The F-105 Thud, a legend flown by

Transcription

1 The F-105 Thud, a legend flown by legends Go! August 30, 2005 The F-105's targets, Rolling Thunder in northeastern North Vietnam Most targets in North Vietnam demanded the Thud pilots fly1,250 mile round trips from Thailand, so air refueling was required on the way in and on the way out. This map displays typical flight routes for the Thud from Korat RTAFB, Thailand. You can imagine a similar route from Takhli RTAFB. Note that for practical purposes, same way in, same way out, day in and day out, for the F-105s, and same kind of refueling orbits for the tankers, so F-105 attacks on North Vietnam seldom came as a surprise. Recall from the earlier map of route packages that the F-105 was heavily tasked in Route Package 6, the northeast sector of North Vietnam, which included Hanoi and Haiphong. This is where we are going to concentrate, because that's where the Thuds did most of the work. We honor service and sacrifice. Please click the "Donate" button and contribute $20 or more to help keep this station alive. Thanks. Table of Contents Introduction F-105 Thunderchief, the airplane The F-105's targets, Rolling Thunder in northeastern North Vietnam Some of the pilots who flew the Thud Concluding comments 1 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

2 F-105 pilots often ran into so many hostile attacks on the way to and exiting from their targets that our refueling aircraft, normally the KC-135, a modified Boeing 707, had to take a high risk and fly over North Vietnam to feed the fuel exhausted F-105 on his way out. You can see that their refueling tracks took them over Laos, but they were not supposed to fly over North Vietnam. But they did. A warfighter does what a warfighter has to do. 2 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

3 Two 355TFW Thunderchiefs taking gas from a KC-135 prior to entering North Vietnam to attack their targets. Photo presented by Thud Ridge Web Let's now get a better "lay of the land" for Route Pack 6 in North Vietnam. 3 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

4 When approaching Hanoi from Thailand, the F-105Ds had first cross the Red River, then fly over to "Thud Ridge", the name given by Thunderchief pilots to a series of hills located between the Red and Black Rivers. They then turned and flew low level down Thud Ridge directly to Hanoi and its near environs, or cross over Thud Ridge and strike at targets to the northeast of Hanoi. Once over "Thud Ridge," the F-105s would approach their targets low and fast, an environment in which the F-105D excelled. Maneuverability and stability during low-level, high-speed flight were excellent because of the aircraft's high wing loading. By fast, we're talking in the vicinity of knots, often at treetop level, no room for error. We have read accounts by veteran 105 pilots that if hit over their targets in this route pack, they would first assess whether they could get to the Gulf of Tonkin to the east and bail out, knowing they would be picked up by the Navy, or second, get back to Thud Ridge where they could bail out and find some cover. Bail-out over the plains almost surely would lead to capture, and bail out over the rugged karsts to the northeast was a dangerous enterprise once their chutes hit the jagged limestone rocks. Sometimes, they could regain control and hobble to Udorn RTAFB as described earlier. Some would even land at or bail out over friendly Laotian dirt strips. In these days, American fighter operations over Laos and North Vietnam from Korat and Takhli RTAFBs did not receive 4 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

5 much publicity. The US and Thailand would not admit the US was flying combat sorties over North Vietnam from Thailand until 1966, and even after that neither government wanted to admit the extent of flight operations from those bases. Politicians and diplomats in both countries were in a "worry-warp" that China would enter the war ala Korea which, in turn, might trigger a nuclear confrontation with the Soviet Union, so these and many other diplomatic games were played. From a USAF perspective, Korat was set up in 1962 with one officer and 14 airmen assigned on temporary status. US Army "Camp Friendship" is in the foreground, the cantonment area where the first Air Force people at Korat RTAFB stayed. The RTAFB can been seen at the top of the photo. Photo taken in 1964 and presented by Photo Gallery for the 44th Engineer Group (Construction), Camp Friendship, Korat, Thailand They lived at an Army cantonment at Camp Friendship, they had some vehicles including crash trucks, refueling units, forklifts, generators and the like. The Army operated their communications. As you can see from this 1964 photo, the Army cantonment area was very close to a pretty darn good airfield, a RTAF field at the time. As early as 1962, perhaps even earlier, the US government saw a need to get ready at Korat to fly and fight with USAF aircraft, mainly the Thud. Following the Gulf of Tonkin battle of August 1964, people started to arrive at Korat to support tactical fighter operations. Initially, the group numbered about 500, and they still lived at the Army cantonment area. The Army started building up USAF facilities at Korat, adjacent to the RTAF airfield. The first fighter squadron, the 36th TFS, arrived in August from Japan on temporary duty. Temporary duty was used as a cover for Thailand, another diplomatic game to reject the idea that fighter aircraft were "assigned" to the field. 5 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

