RIPPLE SALVO… #419…APRIL 22-28: SIXTEEN AIRCRAFT LOST IN A WEEK… but first…
Good Morning: Day FOUR HUNDRED NINETEEN of a day-to-day journal of an air war long-gone…
28 APRIL 1967… HOME TOWN HEAD LINES from The New York Times on a fair and windy Friday in NYC…
Page 1: “Clay Refuses Army Oath: Stripped of Boxing Crown”…”Cassius Clay refused today as expected to take the one step forward that would have constituted induction into the armed forces. There was an immediate governmental action. Although government authorities foresaw several months of preliminary moves before Clay would be arrested and charged with a felony, boxing organizations instantly stripped the 25-year-old fighter of his world heavyweight championship. ‘It will take at least 30 days for Clay to be indicted and probably another year to a year and a half before he could be sent to prison.’… United States attorney Morton Sussman said: ‘Clay made a statement: ‘I have searched my conscience and I find I cannot be true to my belief in my religion by accepting such a call.’…”… Page 1: “Knicks Sign Bradley to $500,000 Contract”... “Princeton basketball star has accepted a 4-year contract worth nearly half a million dollars. He must complete a six month tour of duty with the Air Force Reserve before joining the New York Knicks.”…
Page 1: “President Scores G.O.P. Bid to Alter School Aid Plan”...”President Johnson denounced today as ‘reckless’ and ‘partisan’ a major Republican effort to revamp the Administrations program of aid to elementary and secondary schools…he argued that the Republican plan of channeling aid through the state governments would resolve old feuds between church and public school leader, between poor and wealthy schools, and other contending forces that united behind his approach in 1963.”... Page 1: “Cairo’s New Truculence: Nasser’s Pressure On His Arab Rivals is linked to his home front frustrations. Former King Saud’s call for the ouster of his successor, King Faisal of Saudi Arabia, and the stoning of United States government officers in Yemen yesterday, are interpreted here as further symptoms of the new belligerency President Gamal Abdul Nasser of the United Arab Republic and his supporters have been showing this spring.”… Page 1: “Censure Of Dodd is Asked in Ethics Panels Report For ‘Dishonor of Senate'”…“Vote Unanimous”...”Diversion of Campaign Funds for Personal Use Assailed“…”The Senate ethics committee recommended today that Senator Tomas J. Dodd be censured for conduct ‘contrary to accepted morals’ that tended to bring the Senate into ‘dishonor and disrepute.’ “… Page 9: “Sihanouk Trail Big Supply Link”…”United States specialists think that the so-called Sihanouk Trail–a 60-mile truck route eastward across southern Laos to the Ho Chi Minh Trail — has become a major supply route for enemy forces into South Vietnam. A minor role has been expanded.”… Page 14: “The Weeky Casualty Report: 148 American servicemen Killed In Action and 1,031 Wounded in Action. Enemy killed: 1,185. Total U.S troops in theater: 440,000.”…
28 April 1967… The President’s Daily brief (CIA (TS sanitized)… SOUTH VIETNAM: The Communists seem to be preparing a major offensive in the Central Highlands… defector reports point to a build-up in southwestrn Peiku Province in the area of Ia Drang Valley battles of late 1965. One defector, a North Vietnamese soldier, has said the Communists plan to strike at the height of the monsoon in June and July…GREECE: We see no signs as yet of any organized move against the new regime. The King, however, appears to be reasserting some influence over the new government. He has succeeded in adding four new civilians to the cabinet…
28 APRIL 1967…OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER… New York Times (29 April reporting 28 April ops): Page 1: “U.S. Pilots Down 2 MIGs; Renew Hanoi area Raids”...”American pilots returned to Hanoi yesterday and downed their 43rd and 44th MIGs of the war in six engagements with the Soviet built interceptors. At least 21 MIGs were sighted over the Hanoi area which had been spared bombing raids Thursday because of bad weather. Pilots reported extensive enemy fire over both targets yesterday. Two MIG-17s of Korean War vintage were shot down by F-105 Thunderchiefs near the Danphong highway causeway 12 miles west of the North Vietnamese capital. Both approaches to the causeway were cut by 3,000-pound bombs. Other Thailand based Thunderchiefs returned to the railway repair shops two and a quarter miles east northeast of Hanoi. Pilots leaving the target reported their bombs had caused thick black smoke and multiple rail cuts in the yards…“Navy Raids Storage Dump”...”Further south Navy pilots from the aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk set off a large secondary explosion and started fires in raid on an oil storage dump 15 miles southwest of Vinh in the panhandle…other Kitty Hawk pilots severely damaged a bypass bridge 12 miles northeast of Thanh Hoa A-4 Skyhawks from the carrier Hancock damaged two supply ferries with 20-mm cannon fire 25 miles north of Vinh.”… Page 1: “4 Planes Downed Says Hanoi”... The planes were brought down by local armed forces in close coordination with the air force and missile units… Hanoi Radio report…”
“Vietnam: Air Losses” (Hobson) There were three fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 28 April 1967…
(1) MAJOR MORRISON ARTHUR COTNER and TSGT CARMEN MUSCARA (U.S. Army) were flying an 0-1G Bird Dog of the 21st TASS and 504th TASG out of Nha Trang on a Forward Air Control mission and possibly were downed by small arms fire over the beach 20 miles south of Tuy Hoa. MAJOR COTNER and TSGT MUSCARA did not survive the crash and were Killed in Action on this date 50 years ago. Their remains were recovered.
