Thud Ridge (18 page)

One of the worst goofs we made was due to the insensitive nature of this huge system we live under. In anything as big and impersonal as the Air Force has become, we are all made out of tickey-tackey and we all come in little boxes, and we are just numbers once you get past the immediate command level. We were badly tied up in little rules and regulations about borders, prohibited zones, forbidden zones and the like. If you were standing still and examining the rules under classroom conditions, they were not easy to comprehend and the pilot was hard pressed to catalog all the do's and don'ts and correlate them with the job we laid on him. When you got this same problem moving at 600 per, under lousy weather and navigation conditions, and admitted that a lot of people were trying desperately to kill you, you had a problem that was difficult for the best to solve.

Two of our shiny ones failed to solve the problem to the satisfaction of our bosses. These two were trying so hard to deliver the maximum effectiveness on the task assigned to them that they pressed too hard in the farthest reaches of North Vietnam. They committed the unpardonable sin of flying across the self-imposed line that we have stretched 30 miles below the wandering and crooked line known as the Chicom border. They flew across this line while seeking their target. No matter what the conditions that forced them to this position, they crossed the line, and we picked them up on our own radar and turned them in to ourselves. They were in deep trouble with the powers that be, and they knew it. As is so often the case, the censure they knew was coming forced them closer together than before, and they even flew together all the time, daily risking their behinds while they waited for the administrative ax to fall and stunt the careers they had dedicated to their country. They were bad guys in the eyes of the big men and they knew it, but they never quit. While they were flying far to the north on a particularly gloomy day, the paper work that constituted their official, career-terminating reprimand was making its way up the unfeeling channels to the very top of the Air Force. A sin had been committed and someone must pay lest we arch our backs and stand up for our people. The paper travels through and past the all-wise, who are nonrated, or who have a comfortable view of the fighting, and have no desire to exchange places with those they send to give their all in a hopelessly restricted and prohibitive climate and whom they censure for things beyond the control of the normal man. The vitriolic contempt and rage unleashed by the nonfighting 99 percent of our force appalls me.

These two got their reprimand, and their lack of professionalism and their failure to abide by established constraints was lamented all the way to the top. It was formalized and it was signed, and it was sent back to these two swine in the field. But on this day one of the swine was struck down by the enemy ground fire as he attempted to deliver his bombs. His three flight companions were dangerously low on fuel, so his buddy in trouble, his unprofessional companion and fellow border violator, volunteered to stay on the scene to cover his buddy while the other element raced for a tanker and attempted to establish a doubtful rescue attempt. When the element returned, he too was gone. He had met the same fate while attempting to cover and protect his downed companion. They both went down and we suffered—but not the system—it couldn't care less, except for the cold and formal statistical notices that must be sent. And we sent the notices; we regretted to inform you that your son and husband, and all that rot. But, in this case, the next of kin got two letters. One expressed sympathy and the other blasphemed the two noble lads for their lack of dedication. The system couldn't respond, and these stricken folks had the two young pilots' reprimands routed directly to them, since the lads were no longer at their former address. Their relatives received official reprimands on two of our finest, along with a missing in action notice. How clumsy can you get! I hope the next of kin saved those black papers so that if we are ever fortunate enough to recover these two fine young men, they will be able to see how much we thought of them.

But Gordo's case was not so grim and we saved the day. It was apparent that further frontal approaches to the personnel forces would not be effective and we had to play their game. We slowed Gordo down on his missions for a few days so that statistically he was behind the curve that would finish him on his projected tour completion date. We coupled this with a blast on operational necessity as regards the shortage of qualified aircrews and supervisors, and since the personnel types were the ones who were supposed to keep us up to speed on numbers of crews (actually, they never did), we were one up on the system. They didn't dare make any more fuss as we had them dead to rights on the deficits in combat crews, and with Gordo's concurrence, we extended him for another tour and turned him loose on his missions with the understanding that he would come to work for me as soon as he got the magic one hundredth. Meanwhile, I had our personnel people sit on their thumbs for a few weeks while I got a few letters off to friends in the States and then had them request a new assignment for Gordo using the proper numbers on his card. The letters and the reforecast and the correct numbers combined to do the job and Gordo got a good assignment next time around. Now, isn't that a silly way to have to do business?

Gordo on the ground is so decent, friendly and calm that you wonder how this guy can be a tiger in the air. Yet he is just that and while I was anxiously awaiting his arrival in my office and piling up all sorts of goodies that I would put off until Gordo came to work for me, he distinguished himself twice more and almost didn't make it to the point where he could come to work for me.

The first time that Gordo was awarded the Silver Star was one of the hairier missions that we had over there. He was given the assignment of developing a scheme to deliver weapons in North Vietnam under adverse weather conditions, not associated with the normal radar delivery techniques of which we are capable in all of our various sizes of machines. This was a little different slant on the problem and the question was how you can get into a North Vietnamese target with low ceilings and poor visibility, and get your bombs on the target when you are not preplanned for such tactics, nor for higher altitudes and radar modes of delivery. It was a particularly demanding task in that everyone knew that it would involve low-level, high-speed navigation, coupled with weather flying under dangerous and most demanding conditions, and we also knew that it would place those who gave it the try in an extremely hostile environment. It would force them into the area of enemy ground fire where even the kids fire sling-shots at you. The complex weapons systems that we are operating these days—airplane is too simple a word to indicate their complexity—can be knocked down and the pilot can be killed dead with a pistol just as well as with a 100-millimeter or a Sam, providing the hits are in the right spot. We were asking in effect that Gordo get in, on the deck, in lousy weather and prove to us that we could or could not survive in such a situation and still get our bombs on the target.