6 The 44th TFS arrived from Japan on a temporary rotation in December 1964, giving Korat two fighter squadrons. F-105Ds at Korat RTAFB, Photo presented by Arlis Kelly The 13th TFS was set up at Korat in May 1966, largely using 44th TFS aircraft and pilots. But it did not use the 44th TFS designation, instead taking the 13th designator. The 13th squadron had four flights of F-105Ds (single-seat) for air-toground attack and one flight of F-105E Wild Weasel aircraft (two seat, pilot and weapons system officer-navigator) which specialized in hunting down and destroying enemy surfaceto-air missile (SAM) sites. Leetun flew the F-105D. Thud Row -Takhli RTAFB Flight Line1965. Photo courtesy Jimmy Butler, presented by Takhli RTAFB Web Page. Fighter operations at Takhli RTAFB began earlier, in 1962 when F-100s arrived from Cannon and England AFBs in the States, also on temporary duty. F-100 deployments and rotations went up and down through 1965, tankers arrived in 6 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

7 1965, and so did F-105s from the 355th TFW from McConnell AFB, Kansas. All F-105 squadrons were extraordinarily busy during , focused on attacking North Vietnam and the Ho Chi Minh Trail through Laos. They were part of the controversial Rolling Thunder air campaign against North Vietnam, begun on March 2, 1965, and terminated in Gen. Earle Wheeler, USA, chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff (CJCS), meeting with Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson in the Oval Office, March 31, Photo credit: Yoichi R. Okamoto, presented by Library and Museum of President Lyndon B. Johnson. To this day the mere mention of Rolling Thunder can get a veteran's dandruff up. One can find a number of different descriptions for the mission, and, as is the case often in war, the mission changed and evolved as events dictated. As a general statement, Rolling Thunder was to be a systematic bombing of North Vietnam, starting at the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) between North and South Vietnam. By slowly advancing the target areas northward across North Vietnam, it was hoped the will of the North Vietnamese leaders to fight would be destroyed. The idea was to destroy industrial bases and air defenses, and stop the flow of men and supplies down the Ho Chi Minh Trail. The underlying core objective was to destroy the enemy's will to fight and force a truce. The US dropped more bombs during this campaign than all the bombs dropped during World War II. Many issues are associated with this air campaign, too numerous to outline here. Washington imposed stringent controls. As indicated earlier, Washington feared Communist China would send in its forces to fight ala the Korean war, 7 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

8 which in turn could result in a nuclear confrontation with the Soviet Union. These fears drove many political decisions at home, and many American forces were fighting with their hands tied as a result. In any event, the thinking in Washington was that a major air campaign against North Vietnam would force the North Vietnamese to the bargaining table and the war could be swiftly brought to an end. Some thought this could happen within eight weeks. They were wrong. Rolling Thunder lasted, on and off, for three years and, in response, the North Vietnamese substantially increased their operations in South Vietnam. There were significant differences of opinion about the Rolling Thunder campaign between military, especially Air Force, leaders and political and diplomatic leaders, the latter referred to by this editor as "the suits." These differences deserve more than passing mention. President Lyndon B. Johnson meeting with Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) around a picnic table on LBJ Ranch front lawn, December 22, The red arrow points to General Curtis Lemay, Chief of Staff, USAF (CSAF). Rolling Thunder did not make him a happy camper, and he looks it in this photo. In December 2004, we prepared a photo gallery of other such photos in a presentation entitled, "How did so many smart guys make such a mess of Vietnam?" You may wish to page through it. Photo credit: Yoichi R. Okamoto While Rolling Thunder was initially advertised as an eight-week bombing campaign that would force the North to give up, it developed into what became known as a strategy of "gradualism," the complete antithesis of what General Curtis Lemay, the CSAF and his senior generals saw as the proper use of airpower. The Air Force at this point in its evolution was immersed in strategic bombardment, some called Lemay's "hard-knock." Many knew Lemay as "Bombs away with Curt 8 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

