War For the Hell of It: A Fighter Pilot's View of Vietnam

by Ed Cobleigh

  The ground crew scrambles underneath the plane to move the air umbilical connection over to the right engine. When they all emerge into view, I raise my right hand once again, with two fingers up and rotating,

  "Start number two."

  I repeat the process and the right J-79 whines up into fiery life. I make an unplugging motion with my hands and the crew yanks off the air hose and the electrical cable. The airplane is now on its own power, truly wide awake and growling with malevolent energy, leashed by wooden chocks propped against the main landing gear wheels. The beast is awake, but what sort of nocturnal animal am I riding and hopefully controlling?

  Some fighter planes seem to me to be feline in profile, made up of smooth compound curves with sleek-flowing lines. This category includes all fighters designed in France, where esthetic form evidently dictates aerodynamic function. The French company Dassault's Mirages imitate enormous Persian cats with their dark color schemes, sleekly faired bodies, and pointy noses. The slanting lines of their Plexiglas cockpit canopies seem particularly like clear feline eyes. Eyes with humans in their pupils, that is. In the air, French Mirages are all about agility and grace, with tiny, sharp missiles, the claws of the airborne cats.

  English jets invariably resemble ungainly dogs, maybe Basset or Walker hounds, with gangly discordant parts assembled with no thought to visual esthetics. The English Electric Lightning, the British Aircraft Company's Buccaneer, and the best of breed, the Hawker Hunter, are like a disparate pack of enthusiastic canines of different breeds. British jets are friendly and functional, almost lovable in their apparently uncoordinated designs and unconventional configurations. English fighters are dogs of uncertain lineage and dubious pedigree, but they're appealing all the same.

  American jet fighters are typically not feline or canine in nature, but most are decidedly of the equine persuasion. They tend to be large, rawboned, strong, but not terribly refined in form. A good analogy is a faithful, but homely, cow pony. Aircraft such as the F-100 Super Sabre remind me of a quarter horse, with sturdy lines and a short stature. The F-105 Thunderchief is certainly not an Arabian or a Clydesdale, but a Thoroughbred with long legs and rippling muscles. A Thoroughbred with a brown-and-tan pinto colored paint scheme to be precise. American fighter jocks unconsciously buy into the cowboy/horseman scene with our talk of "mounting up" and "top guns." I have heard of an F-105 pilot who, when he releases the brakes and plugs in the afterburner for takeoff, always announces in true rodeo fashion, "Coming out of chute number one, Stoney Burke."

  The F-104 Starfighter pilots even proudly wear what they call "spurs," which are really metal clips strapped to the heels of their flying boots. These high tech rowels allow the ejection seat to reel in their feet, better to clear the instrument panel when explosively ejecting from a stricken aircraft. The F-104 has to be an Arabian horse, small, elegant and responsive to subtle inputs, but treacherous for the unschooled pilot/rider.

  Unfortunately, the Phantom fits none of these noble animal-to-aircraft analogies. It is nothing if it is not a generic primal beast, ugly but immensely powerful. Seen from the front of its steel and concrete revetment cave, it looks like a large ill-tempered monster lurking in its lair. The F-4's thick wings with their upturned tips, the downward drooping tail, the big black nose, are the couching limbs and peering face of some mythic, evil creature, ready to pounce on the unwary.

  What of the MiG fighters flown by our enemy, the air force of North Vietnam? MiGs are like rats; crude, small, and sloppily built. Their cockpits are probably dirty inside. They have droopy, pointed noses and long tails dragging in the air behind them. The Russian-built aircraft are dangerous, in a vermin sort of way. Without effective air-to-air missiles, they try to gnaw you to death with machine gun and cannon fire. MiGs are fit only for extermination.

  Whatever feral animal it resembles, the Phantom beast must be tested, tamed before flight. I perform a kind of pas de deux with the crew chief using the cockpit stick and rudder to check out the flight controls. I move the stick and he responds with hand signals indicating what the control surfaces are doing. Stick full left-left spoiler up, right aileron down, rudder left. Stick full right-right spoiler up, left aileron down, rudder right. Stick full forward (in the "makes houses look bigger" position)-stabilator leading edge up. Stick full back ("makes houses look smaller")-stabilator leading edge full down.