Obviously we were not talking about a conventional dive-bomb approach to the target where considerably more ceiling and visibility would be required. We were talking about armed reconnaissance under substandard conditions that would perhaps uncover lucrative targets and allow us to destroy them and still get our forces safely back out of the area. A challenging assignment to be sure, one fraught with danger and that could only be proven by actual flight. Gordo prepared himself and his people most thoroughly for this mission. The thoroughness and attention to detail demonstrated in this assignment were to appear to me many times in the future as he devoted the same energy to the more mundane tasks that I laid on him. He picked his day quite well. He picked a day when the visibility was rotten, a day when the clouds were practically on the ground, and he picked a tough target. This was to be the true test and he pulled no punches nor did he make anything easy for himself. He laid it on as realistically as physically possible.

Inbound to his target he was forced down in heavily defended areas by the clouds and the rain to altitudes sometimes as low as 100 feet above the ground. When he arrived in his selected area, he conducted a successful armed reconnaissance under about the worst possible conditions. His preflight planning and his talent paid off as his flight was able to destroy several automatic-weapons sites that fired on them while they were in the process of spotting and destroying a fuel convoy. The fuel truck drivers and convoy masters obviously never expected the stupid Americans to come hurtling at them out of the clouds and rain through which they were driving their trucks with a sense of security and safety. Gordo and his boys dispatched them as well as the flak sites along the way which had been bent on protecting the convoy. Although he had already completed a highly successful mission, his day's work had really just started for him. Having expended most of his ordnance, he took his flight back up through the weather and back out of the hot area to the post-strike refueling area. As he hooked up on the tanker for the fuel that he would need to get him back to home base, he was informed that another pilot, Finch two, had been shot down north of the Red River in the heart of the heavily defended zone he had just left.

He took on a full load of fuel and promptly made himself available for Rescap. He turned and headed back into the country where he knew the weather was poor and where he could now expect fully aroused defenses, even more alert than they had been in the previous portion of his mission. The best weather that he had going back in was 800- to 1,000-foot ceilings with rain. With this backdrop he was a perfect target for the many guns in the area as the gunners knew the exact height of the cloud deck for fuzing purposes and were also able to spot him quite easily as they looked up toward the cloud deck. He had the further disadvantage of having to move slowly enough to be able to search carefully for the downed pilot, which is a difficult assignment even under ideal conditions.

He searched in the hottest corner of North Vietnam under poor conditions for thirty minutes and as he approached the area he had worked before, the weather, getting worse all the time, again forced him down to 100 to 200 feet above the ground. He was unsuccessful in his search and when he could not find the downed pilot he was forced to return to the tanker for more fuel. At those altitudes and at the power settings that he was using, the fuel consumption was fantastic and time on target was short. Gordo was not the only one searching for the downed Finch two, as Finch one, the lead aircraft in Finch flight, had gone back and attempted the same type of search that Gordo had undertaken. Unfortunately, Finch one was not as successful in his search efforts as Gordo, and by the time Gordo returned to the tanker for his second poststrike refueling, he was informed that Finch one had also been shot down. He again picked up fuel and headed back into the same mess, now realizing that he had two people to look for, that the chances of success were not great and that the probability of a safe exit was diminishing with each exposure. He never faltered as he accepted the challenge and reentered to do everything he could, even if it meant losing himself, to try to save two of his nameless buddies who had been downed.

Back on the job again, he received an additional surprise. Although the Sams are supposed to have a low-altitude limitation, we have seen several occasions where they have been launched and have performed at altitudes at which they are not supposed to be able to perform. As Gordo plodded through the rain and murk under the low ceiling, he found, much to his amazement, that a Sam was headed directly for him. The Sam was not arching up above the weather, the Sam was coming at him underneath the weather. It was difficult to see and it was difficult to orient upon, but there it was, pressing in on him at the terrific speed that the Sam can generate as it accelerates. This left him with a difficult decision. If he went up into the weather he would lose his ability to keep visual track of the Sam's progress toward him. He would also lose contact with the ground and this would disrupt his search pattern while he spent priceless time and effort seeking an area where he could safely bring his charges back out underneath the low clouds. If he went up he would also be moving back into an area that was more compatible with the Sam's tracking capability. On the other hand, it was no secret that he was in the area and every gun that could be brought to bear on him was after him. To descend now, especially under the hazardovis weather conditions, was a pretty risky business, but he chose that as the best of the two available courses, and down he went and up came even more of the ground fire that had claimed two Thuds in the past hour. The ground fire was fierce, but he out-maneuvered the Sam so that it crashed into the ground, and somehow or other he came back up through that hail of fire being thrown at him.

As he continued his search he found something he wasn't looking for. It seems that the day before one of the reconnaissance pilots from another wing had crashed and had been given up as lost, captured, killed or who knows what. While searching for Finch one and Finch two, Gordo suddenly heard a beeper, maneuvered his aircraft to locate the beeper and found, to everyone's surprise and amazement, the pilot who had gone down the day before. He had been sitting coolly in the jungle, waiting for possible rescue but certainly not expecting it under the horrible weather conditions prevailing that day. Spotting the downed pilot from the day before, Gordo alerted the search and rescue forces and called for more Rescap plus Spad and chopper support to come in and get the pilot out. While he was orbiting, pinpointing the position and calling on the radio to advise the rescue controllers of the situation, Sam again sought him out, and he was faced with the same situation all over again. He again went down to the deck through the withering hail of fire, outma-neuvered the Sam, came back up out of the ground fire and found himself still flying, with still more to do.