''Its

by

A'XDX.P%-,.HIE, FLAK, AAA,

AND SAM

A Short Operational History of

Ground-Based Air Defense

KENNETH P. WERRELL

Senior Research Fellow

Airpower Research Institute

Air University Press

Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama 36112-5532

December 1988

cad

s
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Werrell, Kenneth P.

Archie, Flak, AAA, and SAM.

"December 1988."

Includes Index.

Bibliography : p.

1 . Air defenses, Military-History-20th century. 2. Antiaircraft guns-History20th century. 3. Antiaircraft missiles-History-20th century. I . Title.

UG730.W47 1985 358.4'145 88-7596

ISBN 1-58566-026-4

First Printing December 1988

Second Printing March 1996

Third Printing August 1998

Fourth Printing October 2000

Fifth Printing September 2002

Disclaimer

Opinions, conclusions, and recommendations expressed or implied within are solely those of the

editors and do not necessarily represent the views of Air University, the United States Air Force,

the Department of Defense, or any other US government agency. Cleared for public release:

distribution unlimited.
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CONTENTS

Chapter Page

DISCLAIMER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ii

FOREWORD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi

ABOUT THE AUTHOR. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii

PREFACE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xix

1 THE EARLY YEARS TO 1945 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

British Antiaircraft Artillery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

The V-1 Campaign . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

American Antiaircraft Artillery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

German Flak Defenses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Allied Countermeasures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Fratricide . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

The US Navy in the Pacific . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

Japanese Antiaircraft Artillery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

The Lessons of World War II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

2 THE POSTWAR YEARS, 1945-65 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

The Korean War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

Antiaircraft Missiles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91

3 VIETNAM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95

French Operations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95

American Operations through 1968 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

American Operations through Linebacker I . . . 112

Linebacker II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119

Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127

4 RECENT EXPERIENCE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137

Arab-Israeli Wars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137

1948, 1956, and 1967 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
5

ILLUSTRATIONS

Vi

Figure

1 German 7.7-cm antiaircraft gun, 1916 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

2 Improvised antiaircraft weapons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

3 Antiaircraft battery training . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

4 British women receiving antiaircraft training . . . 7

5 British experimenting with rockets during

World War II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

6 British 40-mm gun and crew . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

7 V-1 buzz bomb over London. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

8 Initial British defensive deployment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

9 Preparing Pile mattress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

1967-73 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138

1973 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139

1982 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146

American Air Strikes in the Middle East,

1983-86 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147

Indian-Pakistani Wars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150

The Falklands, 1982 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151

Ongoing and Recent Aspects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168

SUMMARY, TRENDS, AND

CONCLUSIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177

Trends (Speculations) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181

Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182

INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
10 3 .7-inch gun mounted on a Pile mattress . . . . . . . . . . 15

11 Final British defensive deployment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

12 Defense of Antwerp, Belgium . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

13 US 90-mm M-1 AAA gun . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

14 German 88-mm gun . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

15 German 88-mm gun was versatile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

16 88-mm gun on the march . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

17 German 128-mm gun . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

18 Ploesti mission was dramatic and costly . . . . . . . . . . . 30

19 German radar in Romania . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

20 Ploesti was protected by smoke and guns . . . . . . . . . 32

21 German light flak was very effective . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

22 German 20-mm guns aboard train . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

23 German light flak pieces mounted on motor

vehicles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

24 40-mm Bofors on truck chassis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

25 50-mm gun on five-ton towing vehicle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

26 128-mm railway guns were largest in Ploesti . . . . 36

27 German Taifun rocket . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

28 Enzian rocket . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

29 Rheintochter rocket . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

30 German Schmetterling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

31 Wasserfall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Viii

32 Chaff. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

33 Liberator over Italy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

34 B-17 nose shot away by flak over Cologne . . . . . . . . 48

35 German flak was impressive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

36 Douglas A-20s attack Japanese positions at

Karos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

37 B-29 hit by Japanese flak on bombing run . . . . . . . . 56

38 75-mm Sky Sweeper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

39 F-51 Mustang fighters at air base in Korea . . . . . . . 75

40 F-80 Shooting Star jets destined for Communist

transportation targets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76

41 B-26 light bombers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77

42 C-119s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79

43 T-6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

44 Nike Ajax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83

45 Nike Hercules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84

46 Hawk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

47 Redeye . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

48 Talos missile. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88

49 Tartar missile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88

50 Boeing IM-99 Bomarc guided missile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90

51 Bomarc interceptor missile. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91

52 American adviser instructing South Vietnamese

troops . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
53 C-123K delivers needed supplies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98

54 North Vietnamese scramble for their guns. . . . . . . . 98

55 A-6A Intruder attack aircraft over the Gulf of

Tonkin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100

56 F-105 Thunderchief pilots head for North

Vietnam target . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101

57 Phantom attacks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

58 RF-4C reconnaissance aircraft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

59 Abandoned surface-to-air missile site in

North Vietnam . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

60 North Vietnamese SA-2 position . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105

61 Soviet SA-2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106

62 SA-2 launch against US aircraft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106

63 EB-66. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109

64 A-4 Skyhawk aircraft fires Shrike missile . . . . . . . . . . 110

65 F-105G Wild Weasel on the wing of a tanker . . . 111

66 CH-53 helicopter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113

67 VNAF Choctaws . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114

68 Regional forces scramble out of an H-34 . . . . . . . . . . 114

69 Soviet SA-7 Grail surface-to-air missile . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

70 AQM-34V in flight with an AN/ALE-38 chaff

pod . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118

71 Marine EA-6B Prowler aircraft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119

72 B-52 dropping bombs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
73 B-52 aircraft damaged by SAM missile . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121

74 Standard arm missile (AGM-78) igniting . . . . . . . . . . 124

75 Soviet SA-6. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141

76 Soviet ZSU-23-4. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142

77 Soviet SA-9 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148

78 Canberra. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152

79 Avro Vulcan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152

80 Hawker Siddeley Harrier . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153

81 Blowpipe launcher ashore on the Falkland

Islands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156

82 Stinger . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157

83 Rapier surface-to-air antiaircraft missile . . . . . . . . . . . 158

84 Rapier system under a camouflage net . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158

85 7.62-mm GPMG deployed ashore on

Falklands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

86 Seacat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160

87 British antiaircraft weapons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

88 Bofors antiaircraft gun served in the

Falklands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162

89 Seaslug . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163

90 Sea Dart launch during peacetime . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164

91 Afghanistan rebels down Soviet helicopter . . . . . . . . 165
FOREWORD

Dr Kenneth Werrell's history of ground-based air defense

performs an important service both to scholarship and,

more important, to the defense of our nation's freedom. It

is perhaps human nature that we tend over time to lose

sight of the lessons of the past, especially when they do not

conform to certain cherished preconceptions of ours. That

such myopia can be dangerous, if not downright disastrous,

Doctor Werrell's study richly illustrates . Without sentimentalism, he chronicles a pattern of lessons learned and

too quickly forgotten, as the marvel of air power was reminded again and again of its limitations and vulnerability .

In Korea and in Vietnam, the American people were

stripped of their illusions of national and technical omnipotence. The unhappy outcome of those two conflicts were

doubly lamentable because the lessons of World War II

were-or should have been-fresh in our minds . In that

world war, as Doctor Werrell shows, relatively cheap

ground-based air defense did make a difference : at Ploesti,

at Antwerp, and at the Rhine bridges.

And it will make a difference tomorrow. The greatest

value of Doctor Werrell's work is that it provides guideposts

and guidance for us as professional soldiers and aviators

charged with upholding American security. We have taken

history's lessons to heart as we plan and program our

ground-based air defenses into the next decade and beyond.

In both the forward and the rear areas, we have emphasized

the time-honored principles of mass, mix, and mobility. No

one weapon, not even today's modern aircraft, can do the

job alone. That truism applies with particular force to antiaircraft defense . And at least one other truism emerges

from Doctor Werrell's and our own studies: effective air

defense requires a joint and combined effort. Our planning

has been predicated on the assumption that counterair will

XI
air attack. On the ground, the Air Defense Artillery will

count on the cooperation and assistance of our colleagues

in the infantry, armor, and field artillery. On our success

or failure in working together to meet the challenges of

tomorrow will rest our nation's future.

DONALD R. INFALNTE

Major General, US Army

Chief of Air Defense Artillery
ABOUT THE

AUTHOR

Dr Kenneth P. Werrell conducted this study while serving

as a visiting professor at the Air University Center for Aerospace Doctrine, Research, and Education (AUCADRE),

Maxwell AFB, Alabama.

A graduate of the United States Air Force Academy, Doctor Werrell holds master and doctorate degrees from Duke

University.

Doctor Werrell was commissioned upon graduation from

the United States Air Force Academy in 1960 and received

his pilot wings in 1961 . Assigned to the 56th Weather Reconnaissance Squadron in Yokota, Japan, from 1962 until

1965, Doctor Werrell served first as a pilot and later as

aircraft commander of the WB-50. He resigned his commission with the rank of captain in 1965 .

Doctor Werrell is professor of History at Radford University, Virginia. His background includes a visiting associate professor assignment at Command and General Staff

College and historian assignments for both Operations Research, Inc., and the War Department Historical Fund.

A frequent participant in military history workshops and

conferences, Doctor Werrell has authored several articles

and two books on military history: Eighth Air Force Bibliography (Manhattan, Kans. : Aerospace Historian, Kansas

State University, 1981), and The Evolution of the Cruise

Missile (Maxwell AFB, Ala. : Air University Press, September 1985).

PREFACE

Archie' Flak, AAA, and SAM is an operational history of

ground-based air defense systems from the beginning of air

warfare up through 1988 . The title refers to the name that

airmen use, and have used, to describe ground fire: Archie

in World War I (from the British), flak in World War II

and Korea (from the Germans), AAA throughout, but especially in Vietnam (from the American abbreviation for

antiaircraft artillery), and most recently SAMs (from the

US abbreviation for surface-to-air missiles) . This study concentrates on how these weapons developed and how they

impacted on both US and non-US air operations.

The subject of ground-based air defense systems is neglected for a number of reasons . First of all, research is

difficult because source material is fragmented. Even more

significant is the fact that the topic does not have "sex

appeal ." Readers are more interested in the aircraft than

the weapons that bring them down. Whereas the airplane

appears as a dynamic, advanced, exciting, and offensive

weapon, ground-based air defense systems are seen in the

opposite light. Further, US experience has been almost exclusively with the offensive use of aircraft, not with the

defensive use of flak and SAMs; Americans have seldom

fought without air superiority. Too, there is the World War

II example that many, if not most, people hold as the archetypical war-during which aircraft defeated all comers

on all fronts . Another factor is that the air defense community has been overwhelmed by the air offensive community. Not that the former is any less able or less

professional than the latter, only that the air offensive community has the attention and support of both industry and

Congress . Little wonder then that the subject of flak and

SAMs has been neglected .
ground-based air defense systems are important . They have

been involved and have impacted on most air conflicts and

have achieved notable successes in some . These weapons

have downed and damaged large numbers of aircraft and

consequently have forced aviators to make changes and pay

higher costs for operations . Clearly ground-based air defenses have been ever present and have always been a factor

in air wars . There is no indication that this influence will

diminish in the future.

The neglect of the subject of ground-based air defense

systems on the one hand, contrasted with its importance

on the other, prompted this study. In it, I have traced the

historical record from World War I up through a number

of smaller conflicts in the 1980s. Although primarily a narrative, I have tried to analyze the story and draw from it

some generalizations, however tentative they may be. I prefer "generalizations" to the often misused term "lessons."

The acknowledgments indicate where I conducted my

research and the footnotes document the material upon

which I based this study. Research was overwhelmingly confined to English language sources, the basis of which was

US Air Force, Army, and Navy documents and studies. In

addition, I found primary materials dealing with both the

Royal Air Force and Luftwaffe. I made considerable use of

secondary sources, and I employed a few interviews. Admittedly, the major difficulty of this study is that, while I

found materials from both sides covering the World Wars

and to a lesser extent some of the more recent smaller wars,

my coverage of the Korean, Vietnam, and Middle East Wars

is drawn primarily from one side. Finally, I did not use the

rich, although spotty, classified materials for obvious

reasons.