  Foot pedals full left and right-rudder full left and right. Speed brakes are tested to open and close with a switch on the inboard throttle. The beast's major muscle groups are limber.

  My navigator comes up on the intercom. "Cleared primary and synch."

  This means the inertial navigation platform is aligned with the local vertical direction and with true north, where it will remain throughout the flight. I synchronize my heading indicator with the platform. A deep breath and I point both thumbs outward on each side of the cockpit, telling the crew chief to pull the yellow wooden chocks blocking the main gear wheels from creeping forward under the engines' power at idle.

  The chief replicates my thumbs outward signal and waves me forward, out of the chocks. I inch both throttles forward and the beast starts to emerge from its protective cave. I tap the wheel brakes by rocking the rudder pedals forward slightly and the nose dips, signaling the brakes are OK. A touch of right and left rudder moves the nose correspondingly; the nose wheel steering is operative.

  I think to myself, "Quick! Which way do I turn?"

  The Phantom can travel at 1500 miles per hour in the forward direction, but it can't back up at all. There are two identical lines of revetments facing each other in a "I' configuration on the flight line. If I turn the wrong way, toward oncoming aircraft traffic, I'm screwed. I'll have to shut the engines down, have the jet pushed back into the revetment with a tractor, and redo the start process. My squadron mates will then gleefully ride my ass about my fighter pilot faux pas for the rest of my life. Thank God for the crew chief; he is on my left side using hand signals for a left turn out of the revetment. I head the jet left, using a touch more power and a tap on the left brake to make the sharp turn. Heading off to war, I flash the chief a big thumbs-up sign, thanking him for a highly professional start. In return, he whips a snappy hand salute.

  The crew chief and his assistants service and care for the Phantom I'm flying tonight, working twelve hours a day, six days a week. They give the ugly jet TLC outdoors, in monsoon downpours and burning Thai sun. The beast is their pet.

  I know as the chief salutes me when I taxi by he is speculating about the condition in which I will return his plane. Will major aircraft systems be broken, requiring hours of repairs? Will there be battle damage, bullet holes? His worst fear is that it will not come back at all, that his beast will die. He worries that I will scatter the object of his mechanical affections in little pieces over North Vietnam tonight. As he handed me my helmet, standing at the top of the boarding ladder, He told me,

  "Good luck tonight, Sir."

  Translation, "Don't bring my precious airplane back shot full of holes that I have to fix."

  I make a mental note to try very hard not to do that.

  My navigator checks out his cockpit systems as we taxi to the arming area at the end of the runway. On ground control frequency, my wingman comes up on the radio to tell me that his jet is broken. He is aborting tonight's flight, as there is no spare aircraft available. Ordinarily, I would also cancel out as well. Flying ground attack sorties solo is not a plan for long-term survival. But tonight, the primary danger will be intense boredom. Satan Flight, now a flight of one, is scheduled for a Combat Sky Spot. We will not venture below 20,000 feet.

  Parked in the arming area with the engines again at humming at idle, the Nav and I extend our hands clear of the cockpit, showing the munitions crew that we are not fooling around with any switches or flight controls as they arm the weapons.

  The arming crew scurries underneath the jet, checking for leaks and pulling the safety pins with their attach
ed red flags from the bomb racks, drop tanks, and missiles. Finished, they show me hands full of red streamers confirming the jet is now lethal to someone beside us. Tonight's load is twelve 500 pound bombs, a total of 6,000 pounds of cast steel and high explosives, along with two Sparrow air­to-air missiles.

  Jack and I lower our canopies and he changes the radio to tower frequency. I ask for and receive permission to take the runway and I'm cleared for takeoff, when ready, by the air traffic controller.

  Pointed down the strip of dark concrete, I douse the bright white taxi light to start acquiring some night vision. The black runway is visible only in outline, lit by amber edge lights. The wing flaps move down to the one-half position in response to a small yellow flap-shaped lever on the left wall of the cockpit.

