Page 1 of 589 AIR WAR: VIETNAM - PLANS AND OPERATIONS, 1961 - 1968 By Jacob Van Staaveren, Herman S. Wolk, and Stuart Slade Page 2 of 589 Acknowledgements This study was prepared by Jacob Van Staaveren, historian on the staff of the Albert F. Simpson Historical Research Center, Maxwel1 Air Force Base, Alabama. Mr. Van Staaveren was born April 9, 1917, in Perrydale, the son of Siet and Christina Strikwerda Van Staaveren. He graduated from Perrydale High School in 1935 and Linfield in 1939. He received a master's degree in 1943 from the University of Chicago and pursued doctoral studies there in history and political science. From 1946 to 1948, Mr. Van Staaveren was a civil information, education and labor education officer with the Yamanashi Military Government Team in Japan. In 1949 he returned to Japan as part of a U.S. government team assigned to write the official history of the occupation. From 1951-53, he worked in South Korea documenting the Korean conflict. He then worked until 1956 in the Military History Liaison Office of the United Nations Command and Far East Command in Tokyo. From 1958 to 1981, he was historian of the Office of Air Force History, later renamed the Center for Air Force History, in Washington, D.C. He retired in 1981, leaving behind a wealth of monographs and histories that set the highest of standards for those who followed him. He also had published or contributed to numerous other historical publications, including several on the war in Southeast Asia. He belonged to the Society for History in the Federal Government, American Historical Society, Japan-America Society and Association for Asian Studies. Page 3 of 589 Copyright Notice Page 4 of 589 Copyright Notice 939335-07-4 No part of this compilation may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording or by any information and retrieval system without permission in writing from the publisher Page 5 of 589 FOREWORD By: Defense Lion Publications During the middle and late 1970s, the United States Air Force Historical Research Center, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama produced a series of 17 monographs that detailed the history of the Vietnam War. These studies were classified as being Top Secret for many years and were only recently released to the public. The core of these monographs is the series that deal with the political, operational and technical development of the Air Force participation in the Vietnam War. These remarkable documents contain a wealth of historical data that explain the background and reasoning behind many controversial decisions. This compilation has taken these monographs and assembled them into a single narrative. The documents have been painstakingly remastered and reset to the printed page but their editorial integrity has been scrupulously preserved. We have also added numerous photographs and other illustrations to the documents. Each monograph has been given a separate section within the compilation as a whole and has retained its own appendices as part of that section. However, the source notes have been moved to the end of the compilation and, in order to reduce unnecessary duplication, the glossaries for each section have been consolidated into a single listing. The first part of this study outlines the role of Headquarters USAF in aiding the South Vietnamese effort to defeat the communist-led Viet Cong. The author begins by discussing general U.S. policy leading to increased military and economic assistance to South Vietnam. He then describes the principal USAF deployments and augmentations, Air Force efforts to obtain a larger military planning role, some facets of plans and operations, the Air Force-Army divergences over the use and control of air power, combat training and testing, defoliation activities and USAF support for the Vietnamese Air-Force. The study ends with an account of events leading to the overthrow of the Diem government in Saigon late in 1963. Because this study emphasizes plans and policies, no effort has been made to chronicle the hundreds of individual air actions in which USAF units participated. The implications of this background starts to become apparent in the second section which emphasizes Headquarters USAF's plans and policies with respect to South Vietnam and Laos in 1964. In the first four chapters the author describes the progressive military and political decline of the Saigon regime, after two government coups, and the efforts by U.S. authorities to cope with this problem. He notes especially the view of the Air Force Chief of Staff, Gen. Curtis E. LeMay, frequently stated, that only air strikes on North Vietnam could end the insurgencies in South Vietnam and in Laos and bring stability to the Vietnamese government. This contrasted with administration efforts to devise an effective pacification program and, pending emergence of a stable government, its decision to adopt a "low risk" policy to avoid military escalation. In the remaining chapters of the study, the author discusses briefly the major USAF augmentations, the expansion of the Vietnamese Air Force, the problem of service representation Page 6 of 589 in Headquarters, Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, and the rules of engagement as they affected particularly air combat training. The section concludes with a brief review of the beginning of USAF special air warfare training for the Royal Laotian Air Force and the inauguration of limited USAF and Navy air operations over Laos to contain Communist expansion. The third part of this study highlights USAF plans, policies, and operations in Southeast Asia during 1965, especially as they were significantly changed by the president's key decisions to bomb North Vietnam and transform the U.S. Advisory role in South Vietnam to one of active military support. The author focuses on U.S. participation in the development of policy for prosecuting the war, the build-up of U.S. military strength in the theater, and the gradually intensified air operations against enemy forces in South Vietnam, North Vietnam, and Laos. The Air Campaign Against North Vietnam, 1966 reviews the political background and top level discussions leading to the renewed bombing campaign in early 1966, the restrictions still imposed on air operations, and the positions taken on them by the military chiefs. It discusses the various studies and events which led to the President's decision to strike at North Vietnam's oil storage facilities and the results of those mid-year attacks. It also examines the increasing effectiveness of enemy air defenses and the continuing assessments of the air campaign under way at year's end. The fifth and final part of this volume deals with the growing realization during 1967 that the war situation was deteriorating at a frightening speed. While focusing on the Chief of Staff and Air Staff roles, the author necessarily has highlighted the plans and policies of higher authorities, the White House, the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the recommendations of the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam. Topics covered include plans for the military buildup in Southeast Asia, political considerations associated with new force deployments, and the continuing debate on war strategy and the conduct of the air campaign in the North. In the final sections, it is possible to detect the growing realization that, somehow, the war had already been lost. A few voices still suggested that some sort of victory was in sight but, with fifty years of hindsight, their reasoning seems almost ingenuous in the light of the storm that was to break loose in the early months of 1968. The final part of the first volume focuses on the roles of the Chief of Staff and the Air Staff and their proposals for the conduct of the air war. It examines the closely linked plans and policies of the White House, Secretary of Defense, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the views of the Pacific Command and the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam. The siege of Khe Sanh and the 1968 Tet offensive had a major impact on the U.S. government's conduct of the war, particularly the President's decision to halt partially, and later completely, the bombing of North Vietnam in an effort to facilitate peace negotiations. This section also discusses U.S. efforts to hasten the modernization and self-sufficiency of South Vietnam's armed forces. The material on events in 1968 is supplemented by a chapter on the research and development activities for Southeast Asia written by Herman S. Wolk. This was actually a short, separate monograph but its content is so vital to properly understanding the context of the political and operational decisions taken in 1968 that it has been included here as Chapter V. Page 7 of 589 A second volume of this compilation will cover the process that led to America's retreat from Vietnam. The Vietnam War profoundly altered America's world view and its strategic outlook. Together these two volumes will provide a unique insight into how and why the decisions that led to those changes were made. Page 8 of 589 CODE NAME DIRECTORY Listed below are the code names of certain air concepts, operations, programs, and aircraft cited in this study. The reader may find it helpful to refer to the list on occasion. Arc LightUse of B-52s to attack hostile ground targets Banish BeachUsing C-130s to drop pallets of fuel oil drums that were then ignited by smoke grenades to achieve area denial. Barrel Roll.Initiated in December 1964, Barrel Roll missions were flown against troops, equipment and supplies provided by North Vietnam in support of the Communist-led Pathet Lao.