Photo via Jack Broughton The Joint Chiefs had a bold plan for airpower, but political leaders chose gradualism instead.

The War

By Jack Broughton That Wasn’t 68 AIR FORCE Magazine / August 2014 s the US fi rst became involved of their tactics and lack of understanding Instead, Operation Rolling Thunder was in direct combat with North of Vietnamese society. designed to be the effective air campaign Vietnam, America’s airpower In 1964 the directed against the North, but was constantly resources were used sparingly, the development of a list of strategic hobbled by President Johnson’s frequent Aspastically, and less than effi ciently. Many targets in . The 94 targets invocation of the “ Card”—a pro- observers pronounced the mere threat of US they identifi ed were considered to have nounced fear of a large-scale Chinese airpower might bring the North to its knees. a direct relationship to the North’s war- intervention in Vietnam, much like in That did not happen. America’s formidable making capabilities and will to fi ght. Ad- the . But this fear ignored the and available airpower arsenal was only ditionally, Air Staff planners had designed historic enmity between the Chinese and tentatively committed and was shackled by an air campaign that Air Force Chief of Vietnamese, and the frequent analogy gradualism and micromanagement from Staff Gen. John P. McConnell considered with the Korean War was seriously fl awed. the highest levels of government. capable of knocking out those 94 targets In the fall of 1950, US forces had pushed Because of this, the scene was set for a in 28 days. invading North Korean forces back over the string of reports on airpower’s ineffective- By all accounts, American airpower 38th Parallel and had advanced to the banks ness, that it was failing to “win” the war. was capable of immediately implementing of the Yalu River, the border with China. Many historians still cling to this view. the plans. There was a fully combat ready Gen. Douglas MacArthur was threaten- But a good number of those who fired F-105 fi ghter-bomber wing at Yokota AB, ing to enter China, so the Chinese responded shots, and got shot at, believe to this day Japan, and another at Okinawa, prepared by simply marching their assembled forces that had US military capabilities been to deploy to operating bases at Takhli and across the border into the Korean War. better utilized, the outcome of the war Korat in Thailand. Tactical Air Command In Vietnam, US ground units were never in Vietnam would have been dramati- fi ghter squadrons were routinely accom- closer than 400 miles from the Chinese cally altered. plishing trans-Pacifi c fl ights for temporary border and never threatened to enter North As early as 1962, Vietnam scholars duty deployments to Southeast Asia. B-52 Vietnam—much less China. Had Chinese such as Bernard B. Fall, arguably the most bombers were in position to engage, and ground forces chosen to enter the ground prominent war correspondent, historian, aerial refueling tankers were prepared to war in , such action would political scientist, and expert on Indochina operate out of Bangkok. Naval carrier air not only have widened the war substan- during the and 1960s, spoke of the wings were on, or en route to, “Yankee tially, but the Chinese would have faced North’s fear that American retaliation to Station”—their operating position in the US airpower that would have forced their military action by would destroy South China Sea, well within range of forces to pay dearly en route to South their emerging economy and lead to post- Hanoi and Haiphong. Vietnam. Also, as the Cultural Revolution war Chinese occupation. began in 1965-66, the Chinese were too had cleverly extracted a great deal of as- STRATEGY FOR DEFEAT bound up with their own internal diffi cul- sistance from both the and The White House announced to the ties to respond militarily except to a direct China, resulting in an industrial complex world in August 1964 that the US would threat to their national security interests. that was the only real economic entity in strike fi rmly if the North or their allied China was under additional stress due to Southeast Asia at the time. Viet Cong units chose to attack any US the worsening diplomatic friction in the In less than 40 years, Ho and his follow- facilities in South Vietnam. 1960s between China and Russia. ers had gained the freedom from China that The reply came with a mortar attack on Johnson and Secretary of Defense Rob- had eluded their ancestors for the preceding the US air base at Bien Hoa, South Viet- ert S. McNamara used the China Card to two thousand years. The leadership and the nam in November, killing and wounding justify their preferred gradualist approach. people of North Vietnam were fanatically Americans, and destroying aircraft just 20 They advocated short periods of limited air proud of this accomplishment. miles north of Saigon. strikes followed by a unilateral cease-fi re Ho himself had spent enough time in In the aftermath of the attack, the John- declaration, to allow the North to assess Korea to know what air strikes had done, son Administration professed concern the situation and in theory beg the US for and he was hesitant to trade the glory of over Chinese reaction should America peace talks. conquering the South for sacrifi cing his do what it had said it would do. The The North took advantage of this ap- national pride and economic potential President, ignoring the JCS and US proach and used the cease-fi res to repair to American bombs. The fact that the Ambassador to South Vietnam Maxwell strike damage, improve and practice tac- leadership in Hanoi was smart enough to D. Taylor, decided to take no retaliatory tics, perfect their communications, further fear a determined assault by US airpower action. disperse MiGs and associated fuel and was lost on American leadership. The In his book Strategy for Defeat, Adm. munitions, build new surface-to-air mis- US leadership also ignored the historical Ulysses S. Grant Sharp Jr., commander sile sites, and