(2) An F-4C of the 433rd TFS and 8th TFW out of Ubon was destroyed on takeoff when a bomb was inexplicably released on take off roll and exploded under the aircraft. Both aviators survived the accident…
(3) CAPTAIN FRANKLIN ANGEL CARAS was flying an F-105D out of the 44th TFS and 388th TFW out of Korat and shot down by a MIG-21 on the egress from a strike on the Hanoi railroad repair shops about 80 miles west of Hanoi. CAPTAIN CARAS was killed in Action. His remains were recovered from the crash site in November 1987 and identified in 1988.
RIPPLE SALVO… #419… The “Tuesday Lunch Bunch” was restless. Sixteen Rolling Thunder aircraft went down in the week of 22 through 28 April. Despite poor flying weather the RT pilots had struck every original Rolling Thunder target on the authorized list at least once. But there had only been four good weather days in March and six in April. Secretary McNamara had concluded that the “gradual escalation” campaign had failed. He concluded that the bombing program was at a “watershed” (watershed: “a dividing ridge between two drainage areas”)... What now?… The following is a good summary of where Rolling Thunder was at the end of April 1967… Quoted from Edward Drea’s “Secretaries of Defense Historical Series, Volume VI, ‘McNamara, Clifford and the Burdens of Vietnam, 1965-1969’ “… Page 207… I quote…
On 22 April (1967) the president approved Rolling Thunder 55, a wide ranging list of targets in North Vietnam’ northeast quadrant, among them two MIG air bases as well as a cement plant and an ammunition dump in Haiphong; only the Hanoi power plant had been deleted from the JCS-proposed list. U.S. warplanes flew into the teeth of enemy MIG, AAA and SAM air defenses as they attacked MIG fields, POL installations, and industrial or military targets in the northeast quadrant. During the week of 21-28 April, 16 U.S. aircraft were lost. McNamara informed staff members of the president’s decision only on 24 April, revealing his underlying rationale for endorsing the latest target list by adding, “Lets get this behind us to show it won’t solve the problem.” He saw the administration at a ‘watershed,’ similar in magnitude to the major decisions of mid-1965, that demanded lengthy and “intense examination” of policy with no firm commitments anticipated before July. Whatever McNamara may have had in mind, the reevaluation of the air campaign proved more ad hoc than comprehensive and less calculated than reactive as competing viewpoints vied for presidential approval.
Wheeler told the president at a 27 April top-level meeting that the bombing campaign was fast approaching the point where all worthwhile fixed targets except North Vietnam’s ports would have been struck. Thus the administration would soon have to address attacking them. In the meantime Sharp was proposing still more new targets for Rolling Thunder 56 as the air campaign reached new levels of intensity. McNamara believed that escalation had to end, but it could only stop in the absence of suitable targets in North Vietnam. So at a 2 May presidential meeting that approved the Rolling Thunder 56 package, he supported short-term escalation in the belief that striking the power plants would would eliminate the last significant targets in the Hanoi-Haiphong area, thereby enabling the administration to “cut back to the 20th parallel.” The increasing intensity of the bombing and Sharp’s proposals to strike still more targets around Hanoi and Haiphong disturbed McNamara who, according to Rostow, felt “rational control over targeting was getting out of his hands.”… end quote…
HUMBLE HOST assessment: Our team had a Head Coach, Offensive Coordinator and a Quarterback that were not only on different pages, they were in different play-books…
CAG’s QUOTEs for April 28: SUN TZU: “He whose generals are able and not interfered with by the sovereign will be victorious.”… PATTON: “It is too bad that the highest levels of command have no knowledge of war.”…
Lest we forget… Bear