RIPPLE SALVO… #395… IN THE NEWS–LIFE and THE NEW YORK TIMES, and around the world fifty years ago…but first…
Good Morning: Day THREE HUNDRED NINETY-FIVE of day-to-day journal of the air war over North Vietnam…
4 APRIL 1967… HEAD LINES AND LEADS from The New York Times on a sunny Tuesday in NYC…
Page 1: The Big Story with a picture of LCDR Dick Stratton bowing for the press above the fold. “U.S. Fears Hanoi is Brainwashing American POWs”...”The State Department expressed concern today that North Vietnam might be brainwashing American prisoners of war to obtain propaganda statements attacking United States policy. Robert J. McCloskey, the State Department spokesman cited an account in the current issue of Life magazine of a captured American pilot’s appearance before foreign newsmen in Hanoi. The Department,, Mr. McCloskey said, is ‘concerned at recent indications that North Vietnam may be using mental or physical pressure on American prisoners-of-war to obtain confessions or statements critical of United States policy in Vietnam. The article in Life by Leo Lockwood, a free-lance American photographer who visited North Vietnam for four weeks described the exhibition in Hanoi on March 6 by LCDR Richard A. Stratton, a Navy pilot who was shot down in North Vietnam in January. Th article said ‘the Navy man looked straight ahead, but wasn’t really looking–his eyes never seemed to focus–he just wasn’t there. He was like a robot,’ Mr. Lockwood wrote, adding, ‘When they said something to him, he acted, if they did nothing, he did nothing.’ North Vietnam, Mr. McCloskey said,’has given repeated assurances that it treats prisoners humanely. However, it has refused to permit the International Committee of the Red Cross or any other neutral observers to visit the prisoners, which is required by the Geneva conventions. In the absence of such independent verification North Vietnam’s professions of human treatment cannot be accepted.’ …According to Mr. Lockwood Commander Stratton, dressed in striped pajamas and sandals, read a five-page ‘confession’ over a microphone from behind a curtain while photographers and foreign newsmen listened. Copies of the statement were given to the newsmen…There are now about 380 American prisoners in North Vietnam. Definitive figures cannot be obtained because the North Vietnamese refuse to provide the Red Cross with lists. Of the total 128 have been confirmed by one means or the other as being in North Vietnamese captivity. Four are Marines, 63 are Air Force and 61 are Navy personnel. Fifty other men, all Air Force, are believed to have been captured and 204 are listed as missing in action and possibly captured. Commander Stratton appeared before the newsmen for four minutes after a recording of his 2000-word statement had been played. Life and The New York Times published the 2,000-word ‘confession.’…” (More in Ripple Salvo)…
Page 1: “U.S. Visitor to Hanoi Tells of Discord With Vietcong”… “An American news photographer (Lee Lockwood) recently returned from North Vietnam said yesterday that he had found ‘significant differences between the Hanoi Government and the Vietcong leadership over ways of restoring peace in Vietnam…His conclusion was drawn from interviews with both Premier Pham Van Dong of North Vietnam and Nguyen Van Tien, the National Liberation Front (Vietcong) representative in Hanoi. What will happen if the U.S. stops the bombardment of the North? Van Dong: a halt of the bombing would open the way to negotiations about settling the war. Mr. Tien of the Vietcong: a halt will have no effect whatever on stopping the bombing.”… Page 1: “Humphrey Chiding Critics On Vietnam”... “Vice President Humphrey, in London on a two-week tour of Europe, is telling European leaders that they could advance the cause of peace in Vietnam if they directed some of their criticism at North Vietnam as well as the United States. The bluntness of this implied rebuke is reported to have startled some European leaders.”... Page 8: “Marchers in Peking Call for Dismissal of President Liu”… “For the third day in a row demonstrators here in Peking attacked President Liu Shao-chi. Some posters suggested that he be ‘shot.’…”… Page 2: “Syrians and Israelis in New Fighting... exchanged gunfire near Sea of Galilee.”…
Page 1: “Columbia Drops Ranking in Class...to become one of the first major institutions in the country to abolish class standing. Draft Boards use these records in Selective Service decisions.”… Page: “Record 76-Degrees Smiles On City ’till Winds Blow Smiles Away…mercury falls 40-degrees in 14-hours…Reservoirs above normal.”…
Page 7: “U.S. Bars Attacks On MIG Bases Now”… “Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara today rejected ‘under pressure circumstances’ congressional demands for United States bombing MIG bases in North Vietnam. He said at a news conference without elaboration that the situation could change but he indicated that for now the United States would continue to avoid hitting the bases. Some Capitol Hill critics have charged that the Soviet-built jet fighters are taking a heavy toll in United States pilots and airplanes. They have downed 10 United States planes since the bombing of North Vietnam began in August 1964.”