Without preempting the conclusions, a number of themes

are present . A study of the evolution of ground-based air

defense weapons provides a classic view of the perennial

contest between offense and defense, as well as of the impact of technology on warfare. More than just technology

is involved, however; coverage includes such topics as tacXVI
portant, this subject cannot be even casually studied

without the distinct impression that many of the main features of aircraft versus ground-based air defense battles are

repeated over and over again . Clearly, lessons and generalizations abound in this story. I trust my treatment will

do justice to the topic; that is, I hope that the result makes

up for some of the previous neglect of this subject and is

commensurate with its past and continuing importance.

KENNETH P. WERRELL

Senior Research Fellow

Airpower Research Institute

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Many individuals and organizations helped make this

book possible . First, I wish to thank those at my home

institution, Radford University, who encouraged and made

possible my work with the Air University: the Board of

Visitors ; Dr Donald Dedmon, president ; Dr David Moore,

vice president for Academic Affairs; Dr W. D. Stump, dean

of the School of Arts and Sciences; and Dr W. K. Roberts,

chairman of the Department of History. Lt Gen Charles

Cleveland, former commander of the Air University; Maj

Gen David Gray (USAF, Retired); and Maj Gen Paul

Hodges, former commandant of the Air War College, were

unsparing in their support throughout this project. Col

Thomas Fabyanic (USAF, Retired), the founder and first

director of the Airpower Research Institute (ARI), and Col

Kenneth Alnwick (USAF, Retired), his successor, deserve

much of the credit for helping conceive the concept, encourage the project, and remove many of the barriers encountered. Also, special thanks to Col Neil Jones (USAF,

Retired) who provided photos for this book . Later CADRE

commanders Col Donald D. Stevens (USAF, Retired), Brig

Gen John C. Fryer, Jr., and Col Sidney J. Wise provided

vital publication assistance. Others at the Air University

helped in many important ways, especially Col Dennis

Drew, Preston Bryant, Dianne Parrish, John Westcott, and

Dorothy McCluskie. Many individuals helped in document

processing: Lula Barnes, Sue Carr, Carolyn Ward, Marcia

Williams, and Cynthia Hall. For logistical support I am

thankful to Capt Harbert Jones, Betty Brown, and Marilyn

Tyus . The US Air Force History Program helped in a number of ways. These individuals include Dr Richard Morse,

Lynn Gamma, Judy Endicott, Pressley Bickerstaff, and

Margaret Claiborn of the US Air Force Historical Research

Center. The Air University Library played a key role in

X1X
Pastorett, Ruth Griffin, and Kathleen Golson . The US

Army also lent considerable support to this project. Especially helpful were the officers and staff at Fort Bliss: Air

Defense School, Air Defense Museum, and Directorate of

Combat Development . Special thanks are due Jesse Stiller,

the Air Defense Artillery Command Historian . Overseas,

Air Commodore H. A. Probert, Humphrey Wynn, and J.

P. McDonald, at the Air Historical Branch, London; the

staff at the Royal Artillery Institute, Woolwick, United

Kingdom; and E. Hines and Paul J . Kemp of the Imperial

War Museum, London, made research of the British and

German side of the story possible.

Finally, I must thank my entire family, especially my wife

Jeanne, who endured much to make this project possible.
CHAPTER 1

THE EARLY YEARS TO 1945

The genesis of antiaircraft defense appeared soon after

man took to the air. There are reports of balloon and antiballoon artillery in the American Civil War and the

Franco-Prussian War, and in 1890 the Russians tested a

field-gun battery against a balloon moored three kilometers

away. The first aircraft downed in combat fell to ground

fire in the Italo-Turkish War of 1912; so when World War

I began, there were precedents for ground-based air defense

systems.

During the war, both sides bombed their opponent's cities . The bombing of London and Paris by the Germans tied

down considerable Allied resources, estimated in the British

case to be eight times the resources expended by the Germans. British defenses claimed 21 airships (of 201 airship

sorties) and 27 aircraft (of 424 aircraft sorties), of which

ground fire accounted for three Zeppelins and 11 to 13

aircraft . In November 1918 the British used 480 antiaircraft

guns and 376 aircraft in the defense of Great Britain .'

Nevertheless, aircraft flew primarily in support of ground

forces. On the Western Front, German antiaircraft gunners

(fig. 1) claimed 1,588 Allied aircraft, while French gunners

claimed 500 German aircraft; Italian gunners claimed 129;

British Expeditionary Force gunners, 341 ; and US gunners,

58 . The guns grew increasingly effective as hastily improvised equipment gave way to specially designed equipment,

while, relatively speaking, aircraft showed only modest improvements in performance (fig. 2) . The number of German

antiaircraft rounds for each claim fell from 11,588 in 1915

to 5,040 in 1918 . Similarly, French rounds per claim decreased from 11,000 in 1916 to 7,000 in 1918, and British
(Photo Credit. USAF Historical Research Center)

Figure 1. German 7.7-cm antiaircraft gun, 1916.

rounds per claim fell from 8,000 in 1917 to 4,550 in 1918 .

American antiaircraft artillery downed 17 German aircraft

in three months, averaging 605 rounds per kill . 2

In contrast to World War I, the air defenders made little

progress between the wars. The three-inch gun of World

War I dominated what little antiaircraft artillery there was,

and acoustical devices provided the best location equipment. In 1928 the United States adopted as standard equipment the three-inch M3 gun with a muzzle velocity of 2,600

to 2,800 feet per second (fps) (fig . 3) . It had an effective

ceiling of 21,000 feet, just exceeding the 17,000-foot aircraft

ceiling of the day. Meanwhile, new technology-such as

removable barrel liners, automatic breech mechanisms, and
(Photo Credit. Imperial War Museum)

Figure 2. During World War 1 many of the antiaircraft weapons were

improvised.

continuous fuze setters-improved the antiaircraft guns .

But the revolution in aviation technology of the 1930s, permitting much greater aircraft speeds and altitudes, rendered

three-inch guns and acoustical-location gear obsolete .

In the latter half of the 1930s, new equipment began to

appear in antiaircraft units around the world . The major

powers adopted slightly larger but much more powerful

guns, settling on about a 90-millimeter (mm) gun with a

muzzle velocity of 850 to 900 meters per second and a rate

of fire of 30 rounds per minute (rpm). The Germans chose

the 88-mm triple-purpose gun, the British built a prototype
Figure 3. Three-inch antiaircraft battery of the 62d Coast Artillery

trained at approaching plane of the 33d Pursuit Squadron,

Mitchel Field, New York, August 1941 .

3 .7-inch gun in 1936, and the Americans began to replace

their three-inch gun with a 90-mm gun in 1940 . All major

powers experimented with new detection devices, but it was

the British who forged a lead in the field of radar.'

British Antiaircraft Artillery

The British had the most acute air defense problem . Of

all the European capitals, London was easiest to find and

closest to the border. In Winston Churchill's colorful words,

the British capital was "a tremendous fat cow . . . tied up

to attract the beasts of prey.

"4 The British convinced themselves of the decisiveness of air power, fearing what they

called the "knockout blow." They accepted the dismal

prophecies of theorists such as the Italian Giulio Douhet,

the Briton Sir Hugh Trenchard, and the American William

"Billy" Mitchell who predicted that the employment of air
power would result in devastated cities, pulverized industries, and panic-stricken civilians. These airmen believed

that there was no direct defense against the bombers and

that, in Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin's words, "the

bomber will always get through." Therefore, the British put

their faith and effort into a strategic bomber force, neglecting most defensive air efforts. Not until 1937 did the Royal

Air Force (RAF) shift its emphasis from bombers to fighters. On 1 January 1938 the British had only 180 antiaircraft

guns larger than 50 mm. This number slowly increased to

341 by September 1938 (Munich), to 540 in September

1939 (declaration of war), and to 1,140 during the Battle

of Britain.

During the decisive Battle of Britain, antiaircraft artillery

played a secondary role to RAF fighters. The gunners

claimed 357 of the 1,733 German aircraft the British believed they destroyed, even though a more recent source

puts the gunners' scores at less than 300. But the measure

of efficiency must include more than simply claims. By the

end of September 1940, the British estimated that 48 percent ofthe German bombers turned back from the defended

areas. Even if that is an overestimation, flak unquestionably

forced the bombers higher, unnerved the crews, and resulted in reduced bombing accuracy. In addition, antiaircraft guns were the principal defense weapon against night

attacks as night fighters were in their infancy. By the end

of 1940 antiaircraft artillery defenses claimed 8 5 percent

of the British night kills .

British antiaircraft artillery defenses had a number of

'problems, for example, their first kill-three days after the

declaration of war-was unfortunately a friendly aircraft

that had even given the correct recognition signal. (The first

German aircraft claimed by antiaircraft artillery did not

come until over a month later, on .19 October 1939.) The

defenses consisted of a mixture of older three-inch guns,

which the British employed until 1943, and the new 3.7-

inch guns . Sighting was visual until October 1940, when
the British began to equip their forces with gun-laying radar.

Radar made a big difference-the number of rounds fired

per claim at night fell from 30,000 in September (when

German night bombing began), to 11,000 in October, and

to 4,087 in January 1941 . 6

A problem that hampered British antiaircraft defenses

throughout the war was that of personnel. The British sent

their regular antiaircraft units overseas and relied on territorial forces, similar to the American National Guard, for

home defense. At the beginning of the war, the territorial

forces were of top quality. But as the war continued, experienced men were reassigned to other duties, and the

overall quality of the forces declined. The first group of 25

militiamen to arrive at one battery, after passing through

a medical examination at a recruiting center, included two

individuals with advanced cases of venereal disease, one

person with a withered right arm, one mentally deficient,

one with no thumbs, and a sixth whose glass eye fell out

when he ran.'

The drain on antiaircraft personnel forced the British to

take drastic measures-they incorporated women into what

they called mixed batteries. The first such unit became operational in August 1941 ; in it women filled all positions

except those involving heavy loading and firing. The women

served well in many capacities, the principal problems resulting not from them but from their parents, friends, and

British culture . In all, about 68,000 women served in British

antiaircraft units during the war (fig. 4).

Another approach to the manpower shortage was to use

the Home Guard. These men were, for the most part, willing enough but were either over age or physically restricted .

In addition, they could only serve 48 hours every 28 days.

The peak strength of the Home Guard serving guns exceeded 145,000 in January 1944 . One antiaircraft weapon

employed by the Home Guard early in October 1941 was
(Photo Credit. Imperial War Museum)

Figure 4. British women training on antiaircraft gun director.

the terrifying but ineffective unguided rocket (fig. 5) .* Despite these measures to compensate for shortages in manpower, the number of personnel assigned to antiaircraft

duties declined from 330,000 in 1941 to 264,000 in mid1942. Britain just did not have sufficient personnel for all

its needs, and the number of personnel available for antiaircraft duties determined how many guns the British could

operate .'

The Germans also faced stiff opposition from Allied antiaircraft artillery on the battlefield. Initially, mobile warfare and an inadequate number of guns reduced the

effectiveness of Allied flak; but after the first few years of

the war, especially in static positions, the situation changed

to the detriment of the German air force (GAF).

At the siege of Tobruk, for example, the Luftwaffe made

*In July 1941 the British deployed 1,000 rocket barrels . Almost 6,000 were deployed

by July 1943, most of which were twin-barrel devices . But rocket units registered few

claims .
(Photo Credit: Imperial War Museum)

Figure 5. The British experimented with rockets during World

War II .

a determined effort to silence British antiaircraft guns and

shut down the harbor. From April 1941 (when the garrison

was cut off) until November 1941 (when it was relieved),

British flak units engaged 4,105 aircraft with 28 heavy guns,

18 40-mm Bofors (fig. 6), and 42 captured Italian 20-mm

Bredas. The gunners claimed 374 aircraft destroyed, probably destroyed, and damaged. More important, the Germans sank only seven ships during the siege and failed to

close the harbor.

