RIPPLE SALVO… #268… COMBAT CRUISES 4 THRU 7 AND ANOTHER 20 COMBAT LOSSES…none but the brave… but first…
Good Morning: Day TWO HUNDRED SIXTY-EIGHT of a return to Yankee Station and the air war of 50 years ago…
25 NOVEMBER 1966… HOME TOWN HEADLINES from the NYT on a cloudy and rainy Friday in New York…
Page 1: “Smog Here-Near the Dangerous Point and patients warned. Air gets better during the day but pollution rises again to high in the evening. City officials confer at night meeting to weigh steps if conditions worsen. Citizens asked to limit use of utilities.”… Page 1: “Living Costs Spur Labor to Seek Sharp Pay Raises and plan on making large salary wage increase demands.”… Page 1: “Contrasts Mark Thanksgiving Day. Festive parade is followed by anti-Vietnam War march here. Many attend prayer services.”… Page 12: “Reds In UN Aim fire at Plan For 2/3 Vote On China Entry.”… Page 19: “US Troops Battle Vietcong for 5-Hours on Thanksgiving Day with enemy forces in a rugged coastal area and reported killing 30 of the enemy. American casualties were light.” … Page 20: “To 12 GIs At Pleime, South Vietnam, Survival is the best reason to celebrate Thanksgiving. The native tribesmen ritual sacrifice of a water buffalo and memories of violent battle nearly blotted out thanksgiving from the minds of 12 American soldiers who share the remote Central Highlands outpost with 400 mountain tribesmen. They ate turkey and cranberry sauce, but there was little talk of the holiday itself–how others had been spent, how it feels to be in Vietnam, and what family and friends are doing in the United States.”… Page 18: “Differing Assessments of War in Vietnam as Seen From Saigon and Washington. Men in the field and Saigon see a long fight and doubt the validity of Pentagon reliance on statistics as a measure of progress.”
Page 1: Article by Max Frankel: “The Two Views of The War”...”In Washington progress in the Vietnam was is measured by the number of bodies counted, the number wounded, the caches of weapons and food found destroyed. The number of troops committed, the aid projects begun. But in Benluc, just 15 miles south of here (Saigon), in mud to their thighs and water to their waists the troops measure the number of rice paddies swept and the number of inoculations given to a village population in the hope that one wizened old man will point out a dozen booby-traps and thus maybe save a life…In Washington, people worry about a President of the United States not being able to sleep because his men are flying risky missions over North Vietnam…”…
25 November 1966… The President’s Daily Brief…CIA (TS sanitized Sept 2015)… NORTH VIETNAM: Entire page redacted-still classified after 50 years?…COMMUNIST CHINA: The line-up of Chinese leaders at today’s Red Guard rally did little to clear up the mystery of who is winning our in the power struggle. Despite grave charges made by the Guards only two days ago against Chief of State Liu Shao-chi and party secretary Teng Hsiao-ping, both men showed up with Mao and the other leaders to watch one million Red Guards tramp past… LAOS: The small war goes on. With the end of the rains, Communist troops have begun sparring with friendly forces for hilltop positions overlooking supply routes in northern Laos. These are small unit actions with limited objectives–because the Communists are reluctant to concentrate in large numbers because of increasingly effective tactical airstrikes against them… JORDAN: the Jordanian situation remains explosive, although the King survived a potentially dangerous Moslem Sabbath. Whipped up by sermons at morning prayer, Moslem worshippers broke from mosques in the Jordanian sector of Jerusalem today for another round of riots against the King. Jordanian security forces opened fire and three civilian were killed before things calmed down. At last report, the streets were quiet. Nasir was very careful in his speech yesterday. He could have inflamed the situation; instead, he chose not to attack King Husayn openly. Nasir (redacted)knws that a revolution in Jordan might suck him into a war with Israel–a war he would probably lose…
25 NOVEMBER 1966… OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER… New York Times (26 Nov reporting 24 Nov ops)… Page 7: “The weather continued ‘generally poor’ in North Vietnam Thursday (24th), but United States pilots flew 101 multi-plane attack missions. They concentrated on targets in the panhandle…but made a few strikes in the vicinity of the major port of Haiphong.”… “Vietnam: Air Losses’ (Hobson) There were no fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 25 November 1966… oohrah…
RIPPLE SALVO… #268… NATIONAL AIRCRAFT CARRIER MONTH… USS CORAL SEA combat cruises 4 thru 7…Ripple Salvo #267 summarized the first three combat cruises of the Coral Maru. Cruises 4 thru 7 (7 September 1968 to 8 November 1973) included 487 more days on Yankee Station (Total for 7 combat cruises=835), and another 35 aircraft (Total 95)…
FOURTH COMBAT CRUISE from NAS Alameda with CVW-15 embarked: 7 September 1968 — 18 April 1969… (7 1/2 mos.)
Days on the line: 110
Combat Losses: 4
13 Oct: A-6A of VA-52…COMMANDER QUINLEN R. ORELL… (KIA) and LT JAMES D. HUNT (KIA)…
3 Jan 69: A-4C of VA-216… LTJG R.M. AARON… (recovered)…
14 Feb: A-4C of VA-216… LTJG LARRY JAMES STEVENS… (KIA)…
14 Feb: A-4C of VA-216… LCDR JAMES F. MEEHAN… (recovered)…
Operational Losses: 4… (1 A-4C, pilot killed; 1 KA-3B, all 3 in crew killed; 1 f-4B, two recovered; and, 1 UH-2C, all four crew recovered.)