strengthen readiness for the advice of theorist Carl Von Clausewitz, of US Pacifi c Command from 1964 to next push southward. Rolling Thunder, as who professed that if you have to go to 1968, said that the President should have it unfolded, struggled for effectiveness. war, victory is all that counts, and using initiated the JCS plan. Sharp stated air North Vietnamese ground forces, em- the maximum amount of force as quickly attacks “would have had a major effect powered from ending French colonial as possible is the preferred path to victory. on North Vietnam and might well have rule at the battle of Dien Bien Phu, were Washington also paid little attention been the very thing needed to stop North certainly a dominating force in the war when Fall, from his on-scene combat Vietnamese aggression in the south and to against South Vietnam, but were not a perspective, predicted that both bring Southeast Asia back to a peaceful, large factor in the JCS plan for aerial and the US would suffer defeat because stabilized situation.” Some 11 years before action against the North. The North’s A post-strike photo showing a target in the war’s end, he argued, the US may well anti-aircraft capability at the initiation North Vietnam destroyed with no col- have prevented the costly and drawn-out of hostilities was minimal and in no That Wasn’t lateral damage. war that followed. way resembled the fi ercest air defenses AIR FORCE Magazine / August 2014 69 Photo via Jack Broughton Jack via Photo

in history that materialized later in the same fighters could also have crippled the An aerial photograph of Thai Nguyen war—after a massive Russian and Chinese docking and storage facilities of Haiphong shows an unprotected cluster of indus- infusion of equipment, communications, harbor, without damaging international trial targets. training, and technical assistance. shipping vessels. Adequate warnings to At the beginning of the air war, there the nations sponsoring the shipping, plus Hanoi’s roundhouse and disabling the were no SAMs to contend with, the North the strategic sowing of mines by B-52s in nearby Gia Lam airfield. Supply inroads Vietnamese MiG interceptor aircraft pro- the waters surrounding Haiphong, would to the North would have been virtually gram was practically non-existent, and certainly have hindered ship traffic bound nonexistent. anti-aircraft guns were mostly limited for the North. An ideal strategic mission awaited B-52 to what was left over from the French The next step in the North’s isolation bombers, at the Thai Nguyen steel mill defeat at Dien Bien Phu. could have been the crippling of the main complex, 50 miles north of Hanoi. It was There was a high probability that aggres- source of supply input from China, the a large, modern, self-contained industrial sive US Air Force and US Navy aviation air northeast rail line that ran from the Chinese complex. If there was a single, meaningful attacks could have changed the calculations border to downtown Hanoi. This was a symbol of the North’s industrial sophistica- in Southeast Asia. 140-mile, single railroad track, allowing tion, Thai Nguyen was it. It was bordered Initially USAF and Navy fighters only one-way traffic. One end of the line on the north by the relatively accessible could have disabled all of the North’s was supply and transshipment facilities on Highway 3 and the Hanoi/Thai Nguyen communication and warning facilities, the Vietnamese-Chinese border, while the rail line and on the south by extensive coke plus anti-aircraft gun positions. Fighters other end was the one and only roundhouse ovens and coal and ore storage facilities. could then have destroyed the wide open, in Hanoi. Its inner area contained blast furnaces, easily identified fuel tank farms in and Fighters could have disposed of the near- iron and steel works, a thermal power around Hanoi and Haiphong, before the border supply facilities without violating plant, an open hearth furnace and steam North began dispersing fuel in barrels the Chinese border. B-52 bomber crews plant, a major four-track rail choke point, into the villages of the countryside. Those were ultimately capable of eliminating a brick plant, barge construction and as- 70 AIR FORCE Magazine / August 2014 sembly units, and multiple logistics and ing, installation, and calibration activity, we stood there, seven or eight administration buildings. It was a prime accomplished by Russian crews, was a F-105 Thunderchief fighter-bombers, fly- strategic target—and initially lacked MiG very conspicuous series of events. Fighter ing at scarcely more than rooftop height and and SAM protection. flights could have destroyed the sites and no more, it seemed, than 100 yards away, Farther west, at the junction of the Red their protecting anti-aircraft weaponry shot across our vision … [at] enormous and Black rivers, was the Viet Tri thermal while under construction. speed. They had come on us suddenly out power plant and rail marshalling facility. of nowhere, the hard, gray, sleek aircraft, Between them was a large, grey, four-story CONVINCING EVIDENCE in superb formation at approximately 600 building that prior to the war was a chemi- Though the JCS and Sharp had identi- mph, disappearing for an instant behind cal plant. At the opening of hostilities it fied 94 significant targets, proper airpower the trees and buildings that lay between was decorated with a large white circle action could have quickly changed the us and the power station (thermal power centered with a red cross and immediately direction of the war even if only a fraction plant), … then quickly climbing clear and designated as a hospital. Intense 37 and 57 of the targets were destroyed. Airpower away. ... Almost simultaneously, such lights mm gunfire from the rooftop and smaller could have convinced the North that US as were on in the apartment went out, the arms fire from all the windows greeted military forces were indeed determined fan stopped turning, and a column of dust, aircraft approaching the hospital. A B-52 to decimate the economic