RIPPLE SALVO… #368… “A WALTER MITTY IN THE WHITE HOUSE”…RESTON… but first…
Good Morning: Day THREE HUNDRED SIXTY-EIGHT of remembering an air war fought fifty years ago…
8 MARCH 1967…HEAD LINES and LEADS from The New York Times on a fair Wednesday with chance of snow in NYC…
Page 1: “All Over the East the Weather Story is Wet”... “Precipitation in many forms–rain, snow, freezing rain and sleet–descending on the eastern third of the nation yesterday in a storm that created hazards, discomforts and quirks from Birmingham to Boston.”... Page 1: “Vatican Limits Popular Music in the Mass Until it is Suitable”… “The Vatican explained today that a recent Roman Catholic church document on sacred music limited the role of popular music in the mass. A Vatican spokesman said such music would not be acceptable in the church until it became of a sacred nature, but the possibility that this could be achieved was not ruled out.”… Page 3: “Senator Discerns Sharp War Changes”... “Senator Robert F. Kennedy declared yesterday that the Vietnam situation has changed drastically and dramatically within the last month…urged the Administration to seize the unique opportunity now offered to negotiate an end to the war… He said the situation had altered ‘tremendously’ because the North Vietnamese appeared to have withdrawn their demand that United States forces be pulled out of Vietnam as one of their preconditions for peace talks. Kennedy: ‘Before we take the final plunge to even greater escalation, I think we should try negotiation. We can always go back to war.”…
Page 6: “House Will study Draft Plans Effect on Education”...”The House Education Committee indicated today that it would look into the educational impact of the proposed changes in the military draft…a 77-member group including educators, religious leaders, authors, actors and civil rights leaders suggested replacing the draft with a volunteer army.”… Page 7: “Draft Board Job is Soul Searching”…”Manhattan has 17 draft boards. A typical board consists of two paid office clerks and two lawyers, a bank officer and an engineer who are volunteers. ‘It’s a heart-breaking, soul-searching job. It has comedy and great sadness,’ said a member who served in World War I. The four men process nearly 1,500 men each month. The board has a list of 12,000 names of young men in their board’s district. Hardship is what determines the hard choices. The board members are looking to President Johnson’s lottery system to ease their soul-searching.”… Page 44 Editorial: “Making The Draft Fairer”…”President Johnson has set forth with great clarity all the reasons why the military draft must be more equitable, but his message to Congress shows a puzzling absence of insistence on swift action to get rid of the unfairness. The underlying principle of the draft, in peace as well as in war, is equal service. Yet the President rightly notes that, it is in the glare of conflict that all of us are focused more urgently on the need to review the procedures by which some men are selected and others are not…essential under condition of total war the boards are now a font of confusing and contradictory selection practices. Congress ought to demobilize them with the nation’s thanks.”
8 MARCH 1967… OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER… New York Times (9 Mar reporting 8 Mar ops)…Page 9: “In raids over North Vietnam yesterday United States Air Force pilots reported having destroyed a storage area 72 miles east of Dien Bien Phu and damaged a storage area 80 miles west of Hanoi… “Vietnam: Air Losses” (Hobson) There was one fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 8 March 1967…
(1) LCDR CARROLL OWEN CRAIN, LTJG GEORGE FRENCH PAWLISH and ATAN RONALD EDMOND GALVIN were flying an A-3B SkyWarrior of VAH-4 embarked in USS Kitty Hawk on an unescorted river mining mission and failed to return from the mission. It is presumed the aircraft was downed by enemy ground fire or the aircraft was inadvertently flown into the sea en route to the target area–the Kien Giang River near Dong Hoi. LCDR CRAIN, LTJG PAWLISH and AIRMAN GALVIN perished, killed in action, and remain unaccounted for fifty years after their last flight. Glory gained, duty done.
RIPPLE SALVO… #368… New York Times 10 March 1967 Page 38: “A TROUBLED PRESIDENT”….
“The importance of power was never more somberly in evidence than in President Johnson’s news conference yesterday. He was the leader of the greatest power that the world has ever known, with the tide of battle running more favorably than it has at any time since the start of the Vietnam conflict. Yet it was plain that the mood was one of pathos–of a President locked into a situation to which he saw no end and no key.
“Mr. Johnson was never more impressive in his pronouncements on Vietnam. One saw, heard and had to believe that this was a man who had prayed and pondered and who longed with all his heart to find an honorable way out of that far away war–and had failed.
“One reason the situation is so tragic is that there are men of good will everywhere and the President included all the critics in that company–who believe his policy either to be absolutely right or absolutely wrong. Every one of them as Mr. Johnson said, is seeking peace. The President himself is planning another trip to the Pacific to confer with General Westmoreland and Ambassador Lodge in that quest. Yet the result is an ever-widening war. The Johnson conference was preceded by the release of figures showing the highest casualties of any week of the war. The most open secret of the conflict–that the United States has been using Thai bases to bomb North Vietnam–was made official yesterday. Hanoi and the Vietcong are fighting back harder than ever.
“Behind everything President Johnson said yesterday was a combination of pessimism that amounted almost to despair and a determination not to change the present American policy unless Hanoi changes its policy. This is another element in the tragedy. The men in Hanoi and Moscow, like Lyndon Johnson surely believe just as strongly in the righteousness of their cause and the correctness of their policy. The result as Mr. Johnson put it, is that there is ‘no area of agreement today.’ Everyone is a prisoner of his own slogans.
“The President once more, and for reasons often expressed, refused to consider a halt in the bombing of North Vietnam. Yet it has been–and remains– the conviction of this newspaper and of many others that a bombing pause is worth trying. It is risky; it offers no guarantee of success; but it does present a reasonable possibility of achieving peace talks. The present policy is leading only to a long, grueling costly war in which there can be no ‘victory’ commensurate with the tragic price that must be paid.”
James Reston came away from the same press conference to include this paragraph in his Sunday column: “WALTER MITTY IN THE WHITE HOUSE. Keeping up with Lyndon Johnson is quite a job! Last week a tiger in Bobby Kennedy’s tank, raging at his dissenting critics. This week he is Mr. Cool with a kind word for everybody and a special grant of ‘sincerity’ for all those who differ with him. It is like watching a great character actor playing different roles: the bold defiant leader; the patient sorrowful philosopher; the conniving tyrant; the poker player or the preacher. You name it, he can play it.”
CAG’s QUOTES for 8 March: PLUTARCH: “If all the world were just, there would be no need for valor.”… PATTON: “It is too bad that the highest levels of command have no personal knowledge of war.”…
Lest we forget…. Bear