  I push both throttles to the first stop and the engines quickly wind up to 100 percent thrust, pushing the nose down, straining mightily against the locked wheel brakes. It takes nearly all my foot strength to hold the brakes against the engine thrust; the beast is raring to go. A quick check of the gauges shows all is normal. I release the brakes and the nose bobs up, the beast is unleashed. I push the throttles past the first detent into the afterburner range and feel a boot in the ass as the extra thrust kicks in. A quick glance at the gauges confirms what my butt has already told me; both burners are lit.

  Despite 5,000 pounds of iron bombs, an equal weight of fuel in two drop tanks, and full internal fuel, the Phantom accelerates briskly. Thirty-five thousand pounds of jet thrust will not be denied. I work the rudder pedals to keep the plane straight on the narrow, high-crowned runway.

  Unlike most jets, which demand some finesse with the controls to be coaxed safely off the runway, a Phantom takeoff is a no-brainer. When I release the brakes, I pull the control stick all the way back against my lap, hold it there and wait. As the nose comes up to ten degrees above the invisible horizon, I start the stick forward to hold the nose steady and we "slip the surly bonds of earth." as the poem says. The runway lights recede in my peripheral vision and we climb into the dark Thai night. I raise the flaps and slap the landing gear lever to the up position. The gear lever on most jets is a small handle, maybe six inches long with a lighted wheel on its end in case you forget what it is for. Not for the F-4 such a wimpy handle. The Phantom's gear lever is all of a foot and a half long, thick in diameter, with a large red-lighted wheel on its end. It looks as if it belongs on a steam locomotive, not a flying machine.

  As the flaps retract, I get a definite sinking sensation due to the loss of extra lift they produced. At 300 feet in the air and only 200 knots with nothing ahead but soggy rice paddies, a sinking situation is unsettling, but normal. I instinctively pull the stick back another inch and the sink rate stops. This is the only time I ever feel the Phantom's full 50,000 pounds of weight; once the airspeed builds, the jet feels solid and agile.

  Tonight's liftoff isn't as hairy as the ones the U.S. Navy pilots experience when they are shot off their aircraft carrier at night into a totally black abyss. They leave the boat only seventy feet above the water, just barely flying. They can have that experience all to themselves; a night takeoff from a runway with a fully loaded jet thrills me quite enough, thank you very much.

  I confirm the landing gear and flaps have retracted with a glance at the gauges and pull the engines out of afterburner as we accelerate through 350 knots. The engines settle down at 100 percent power and our rate of climb slackens. The fuel flow assumes a more reasonable rate of consumption now that the greedy afterburners are shut down. Fading unseen into the black behind us are the lights of the air base and of Ubon City as we continue to climb into the night. The dark lands of Laos and North Vietnam are ahead of us, in front of the nose.

  Over sleeping, Thailand, it is five minutes to midnight on Christmas Eve. Soon, it will be the twenty-fifth of December, the holiest day in all Christendom. For two of the last three Christmas Nights, I have been airborne, delivering explosive presents of death and destruction to atheists, trying to win the freedom for the Buddhists of South East Asia.

  As we climb to cruising altitude, I activate the cabin pressurization and adjust the cockpit lights. I am too busy to contemplate the theological significance of tonight's action. Without me asking, Jack gives me a course to steer toward the extreme southern panhandle of North Vietnam.

  I pull the power back to establish a 400-knot cruise at 20,000 feet, headed northeast, and leave the cockpit lighting turned up. We won't be dive bombing tonight. Having good night vision is not so important, but performing the switchology correctly is vital; I need to see and confirm every switch position in the cockpit.

  We will be blind bombing straight and level from this altitude, a night mission which would seem familiar to the Royal Air Force pilots led by Air Marshal Arthur T. "Bomber" Harris during WWII twenty-five years ago. The RAF specialized in night bombing, alternating with the US Eighth Air Force who pounded Germany by daylight. Hopefully our delivery accuracy will be better tonight than it was back then. The RAF only had to hit the city of Dresden, Germany, with thousands of bombs from hundreds of planes. We are trying for a truck park, maybe two acres in size, with about half of the bomb load of only one of the four-engine, propeller-driven Avro Lancaster bombers of the RAF in 1943.

