again Mr. Rusk ruled out any cessation of the bombing of North Vietnam until Hanoi gave some indication of what it would do to scale down ‘it’s half of the war.’ In the process Mr. Rusk gave impetus to a developing partisan debate by eight Republicans members of the House, led by Representative F. Edward Morse of Massachusetts for a “staged de-escalation’ of the bombing. The Republican proposal called for the United States to take the initiative by halting all bombing north of the 21st parallel–a step that would exclude Hanoi but not Haiphong–for the 60 days. Then if North Vietnam responded with a step of its own to reduce the war, Washington would gradually extend the bombing ban southward.
“The Republicans argued that such an approach would not require Hanoi to take the first step of a simultaneous step, and thus North Vietnam would be given a ‘face saving’ way to seek a negotiated settlement. Mr. Rusk responded that Hanoi had been given repeated opportunities to explain what it would do if the bombing were suspended and had taken the position that only a permanently and unconditional cessation would be an acceptable precondition for negotiations
” ‘We don’t have to fish in the dark for this kind of thing or rely on hunches or speculation. We can ask Hanoi: If we stop bombing what will you do? Will you do A, B, or C? And if they come back and they say no, then we know what the answer is.’ “…
Page 1: “New Navy Chief Among 82 Killed In Air Collision– John T. McNaughton Dies With Wife and Son In North Carolina Crash–79 Victims in Airliner–3 Dead in Small Plane, Which Tower Official Says Was 12 Miles Off-Course”...”A Boeing 727 airliner and a private airplane collided over western North Carolina today, killing 82 persons including the Secretary of the Navy designate John T. McNaughton, 45 years old. There were 75 passengers and four crew aboard the Piedmont airlines 727. the smaller craft carried two businessmen and a pilot…also killed was Sarah McNaughton, 46, and their young son Theodore, 11. The Piedmont had departed Asheville airport minutes before the mid-air collision. The McNaughtons were in Asheville to pick-up their son from a summer camp. The smaller aircraft, a Cessna 310 ‘struck the airliner nose-to-nose,’ said a witness. The small plane exploded and went down immediately and the Piedmont attempted a recovery and tried to make it to make to Interstate 26, then it too exploded and went down. Debris field is in 2-miles northeast of Hendersonville en route to Roanoke.”…
MIDEAST: Page 1: “Israelis Say Price For Withdrawal Is Peaceful Ties–Rafael Asserts Gromyko’s Demands Would Lead to New Assault by Arabs”… “Israel declared today that normal relations with the Arab states was the price of withdrawal and disengagement of her occupation forces. ‘In the view of the Government of Israel,’ said Gideon Rafael, the Israelis delegate, in a letter to the President of the Security Council, ‘an integral and inseparable link exists between the withdrawal and the establishment of normal, peaceful and good neighborly relations between the states in the region.’ “….. Page 1: “Israelis Assembling Big Guns and Tanks on East Bank of Suez”…
SUMMER 1967: Page 1: “Riot Bill Voted By House–Fate In Senate Is In Doubt”... “…a bill to make it a Federal crime to use interstate facilities or to cross state lines to incite a riot the bill passed 340 to 70. Emanuel Cellar, Democrat and Chair of House Judiciary Committee, in dissent: ‘I consider the bill to be a futile gesture, neither preventative nor curative…the basic disorder is the disenchantment of the Negro; his disenchantment as to promises made but not fulfilled, the dreary, slow pace by which he achieves equality, This bill will not allay his anger and frustration,’ he said, with deep emotion. ‘Instead it will arouse his anger and frustration more deeply. His leaders ask for better housing for their fellows. You offer them jails. His leaders ask for better facilities for education. You read them a riot act. They ask for a decent living. You feed them a drastic statute. They ask for more employment. You give jobs in prison garb. You cannot fight fire with fire. You can only fight fire with water. You can only fight the distress of the Negro with the lotion of human kindness, with constructive, not negative action.”