In 1941 the vital British defense facilities on Malta came

under aerial siege. The island, only 60 miles from Sicily,

was critical in the battle for the Mediterranean and North

Africa. In early 1942 the German air force won air superiority over Malta and pounded it ferociously. For two

months the British antiaircraft gunners defended Malta

alone. The critical month was April when Axis airmen flew

10,323 sorties and dropped about 7,000 tons of bombs,
(Photo Credit. Imperial War Museum)

Figure 6. British 40-mm gun and crew. The Swedish Bofors 40-mm

saw extensive action throughout the world, serving both

sides.

about half the total tonnage unloaded on the island. The

British claimed 102 aircraft destroyed that month; however,

the correct figure is probably closer to 37. During the entire

campaign the defenders (airmen and gunners) claimed between 860 and 1,000 aircraft destroyed on 1,199 air raids,

while the Axis admit to the loss of 567. Whatever the actual

number, the stout and successful defense of Malta contributed immensely to the Axis defeat in North Africa. 9

Developments in technology aided the defenders. By

1943 the British converted from powder to mechanical

fuzes. Flashless propellants also increased the efficiency of

their guns, as did automatic fuze setters that improved accuracy and increased the rate of fire two and one-half to

three times. By this time, electric predictors were also

used.

'°
German bombing attacks on Britain trailed off in 1941,

as the Soviet campaign began to dominate the European

war. On 27 March 1942 the Germans opened a new phase

in the air war against Britain with attacks on southern

coastal towns by small numbers of low-flying fighter-bombers. A lack of early warning devices, a wide range of targets,

and an inadequate number of light antiaircraft guns created

problems for the defenders. The British could do nothing

about the first two factors, but they did increase the number

of 40-mm guns from 43 in May 1942 to 267 by the end of

September. By April 1943 the British had deployed 917 40-

mm guns, 424 20-mm guns, and 506 two-pounders (onethird of their available 40 mms and two-fifths of their light

flak units) along the southern coast . The increased alertness

of the gunners and increased number of guns brought about

impressive results. The gunners downed four of 42 sorties

on 23 May, four of 24 sorties on 25 May, and 10 of 35

sorties on 30 May. In this phase of the air war-hit-andrun attacks on fringe targets-the British claimed 56 aircraft destroyed of 1,250 sorties, an attrition rate of 4.5

percent."

The V-1 Campaign

The last major opponent of British home-based antiaircraft artillery was the German V1 (fig . 7), the flying bomb

also known as the buzz bomb, which carried a two-ton

warhead about 160 miles at approximately 400 miles per

hour (mph) . Allied defenses consisted of offensive bombing

raids of V-1 targets (launching sites, fabrication plants, and

supply depots), fighter patrols, balloon barrages, and antiaircraft artillery. Initially, the defenders assumed that the

pilotless bomb would fly at about 400 mph and at a height

of 7,500 feet. Later, they revised their assumptions to 350

mph at 7,000 feet and, finally, to 330 mph at 6,000 feet.

The British completed a detailed plan on the defense of

1 0
Figure 7. V-1 buzz bomb over London.

their homeland in January 1944 . The plan established

fighter patrol lines and an artillery line of 400 heavy pieces

and 346 light pieces immediately south of London (fig. 8) .

But the demands of supporting the D-day invasion and

optimism resulting from the bombing ofthe German launch

sites led to a revision in March. The revised plan called for

a reduction in the number of guns defending London to

192 heavy pieces and 246 light pieces, and a total reduction

from 528 to 288 heavy pieces and from 804 to 282 light

pieces. Air Chief Marshal Roderic Hill, the defense commander, pointed out that the antiaircraft artillery would

have difficulties if the Vl s operated at 2,000 to 3,000 feet

and not at the predicted 6,000 feet.

12 Events validated Hill's

warning.

After the Allied invasion of Europe on 6 June 1944,

Adolph Hitler pushed for the V-1 campaign as a means of

relief for his troops. The Germans hoped to begin operations on 11 June, but they were forced to postpone operations until the next night. Even then, they could fire only

two small salvos; but by 18 June the Germans launched the

500th V-1, by 21 June the 1,000th, by 29 June the 2,000th,

and by 22 July the 5,000th. These V-1 attacks continued
111111111111111

,nPVER

EOLKESIONE

Figure 8. Initial British defensive deployment.

until September, when the Germans withdrew from their

French bases before the Allied advance.' 3

The V-ls traveled fast for the day, crossing the English

coast at an average speed of 340 mph and accelerating to

about 400 mph. Thus the fighters had but six minutes to

sight and down the Vl s before they reached their target .

Because of their small size, the Vl s were difficult to spot .

This problem was exacerbated by the low-altitude approach

averaging between 2,100 and 2,500 feet. Not only was the

V1 tough to spot and intercept, it was also tough to down.

One source estimated that a V-1 was eight times as difficult

to down as a manned aircraft, even though it flew straight

and level. That estimate was probably an exaggeration, but

the V-1 was certainly a difficult target to destroy.

14

1 2
The Allies steadily increased their fighter units to 15 day

and eight night fighter squadrons (two part-time) . Rules of

engagement gave the fighters full rein in good weather and

gave antiaircraft artillery gunners complete freedom in bad

weather. During in-between weather, the most frequent situation, the antiaircraft artillery gunners had complete freedom up to 8,000 feet. On 10 July the British modified a

26 June order allowing fighters to enter the gun belt in hot

pursuit of VIs. Consequently, fighter pilots entered active

antiaircraft gun areas at their own risk.

15

England's third line of defense, after the offensive bombing and the fighter patrols, was its antiaircraft artillery .

When the campaign began, the Allies rapidly got 192 heavy

guns into position with the support of 200 light guns ; and

by the end of June, increased this number to 376 heavy

guns, 594 light guns, and 362 rocket launchers.

16 But despite

these numbers, V1 s were getting through as British defenses were not working at optimum efficiency. The V-I's

operating altitude of 2,000 to 3,000 feet was the worstpossible altitude for the defense-too high for the light guns

and too low for the heavy guns . Heavy mobile pieces proved

unsatisfactory because they could not traverse smoothly and

rapidly. Radar, positioned in hollows and folds in the terrain to protect it from German countermeasures that did

not materialize, operated at a disadvantage . The proximity

of the gun belt to London created another problem . The

British hit a number of V1 s that later crashed into London,

even though the defenders had done their job . Finally, there

was considerable interference between the gunners and the

fighter pilots-fighters chasing the fast, low-flying missiles

sometimes strayed into the gun belt, inhibiting the gunners

who sometimes fired on the fighters as well as the missiles .

The defenders made a fast, effective, and flexible adjustment to the situation, which was much to their credit and

to a large degree responsible for their ultimate success."

The defenders easily came to grips with some of the problems-on 18 June 1944 they ordered guns within London

1 3
silenced and by the end of June resited their radar onto

higher ground. The defenders built permanent structures

for their portable guns. Constructed of 28 railway sleepers

and 12 ties, these structures were first called Pile portable

platforms; but they quickly became known as Pile mattresses, named for Gen Frederick A. Pile, the antiaircraft

artillery commander (fig. 9) . In late June the British began

to replace their static guns (fig. 10) with mobile guns; and

they put better gun predictors into action in early July. The

most difficult problems remaining involved damaged V1 s

falling on London and interference between fighter pilots

and gunners .

II

Hill and Pile concluded that they should designate an all-

(Photo Credit. Imperial War Museum)

Figure 9. Preparing Pile mattress.

1 4
(Photo Credit. Imperial War Museum)

Figure 10. 3.7-inch gun mounted on a Pile mattress.

gun belt from which all aircraft should be excluded . As this

idea emerged, a staff officer suggested moving the guns and

radar to the coast. Such a relocation would eliminate the

problem of damaged missiles falling on London and would

provide radar operators and gunners optimum visibility.

This scheme would also give the fighter pilots a clear boundary (the coastline) between the gun and aircraft zones (fig .

11). Almost simultaneously, Robert A. Watson-Watt, the

eminent scientist and developer of radar, independently

came up with the same concept, giving it even more

weight.' 9

The plan had a number of dangers. First, there was the

question of effectiveness. Would the new concept actually

improve the defenses? The fighter pilots, who claimed 883

of the 1,192 V-1 kills as of 13 July, would be inhibited by

a split zone. Second, how long would such a redeployment-entailing hundreds of heavy guns, thousands of personnel, and tens of thousands of tons of supplies and

equipment-take? What would happen to the defenses in

1 5
f1C :1Uf: f$

FOLKFST(i^ii

Figure 11 . Final British defensive deployment.

the meantime? Finally, how long would it take to get a clear

decision on this proposal? As each day passed, redeployment became increasingly difficult as more of the mobile

guns were fitted with Pile mattresses and more guns were

added to the gun belt.

On 13 July Hill made the decision to create an all-gun

belt on the coast. This bold, quick exercise of authority was

remarkable, as was the speed with which the decision was

implemented. By 17 July the heavy guns, radar, and supporting equipment and supplies were in place, followed in

two days by the light guns. This action, which involved the

movement of 23,000 people and about 60,000 tons of supplies, was no small feat. The British deployed the guns on

the coast between Dover and Beachy Head, creating a zone

extending 10,000 yards over the water and 5,000 yards in1 6
land. Aircraft were restricted to altitudes above 8,000 feet

in this area, but the fighter pilots were free to roam over

the English Channel and over England between the gun belt

and the balloon line ." Most important, the decision turned

out to be an effective solution.

Although the redeployment and separation of the aircraft

and guns was a major factor in the increased effectiveness

of the defenses, there were other factors as well. The number

of heavy guns in the coastal belt increased from 376 on 1

July, to 416 on 23 July, to 512 on 30 July, and to 592 on

7 August. In addition there were 892 40-mm guns and 504

20-mm guns plus 254 rocket tubes. The addition of new

American radar (SCR-584) and predictors for the British

3 .7-inch guns and the American 90-mm guns also helped

the defenses. - 2 Another technical improvement was the use

of proximity fuzes that detonated at a preset distance from

the target. The new fuze proved to be about five times more

effective than either time or contact fuzes.z 3 Finally, the

gunners became more accurate as they got more practice .

These defensive improvements, coupled with the known

direction, altitude, and speed of the V1 s, enabled the defenders to dramatically improve their effectiveness. Before

the redeployment, the defenses downed 42.3 percent of the

V-1 s observed; after the redeployment, that figure rose to

58 .6 percent. Another set of data, similar but not exactly

coinciding, indicated that the defenses downed 48 .4 percent

of those missiles spotted over land before the redeployment

and 84 .1 percent of those spotted after the redeployment.

The high point occurred on the night of 27/28 August when

the defenders destroyed 90 of 97 missiles reported; only

four V1 s got through to London.

The increased power of the defenses resulted largely from

the tremendous improvement in the effectiveness of antiaircraft artillery. The gunners got 21 .5 percent of the destroyed credits before the redeployment and 53 .9 percent

afterwards. They downed 17 percent of their targets in the

first week after redeployment and 74 percent in the last

1 7
four days of action (29 August through 1 September).

During the summer campaign, the Germans began to

launch Vl s from bombers. The first air launch known to

the British occurred on 6 April 1944 at Peenemunde, with

the first recognizable use of an air-launched weapon against

England on 9 July 1944 . The German air force air launched

about 90 V1 s before the redeployment and 310 V1 s from

then to 5 September. With the withdrawal of German forces

from the French launching sites, these air-launched weapons became the chief air threat to Britain in the closing

months of the war. Between 5 September and the last air

launching on 14 January 1945, the Germans hurled about

1,200 of these V-1s against Britain, but only 66 reached

London. Not only did few of the weapons reach London,

but the accuracy was very poor. The final act in the V- 1

campaign against Britain came in March 1945 when the

Germans introduced a long-range version of the V1 . Fitted

with a lighter wing and warhead, this V1 variant could fly

220 miles compared to the standard missile's range of about

150 to 160 miles. The Germans launched the first modified

V1 from Dutch ramps on 3 March. From 3 March to 29

March, the Germans fired a total.of 275 Vls against Britain, only 13 of which reached London. The Allies had been

tipped off by photoreconnaissance and intelligence reports

about this new weapon, and they ordered the northern defenses bolstered on 27 February with reinforcements consisting of seven squadrons of day fighters and three

squadrons of night fighters . But the antiaircraft artillery

gunners performed so well that the British relieved all but

one of the day squadrons . The defenders downed 72 .8 percent of the 125 missiles observed.