4 August 1967… The President’s Daily Brief…CIA (TS sanitized) NORTH VIETNAM: Hanoi’s great debate about the relative merits of building up the main forces or the irregulars is continuing. The whole question is re-argued in an article in the February issue of the party journal…. The article also suggests that Hanoi has upped its estimate of the number of US forces it may ultimately have to face to a million, as opposed to the 500,000 figure generally mentioned in the past.
4 APRIL 1967… OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER… New York Times (5 Apr reporting 4 Apr ops)… Page 1: “500th Plane Lost In North Vietnam”… “The United States has lost its 500th warplane over North Vietnam since the bombing began 32-months ago. The loss of the plane, an F-105 Thunderchief, was disclosed today. It was also announced that American fighter-bombers carried out 147 missions against North Vietnamese targets yesterday, the highest number in five months. The Thunderchief jet was lost Sunday, but the Defense Department withheld the announcement in the hope that the pilot who had bailed out could be rescued. When rescue efforts failed the pilot was listed as missing in action. He joins 390 American fliers who have been killed, captured or listed as missing in action.”… “Among the North Vietnamese targets attacked yesterday were bridges, storage areas, trucks and military installations in the panhandle near the South Vietnam border and in the Red River Delta in the North. Pilots saw smoke billowing 500-feet in the air after A-4 Skyhawk fighter-bombers from the nuclear carrier Enterprise raided a petroleum storage area 22 miles southeast of Vinh on the Gulf of Tonkin…”
“Vietnam: Air Losses” (Hobson) There were two fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 4 April 1967…
(1) and (2) Two F-4B Phantoms from the VF-92 Silver Kings embarked in USS Enterprise collided while on a BARCAP mission and both aircraft were damaged too extensively to continue flying. Two of the four aviators survived the midair, LT EDWARD PHILIP SZEYLLER and ENSIGN DAVID EARL MARTIN perished in the accident… “Killed in Action, Body Not Recovered:” Two young warriors rest in peace where they fell fifty years ago today…
A ROLLING THUNDER TRUE STORY: Humble Host is pleased to be able to relate the following flying story from 7 April 1967.. VA-35 Black Panthers, USS Enterprise, Yankee Station. Target: another A-6 night attack on the sprawling Thainguyen steel complex of many targets… Pilot: LCDR Everett “Hoot” Foote and Bombardier/Navigator LT John Griffith…
The flight proceeded as briefed to the coastal entry. LCDR FOOTE utilized the A-6 Intruder’s terrain-avoidance radar augmented by LT GRIFFITH’s search radar observations to establish their minimum terrain avoidance altitude under night instrument flight conditions. The low altitude at which they flew over the mountainous terrain greatly complicated the radar navigation challenge. LT GRIFFITH never-the-less hit each checkpoint on time, inserting updated position data into his navigation and weapons system computer to ensure accurate track. Approaching Highway 1A east of Kep, the crew received indications of steadily tracking enemy fire control radar and at about six miles from the final checkpoint for target run-in intense aimed fire anti-aircraft fire began to detonate near the aircraft. Although maneuvering radically in an attempt to avoid the enemy ground fire, LCDR FOOTE maintained his close proximity to the terrain in order to avoid tracking surface to air missile guidance radar. After about 90-seconds the gunfire ceased, and the crew continued toward the target, still under continuous tracking by enemy radar. At 15 miles from the target the crew received indications of a missile launched toward their aircraft. LCDR FOOTE maintained an altitude of between 800-feet and 1000-feet above the terrain. At about 12 miles from the target, LT GRIFFITH lost radar view of the target and requested an immediate climb. LCDR FOOTE eased up to 1500-feet making a final heading correction to the target. LT GRIFFITH reacquired the target and began tracking the center of the target. At eight miles from the target, intense antiaircraft fire illuminated the clouds ahead of the aircraft and shells began bursting around the aircraft. At six miles from the target a surface-to-air missile detonated approximately 200-feet ahead and to the left of the aircraft jarring the aircraft sufficiently to dislodge the red lens from a floodlight, flooding the cockpit with bright white light. The crew continued the attack, and six seconds later were hit with a second missile, which shook the aircraft violently and made five holes in the right wing and fuselage. Although aware that they had been hit, and uncertain of the extent of damage, the crew pressed the attack into the intense barrage of flak over the target, maintaining a smooth, level flight path and steady target tracking until bomb release. As the bombs fell, LCDR FOOTE executed a precise high-G recovery maneuver, retiring at minimum terrain avoidance altitude through the mountains. The crew again encountered heavy aimed fire as they retraced their route toward the coast, but were able to evade the fire by hard maneuvering at low altitude. The return to the carrier and recovery in IFR weather were without incident. The aircraft sustained several holes from the enemy missiles, including a three-inch hole in the wing barely missing the wing fuel tank… Bomb damage assessment confirmed an on target release of 22 500-pound MK-82s on the target complex on or near the primary target, the blast furnaces.
