RIPPLE SALVO… #188… and the MIG-17S FROM PHUC YEN… and the rest of the story at MIGHTY THUNDER’s Post…
Good Morning: Day ONE HUNDRED EIGHTY-EIGHT of remembering and honoring the fallen warriors of Rolling Thunder…
5 SEPTEMBER 1966…THE FRONT PAGE FROM FIFTY YEARS AGO… NYT… A sunny Monday and Labor Day in NY, NY…
Page 1: “U.S. Insists Hanoi Must Move First on Pull-Back”…”An Administration official said today that it was up to the North Vietnamese to make the first move in any general troop withdrawal from South Vietnam. In a televised interview assistant Secretary of State William Bundy gave the first public response–a harsh one–to proposals made by President DeGaulle during his visit to Cambodia last week. Mr. Bundy, rejecting the French President’s suggestion that the United States set a date for the withdrawal of its troops, questioned General DeGaulle’s judgement that a unilateral statement of this kind would induce Hanoi to negotiate a peace. ‘In point of fact, it has not been one of the clearly stated conditions that Hanoi has ever put forward. This is DeGaulle’s version of the things that we are dealing with, and if you look at Hanoi, you will see it on and off a little bit on this question of withdrawal.’ He appeared on NBCs program, “Meet the Press,’ saying that there were perfectly good diplomatic channels available, Mr. Bundy commented that it was unnecessary for the President to meet with the French leader to learn what North Vietnamese leaders told him in Cambodia. The administration has in fact ruled out the possibility of such a meeting at this point. (A meeting that had been suggested by senator Mike Mansfield.)…. Page 1: “Lin Piao Is Made Red Guard’s Head”…”Lin Piao, China’s second ranking leader, has taken over as commander -in-chief of the Red guards, a youth movement formed to speed a cultural revolution. The disclosure in a Peking broadcast also described Premier Chou En Lai as the advisor, and Ho Lung as chief-of-staff of the Red Guard’s picket corps, apparently the control body… ‘Then Chairman Mao Tse Tung’s dearest comrade in arms, Comrade Lin Piao came among us. We went before him carrying the number 1 armband of the capital’s picket corps and asked him to become commander-in-chief. He replied ‘All right.’ We were enthusiastic and presented him with the armband.’…”
Page 1: “Guards Bayonet Heckler’s In Cicero’s Rights March”…”A two hour march for open housing in this all-white suburb of Chicago ended today in violence. At least 12 persons were hurt during the march, including several hecklers wounded, none seriously, by National Guard bayonets. Thirty-two hecklers were arrested. Several hundred white angry whites followed the 250 demonstrators most of the 30 block march, shouting insults and sometimes lunging past guard troops and police protecting the marchers. About 200 of the demonstrators were Negroes. As the line of marchers returning to Chicago reached the city boundary white youths tossed a volley of bottles at them and sought to rush them. The violence occurred in Cicero, 50-yards west of where the Belt Line railroad divides this suburb from Chicago. The hecklers were held back by police…swinging clubs. Several were beaten to the ground. A Guardsman in a jeep, after giving two warnings, fired three shots from a sub-machinegun over the heads of the white’s to break up the fist-waving crowd…The tumultuous climax ended a march marked earlier by the demonstrators throwing rocks, eggs and cherry bombs at the demonstrators by roving gangs of white toughs in T-shirts and sport shirts. They ran from alley to alley and vacant lot to vacant lot to confront the marchers. More than 2,000 Guardsmen, under orders to ‘shoot to kill, if fired upon,’ and 500 policemen were on hand to protect the marchers…”…
Page 3: “Brawl In Vietnam Had Racial Tone”…”United States Navy authorities disclosed today details of a recent brawl involving 200 white and Negro sailors. The incident which took place in and outside a servicemen’s club at Tiensha, a naval installation two miles from here (Danang) was the most severe of a recent series of fights involving Negroes and whites around the sprawling cluster of American installations. The Navy said the violence has arisen mainly from drunkenness, rather than racial hatred. Young Negroes who took part in the melee, which occurred August 11 and left at least eight sailors injured, said that the fighting was partly blowing off steam, but it started when a white called a Negro the ‘n-word.’…’If white people find out you are chicken, they feel they can run over you, but I know damn well they are not going to run-over me,’ said Fireman Recruit Edward Grooms. He was one of two Negroes who were disciplined for their part in the brawl. No whites were punished.”….