The Germans fired a total of about 10,492 Vls against

Britain, of which about 2,000 crashed shortly after takeoff.

The defenders observed 7,488 missiles and downed 3,957

(52 .8 percent); they credited fighter pilots with 1,847 kills,

the gunners with 1,878, and the balloons with 232 . 28 Efficiency improved from downing 42.3 percent of the Vl s

1 8
observed before the redeployment (12 June to 15 July) to

5 8 .6 percent after the redeployment (16 July to 5 September). The guns downed 63 .2 percent of the air-launched

missiles after this period (16 September 1944 to 14 January

1945) and 33.1 percent of the ground-launched V-ls from

Holland. Put another way, the percentage of Vl s that

reached London, relative to those launched, declined in

these same periods (29 .1, 23, 5 .5, 4.7) for an overall figure

of23.1 percent. Thus, about 2,419 V-1 s reached the London

Civil Defence Region, killing 6,184 civilians and seriously

injuring another 17,981 with about another 5 percent of

the total casualties consisting of service personnel. Approximately 92 percent of the casualties were in the London

area."

To put the V-1 s into perspective, they must be compared

with other German weapons that killed and maimed British

civilians during World War II. German bombings killed

51,509, V-2s killed 2,754, and long-range guns 148 . Of the

146,777 British civilian casualties (killed and injured) in

World War II : 112,932 were caused by bombings, 24,165

by the V1 s, 9,277 by the V-2s, and 403 by long-range

guns. 3 o

Another aspect of the V1 operational story is frequently

overlooked. The Germans also launched about 7,400 to

9,000 V-ls against targets on the continent, mostly (4,900)

against the port of Antwerp, Belgium. In the city's defense

the Allies deployed 18,000 troops manning 208 90-mm

guns, 128 3.7-inch guns, and 188 40-mm guns. In addition,

they used 280 balloons later augmented to 1,400. No fighters were employed in the defense of Antwerp (fig. 12). 3 1

In the attack on Antwerp, the Germans deployed their

first missiles from the southeast. In mid-December, they

shifted to the northeast and finally, by the end of January,

to the north. The last direction of attack created a particular

problem for the defense because a large airfield in that sector was not closed until 21 February 1945 . Nevertheless,

the defenders downed 2,183 (91 .2 percent) of the 2,394

1 9
(Photo Credit. US Army Air Defense Artillery Museum)

Figure 12. Defense of Antwerp. Although the Germans had lost control of the skies, they were able to bombard area targets

such as the port of Antwerp with V-1 s.

missiles plotted. More to the point, only 211 V1 s reached

a 7,000-yard radius area around the docks that the defenders designated as the vital area. 32

The Germans also attacked Liege, Belgium, with about

3,000 V1 s. It was defended between 23 November and 11

December 1944, when the urgent needs of the Battle of the

Bulge pulled the defenders out.

20
American Antiaircraft Artillery

(Photo Credit. US Army Air Defense Artillery Museum)

Figure 13. US 90-mm M-1 AAA gun.

2 1

Vis killed a total of 947 military and 3,736 civilians and

wounded 1,909 military and 8,166 civilians on the continent. Antwerp suffered 1,812 military and 8,333 civilian

casualties, or 10,145 of the 14,758 V-1 casualties on the

continent.

American flak also made an impressive showing in combat (fig . 13). During the Normandy campaign (7 through

30 June 1944), First Army antiaircraft gunners claimed 96

aircraft destroyed of 682 enemy sorties. Following the

breakout from the invasion beachhead, between 31 July and

6 August, the Luftwaffe hurled 1,312 aircraft at American
forces passing through difficult terrain at the Avranches

bottleneck. Although the US gunners downed only 58 aircraft, the Germans did not hit a single bridge, dam, or vital

target. 11

On 3 December 1944 the Luftwaffe launched 80 to 100

aircraft against the First Army and lost 30 to 41 aircraft in

a 45-minute engagement. During the Battle of the Bulge

(16 December 1944 through 1 January 1945), the First

Army antiaircraft units claimed 366 German aircraft destroyed or probably destroyed of 1,178 sorties. 35

The most spectacular one-day Allied air defense effort

took place on New Year's Day 1945 . The GAF plan called

for about 900 German fighters, led by Ju-88 night fighters,

to attack 16 Anglo-American airfields. Coordination broke

down badly as German flak downed about 100 of their own

aircraft before they reached Allied lines. Poor weather, lack

of training, confusion, Allied flak, and Allied fighters further diluted the impact of the raid. Allied losses were much

lower than might have been expected, and German losses

were much higher. The German air force claimed to have

destroyed 402 Allied aircraft on the ground and 65 in the

air; but the Allies put their own losses at 236 destroyed and

badly damaged on the ground and 23 in air-to-air combat .

The Germans put their own losses at 304 aircraft destroyed

and 232 pilots lost . Anglo-American pilots claimed 102 aerial victories, and Allied gunners claimed 185 to 394 (the

former figure, confirmed kills ; the latter, confirmed kills

plus those awaiting confirmation). The Allies recovered 137

German aircraft wrecks in their area of control and, from

their remains, credited the fighters with 57 kills and flak

with 80. 36

A clearer view of the confused battle is perhaps possible

by focusing on the attack of one airfield . The German

fighter unit JG11 launched about 65 fighters against the

Anglo-American airfield (Y-29) at Asch, Belgium, where

four RAF Spitfire squadrons (41st, 130th, 350th, and

610th) and two US fighter groups (352d and 366th) were

22
stationed. When the Germans struck Asch, one Spitfire

squadron and one Thunderbolt squadron were airborne,

and a dozen P-51s of the 352d Fighter Group were taking

off. The latter's group commander, Col John Meyer,

claimed one FW 190 before he had raised his landing gear.

In the ensuing melee, American pilots claimed 32 kills ;

British pilots, one . In all, the Allied pilots and gunners at

Asch claimed 35 to 41 German aircraft out of 50 attackers.

The Allies lost no P-51 s and only one P-47 in the air; they

lost seven Spitfires and several C-47s on the ground . The

Germans admitted losing 27 aircraft in the attack.

A few months later, US flak gunners scored another impressive victory. After American forces unexpectedly captured the railway bridge across the Rhine River at Remagen,

Germany, on 7 March 1945, German forces made considerable and desperate efforts to destroy it . By 14 March the

American antiaircraft gunners massed 64 90-mm, 216 40-

mm, 24 37-mm guns, and 228 quad and 140 single .50-

caliber machine guns in their defensive effort. They claimed

142 German aircraft destroyed of 442 attacking. More important, German aircraft did not damage the bridge."

During the European campaign, American forces of the

12th Army Group (First, Third, and Ninth US Armies)

recorded 14,776 sorties by the German air force. US gun

ners claimed the destruction of 2,070 Luftwaffe aircraft .

The German air force recorded 29,953 aircraft lost to enemy action or missing in the entire war. Of the 14,938

downed over Germany, the Germans credited antiaircraft

artillery with the destruction of 2,598 aircraft ."

German Flak Defenses

Ofall combatants in World War II, the Germans had the

most experience with antiaircraft defense. They had come

a long way from the Versailles peace treaty that essentially

banned German antiaircraft weapons . Although the Ger23
mans evaded the provision of the treaty to a degree, it

clearly inhibited them from building any military force until

Hitler came to power in 1933 . In April 1934 the Germans

assigned the antiaircraft arm to the Luftwaffe . At first, they

considered antiaircraft artillery as the primary defense of

the homeland from enemy aircraft. The Germans expanded

the role of flak as they assessed the lessons of the Spanish

Civil War, where antiaircraft artillery also served as an infantry support weapon. On the basis of that war, the Germans doubled the number of their flak units. So when

World War II began, the Germans had 2,600 heavy and

6,700 light flak guns.

Germany's best-known artillery piece was the 88-mm gun

(fig. 14). Although a gun of that caliber was used in World

War I, Krupp designers at Bofors in Sweden worked out

the details of a new 88-mm gun in the interwar years and

returned to Germany with the new model in 1931 . The

resulting 8 .8-centimeter (cm) Flak 18/36/37 comprised

about 60 percent of Germany's heavy flak guns during

World War II. The gun fired a 20.3-pound shell at a muzzle

velocity of 2,690 fps to an effective ceiling of 26,000 feet.*

The fame of the 8 .8 stems mainly from its versatility as

a triple-purpose weapon (antiaircraft, antitank, and standard artillery piece) and its ubiquity (fig. 15). The Germans

began to work on a more advanced model-the 8.8-cm Flak

41-in 1939, but did not get this gun into service until

1943 . In spite of early mechanical problems, this flak gun

had greater performance** as well as a lower silhouette on

its turntable mounting than did the 8 .8-cm Flak 18/36/37

on its pedestal mounting (fig. 16) . Because of its high cost

*Compare these figures with the standard British heavy antiaircraft gun, the 3.7-inch

Mark 3, and the American 90-mm Mark 1 . The former fired a 28-pound projectile at

a muzzle velocity of 2,600 fps to an effective ceiling of 32,000 feet, whereas the latter

hurled a 23-pound shell at 2,700 fps to an effective ceiling of 32,000 feet . The two

Allied guns weighed more than the German gun and had a higher rate of fire, 20 rpm

compared with the German 15-rpm gun.41

**It fired a 20.7-pound shell at a muzzle velocity of 3,280 fps to an effective ceiling

of 37,000 feet .

24
(Photo Credit: Imperial War Museum)

Figure 14. The German 88-mm gun was probably the most famous

and feared artillery piece of World War II .

and complexity, the Germans manufactured relatively few

of this model and, in February 1944, fielded only 279. 42

In 1933 the Germans established the specifications for a

105-mm antiaircraft gun, and three years later selected

Rheinmetall's proposal over Krupp's. The 10.5-cm Flak

25
(Photo Credit: Imperial War Museum)

Figure 15. One reason for the 88's fame was its versatility; it served

well in conventional artillery, antitank, and antiaircraft

roles.

3 8/39 fired a 3 3 .2-pound shell at a muzzle velocity of 2,8 8 5

fps to an effective ceiling of 31,000 feet. In 1936 Rheinmetall also won a contract for a 12 .8-cm gun designated as

the 12.8-cm Flak 40. It fired a 57.2-pound shell at 2,890

fps to a maximum ceiling of 35,000 feet. Compared with

the 88-mm gun, the 128-mm gun (fig. 17) used a powder

charge four times as great and thus its shell's flight time

was only one-third as long. In late 1944 there were 116 105-

mm flak guns mounted on railroad mounts, 827 on fixed

mounts, and 1,025 on mobile mounts. For increased mobility the Germans mounted about 5 percent of their 105-

mm and 128-mm flak guns on railroad cars. These potent

guns were manned by Germany's best flak gunners and were

correctly considered to be the cream of the flak arm.

2 6
(Photo Credit: USAF Historical Research Center)

Figure 16. 88-mm gun on the march.

In the early years of the war (1939-41), flak protected

German troops from the few Allied aircraft that the German air force had not destroyed and supported the advancing armies as an antitank and direct support weapon.

In the Western European campaign of 1940, flak units

claimed 854 of 2,379 aircraft destroyed and over 300 armored vehicles . By October 1941 German flak gunners

claimed a score of 5,381 aircraft and 1,930 armored

vehicles.

Another victory, partially due to German flak, was the

evacuation of Axis forces over the Strait of Messina from

Sicily in August 1943 . Despite Allied air and sea superiority,

almost 40,000 German and 62,000 Italian troops left the

island with much of their equipment, nearly 10,000 vehi27
(Photo Credit. Imperial War Museum)

Figure 17. German 128-mm gun.

cles, and even with their rear guard. This Axis victory resulted because of Allied preoccupation with the upcoming

Italian invasion and completion of the conquest of Sicily,

as well as the Axis employment of 500 heavy and light flak

28
pieces. 44 But the Messina evacuation was as much an Axis

accomplishment as it was an Allied failure .

During the early years, German home defenses faced light

opposition as the British night raiders were few in number,

ill equipped, and poorly trained (a bomber could rarely find

its target, much less destroy it) . But British airmen began

to strike telling blows, as dramatically seen in the first raid

of 1,000 bombers on Cologne in May 1942 . Shortly afterwards, American heavy bombers joined the fray with daylight attacks, but they did not launch large raids on

Germany until the spring 1943.