9 Lemay." He wanted to pulverize North Vietnam's strategic targets and was not much interested in coaxing them to lose their will inch by inch. General William W. Momyer commanded the 7th Air Force (7AF) in Vietnam and became General Westmoreland's air component commander for this theater of warfare. His idea of employment of air power was much like Lemay's "hard-knock,' except his plan was referred to as SLAM, a concept for seeking, locating, annihilating, and monitoring the enemy. In a book written by General Momyer, entitled Airpower in three wars, published by the Air University Press in April 2003, General Momeyer makes the following points about Operation Rolling Thunder: Senior USAF leadership felt the operation was too restrictive and that it should target vital North Vietnamese strategic targets instead of lines of communication. The USAF wanted an "air strategy focused upon the heart of North Vietnam. But neither the President, the Secretary of State, nor the Secretary of Defense yet conceived of Rolling Thunder as a strategic air offensive... Secretary McNamara still believed that Rolling Thunder should be a limited application of Airpower against logistics targets relatively close to the DMZ. Further, the size and frequency of these strikes, as well as the targets, should be selected in Washington." There was no agreed on formal command arrangement for who would control the strikes into North Vietnam. As an aside, Momyer took this on as a major task to fix while commanding 7th AF, and he finally became the air component commander for all air forces, though tensions always remained between the USAF and Navy-Marines. Instead, a Rolling Thunder Coordinating Committee controlled air operations during the bombing campaign... "The Rolling Thunder Coordinating 9 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

10 Committee could not do the job." This was most surely a recipe for disaster - warfare by committee. The F-105 in the early years of the war was flying about 75 percent of the Air Force's attack missions into North Vietnam, largely because the USAF did not want to risk the B-52 strategic bomber, which had to be protected for the nuclear strike mission against the Soviet Union. While the Thuds did enormous damage to the North Vietnamese war machine, they took a severe beating. The USAF bought about 600 F-105Ds. As of early 1967, there were only about 300 left. About 350 F-105s were lost to combat. Most of these, 312, were lost to anti-aircraft artillery (AAA) and surface-to-air missiles (SAM). Most of these were lost to AAA. North Vietnamese MiGs claimed 22 F-105 kills. In 1966 alone, the year we lost Captain Leetun, 126 Thuds were lost, 103 to AAA. One problem was that the F-105 formations flew every day at roughly the same time, using roughly the same flight routes, and the same callsigns. So the enemy was waiting for them. In December 1966, MiG-21 pilots intercepted a large group of Thuds and shot down 14 of them. It was calculated that an F-105 pilot stood only a 75 percent chance of surviving 100 missions over North Vietnam. In order to give you a sense for the job undertaken by the F-105 pilot and his machine, we want to present a few USAF photos of them in combat over North Vietnam. They were provided courtesy of "Ralph H. via Paul Jarvis," and presented on a page entitled, "388th TFW F-105 Thunderchiefs over Vietnam:" Remember, there is an American pilot in those cockpits! 10 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

11 June 1968 Hanoi strike. F-105 over Hanoi. 11 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

12 Enemy surface-to-air missile (SAM) fired at F-105 F-105 struck by SAM and on fire 12 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

