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Bob ‘Hippo’ Hipps (334 Tactical Fighter Squadron): The night of Dec 17, 1972 our F-4E squadron (the 334TFS had deployed from Seymour Johnson, AFB, NC — which is the only Air Force base named after a Naval Aviator) stood down and we were all in the club asking, “WTFO?” Then, one of our maintenance officers came in and told us we were getting wall-to-wall ALE-38 chaff dispensers loaded on our jets. Since laying chaff corridors in RP-VI had been our primary mission in the previous Linebacker fun and games, this was our first clue that the following day was not going to be just another day at the office. The general consensus at the time among our aircrews was, “Oh shit, here we go again.” The next morning we attended a mass briefing by the 4TFW wing king. Kind of resembled one of those briefings you see in the old WWII “12 O’Clock High” movie. Shortly into the briefing, he said, “And there will be no SAR for the first three days of the operation.” You could have heard a pin drop…..

Bill ‘Bear’ Pickavance (VA-93 USS Midway): As I recall, on the 18th  we were on a stand-down day going between noon to midnight and midnight to noon. I was in CVIC with Fast Eddie Contreras (VA-93 AI) behind the curtains updating my nuc target folder. Without “knocking” in walked Skipper Terrell who said he and I were flying that night and that was all he could say. He said he would brief me on the mission later. Well off we went as Iron Hand into Indian country and like most of you we saw a shit load of SAMs, fired a bunch of Shrikes and sadly watched several BUFFs go down!

The two quotes highlight a significant difference between flying the Air Force war out of multiple bases in Thailand and the Navy execution from the carriers.

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Perspective from John Chesire – VF-151 Switchboxes – flying MiG-CAP around Haiphong.

Of my nearly two years combat flying in SEA (Southeast Asia), the most spectacular and memorable sight occurred on December 20, the third and worst night of the of the historic Linebacker II Christmas Raids, designed to end the war.

Although we (F-4’s) never flew ‘planned’ night MiG-CAP “feet dry” overland, some of us were now tasked for this major strike to do so. My RO “TA” and I set up our CAP station in the vicinity of Haiphong, and hopefully on the outer ranges of their SAM sites. Fortunately, we took no serious enemy fire that night due to our range, but especially because of the North Vietnamese concentration on the higher value B-52s targets, rather than us in an F-4. Also, there were no MiG’s in our immediate vicinity, so we could somewhat ‘relax’ and just watch in total amazement. Continue reading →

Linebacker II from 18-29 December 1972 is commonly understood as the B-52 strikes over Hanoi that brought the NVN back to the negotiating table in Paris, leading to the end of the war, a treaty- The Paris Peace Accords –  and the return of America’s Prisoners of War. Given that the aim of LB II was not a military one, but rather was a political campaign that used physical damage to send a message, it is not surprising that the highly visible /high press interest missions of the first use of B-52s  night after night at such scale in the high threat Surface to Air Missile environment of Hanoi has received such notoriety. (B-52s had flown one mission to the Haiphong area in April ’72. This indeed created serious questions about employment of lots of big airplanes in a high threat environment. Those questions appear to have been resolved completely bass ackwards for the first few nights of Christmas ’72)

Fifteen B-52s were shot down, three were seriously damaged and six had minor damage. Overall, the B-52s flew 795 sorties. Only about half of the total sorties-372-went to Hanoi, but all of the 15 B-52s lost were hit within a thirteen-mile radius of the capital.  Ninety-two crew members were involved in the 15 losses, and 61 of the 92 were in 10 aircraft that crashed in North Vietnam. Of the 61 crew members involved in aircraft that crashed in North Vietnam, 28 died (the bodies of 7 of these have not been recovered) and 34 were captured. One of those captured died from his wounds and is included as killed in action.

But to see LB II only from the perspective of B-52 strikes – despite the bravery of the BUFF crews on missions far more dangerous than any they had previously flown – is to miss significant pieces of the operation.  Often left without discussion are the night low level missions to Haiphong by A-6 Intruder squadrons: VA-115 Midway, VA-196 Enterprise, VA-35 America, VA-145 Ranger and VA-75 Saratoga. Continue reading →