One key target was the oil complex at Ploesti, Romania.

After an ineffective attack by 13 American B-24s on 12

June 1942, the Army Air Forces (AAF) dispatched 178

bombers on a low-level attack on 1 August 1943 (fig. 18) .

American airmen estimated Axis flak defenses at about 100

heavy guns and several hundred light guns but encountered

twice that number. These guns, combined with the vulnerability of the Liberators at low altitude, confusion of the

battle, and the long range (over 2,300 mile round-trip) of

the mission, caused heavy bomber losses. A total of 54

bombers failed to return; the airmen attributed the bulk of

these losses to flak (fig. 19) .

The Allies conducted 19 high-level raids on Ploesti between 5 April and 19 August 1944 (fig . 20) . On 5,479 effective sorties, American bombers dropped 13,469 tons of

bombs and lost 223 bombers. Flak downed 131 bombers

and 56 fighters .

Besides the 21 heavy bomber raids by the AAF, there

were four other bombing attacks on Ploesti . The RAF flew

three night missions, dropped 313 tons of bombs on 186

effective sorties and lost 15 bombers to unknown causes .

In contrast, on 10 June 1944, the Americans dispatched 46

P-38s, each carrying a 1,000-pound bomb and a 300-gallon

fuel tank, escorted by 48 Lightnings, against the oil target.

The airmen credited 38 P-38s with effective bombing sorties and with getting 19 bombs on target with good results.

29
Figure 18 . The 1 August 1943 Ploesti mission was both dramatic

and costly.

But the Americans met stiff resistance, including 100 enemy

aircraft; as a result, they lost nine dive-bombers (seven to

flak) and 14 of the escorting P-38s. American fighters

claimed 28 enemy aircraft destroyed in the air. 46

In early April 1944 German heavy guns at Ploesti numbered 178, light guns 203 . The Germans bolstered this number to 278 heavy guns and 280 light guns by the time of

the final attack on 19 August (figs. 21-25). The heavy guns

(fig . 26) consisted of 128-mm guns (10 percent), 105-mm

mobile guns (15 percent), 88-mm mobile guns (60 percent),

and Romanian 75-mm guns and captured Soviet 76 .5-mm

guns (15 percent). Flak took an increasing toll of American

bombers, rising from 1 .2 percent of sorties in April to 2.4

30
Figure 19. German radar in Romania.

percent in August, as losses to enemy aircraft declined from

2 percent of sorties to zero . 4 '

The Germans fiercely defended other oil facilities as well.

At Politz, they deployed 600 heavy antiartillery weapons

and at Leuna, 700. At the latter, about 40 percent of the

heavy weapons were larger than 88-mm guns. The campaign against Leuna, Germany's second largest synthetic

oil and chemical plant, lasted from 12 May 1944 to 4 April

1945 . The AAF sent 5,236 bomber sorties and the RAF

sent 1,394 sorties, which dropped 18,092 tons of bombs

on the target. But because of weather and enemy opposition, only 10 percent of those bombs fell on the plant complex. Bombing accuracy as measured in bombs on target

declined from 35 percent in May 1944, to 5 percent in July,

and finally to 1 .5 percent in September. On three missions

in October, the Germans reported that no bombs fell on

the plant . The Americans lost 119 bombers (2 .3 percent of

3 1
Figure 20. Ploesti was protected by smoke as well as by guns.

Smoke screen is shown developing on 17 August 1944.

Romana Americana Oil Refinery is at center right. White

dots are bomb craters.

sorties), while the British lost eight (.57 percent), mostly to

German flak. 48

The Germans stoutly defended other targets as well.

Hamburg's defenses included 400 heavy guns, while Munich's had almost 300, and Vienna's had 327. The Allies

hit the Austrian capital on 47 raids and lost 361 heavy

bombers, 229 (63.4 percent) to flak. On 7 February 1945

the Fifteenth Air Force lost 25 of the 689 aircraft sent

against Vienna (19 to flak) . The Fifteenth Air Force hit the

city again the next day, but this time it lost none of its 470

32
(Photo Credit: Imperial War Museum)

Figure 21. German light flak was also very effective. German single

20-mm mount. Note German soldier in background operating a range finder.

bombers. The losses on the first raid were due to the clear

weather that helped the gunners and to the Americans' lack

of airborne coordination and electronic countermeasures

(ECM). The success on the following day was attributed to

poorer weather (7/10 to 10/10 overcast) and better American coordination and ECM.49

The Germans introduced technological improvements to

increase flak efficiency. In 1941 flak units began to get gunlaying radar and grooved projectiles. These shells fragmented into 80- to 100-gram pieces instead of the usual 1-

to 7-gram pieces, therefore causing much greater damage.

Incendiary shells also increased flak efficiency by three

times, according to German estimates.

Another important advancement dealt with fuzes. Having requested double fuzes (contact and timed) in 1943, the

Germans introduced them in late 1944. These fuzes increased the effectiveness of 88-mm guns five times, 105-

mm guns three times, and 128-mm guns two times. But the

3 3
(Photo Credit. Imperial War Museum)

Figure 22. German 20-mm guns aboard train .

Germans did not make the big change in fuzes ; instead, the

Allies introduced proximity fuzes. After the war, an American study calculated that had the Germans used proximity

fuzes, they could have increased their flak efficiency by a

factor of 3.4, making B-17 operations very hazardous and

B-24 operations impractical. 5 o

The Germans also experimented with a number of novel

approaches to ground-based antiaircraft systems. They

tested squeeze bore and sabot devices* but got neither into

service.

The Germans examined yet another concept, flak rockets,

*In both systems a gun fires a shell of smaller size, for example, a 88-mm shell from

a 105-mm gun. Because more powder pushes a smaller projectile, much greater velocity

is achieved.

34
(Photo Credit. USAF Historical Research Center)

(Photo Credit. USAF Historical Research Center)

Figure 24. 40-mm Bofors on truck chassis.

3 5

Figure 23. German light flak pieces were also mounted on motor

vehicles. Here a 20-mm gun is seen with a makeshift

mount on an Opel truck.
(Photo Credit: USAF Historical Research Center)

Figure 25. 50-mm gun on five-ton towing vehicle.

Figure 26. 128-mm railway guns were largest in Ploesti, Romania.

There were 24 of these, each of which could fire one

shell every five seconds.

3 6
but barely employed them in World War II . Since the Germans realized little positive results with the program in the

1930s, Hitler halted all long-range development projects in

September 1941 . The Germans lifted the stop order on the

program, and in April 1942 they drew up the specifications

for a variety of flak rockets, both guided and unguided. In

September 1942 Hermann Goering authorized work on

AAA rockets. In response, Wernher von Braun forwarded

a study in November 1942 that mentioned three types of

guided flak rockets: a 28-foot, single-stage solid-fuel missile;

a 33-foot, two-stage solid-fuel missile; and a 20-foot, singlestage liquid-fuel missile.''

Subsequently, the Germans developed a number of

guided flak missiles and two small unguided groundlaunched rockets, the Foehn and Taifun. The Foehn

weighed 3 .3 pounds and measured two feet in length. First

fired in 1943, the rocket had a 3,600-foot range and was

intended to be fired in ripples from a 35-barrel launcher.

The Germans put three batteries into service and credited

them with downing three Allied aircraft . The rocket's primary impact was, however, psychological.

The other unguided flak rocket, the Taifun (fig . 27), measured 75 .6 inches in length, weighed 65 pounds, and carried

a 1 .4-pound warhead . The Germans fired the liquid-fuel

rockets in ripples from either a 30-barrel launcher or a 50-

barrel launcher mounted on a 88-mm gun carriage . The

Taifun had an altitude capability of 46,000 to 52,000 feet."

In addition, the Germans developed four guided rockets:

Enzian, Rheintochter, Schmetterling, and Wasserfall. The

Enzian (fig . 28) also could have passed for an aircraft, albeit

a radio controlled and tailless one . (It was an unmanned

version of the rocket-powered Me 163 .) Almost 12 feet in

length, the missile's sweptback wing spanned 13 .5 feet. It

weighed 4,350 pounds and was launched by four solid-fuel

boosters from a 88-mm gun carriage . The Enzian carried

a 660-pound warhead to an altitude of 53,000 feet and a

slant range of 16 miles at 560 mph. The Germans tested

3 7
(Photo Credit. Smithsonian Institution Photo No. 41183)

Figure 27. German Taifun rocket, an unguided, liquid-propelled

antiaircraft rocket.

possibly 3 8 Enzians. But only a few were successes; and in

January 1945 the Germans canceled the project.

Rheintochter I (fig. 29), a solid-fuel, two-stage rocket,

measured 20 .1 feet and weighed 3,860 pounds. The second

stage had four canard fins and six wings (which spanned

9.8 feet) and carried a 220- to 330-pound warhead to a

slant range of 18,000 yards and an altitude of 23,000 feet.

The Germans first tested the radio-controlled device in August 1943 ; and by the time it was canceled in February

1945, they had fired 88 flak rockets . Rheintochter I's unsatisfactory performance led to Rheintochter II, which had

four jettisonable booster rockets between its wings. Rheintochter III used the same first stage, but its second stage

was about 3 .5 feet longer. Powered by a liquid-fuel engine,

it used two booster units . The Germans tested about 40 of

3 8
(Photo Credit. Imperial War Museum)

Figure 28. The Germans tested the Enzian but dropped it in favor

of other German flak rockets. Note the solid-fuel boosters mounted on the missile's fuselage.

these before canceling Rheintochter in favor of the

Schmetterling.ss

The Schmetterling (fig. 30) looked like a sweptwing aircraft measuring 11 .8 feet in length and 6 .6 feet in span . At

an all-up weight of 970 pounds, it was launched by two

solid-fuel boosters from a 37-mm gun carriage. The radiocontrolled missile carried a 51-pound warhead out to a maximum slant range of 17,500 yards and an altitude of 29,000

feet at a maximum speed of 537 mph. The Germans first

fired it in January 1944 and tested perhaps 80 despite engine (fuel regulation) problems.

Wasserfall (fig. 31), the largest German flak rocket, was

a scaled-down V-2, from which it was derived. Unlike the

V-2, however, Wasserfall had a set of four fins mounted

about one-third down its 25 .6-foot length, and larger tail

fins. Wasserfall had a lift-off weight of 8,400 pounds and

39
(Photo Credit. Imperial War Museum)

Figure 29. Another German flak rocket experiment was this

Rheintochter.

carried a 200-pound warhead. The Germans desired a missile that could down an aircraft flying 540 mph at an altitude of 12 miles and at a distance of 30 miles . The

Wasserfall fell short of these requirements by only reaching

an altitude of 6 miles at a distance of 30 miles, an altitude

of 9 miles at 25 miles, and an altitude of 11 .4 miles at 16 .5

miles. But American bomber formations in 1945 were

flying less than 200 mph at about an altitude of 5 miles .

The Germans intended to use beam-rider guidance, in

which the missile rides along an electronic beam to its target. But telemetry difficulties created problems. The Germans had two schemes for detonating the warhead: groundactivated signals and a proximity fuze. Design work for the

Wasserfall was completed in early 1943, and the missile

was first flown in February 1944. The Germans tested at

least 50 before canceling the project in February 1945 . 58

Some authors speculate on what might have been if the

40
(Photo Credit: USAF Historical Research Center)

Figure 30. German Schmetterling.

Wasserfall, the most promising flak rocket, rather than the

V-2, had been built in quantity. They overlook some basic

factors . The antiaircraft problem is much more difficult

than that of ground bombardment; the target is small, possibly maneuvering, and fast moving. The Germans lacked

an operational proximity fuze; and the Allies had a lead in

electronics that probably could have nullified, certainly degraded, the German's radio-controlled guidance system.

A number of problems inhibited German flak. Flak personnel declined in quality, especially after 1943 as Germany

combed out its forces to make good the war's heavy attrition. The Germans employed women, old men, young boys,

factory workers, foreigners, and even prisoners of war in

flak units . In November 1944, 29 percent of flak personnel

were civilians and auxiliaries; in April 1945, 44 percent.