FIFTH COMBAT CRUISE departed NAS Alameda with CVW-15 embarked: 27 September1 968 — 1 July 1970 (9 mos.)…
Days on the line: 125
Combat Losses: 1
7 Jan 70: A7-A of VA-86… LCDR MICHAEL GEORGE HUFF… (KIA)…
Operational Losses: 10 (4 A-7As, 1 pilot killed; 3 F-4Bs, 2 killed; 1 A-6A, 2 killed; 1 E-2A, 5 killed; and, 1 EKA-3B, 3 killed)…
SIXTH COMBAT CRUISE departed Alameda with CVW-15 embarked; 14 December 1971 — 17 July 1972 (7 mos.)…
Days on the line: 148
Combat Losses: 12
30 Dec: F-4B of VF-111… LCDR D.W. HOFFMAN… (POW) and LTJG N.A, CHARLES… (POW)…
6 Apr 72: A-7E of VA-22… COMMANDER TOM DUNLAP, COMMANDER CVW-15… (KIA)…
9 Apr: A-6A of VMA(AW)-224… MAJOR CLYDE D. SMITH, USMC…(recovered) and 1ST LT SCOTT DAVID KETCHIE, USMC… (KIA)…
16 Apr: A-7E of VA-94…COMMANDER DAVE MOSS… (RECOVERED)…
27 Apr: F-4B of VF-51… LT A.R. MOLINARE… (POW) and LCDR J.B. SOUDER… (POW)…
1 MAY: A-7E of VA-94… LT M.G. SURDYK… (recovered)…
3 May: A-6A of VMA(AW)-224… 1LT J.W. McDONALD, USMC… (KIA) and CAPTAIN D.B. WILLIAMS, USMC… (KIA)…
6 May: A-7e of VA-22… LT M.W. MILES…(POW)…
24 May: a-7E of VA-94… LCDR HARVEY EIKEL… (recovered)…
29 May: A-6A of VMA(AW)-224…LCDR P. SCHUYLER… (recovered) and CAPTAIN L. J. FERRACANE, USMC… (recovered)…
11 Jun: A-6A of VMA(AW)-224… CAPTAIN ROGER E. WILSON, USMC…(KIA) and CAPTAIN W.K. ANGUS, USMC…(POW)…
25 Jun: A-7E of VA-22…LT GEOFFREY R. SHUMWAY…(KIA)…
Operational Losses: 4 (2 A-7Es one killed; 1 F-4B; and 1 SH-3G five recovered and 3 killed)…
Cruise Highlights: Five MIG-17 Kills.
(1) VF-111: LT GARRY L. WEIGAND and LTJG WILLIAM FECKELTON a MIG-17.
(2) VF-51: LCDR JERRY B. HOUSTON and LT KEVIN MOORE a MIG-17.
(3) VF-51: LT KENNETH CANNON and LT ROY A. MORRIS a MIG-17.
(4) VF-51: CDR FOSTER S. TEAGUE and LT RALPH M. HOWELL a MIG-17.
(5) VF-51: LT WINSTON C. COPELAND and LT RALPH HOWELL a MIG-17.
SEVENTH COMBAT CRUISE out of Alameda with CVW-15 embarked: 9 March 1973 –8 November 1973… (8 mos.)
Days on the line: 84
Combat Losses: 0
Operational Losses: 0 thru Jan 73.
Humble Host comments: USS Coral Sea put to sea on her first combat cruise on 7 December 1964 and completed her seventh combat cruise on 8 November 1973. Between each of these cruises she was at sea for about two months of work-up training. She was deployed to West Pac for more than 4 1/2 of nine years with another year at sea in East Pac. She logged a total of 835 days of ops at Yankee Station and left almost 100 aircraft and more than 50 souls, God bless them, behind, plus 18 surviving POWs who returned in early 1973. Hers was a typical Vietnam War attack carrier experience.
Tempo of operations? Sacrifice? Price? Blood, sweat and tears? Is there anybody out there who can convince me that any of the subsequent ops by our carriers in the mid-east in the 1990s to date were or have been any more arduous than that of the carriers who carried the fight to North Vietnam for nine years? Yet, it is written in many quarters that the mid-east ops of Desert Storm and forward have been the most arduous ever. Poppy-cock. Anybody who thinks so, I invite your case for the post- Vietnam operators.
Is there anybody out there who can explain how Operations Rolling Thunder and Linebacker remain un-commemorated? How could the second greatest sustained air campaign in our country’s history remain unnoticed and unrecognized? Both were major campaigns and there is still no campaign ribbon for either. We are now 50 years away from those bloody battles, and still the heads of the leaders who got us into the mess are hiding from the incredible performance of the only warriors who carried the war to the enemy’s heartland. What in the hades are the Secretaries of the Navy and Air Force waiting for??? It is a fifty year old short-change for some of the greatest warfighters that ever went forward to engage the enemy day in and day out for years on end. Not a single campaign ribbon or commemorative medal???… Hey, Senator McCain, get in gear, sir… better late than never… OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER and LINEBACKER remain something the United States Departments of Defense and State would like to forget… Not so fast– I will be sounding off about this (intentional?) oversight for the duration of this RTR effort to remember the warriors and events of Rolling Thunder… they were the bravest of the brave–they flew hundreds of missions into the most heavily defended target complex in the history of American wars… THEY ARE NOT TO BE FORGOTTEN…
Tomorrow: Another hard charging carrier of the Vietnam War era… CARRIERS FOREVER…
Lest we forget… Bear -30-