and national smoke, and flame rose from the direction mission and a few fighter strikes could progress Ho held dear. of the power station. … The performance have removed Viet Tri from the target list. In evaluating what could have been done, of this squadron disposed of every com- Another target for initial action would have accuracy of the strikes and collateral dam- munist or other illusion about the laxity been any one of a number of irrigation dike age were always under scrutiny. For pilots, of American bombing or the imprecision systems that were the main feature of the postmission evaluation of strike photos of US bombing techniques. … There was, Red River Delta. Rupturing even a small was adequate for mission assurance, but in our opinion, no hope at all for [the segment would have issued notice to the outsiders needed more convincing. power plant].” majority of the North’s population that the It would be difficult to find more accurate Colvin noted that of the complex of 50 US had the capability of quickly depleting evidence than on-scene comments from a houses around the plant only three had their main food staple: rice. qualified observer, and John Colvin, British been damaged—and by blast rather than Though the major Soviet deliveries consul in Hanoi, provided such a critique bomb hits. of MiG fighters were yet to come, a few excerpted in the book Vietnam Voices, by US combat aviators of all services bomber trips to the airfields at Phuc Yen John Clark Pratt. involved in the were well- and Kep would have been appropriate. Colvin recounted that he and his vice SAM sites were also a thing of the future, consul walked to their balcony as the air This photo shows the Thai Nguyen but as they arrived, the earth-moving, grad- raid sirens sounded in May 1967, and “as steel plant under attack in 1967. USAF photo USAF

AIR FORCE Magazine / August 2014 71 trained, experienced, the presidential press secretary. ... The Left: Army Gen. Creighton Abrams, and highly dedicated. The significant point is that no professional Secretary of Defense Robert McNa- majority of USAF pilots ranged military man, not even the Chairman of mara, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. David McDonald, and USAF Lt. Gen. in rank from seasoned captains to the JCS, was present at these luncheons David Burchinal (l-r) discuss war plans full , with new lieutenants a until late in 1967,” he wrote. in 1966. McNamara and President rarity. Navy and Marine units were simi- If the USAF penchant for seeking Johnson rejected the Joint Chiefs of larly manned. A good percentage of these knowledge by way of analysis of lessons Staff’s recommendations in favor of “gradualism.” Above: Adm. Ulysses pilots had seen combat before, and actively learned is valid, then it is appropriate to Sharp, chief of US Pacific Command employed units had seasoned combat vet- theorize as to what would have happened from 1964 to 1968, believed the JCS eran commanders. Proper utilization of if airpower had been used effectively at the plan could have averted the long and available airpower and personnel could start of the Vietnam War. Colvin’s recount- costly war. have, in a matter of weeks, eliminated a ing from central Hanoi was a persuasive high enough percentage of those 94 targets tale, and his on-scene comments define ing no longer,” he wrote. “The country’s to alter the entire war. the conditions that existed even as Rolling endurance had reached its limits.” But the basics of the JCS plan were Thunder was strangled by gradualism. A determined air assault would not have ignored. Bombers were not committed In his report, Colvin observed the immediately defeated the North’s ground against strategic targets, but were relegated evidence of malnutrition was clear among army, but Ho would still have been forced to bombing runs over jungles down south. adults and children in the capital area, as to consider two premier rules of communist Fighters were used in a restricted and food was not coming in from China. “For ideology: one, that half a loaf is better than wasteful manner against strategic targets three days there was no water supply” due none, while the second affirms that time up north. to failed electrical pumps, he wrote, and is on our side. Tactical commanders, up to the general already unsanitary conditions were growing Ho could well have selected alternate officer level, were forbidden from exercis- worse. The economy of the North was at options to protect his country. ing target selection and mission control, last “breaking down,” and for the first time Finally, proper utilization of US nor could they specify attack techniques. “no amount of excited exhortation could airpower could have achieved an even Instead, power over the air war was confined correct” the conditions. Since Colvin had more important goal: With a strong to detailed decrees from the Washington, arrived in Hanoi in 1966, the streets had display of airpower at the beginning of D.C.-based “Tuesday Lunch Bunch,” as been lined with war materiel delivered from the conflict, the US could have saved described by Sharp in his book. China, but by August and September 1967 many of the 58,000 American lives that “The final decision on what targets there was little left. “The trains were com- were later lost. n were to be authorized, the number of sor- ties allowed, and in many instances even Jack Broughton is a retired USAF and fighter pilot. During his time on the tactics to be used by our pilots, was Active Duty he was the recipient of four Distinguished Flying Crosses, two Silver made at a Tuesday luncheon in the White Stars, and the Air Force Cross. He is the author of two memoirs from the Vietnam House attended by the President, the Sec- War era, Thud Ridge and Going Downtown. This article is adapted from his 2007 retary of State, the Secretary of Defense, book Rupert Red Two. His most recent article for Air Force Magazine, “The Heart Presidential Assistant Walt Rostow, and of the North,” appeared in the April issue. 72 AIR FORCE Magazine / August 2014