5 SEPTEMBER 1966… The President’s Daily Brief…CIA (TS sanitized) … Vietnam: Predictably, Hanoi is giving high praise to De Gaulle’s speech in Phnom Penh. The North Vietnamese propagandists are even able to market their points without departing too far from objectivity. Hanoi gives special stress to De Gualle’s implication that the war is an outgrowth of national resistance against the US. Moscow’s initial reaction has been brief. It seems to reflect some difficult in determining how to bring De Gaulle’s pronouncements into line with Moscow’s own positions. In deference to North Vietnamese sensitivities, Moscow downplays De Gualle’s statement that a military solution is impossible and ignores his profession of hope that, as in 1954, agreement can be reached guaranteeing the neutrality of all Indochina…Communist China: The Red Guards are being shaken down into a regular organization under even tighter army control. Press reports, as yet unverified by official Chinese news broadcasts, Identify Lin Piao as commander of the guards, Marshall Ho Lung as his chief-of-staff, and Chou En-Lai as an advisor. (TS??? this is from page 1 of NYT!)
5 September 1966…OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER…NYT (6 September reporting 5 September ops)… Page 4: “4 U.S. Planes Lost”…”The United States stepped up air raids in North Vietnam’s Red River Valley yesterday as monsoon storms subsided, but lost three jet fighter-bombers…A fourth plane crashed today bringing to 361 the number of United States planes lost in North Vietnam. American pilots flew 134 missions over North Vietnam. They attacked 30 targets between 10 and 117 miles from Hanoi. Most of them were along the Red River Valley to the northwest. Air Force pilots said they set off nine ground explosions with their bombs at the Nguyen Khe fuel depot 10 miles north of Hanoi and left it covered in flames and black smoke. Five other fuel depots, six railroad and highway bridges and three surface-to-air missile sites were among the targets near Hanoi and Haiphong. The attacks were far from the heaviest on the North Vietnamese capital and Red River Valley, but they represented an increase over recent actions there. The southwestern monsoon has hampered action in the region since May. Weather experts said flying weather would continue sporadically over the area until about mid-October. The three planes shot down in the raids in the river valley targets–an Air Force F-4C Phantom and two F-105D Thunderchiefs–crashed 10, 20, and 40 miles north of Hanoi. The four Air Force crew were listed as missing. The plane downed today was an Air Force F-105D. The pilot bailed out 15 miles west of Dong hoi and was rescued by an Air Force helicopter. Four civilians and 20 to 25 troops were injured when an Army two engine Caribou crashed on take-off at Dong-ha.”… “Vietnam: Air Losses” (Hobson) The three aircraft lost near Hanoi (1-F4 and 2-F105s) were reported lost on 4 September by Hobson and were included in yesterday’s RTR. Two fixed wing aircraft lost on 5 September in southeast Asia…
(1) CAPTAIN WILFRED KEESE ABBOTT, USAF, was flying an F-8E of the VF-111 Sundowners embarked in USS Oriskany with wingman Navy Lieutenant Randy “Iceman” Rime on his wing providing TARCAP for a flight of A-4 Skyhawks attacking a target near Phu Ly. The section of F-8E Crusaders was jumped by four MIG-17s emerging out of the clouds. Both F-8s took cannon fire hits. CAPTAIN ABBOTT’S aircraft was un-flyable and he was forced to eject. He was subsequently captured and finished the war as a POW. He came home in March 1973. “Iceman” returned his damaged aircraft to Oriskany, but that is another story…see MIGHTY THUNDER’S post for 5 September…
(2) CAPTAIN T.D. DOBBS was flying an F-105D of the 354th TFS and 355th TFW out of Takhli on a strike on a truck park seven miles west of Dong hoi and was hit by ground fire. He was able to fly the aircraft several miles further west before ejecting. He was rescued by an HH-3 as the NVN troops closed in.
RIPPLE SALVO… #188… MIGHTY THUNDER and Brown Bear Schaffert are on duty tonight… Have a great Labor Day and take a moment to reflect on all the Labor Days, 50 of them, that those of us who came home have had with our families that those we left behind have not…
Lest we forget…. Bear ………. –30– ……….