  Tonight's orders call for a Combat Sky Spot delivery. The Sky Spot device was originally used by the Strategic Air Command as a bomb scoring system. SAC's huge bombers would conduct atomic bomb practice runs on known targets, tracked precisely from the ground by the Sky Spot radar. When the bomber ceased transmitting a tone on the radio, signifying a simulated bomb release, the ground-based Sky Spot computer would calculate where in relation to the pretend target a real nuclear bomb would have impacted. Early in the current war, some technoid had what (at least to him or her) seemed to be a great idea. Why not run the problem backward through the Sky Spot computer? The ground radar could steer the aircraft toward the target with the aid of voice commands and tell the pilot when to drop the ordnance for a perfect hit on a target whose location was known.

  I guess the scoring system worked well enough for nukes, where pinpoint accuracy was not required. Any thermonuclear detonation within a quarter of a mile radius will thoroughly vaporize most targets. If we were dropping even a small nuke tonight, the chances of successful target destruction would be very high. But we aren't. Uncorking the nuclear genie would usher in an entirely different sort of war, much shorter in duration. Wisely, nobody calling the shots in Washington wants that, yet. Instead, we have twelve, count-'em, twelve iron bombs each with a kill radius measured in a few hundreds of feet, not large fractions of a mile.

  Tonight's target is a anonymous stretch of jungle suspected to be harboring a truck park. The intelligence troops think it is just north of the political boundary drawn on maps as the border between the theoretically independent countries of South and North Vietnam. Actually, the existence, or not, of this political border is the public rationale for the war, used by both sides. As is usual with all intelligence data, the location, or even the existence, of the truck park is also somewhat suspect. However, for the purposes of tonight's aerial argument, I will trust that the promised truck haven does indeed exist and, like Dresden, it should be torched.

  That is, if the unguided iron bombs can be delivered anywhere close to their desired destination. The odds of this occurring are not high. A bewildering number of fundamental errors infest the Combat Sky Spot system. Our bombs' impact point in relation to the target will be affected by unforeseen winds, natural ballistic bomb dispersion, inherent radar tracking inaccuracies, by my limited ability to fly the jet precisely, by target location uncertainty, map errors, computer settling time, my reaction time on the pickle button, the rotation of the earth, and gravity. We'll be lucky to get the bombs close enough to wake up, much less blow up, the sleeping North Vietnamese truckers.

  Outside in the night, I see the Mekong River pass far below us in the hazy moonlight. It appears to be a silvery ribbon
slowly wandering in a flat black landscape. We are across the watery fence now and over southern Laos. With my left hand, and without looking, I set up the armament switches, practicing for missions when the cockpit lights can't be this bright. A quick confirming glance shows amber lights on the panel between my legs at the two inboard wing and the centerline stations.

  Jack has already checked in on the radio with Bruce orbiting in Alley Cat. The navigator changes the frequency to one assigned to the Combat Sky Spot site and reports in, ready for action.

  Earlier, a wing intelligence officer told us the target is in the De-Militarized Zone, the DMZ. This is a twenty-kilometer wide strip of land that runs parallel to and on each side of the imposed artificial border. It was delineated by the United Nations at the end of the French Indochina War (they lost). All military activities, including fortifications and troop movements, are forbidden in the DMZ. It says so clearly in the treaty signed by all concerned parties in the late 1950s. The UN's intent was to provide a safe, peaceful area to separate the two Vietnams. The demilitarized zone is now one of the most highly militarized stretches of real estate on the planet.

  The DMZ is a hellish wasteland of bunkers, minefields, tunnels, gun emplacements, fortified outposts, bomb craters, ambush sites, burned-out vehicles, wrecked bridges, torn-up rail lines, concertina wire, and graves. What little jungle that remains in the DMZ offers cover for troops of both sides and supposedly one truck convoy carrying ammunition southward tonight. I'm glad the zone is de-militarized; God only knows what would be in there if it weren't.

  The Sky Spot site comes up on the radio and Jack tells them the particulars of our mission and location. Soon they have a radar lock-on and begin giving us steering commands. Once we are stabilized on the desired heading for the bomb run, the operator instructs,