Understandably these individuals were less than satisfac41
(Photo Credit. USAF Historical Research Center)

Figure 31 . Wasserfall test at Peenemunde, fall 1944.

tory. The increasing number of guns deployed by the Germans consumed tremendous amounts of materials, causing

another difficulty-the shortage of ammunition, which, in

early 1944, forced the Germans to restrict their firing. By

the end of the war, flak units could deliver only half of their

firepower potential because of these shortages ."

Nevertheless, German flak was effective in World War

II and grew increasingly effective as the war continued.

Through 1944 German gunners inflicted about one-third

of Allied aircraft losses and two-thirds of the damage; and

after that, about two-thirds of the losses and almost all the

damage . To be precise, not only did German flak become

more effective through the course of the war but, as German

aircraft became less effective, the flak gunners picked up

the increasing burden. The AAF lost 18,418 aircraft in combat against Germany in World War 11 . The American airmen credited antiaircraft artillery with downing 7,821 of

these, enemy aircraft with 6,800. 60

42
In addition to downing and damaging Allied aircraft, flak

also degraded bombing accuracy. A 1941 British report said

the accuracy had been degraded by a figure of one-third.

A similar study of Eighth Air Force bombing errors between

May 1944 and February 1945 credits almost 40 percent of

these errors to enemy guns . The Mediterranean Air Forces

put the same message across in another way-with little or

no flak opposition, the fighters required 30 bombs to hit a

bridge ; but against intense flak it took 150 bombs per hit.

Medium bombers not encountering flak destroyed 21 percent of the bridges attacked and completely missed only 3

percent, but against flak the bombers destroyed only 2 percent and completely missed 28 percent.

Allied Countermeasures

Allied airmen used a number of measures to reduce the

effectiveness of enemy flak. Planners picked routes around

known flak positions, used higher bombing altitudes, employed saturation tactics, and devised tighter formations.

Two other measures deserve detailed treatment.

The importance of radar as both an early warning and

gun-laying device grew as Allied bombers increasingly operated at night and in poor weather. Fortunately for the

Allies, the British held a marked advantage over the Germans in electronic warfare; some say a two-year lead. One

countermeasure used against German radar was called

either window (by the British) or chaff (by the Americans)

(fig . 32). Aircraft dropped strips of foil, similar to Christmas

tree tinsel, which caused false signals on German radarscopes. The RAF first used this electronic countermeasure

in the July 1943 Hamburg raids, following a command decision that cleared its use after being withheld for almost

18 months. The second major ECM device, called carpet,

electronically jammed German radar. In October 1943 the

Allies first employed the device in bomber formations as

43
(Photo Credit: US Army Air Defense Artillery Museum)

Figure 32. Chaff.

both a broad band and spot jammer. Estimates vary on the

impact of ECM; and ECM impact changed as specific conditions changed, especially weather. Although the ECM device may have decreased the effectiveness of flak by as much

as two-thirds, an overall estimate of one-fourth is probably

closer to the truth .

The AAF used more direct tactics as well. On the first

day of the Market-Garden operation, 17 September 1944,

the AAF attacked 112 flak positions. In addition to over

3,000 tons of bombs dropped by B-17s, P-47s dropped 36

tons of fragmentation bombs and expended almost 123,000

rounds of 50-caliber machine-gun ammunition. The relatively light losses suffered by the attackers, the troop carriers, and gliders indicate that the effort worked.63 This was

44
not the case the next day. On 18 September 1944, 38 P47s of the crack 56th Fighter Group attacked German flak

positions in the Turnhout area with .50s and parachute

fragmentation bombs. Disaster ensued. Low overcast, haze,

and orders requiring pilots to hold their fire until fired upon

inhibited the American pilots and put them at a disadvantage. The unit lost 15 aircraft to German flak and one aircraft to Allied antiaircraft fire; in addition, of the 22 aircraft

that returned home, 13 were damaged by flak.* That day,

the AAF flew 104 sorties against antiaircraft guns and lost

21 aircraft with another 17 damaged. These missions

claimed 18 flak guns destroyed.

In the entire Market-Garden operation, Allied airmen

claimed destruction of 118 flak positions and damage to

127 others. But the Anglo-Americans lost 104 aircraft on

4,320 sorties (excluding troop carriers and gliders), ofwhich

37 were lost on 646 sorties to suppress flak. Analysis of the

entire operation indicated that flak suppression succeeded

only on the first day of the operation. 6 s

Not surprisingly then, the next month, US Strategic Air

Forces in Europe recommended against attacking heavy

flak positions with low-flying aircraft. The writer based his

report on the opinions of the three American numbered air

forces in Europe (the Eighth, Ninth, and Fifteenth Air

Forces), which agreed that such attacks would be ineffective

and costly. The report concluded that alternative measures

(ECM, formations, evasive maneuvers, and fragmentation

bombing) were more practical . 66 American airmen found

little profit in attacking flak positions in World War II. As

Maj Gen Elwood "Pete" Quesada, commander of the 9th

Tactical Air Command, put it : "It was like a man biting a

dog.' 967

The Americans also employed artillery to fight flak . Ar

*Eleven pilots, three injured, got back to Allied lines while three others were killed

and two captured . Of 338 Eighth Air Force fighters lost to flak during the war, 77

percent were lost while strafing.

45
tillery was used to blanket known flak positions as the fighters approached. The American gunners attempted to pin

down the flak gunners so that the fighters could launch their

initial attack against minimal resistance . These tactics were

employed with mixed results during the June 1944 siege of

Cherbourg, France."

Another Allied effort at flak suppression occurred during

the Anglo-American airborne assault across the Rhine

River at Wesel on 24 March 1945 in Operation Varsity.

Allied aircraft and artillery attempted to silence or neutralize the 922 German flak barrels in the area. Allied

bombers flying 3,741 sorties dropped over 8,100 tons of

bombs on flak positions during the three days before the

airdrop. The Ninth Air Force medium bombers dropped

517 tons of bombs on 265 sorties, while RAF bombers

dropped 88 tons of bombs on 71 sorties. RAF Typhoons

used bullets, bombs, and rockets . In addition, Allied artillery fired 24,000 rounds (440 tons) at 95 German positions.

Despite this awesome firepower, the Allies accomplished

little. Allied airmen and artillery men scored few hits and,

at best, temporarily lowered the morale of the German gunners. Nevertheless, German flak inflicted considerable casualties on Allied forces (figs. 33-35). In addition to

destroying 5 3 tow and 16 supply aircraft, the Germans

damaged 381 of 853 American gliders and 160 of 272 British gliders, of which 142 had major damage. 69

Fratricide

One problem that antiaircraft gunners would rather not

talk about is firing on and hitting friendly aircraft. Fratricide in the speed and confusion of battle is as understandable as it is regrettable. Ground troops and antiaircraft

gunners had fired on friendly aircraft in World War I and

formed the attitude : "There ain't no such thing as a'friendly

airplane' ."'° That attitude and that problem continued.

46
Figure 33 . Liberator over Italy. After bombing in support of the

Eighth Army drive in northern Italy, this B-24 Liberator

of the US Army Fifteenth Air Force has been hit by flak.

Two men bailed out of the burning plane.

The most costly Allied fratricide incident in World War

II occurred on the night of 11/12 July 1943, when the Allies

attempted to reinforce the Sicily invasion with elements of

the 82d Airborne Division. Gen Matthew B . Ridgway, the

division's commander, anticipating difficulties, attempted

to get a protected aerial corridor for his forces and got

assurances from both the US Navy and the US Army antiaircraft gunners. Unfortunately, Ridgway's worst fears

were realized . The troop-filled C-47s and the gliders arrived

over the invasion fleet shortly after an Axis bombing raid.

The first flight passed without incident, but then one gun

opened fire and acted as a signal for Allied gunners both

ashore and afloat to cut loose at the rest of the aerial armada. Antiaircraft fire destroyed 23 of the 144 aircraft that

departed Africa that night and badly damaged 37 others.

47
Figure 34. Some survived . . . somehow. The pilot landed this B-17

safely after its nose was literally shot away by flak over

Cologne, Germany.

4 8

Figure 35. German flak was impressive. B-17 Flying Fortresses

over Bremen, Germany.
Losses in personnel amounted to 97 paratroopers killed or

missing and 132 wounded and 60 airmen killed or missing

and 30 wounded ."

Two nights later, a similar incident occurred with slightly

less disastrous results. American and British troop carriers

attempted to drop British paratroopers to seize a bridge

and establish a bridgehead on the east coast of Sicily.

Friendly naval and ground fire engaged the transports, destroyed 11, damaged 50, and forced 27 others to abort the

mission . Of the 87 aircraft that pressed on, only 39 got

their troops within a mile of the designated drop zone.

Thus, only 300 of the 1,900-man force reached their objectives; nevertheless, they carried it . 72

Fratricidal problems continued throughout the war. Fortunately for the Allies, they proved less costly than the Sicily

debacles. On D-day, for example, despite special invasion

markings (white stripes), "friendly fire" hit a number of

Allied aircraft . At 2025, guns aboard a landing craft

downed two P-51 s flying at 500 to 1,000 feet . Ten minutes

later, Allied flak destroyed two more allied aircraft . At

2050, gunners fired on four Spitfires but apparently did not

score any decisive hits . At 2130, however, Allied flak holed

one Spitfire that was last seen smoking and losing altitude .

At 2200, gunners engaged two Typhoons and appeared to

hit both. These are the recorded cases; we can assume other

incidents escaped without reporting .

The Allies instituted measures to prevent fratricide-employing electronic identification devices (identification,

friend or foe-IFF), recognition signals, and restricted

areas; but the problem continued. Between 22 June and 25

July, Allied gunners engaged 25 friendly aircraft and destroyed eight . Five of these aircraft, two Spitfires on 22

June and three P-51 s on 26 June were destroyed after they

attacked friendly forces. (In fact, there were at least 13 incidents of Allied aircraft attacking Allied forces between 20

June and 17 July 1944, killing at least two soldiers and

wounding three others.) Fragmentary records indicate that

49
Anglo-American flak crews downed six Allied aircraft in

August, two in October, and at least three in November.

Even the brass could not avoid the problem . On 1 January

1945 US AAA units fired on an aircraft carrying AAF Generals Spaatz and Doolittle. Spaatz informed General Patton

of his gunners' poor aircraft recognition and shooting skills .

The 8th Fighter Command lost seven fighters to Allied flak.

US gunners admitted engaging 15 friendly aircraft and destroying 12, all of which the gunners asserted were either

committing a hostile act or flying in a restricted zone . US

gunners complained that lack of identification restricted

them from engaging one-third of 6,000 targets.

*73

Following the 26 June incident with the three US P-51 s,

the 9th Tactical Air Command restricted free-lance strafing

within 10 miles ofthe bomb line; only prearranged missions

were to be flown in that area. The armies established restricted areas that by 7 September 1944 constituted an almost continuous belt from Antwerp, Belgium, to Nancy,

France. British Bomber Command protested that this restriction inhibited their operations, and so the Allies limited

the zones without satisfying either party.

The problem of fratricide was, of course, not limited to

the Allies or to the European theater. All warring powers

had the problem-for example, the German fighter attack

on Allied airfields on 1 January 1945 . In the Pacific between

December 1943 and June 1944, the US Navy downed at

least six of its own aircraft and two or three AAF B-25S.75

The worst case was probably at the Cape Gloucester, Bismarck Archipelago assault that began on 26 December

1943 . American naval antiaircraft fire downed two B-25s

and one P-47 and damaged two other B-25s. US ground

gunners also destroyed an American night fighter. Apparently, naval gunners fired on "anything that was not a P-

*Just as the subject of fratricide is neglected, so is the issue of enemy aircraft not

engaged. Only one example should be required to make the point; American radar

detected aircraft flying toward Pearl Harbor prior to the attack but could not identify

them.

5 0
38," the readily identifiable twin-boom American fighter.

The Marines credit friendly antiaircraft fire with downing

three of their aircraft during the war.

16

The US Navy in the Pacific

The US Navy made strenuous efforts to defend its ships

against enemy aircraft. During World War 11, it spent over

$4 billion on this problem, almost half of this amount on

ammunition. As a result, the Navy estimated that although

the US naval effort really did not begin until the spring of

1940, its antiaircraft guns increased their effectiveness 100

times from the start to the finish of the war. Mid- and shortrange, light antiaircraft guns presented the major problem

because existing armament (50-caliber machine guns and

1 .1-inch guns) proved inadequate . The US Navy turned to

foreign guns, the 20-mm Swiss Oerlikon and the 40-mm

Swedish Bofors.