Just your average DFC for an Intruder crew… (#3 for Hoot and #4 for John) Taking the fight to the enemy in his homeland, as nobody else could… oohrah… By contrast, Humble Host was airborne in my Skyhawk with a wingman on the same cycle. My mission was armed reconnaissance near Vinh. Overcasts diverted me to the south for a Milky radar drop of 6-MK81s through the clouds somewhere near the DMZ. Mission #51, good for 2-points toward the next Air Medal and a night trap in the log book… After the recovery I stood in awe in the Intel debriefing spaces on the Big E as Hoot Foote and John Griffith debriefed… Gangway, incomparable Intruder crew!!!… The awe has never ceased…
LT Griffith, along with pilot LCDR Glenn Kollman, lost their lives on 12 March 1968 when their A-6 plunged into the Tonkin Gulf shortly after catapulting off Enterprise.
RIPPLE SALVO… #395… Humble Host adds a little more to the 50th anniversary of Dick Stratton coming-out story of April 1967… This from the Rochester and Kiley “Honor Bound”…. Pages 224-25 and 344…
“Navy Lt. Cdr.Richard Stratton, seized on 5 January 1967, the first American pilot bagged by North Vietnam in the new year, ‘was a Communist propagandist’s dream,’ author John Hubbell observed.’He was just what the Vietnamese were waiting for, a big, heavyset, dark-visaged, rough looking…American imperialist.’
(Footnote: In a 1978 self-characterization, Stratton agreed that he fit the stereotype perfectly: “I’ve got the big nose, sloping forehead, the crew cut, the pot belly; I’m everything their cartoonists use to portray the typical American aggressor on the land, sea or air; and I’ve got the loud mouth; I was the arch-type of what the mad-bomber was going to be.”)
“As Pigeye (Prison staff interrogator) administered the rope treatment, Stratton, his wrists already shredded from the handcuffs, felt the pain beginning instantly, ‘as if someone had thrown a switch.’ The sensation ‘indescribable,’ his shoulders seemingly ‘trying to roll out of their sockets.’ In repeated efforts to get the aviator to admit his plane had been felled while bombing Hanoi, Stratton was beaten to a pulp, burned with a cigarette, had his thumbnails bent back, and was twice left cinched in the ropes. After two weeks he capitulated, but not before urinating on the confession papers. (oohrah!!!) Stratton’s defiance would soon manifest itself again in an episode that would cause Hanoi considerable grief and deliver another serious blow to its psywar campaign.”…
Page 344… “The spring of 1967 had been a busy season for Hanoi’s propaganda directors even prior to the activation of the Plantation camp. In one of the most dramatic incidents of the psywar, on 6 March the North Vietnamese had forced Dick Stratton to appear at a press conference in which they played an extracted taped confession, then escorted the PW onstage to bow before a swarm of television and movie cameras. Tortured repeatedly since his capture in January. Stratton had paid a steep price for his taunting defiance, suffering from multiple wounds and recurrent sickness, but his still husky build and ‘imperialist’ swagger continued to make him a prize candidate for the spotlight. With the Vietnamese apparently bent on both exploiting and humiliating him, the aviator decided this time to hedge his resistance with a maneuver that outwardly complied with the enemy’s command but in such robotic fashion that it left the hosts non-pulsed and the assemblage of reporters shaken. Zombie-like, standing rigidly and glassy-eyed in his striped prison pajamas, he bowed mechanically and expressionless before the cameras as though drugged or brainwashed. the resulting pictures, in stark black and white, were published worldwide, accompanied by stories in Life and Time referring to ‘Pavlovian’ and ‘Orwellian’ overtones of the exhibition. The Communists received a public relations black eye as damaging as the effect of the Hanoi March.”
(Footnote on the page: “Stratton actually was reprising his ‘Manchurian candidate’ performance, mouthing monotone, programmatic responses to a reporter’s questions about his condition: ‘Get enough to eat…In the camp I can listen to the radio Voice of Vietnam…We get the medical care we need.’ He repeated the same replies no matter the queries. The tape was edited to convey the impression that Stratton was fit and clear-thinking.”)…
For Dick Stratton and the other POWs who were paraded in public for propaganda and other exploitation purposes, there was an upside. They were known to be alive and would therefore have to be accounted for at the end of their ordeal as prisoners of the North Vietnamese. Unfortunately, for Dick Stratton and the POWs of 1967, that ordeal had six more years to run. March 1973 was a long way off.
Lest we forget… Bear