13 F-105 egress Ed Rasimus, a lieutenant F-105D pilot at the time, later wrote a memoir of his F-105 days in Vietnam called, When Thunder Rolled. We have seen some of his chats on the internet. In one, he said his roommate at Korat in 1966 kept a log for four months of Rolling Thunder. That log said they were losing about a pilot and an aircraft a day. He described it this way: During four months of 1966, I briefed each day for missions into NVN (North Vietnam) with a group that typically consisted of four or five flights of four aircraft--a total of around 25 pilots at a time. On average over the period we lost one of those guys daily. Next morning, start with 25, that night you have 24. Go in the following day with 25, finish the day with 24. Over six months that it took to fly my 100 missions my roommate kept a diary that listed each time we lost someone. During the tour we lost 110% of the aircraft assigned and 60% of the pilots who started the 100 mission tour didn't finish. As a result of such high attrition, the 13th TFS was transferred to Udorn RTAFB as an F-4D Phantom II squadron in October The F-105 men, machines and mission transferred to the 44th TFS at Korat. So, the 13th squadron spent about one and one-half years flying the Thud in the war. The squadron arrived in May 1966, and Captain Leetun was shot down four months later, in September. He was on a Rolling Thunder mission. 13 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

14 Capt. Leetun's mission has been described as targeted against rail and road bridges near Kep, in what was known as Route Package 6. Kep Airfield, North Vietnam. Note bomb craters. Presented by skyhawk.org Several months prior to his attack mission, a CIA Intelligence Memorandum provided to President Johnson addressed the Kep Airfield as part of a growing number of North Vietnamese air bases that could host the MiG-21 fighter, a major air-to-air threat to US F-105 strikes in the Hanoi and Haiphong areas. It appeared at the time that the North Vietnamese were trying to disperse their fighter force to reduce chances of their being destroyed on the ground and improve their access to incoming US fighter formations. The roads and bridges, of course, were used to bring in the needed equipment and supplies to build up the air base. The Soviets were mightily involved, assisting the North Vietnamese in developing their plans for air base buildups throughout the country. 14 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

15 As things turned out, the enemy MiG threat was not the major threat to the F-105, especially early on. So worrying about the airfield, in retrospect, arguably should not have been the major concern. More important, Kep was a major distribution point for transportation of weapons coming from China. It was a key hub on the North Vietnamese railroad system. Once weapons arrived at Kep, they were moved by trucks and boats to designated collection points were porters then carried them to their final destination points in the war zone. Kep was on the most important segment of the rail system which was a single track northeast railroad line that ran some 82 nautical miles from the Chinese border through Kep into the heart of Hanoi. There were a large number of important targets along the length of this railroad, including multiple rail yards and bridges linking the industrial and military triangle of Hanoi, Thai Nguyen and Kep. Those who favored strategic bombing felt that disruption, even total destruction, of transportation between these areas would greatly reduce the war making capability of North Vietnam. However, the suits put on all kinds of restrictions in bombing these targets. For example, at one point, only miles of its total length, depending on the timeframe, were declared accessible to US air attack because of self-imposed rules of engagement. The rest of the railroad line lay within the 30-mile buffer zone south of the North Vietnamese-Chinese border and the protected zones around Hanoi and Haiphong. This is what drove senior Air Force leaders nuts. They wanted to take down Hanoi and Haiphong and all the major distribution points around them; the idea that they would fall in "protected" zones was unthinkable. 15 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM

16 North Vietnamese gunners manning an anti-aircraft artillery site. This was photographed by an Air Force reconnaissance pilot. Presented by secretvietnamwar.com Returning to that mile section of railway, the North Vietnamese installed AAA batteries every 48 feet and concentrated SAM sites around the tracks. The buildup of AAA became the major threat to F-105 operations, and most Thud losses were due to these guns. You will, in the next section, learn that our pilots watched the building of SAM sites in this area, prohibited from attacking them. Only when the SAM sites were operational and demonstrated hostile intent could our pilots take them out. For a long time, the suits did not want to admit that the Soviets and Chinese were building these sites, once again fearing they would enter the war with significant combat forces. You've been exposed to the airplane flown by and the targets attacked by Captain Leetun and many others. Let's now expose you to the courageous men who flew the F-105. Some of the pilots who flew the Thud 16 of 16 7/27/10 4:33 PM