The Navy estimated that the 20-mm cannon was eight

to 10 times as effective as a .50-caliber machine gun and

in 1935 bought some of the Swiss Oerlikons, even though

Army and Navy aircraft used the French Hispano Suiza 20-

mm guns . By war's end, the Navy had 12,561 of the 20

mms shipboard and had spent $787 million for one billion

rounds of 20-mm ammunition. The investment paid off.

Between Pearl Harbor and September 1944, the 20-mm

guns downed 32 percent of all Japanese aircraft claimed by

Navy guns and 25 percent after that date . Although the 20-

mm gun did have certain advantages over heavier guns, the

40 mm began to replace it toward the end of the war."

The Bofors 40-mm gun was the most widely used antiaircraft piece of World War II. By 1939 the Swedes delivered the Bofors to 18 countries and concluded production

licenses with 10 other countries . Thus, both sides used,

manufactured, and captured Bofors during the war.

The Navy's interest in the Bofors 40-mm gun began in

51
the fall of 1939; and in late August 1940, guns and equipment arrived in the United States. Tested in September,

the Bofors guns proved superior to both the US 37 mm and

the British two pound (pom pom). The US government

signed a contract in June 1941 and installed the first 40-

mm Bofors gun aboard ship early the next year. But there

were problems in manufacturing the Bofors . First, the original metric drawings had to be converted to English measurements; then it was found that two manufacturers used

different systems-York decimals and Chrysler fractions .

As a result, parts for the American-made guns were not

completely interchangeable . At first 200 parts differed, but

this number was eventually reduced to 10 . By June 1945

the US Navy had 5,140 40-mm guns in dual and quad

mounts . These guns claimed about 18 percent of the Japanese aircraft destroyed through June 1944 and about 50

percent between October 1944 and March 1945 .' 8

The United States experimented with dual-purpose (antiship and antiaircraft) guns in the 1920s, produced the 5-

inch/38-caliber gun in the early 1930s, and installed it on

a destroyer in 1934. The gun had a horizontal range of 10

miles, a vertical range of 6 miles, and could fire 12 to 15

rounds per minute. The Navy increased the number ofthese

guns from 611 in July 1940 to 2,868 in June 1945 .

A major advance in the increased effectiveness of the

heavy caliber gun came with the introduction of proximity

fuzes. The Navy first fired the proximity fuze in January

1942, and in its first simulated combat test that August

downed three drones with four shells. In the proximity

fuze's first combat engagement on 5 January 1943, the USS

Helena downed a Japanese bomber with its second salvo.

The Navy estimated that the proximity fuzes increased antiaircraft artillery effectiveness three to four times. The fuze

helped account for the high percentage of Japanese aircraft

claimed by the 5-inch/38-caliber guns, 31 percent through

the first half of 1944. 79

5 2
Japanese Antiaircraft Artillery

Japanese antiaircraft artillery lagged behind that of the

other major powers from the beginning to the end of the

war. The Japanese lacked the technological and manufacturing base to deal with their air defense problems and to

make good their deficiencies. In addition the Japanese received only limited assistance from the Germans and also

failed to fully mobilize their civilian scientists .

s°

The most widely used Japanese heavy flak piece was the

75-mm type 88 that entered service in 1928. It fired a 14.5-

pound shell at a muzzle velocity of 2,360 fps to 23,550 feet

but was inaccurate above 16,000 feet . The Japanese stuck

with this gun throughout the war, while the Americans,

British, and Germans went to larger and better performing

weapons. Not that the Japanese did not try to upgrade their

weapons-they produced an improved 75-mm gun (75-mm

type 4) in 1944 but built only 65 and got few into action .

Likewise, the Japanese put a 120-mm gun into production

in 1943 but built only 154. Only two 150-mm guns saw

service . The Japanese also used a few 88-mm naval guns.

Associated equipment, especially radar and fire control

equipment, also proved inadequate in numbers and outdated in performance."

In 1941 the Japanese deployed 300 antiaircraft guns in

defense of the home islands . By March 1945 they deployed

1,250, and by the end of the war over 2,000. The bulk of

their heavy guns (509 to 551) guarded Tokyo-in August

1945, 150 naval 88-mm, 72 120-mm, and two 150-mm

guns. Thus compared with the Germans, the Japanese deployed fewer and less-capable guns.

Little wonder that Japanese flak proved less effective than

that of the other combatants. On the basis of overall losses

and losses per sortie, the air war against Germany was much

more costly to the AAF (18,418 aircraft and 1 .26 percent

of sorties) than the air war against Japan (4,530 aircraft

and .77 percent of sorties) .

12 In the entire war, the AAF

53
credited Japanese flak with destroying 1,524 AAF aircraft,

Japanese fighters with 1,037 (fig . 36).*

In the strategic bombing campaign against Japan, the

AAF used their best bomber, the Boeing B-29, which was

faster, higher flying, and heavier armed than either the B17 or B-24 used against Germany.

13 The AAF lost 414 B29s in combat against Japan. They calculated that 74 fell

to enemy aircraft, 54 to flak, and 19 to both flak and fighters. The ineffectiveness of Japanese flak is highlighted by

the American decision to change from their prewar bombing doctrine and European strategic bombing practice of

high-altitude day attacks to night attacks below 10,000 feet.

This decision resulted from poor bombing results, not because of aircraft losses, although 35 bombers had been lost

on 814 sorties (4.3 percent) on daylight high-altitude attacks. Consequently, the B-29s attacked Tokyo at low altitudes at night and suffered slightly fewer casualties (39

aircraft on 1,199 sorties, 3 .2 percent); at the same time

bombing effectiveness greatly increased . The American airmen went on to burn out Japanese cities and towns with

conventional weapons . The reduced and bearable attrition

resulted from Japanese flak deficiencies and employment

of such American measures as saturating the searchlight

defenses, ECM, desynchronizing the propellers of the

bombers to inhibit Japanese sound-controlled searchlights,

and use of high-gloss black paint. The rate of B-29 losses

to flak and flak plus fighters decreased steadily after peaking

in January 1945 at 1 .06 percent of sorties (fig. 37). In numbers of aircraft lost, April 1945 was the worst month with

22 B-29s lost. Tokyo was the most bombed (4,300 of 26,000

sorties) and the best defended of the Japanese targets . Tokyo's defenses accounted for 25 of the 55 flak losses of the

Twentieth Air Force and for 14 of its 28 losses to flak plus

fighters . American losses were much lighter at the other

*Japanese antiaircraft artillery did better proportionally against the US Navy than

against the US Marine Corps, claiming 1,545 of 2,166 Navy aircraft lost in combat as

compared with 437 of 723 Marine aircraft .

5 4

Figure 36. Douglas A-20s attack Japanese positions at Karos, Dutch

New Guinea. Note sequence of attack (continued).

Figure 37. Although not as effective as German flak, Japanese flak

did inflict losses on US aircraft. Boeing B-29 hit on bombing run over Japan, 26 June 1945 .

56
targets that were not as well defended . For example, in

flying 4,776 night sorties at low and medium altitudes

against major Japanese cities, the Twentieth Air Force lost

83 bombers (1 .8 percent) as compared with seven lost on

7,550 sorties ( .1 percent) under similar conditions against

secondary cities. 14

The Lessons of World War 11

Like all major wars, World War II provided many lessons .

As the first true air war, this conflict was especially valuable

for the airmen. But the airmen of all countries tended to

overlook or disregard flak. Although the war indicated the

value and lethality of flak, the airmen looked instead to

lessons that better fit their designs. The airmen's attitude

changed little from the interwar years when they considered

flak to be of little use and not worth the effort. The result

of this disdain would be evident in the wars that would

follow.

In retrospect, at least six flak lessons emerge from World

War II . First, flak proved to be lethal and effective-downing more US aircraft than any other enemy weapon . Clearly,

it was the big killer from early 1944 on . Concentrations of

guns demonstrated the ability to seriously inhibit or nullify

aerial operations such as the case of the V1 campaign, the

fall-winter 1944 oil campaign, and operations against the

Remagen Bridge.

Second, flak made low-level operations very costly. Flak

downed most of the American fighters lost during the war,

the bulk of these in strafing attacks." A number of missions

emphasized the dangers of low-level operations; the most

notable were the Ploesti mission of August 1943, flak

suppression at Arnhem, the Netherlands, in September

1944, and the German attack on Allied airfields in January

1945 .

A third lesson that can be gleaned from the war is that

57
the airmen came up with countermeasures to antiaircraft

artillery that would be standard for the future . The airmen

attempted to avoid areas of flak concentrations by flying

irregular courses in the face of ground fire, by flying only

one pass over the target, and by using both the sun and

terrain for maximum protection. They also employed chaff

and jammers to degrade radar equipment, especially during

the night or in poor weather. Finally, the airmen attacked

the guns directly. But in most aircraft-versus-gun duels, the

gunners had the advantage. Combat experience indicated

that pitting a highly trained pilot and an expensive aircraft

against a less-trained crew and less-valuable gun made little

sense.

Fourth, rapidly evolving technology tilted the offensivedefensive balance in favor of the defense. Radar was the

first and most important piece of equipment. It overturned

the carefully constructed theories of Douhet and others

(such as instructors and students at the Air Corps Tactical

School), who believed that the bomber would always get

through. Electronic countermeasures nullified somewhat

the benefit of radar to the defense, but radar still gave the

defenders early warning and more accurate aiming information than was previously available. The proximity fuze

gave another big boost to the defenders, increasing the effectiveness of the guns by a multiple of five or more . One

technological advancement that was in the development

stages but did not see service during the war was flak rockets

or, as they would later be known, surface-to-air missiles

(SAMS). These devices were capable of reaching altitudes

well above that of the highest-flying World War II bombers

and fitted with proximity fuzes would have inflicted heavy

casualties on the border formations.

Fifth, flak proved very cost-effective, downing hostile aircraft at a relatively low cost. But flak effectiveness cannot

be measured by kills alone . Ground fire complicated the

airman's task, forcing him to carry additional equipment

and adopt additional procedures, all of which detracted

58
from his primary job. Flak defenses also decreased bombing

accuracy.

A final lesson of the war concerned the difficulty of correctly identifying aircraft . In short, the gunners were never

able to adequately sort out the friendlies from the foes. Not

only did friendly fire down friendly aircraft-most dramatically demonstrated by Allied troop carriers over Sicily

in July 1943 and German fighters on 1 January 1945-but

frequently friendly fire did not engage hostile aircraft. Despite electronic equipment, codes, procedures, briefings,

and restricted zones, the problem persisted and accidents

happened.

NOTES

In this note system, information within the brackets indicates

the location of the material and, in the case of Air Defense School

Library, Air University Library, US Air Force Historical Research

Center, Directorate of Combat Development, and Royal Artillery

Institute, their call numbers. The following abbreviations are used:

Air University Library, Maxwell AFB, Alabama [AUL] ; Air Force

Historical Research Center, Maxwell AFB, Alabama (AFHRC]; Naval Historical Center, Washington, D.C. [NHC]; Royal Artillery

Institute, Woolwick, United Kingdom [W]; US Army Air Defense

School, Fort Bliss, Texas [ADS] ; US Army Command and General

Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas [L]; US Army, Directorate

of Combat Developments, Fort Bliss, Texas [DCD].

1 . P. T. Cullen, "Air Defense of London, Paris, and Western Germany" (Paper, Air Corps Tactical School, n.d.), 7, 9, 28, 99, table 5

[AFHRC-167.404-11] ; "Antiaircraft Defences of Great Britain: 1914

to 1946," appendix A [W-552] ; US Army Air Defense School, "Air

Defense: An Historical Analysis" (U), 1965, vol. 1 :8 [AUL-M39991-

59
4] (SECRET-Information extracted is unclassified) ; "Antiaircraft

Gun Trends and Scientific and Technical Projection : Eurasian Communist Countries," July 1981, 1-1 .

