Red Flag: How the Rise of “Realistic Training” After Vietnam Changed the Air Force’S Way of War, 1975-1999
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RED FLAG: HOW THE RISE OF “REALISTIC TRAINING” AFTER VIETNAM CHANGED THE AIR FORCE’S WAY OF WAR, 1975-1999 by BRIAN DANIEL LASLIE B.A., The Citadel, 2001 M.S., Auburn University at Montgomery, 2006 AN ABSTRACT OF A DISSERTATION submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Department of History College of Arts and Sciences KANSAS STATE UNIVERSITY Manhattan, Kansas 2013 Abstract This dissertation examines how changes in training after Vietnam altered the Air Force’s way of war. Specifically, the rise of realistic training exercises in the U.S. Air Force, particularly in the Tactical Air Command, after the end of the Vietnam conflict in 1975 ushered in a drastic increase in the use of tactical fighter aircraft to accomplish Air Force missions. Many scholars, including Benjamin Lambeth and Richard Hallion, have emphasized the primacy of technological developments in the renaissance of air power between Vietnam and the Gulf War. This neglects the importance of developments in training in the Tactical Air Command during the same period. This dissertation demonstrates that throughout the 1970s and 1980s Air Force leaders reconsidered some of their long-held assumptions about air power’s proper use and re- cast older ideas in ways that they considered more realistic and better justified by past experience. Realistic training exercises led to better tactics and doctrines and, when combined with technological advancement, changed the way the Air Force waged war. Tactical assets became the weapons of preference for Air Force planners for several reasons including their ability to precisely deliver munitions onto targets and their ability to penetrate and survive in high-threat environments. Tactical assets could accomplish these missions precisely because of the changes that occurred in training. At the same time, the rise of tactical assets to equality with strategic assets directly led to the demise of both Tactical Air Command and Strategic Air Command and the creation of the single Air Combat Command. The conventional view that a massive technological revolution in military affairs took place in the 1980s and led to success in Desert Storm is conceptually too limiting. That interpretation places too much emphasis on the technological advancements used to prosecute war and slights the experiences of the airmen themselves in the development of the training exercises that helped change how the U.S. Air Force waged war. RED FLAG: HOW THE RISE OF “REALISTIC TRAINING” AFTER VIETNAM CHANGED THE AIR FORCE’S WAY OF WAR, 1975-1999 by BRIAN DANIEL LASLIE B.A., The Citadel, 2001 M.S., Auburn University at Montgomery, 2006 A DISSERTATION submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Department of History College of Arts and Sciences KANSAS STATE UNIVERSITY Manhattan, Kansas 2013 Approved by: Major Professor Donald J. Mrozek Copyright BRIAN D. LASLIE 2013 Abstract This dissertation examines how changes in training after Vietnam altered the Air Force’s way of war. Specifically, the rise of realistic training exercises in the U.S. Air Force, particularly in the Tactical Air Command, after the end of the Vietnam conflict in 1975 ushered in a drastic increase in the use of tactical fighter aircraft to accomplish Air Force missions. Many scholars, including Benjamin Lambeth and Richard Hallion, have emphasized the primacy of technological developments in the renaissance of air power between Vietnam and the Gulf War. This neglects the importance of developments in training in the Tactical Air Command during the same period. This dissertation demonstrates that throughout the 1970s and 1980s Air Force leaders reconsidered some of their long-held assumptions about air power’s proper use and re- cast older ideas in ways that they considered more realistic and better justified by past experience. Realistic training exercises led to better tactics and doctrines and, when combined with technological advancement, changed the way the Air Force waged war. Tactical assets became the weapons of preference for Air Force planners for several reasons including their ability to precisely deliver munitions onto targets and their ability to penetrate and survive in high-threat environments. Tactical assets could accomplish these missions precisely because of the changes that occurred in training. At the same time, the rise of tactical assets to equality with strategic assets directly led to the demise of both Tactical Air Command and Strategic Air Command and the creation of the single Air Combat Command. The conventional view that a massive technological revolution in military affairs took place in the 1980s and led to success in Desert Storm is conceptually too limiting. That interpretation places too much emphasis on the technological advancements used to prosecute war and slights the experiences of the airmen themselves in the development of the training exercises that helped change how the U.S. Air Force waged war. Table of Contents Acknowledgements .................................................................................................................... x Dedication ................................................................................................................................ xii Preface .................................................................................................................................... xiii CHAPTER 1 - USAF Pilot Training and the Air War in Vietnam ............................................... 1 Preparing the Tactical Force for Combat .................................................................... 13 Reports on Tactical Problems .................................................................................... 23 The Graham Report ............................................................................................... 24 Project Red Baron .................................................................................................. 27 Strategic Bombers in Vietnam ................................................................................... 36 Accepting Blame ....................................................................................................... 38 CHAPTER 2 - Training Tactical Fighter Pilots for War ............................................................46 Realistic Training ...................................................................................................... 58 Aggressors and MiGs................................................................................................. 62 CHAPTER 3 - Operational Exercises ........................................................................................77 RED FLAG ............................................................................................................... 80 Red Flag I .............................................................................................................. 88 The Era of Bill Creech ............................................................................................... 96 Red Flag Expands .................................................................................................... 102 CHAPTER 4 - Setting the Stage: Impact of New Aircraft on Training .................................... 116 The Close Air Support Debate and the A-10 ............................................................ 119 The Dawning of the Advanced Fighters and the “Reformers” .................................. 122 Stealth ..................................................................................................................... 131 The State of Affairs in 1980 ..................................................................................... 137 CHAPTER 5 - Short of War: Air Power in the 1980s .............................................................. 140 The Thirty-One Initiatives ....................................................................................... 141 El Dorado Canyon ................................................................................................... 147 The Line of Death ................................................................................................ 148 The Attack ........................................................................................................... 153 Panama .................................................................................................................... 155 viii Was Red Flag Working? .......................................................................................... 158 CHAPTER 6 - Desert Storm: A Theater Air War .................................................................... 161 The Iraqi Threat ....................................................................................................... 175 Final Operational Plan ............................................................................................. 179 CHAPTER 7 - Desert Storm: Execution .................................................................................. 186 SAC’s Supporting Role............................................................................................ 201 CHAPTER 8 - After the Storm ................................................................................................ 215 The Air Force Bets on Black .................................................................................... 217 Soviet Observations affect their training .................................................................