You have a few of your facts and explantions wrong.

Well, not just me but several prominant authors..

I have read several prominent authors, too, and some of their "facts" were
point blank wrong. The two targets I mentioned were included in the lists of
targets destroyed in the ACSC and Air War College texts. The coal fired
electrical plant we took out with LGBs in the daylight on Day #3 after the
bombers two nights in a row is one that stands out in my mind. The post strike
photos in the textbook clearly shows the damage we left behind. Don't believe
all you read unless the author was there himself.

Hereis an interesting read for you from aother author

http://www.sftt.org/303VINq.pdf



You made prior reference to a hundred or so WWII French truck as being the
exxtent of the NVN tranportation system. Doesn't explain the 800+ Russian
and
Chinese trucks we struck in Sept 22

These were truck being used as supply vehicles on the Ho Chi Mihn trail?

Yes they were. We also used to escort Specter on the trails at night, in
F-4Ds. We usually carried CBU-58 and MK 82 with daisy cutters. Specter would
"mark" the lead and tail trucks and stop the convoys with 20 mm API then we
would drop in the line between the two truck fires. According to the Specter
guys the convoys were often in the miltiple hundreds of trucks. I seem to
recall that the record number of Specter truck kills in one night was 500+. I
got credit for a total of 400+ over a period of four months according to
Specter BDA for whatever that was worth. I never cared much about BDA numbers
but I understood them to be fairly accurate from recce photos and from
Specter's night vision and IR gear.



Not sure you can say that damage was a secondary concern.

It was, at least for the politicians who ordered the operation.

If so then why were the LGB and Loran bombers sent up in the daylight to go
after targest that the bombers had missed? Must have made sense to somebady
and we all worked for the politicians. Certainly would have been easier for
the fighter bases that were having to put sorties up around the clock. I flew
a 18 hour crew duty day with two sorties over RP 6 on Day 2/3.



we continued to restrike targets that were missed by the bombers at night,
recce'd in the AM and hit by fighters in the afternoon

Of the 7 night #1 B-52 targets, only a "few" were recce'd prior to night #3.
Had they recee'd immediately they would have noticed that the BUFFs bombing
in
a strong crosswind (the same crosswind that was moving the chaff corridor)
were
having accuracy problems due to those strong crosswinds. Interstingly enough,
18 years later, that same problem would resurface on targets in Iraq and
Kuwait.

SAC couldn't hit a point target with strings of up to 300 bombs in a crosswind
or wind shear in other words? We managed reasonably well with the LORAN
equipped
A-6s, F-111As, and F-4s. An A-6 with two flights of three waqs accurate enough
to nearly destroy the DaNang POL facility when the BN forgot to switch steering
from his offset aimpoint to his target, similar to that incident where the
B-52 cell hit Neak Long in Cambodia.



My strong recollection was that we were trying to damage the NVN
supply chain and command structure as much as we could while we had the
opportunity as the war was Vietnamized.

Which was done with great success during LB I and Freedom Porch.

The NVN didn't recover until 1975.

True, but the damage inflicted during LB II had much less to do with that
than
LB I.

Maybe for the bombers but I would have to disagree for the fighters.

On Day 8 for example, Korat was fragged against a rail LOC, first daytime
strike for the AF A-7Ds. Unfortunately that one was a fiasco as the #2 -105
Weasel punched off his load on the runway on TO roll after an engine problem
and shut the runway down for 45 min. We finally did get off and over the
target but it was 100% unercast, the Pathfinder couldn't get a Loran lock and
so we all went home. It is described in the ACSC thesis that Karl Eschmann
wrote that became the book you refer to. I'd have to get it out to see exactly
what the target was but I am almost certain it was a rail yard. Karl and I are
friends and as I was a contributor and proofreader, he gave me a couple copies
of the manuscript. I loaned my book out and never got it back. The book
leaves out some information in places that is in the manuscript.

The accounts of LBII are a sore subject with me as there seems to have been an
element in the AF that was determined to show SAC in the best light possible.
That revisonist history tries to say that the bombers won the war and any
contribution from the fighters was purely coincidental. Particularly when I
see BDA attributed to the bombers when I know for a fact that the fighters were
responsible. I am in no way tryng to downplay the bravery of the SAC crews - I
wouldn't have wanted their jobs for twice the pay - but I don't believe the
bombing was all that effective.. What brought the North back to the bargaining
table was the threat that the bombing was going to become a lot more effective.
They were running out of missiles and fuel as their supply lines had been
pretty well cut off as early as Day 3. I guess you could call that political
but I see it as more of a tactical solution. Had the supplie lines stayed open,
the bombong might have gone on a lot longer. I don't think it wold have
happened as it did if NVN had more missiles. I sat in an orbit over downtown
for 15 minutes on Day 3 until a single cloud drifted away from the target the
the Ubon LGB guys were after. We had a total of seven rounds of 57 mm fired at
us at 15,000'. It was a good day for sightseeing - in fact I still have some
pictures I took with a little camera I carried with me.

Regards.

Steve Mellenthin






BUFDRVR

"Stay on the bomb run boys, I'm gonna get those bomb doors open if it
harelips
everyone on Bear Creek"