... Page 1: “Troopers Search Plainfield, N.J. Homes For Stolen Guns–But House-to-House Hunt is Ended After Negroes Complain of Damage–Some Weapons Found– Heavily Armed Troopers act Without Warrants Under Proclamation By Hughes”… ‘…despite the resentment of residents the city had a relatively quiet day…the search by 300 troopers and Guardsmen in a mile square area cordoned off West End was carried out by proclamation. The city was declared ‘in a state of disaster and emergency ‘giving the Governor the power to invoke extraordinary powers ‘until such time it is declared by me that a state of emergency no longer exists.’ “… Page 1:”The Strategy of Riot Control–The City of Newark Assesses Use Of Guns”... “Did city and state police and the New Jersey National Guard invoke excessive gunfire in quelling Newark’s riots? Was there indiscriminate –even back lash– shooting by law enforcement officers? What strategy did they employ? Reason for inquiry: 26 deaths and 1,200 injured Blue Ribbon independent inquiry called by Governor Hughes.”…
20 JULY 1967… OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER…New York Times (21 July reporting 20 July ops) Page 1: “Heavy air strikes continued on targets in North Vietnam as good weather held over the North. American pilots flew 142 missions striking three petroleum storage depots and an army supply depot….during the day eight MIG-17s attacked a flight of four F-4 Phantoms as they completed an attack on a target 20 miles north of Hanoi. Two of the Phantom pilots fired air-to-air missiles at the MIGs as they fled without firing a shot.”
“Vietnam:Air Losses” (Chris Hobson) There were four fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 20 July 1967…
(1) The 12th ACS and 315th ACW out of Bien Hoa lost a Ranch Hand defoliator aircraft on a spraying mission in South Vietnam killing the five airman aboard.
(2) VA-163 and Oriskany lost an A-4E on a strike near Haiphong and the pilot LT R.W. Kuhl ejected over the water and was rescued.
(2) An F-8E of VF-162 and Oriskany was lost on a partial power CAT shot. LT Jim Nunn settled into the water, ejected under water and was rescued with minor injuries.
(4) An A-4E of the VA-212 Rampant Raiders embarked in USS Bon Homme Richard piloted by COMMANDER FRED WHITTEMORE was hit a few miles from the target– the Myxa POL storage site 15 miles southwest of Haiphong. What followed is best described by Steve Gray… in RIPPLE SALVO…
RIPPLE SALVO… #502… “The Gutsy Little A-4 and the Wild Ride of XO Whittemore” (from “Rampant Raider” by Steve Gray)…
“July twentieth was a bad day for the XO Commander Fred Whittemore. First he was hit by antiaircraft artillery fire while on a strike to the Hi Dong area. The airplane was hit in the control package where the hydraulic boost was added to the cable-actuated flight control system. After the hit, Fred was dismayed to discover that the control stick was no longer connected to anything! It just flopped around loose in his hand. He was far out over the flat delta where ejection meant certain capture. The good news was that he still had rudder control and electrically operated pitch trim. Now, the A-4 was inherently aerodynamically unstable; it had to be to operated in the wide range of flight regimes its mission required. Continual small control inputs had to be made to keep the airplane in any attitude of flight. Without the control stick, the airplane soon began to roll and dive for the ground. The XO was determined not to eject over enemy territory, so he used rudder control to roll the airplane upright and used pitch trim to get the nose up. But doing this caused the airplane to pitch nose up and climb, losing airspeed. So he had to rudder roll inverted to get the nose down and then roll upright again. In this fashion, with a series of roller coaster vertical moves, the XO worked himself far enough out over the water to eject. He was rescued without injuries–further proof that if the engine was running, fire wasn’t burning the pilot out of the cockpit, and any control remained to the pilot, the gutsy little A-4 could get its pilot out of harm’s way.”
Chris Hobson noted that the series of roller coaster maneuvers were flown between 2,000 and 6,000-feet ove the badlands of the Red River Delta and called the flight a “miracle.” Brilliant airmanship is what it was…
RTR QUOTE for 20 July: “EMERSON: “Skill to do comes from doing.”
Lest we forget…. and may God bless John McCain as he fights forward…. Bear