2. US Army Air Defense School, "Air Defense," 21, 29, 30; Cullen,

"Air Defense of London," 94; Extracts from Conference on AntiAircraft Defense, Military Intelligence Division, France, no. 8312, 26

December 1923 [AFHRC-145 .91-534] ; A. F. Englehart, "Antiaircraft

Defenses : Their Development During the World War" (Paper, Air

Corps Tactical School, circa 1934), 6, 9 [AFHRC-248 .101-20] . American machine guns got another 41 German aircraft. Charles E. Kirkpatrick, Archie in the A.E.F. : The Creation of the Antiaircraft Service

of the United States Army, 1917-1918 (Fort Bliss, Tex. : Air Defense

Artillery Museum, 1984), 85-86 .

3 . Maj Gen B. P. Hughes and Brigadier N . W. Routledge, Woolwick,

United Kingdom, interview with author, October 1982; Air Corps

Tactical School, "Antiaircraft Artillery," text, 1 November 1932

[AFHRC-168 .69-9] ; Louis P. Smithey and Charles K. Atkinson, "Development of Antiaircraft Artillery," The Coast Artillery Journal, January-February 1946, 70-71 ; William J . Wuest, "The Development of

Heavy Antiaircraft Artillery," Antiaircraft Journal, May-June 1954,

23 .

4. Theodore Ropp, War in the Modern World (Durham, N.C. : Duke

University Press, 1959), 289.

5 . "Antiaircraft Defences of Great Britain" ; Frederick A. Pile, AckAck (London : Harrap, 1949), 73. One American wrote in his 1929 Air

Corps Tactical School thesis that flak was not worth the effort, which

was the view of bomber proponents on both sides of the Atlantic.

Kenneth Walker, "Is the Defense of New York City from Air Attack

Possible?" research report, Air Corps Tactical School, May 1929, 30

[AFHRC-248 .211-28A] .

6 . Pile, Ack-Ack, 100, 157, 181, 183; "Antiaircraft Defences of Great

Britain"; Maj Gen B. P. Hughes interview ; US Army Air Defense

School, "Air Defense," 2:122-24; Frederick Pile, "The Anti-Aircraft

Defence of the United Kingdom from 28th July, 1939 to 15th April,

1945," supplement to the London Gazette, 16 December 1947, 5978

[AUL-940.54 G7861 #38149] ; "History of A. A. Command," n.d., 14

[WC3/53].

7 . Pile, Ack-Ack, 115; Pile, London Gazette, 5975; "History of A. A.

Command," 14-15 .

8 . Pile, Ack-Ack, 186-93, 155-56, 379 ; Pile, "Anti-Aircraft Defence

of the United Kingdom from 28th July, 1939 to 15th April, 1945,"

5982; "History of A. A. Command," 123-24, plates XLV, LXIX; "Antiaircraft Defences of Great Britain," appendix B.

60
9 . US Army Air Defense School, "Air Defense," 2:127-28, 131-32;

H. E. C. Weldon, "The Artillery Defence of Malta," Antiaircraft Journal, May-June 1954, 24, 26, 27, 29; Charles Jellison, Besieged: The

World War II Ordeal ofMalta, 1940-1942 (Hanover, N.H . : University

Press of New England, 1984), 166-67, 170, 205, 258; Christopher

Shores, Duel for the Sky (London: Blandford, 1985), 88, 90, 92 .

10. Pile, Ack-Ack, 266, 301, 303, 305; Pile, London Gazette, 5984 ;

"Survey of Antiaircraft Defenses of the United Kingdom," vol. 1, pt.

3 :52, 53, 118 [WMD1397].

11 . Pile, Ack-Ack, 323-44; "Fringe Targets" [W-MD1397] .

12 . For a more detailed discussion of the V-1 and its operations in

World War II, see Kenneth P. Werrell, The Evolution of the Cruise

Missile (Maxwell AFB, Ala. : Air University Press, 1985), chap. 3 . Basil

Collier, The Battle ofthe V- Weapons, 1944-1945 (London: Hudder and

Stoughton, 1964), 56-59; Roderic Hill, "Air Operations by Air Defence of Great Britain and Fighter Command in Connection with the

German Flying Bomb and Rocket Offensives, 1944-45," supplement

to the London Gazette, 19 October 1948, 5587-89; Basil Collier, The

Defence of the United Kingdom (London: Her Majesty's Stationery

Office, 1957), 361, 365; British Air Ministry, "Air Defence of Great

Britain, The Flying Bomb and Rocket Campaign: 1944 to 1945," first

draft of report, vol. 7:42-43 [AFHRC-512.431 A] .

13. Collier, V- Weapons, 69, 71-75, 79; Hill, "Air Operations by Air

Defense," 5591-92; Rowland F. Pocock, German Guided Missiles of

the Second World War (New York: Arco Publishing, Inc., 1967), 48 ;

Jozef Garlinski, Hitler's Last Weapons (London: Times Book, 1978),

168; David Irving, TheMaresNest (London: Kimber, 1969), 233, 236,

240; M. C. Helfers, The Employment of V- Weapons by the Germans

During World War II, monograph (Washington, D.C. : Office of the

Chief of Military History, Department of the Army, 1954), 18-30

[AFHRC-Film 31731, Frame 323].

14. Hill, London Gazette, 5594; Collier, UK, 374; Mary C. Welborn,

"V-1 and V2 Attacks Against the United Kingdom During World

War Il," technical report ORO-T-45 (Washington, D.C. : Johns Hopkins University Press, 16 May 1950),9 [AFHRC-170.81-45] ; "Minutes

and Related Data Scientific Sub-Committee of Crossbow Committee,

V-1, vol. 2," Operations Research Section (ADGB) Report 88, n.d .

[AFHRC-142.0423-9] ; Report of the British Air Ministry, "Points of

Impact and Accuracy of Flying Bombs: 22 June-28 July," 29 July

1944 [AFHRC-512.6522-9] ; "The Speed of Air-Launched Divers";

Report of the General Board, US Forces, European Theater, "Tactical

Employment ofAntiaircraft Artillery Units Including Defense Against

Pilotless Aircraft (V-1)," study no. 38, 39 [AFHRC-502.101-38]; "Min6 1
utes and Related Data Scientific Sub-Committee of Crossbow Committee, V-1, vol . 2," S.B. 60093, 7 August 1944; Report of British Air

Ministry, "Air Defence of Great Britain Tactical Memoranda I .G. no.

9675," 24 November 1944 [AFHRC-512.6522-9]; British Air Ministry, "Air Defence of Great Britain," 126; Hillery St. G. Saunders, Royal

Air Force, 1939, 1945, vol. 3, The Fight Is Won (London: Her Majesty's

Stationery Office, 1954), 165 .

15. Hill, "Air Operations by Air Defense," 5592, 5594; British Air

Ministry, "Air Defence of Great Britain," 121, 151, 179; Saunders,

Royal Air Force, 165 ; Collier, UK, 380.

16. AC/AS, Intelligence, "Flying Bomb," 8 ; Mary C. Welborn,

"Over-all Effectiveness of First US Army Antiaircraft Guns Against

Tactical Aircraft" (Working paper, Johns Hopkins University, Washington, D .C., 18 January 1950), 6 [AUL-M35044-2#42] ; Report of

Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Forces (SHAEF), Air Defense Division, "Notes on German Flying Bomb," 22 August 1944

[AFHRC-506.6522C] .

17. Pile, Ack-Ack, 330-33 .

18. Hill, "Air Operations by Air Defense," 5592, 5594; SHAEF

notes, 26 July 1944 [AFHRC-506.6522C] ; Collier, UK, 375 .

19. Hill, "Air Operations by Air Defense," 5596-97 ; British Air

Ministry, "Air Defence of Great Britain," 133-35. For another suggestion for a coastal belt, see Lt Gen Carl Spaatz to supreme commander, SHAEF, letter, subject: The Use of Heavy Anti-Aircraft

Against Diver, 11 July 1944 [AFHRC-519.161-7] .

20. Collier, UK, 381-83; Collier, V-Weapons, 91-95 .

21 . Pile, Ack-Ack, 334-35; Hill, London Gazette, 5597; Collier, UK,

523 .

22 . British Air Ministry, "Air Defence of Great Britain," 130;

AC/AS, Intelligence, "Flying Bomb," 8; SHAEF notes, 15 August 1944

[AFHRC-506.6522C] .

23. British Air Ministry, "Air Defence of Great Britain," 106; Ralph

B. Baldwin, The Deadly Fuze (San Rafael, Calif. : Presidio Press, 1980),

261-66.

24. Collier, UK, 523 ; Welborn, "V-1 and V-2 Attacks," table 2; Hill,

London Gazette, 5599.

25 . Collier, UK, 523; Welborn, "V-1 and V-2 Attacks," 10.

26 . Hill, London Gazette, 5599, 5601 ; "Air Launched `Divers' September and October 1944"; British Air Ministry, "Air Defence of

Great Britain," 113 ; Collier, UK, 389, 391, 522; Saunders, Royal Air

Force, 167-68; Seventeenth report by assistant chief air staff (Intelligence), "War Cabinet Chiefs of Staff Committee Crossbow," 22 July

1944 [AFHRC-142.0432-32] ; Collier, V-Weapons, 119, 131 .

62
27. Air Ministry Weekly Intelligence Summary 289 [AFHRC142.423-15].

28. The antiaircraft artillery cost a third of what fighters cost and

about 25 percent more than the balloons. Collier, UK, 523 ; Hill, London Gazette, 5603; British Air Ministry, "The Economic Balance of

the Fly-Bomb Campaign," summary report, 4 November 1944

[AFHRC-512.675-3].

29. Memorandum 5-7B by US Strategic Air Forces, Armament and

Ordnance, "An Analysis of the Accuracy of the German Flying Bomb

(V-1) 12 June to 5 October 1944," 144 [AFHRC-519.6522-1 ] ; British

Air Ministry, "Air Defence of Great Britain," 123; Collier, UK, 523.

30. Collier, UK, appendix L.

31 . European Theater report no. 38, 40-41, 45 ; Operations Report

of Headquarters Antwerp X Forward, no. 2J, 1 May 1945, annex A

[AFHRC-539.667-12]; SHAEF, "Report of `V' Section on Continental

Crossbow (September 1944-March 1945)," 28; United States Strategic

Bombing Survey (USSBS), V- Weapons (Crossbow) Campaign, January

1947, 2d ed., 15 .

32. Report of Headquarters Antwerp X Forward, no. 2H, 4 March

1945 [AFHRC-539.667-12] ; Antwerp X report no. 2J, annex A; European Theater report no. 38, 40-45 .

33 . Peter G . Cooksley, Flying Bomb (New York: Scribner, 1979),

185 . For a good secondary account, see R. J. Backus, "The Defense

of Antwerp Against the V-1 Missile" (Masters of military arts and

sciences thesis, US Army Command and General Staff College, 1971).

34. US Army Air Defense School, "Air Defense," 2 :36; Welborn,

"Over-all Effectiveness," table 8.

35 . US Army Air Defense School, "Air Defense," 2:37 ; US Army,

Antiaircraft Artillery note no. 8, 4 [L].

36. "The GAF I January Attack," United States Strategic Air Forces

in Europe, Air Intelligence Summary 62 (week ending 14 January

1945), 5 [AFHRC-519.607A]; "Airfield Attack of 1 January"; SHAEF

Intelligence Summary 42, 30 [L]; Daily Air Action Summary, Office

of Assistant Chief of Staff, Intelligence Headquarters, Army Air

Forces, Washington, D.C., 3 January 1945 [AFHRC-142 .0323]; Duty

Group Captain's Daily Resume of Air Operations, serial no. 1843,

Air Ministry, Whitehall, 2 January 1944 [AFHRC-512.6061 A]; Saunders, Royal Air Force, 209; Roger A. Freeman, The Mighty Eighth War

Diary (New York: Jane's Publishing Co. Ltd., 1981), 412-13 ; History

and Statistical Summary, IX Air Defense Command, January 1944-

June 1945, 80; Werner Gerbig, Six Months to Oblivion (London: Allan,

1973), 74, 76-79, 110, 112 ; USAF Credits for the Destruction ofEnemy

Aircraft, World War II, USAF Historical Study 85 (Maxwell AFB, Ala. :

63
USAF Historical Division, Air University, 1978), 286; Air Staff Operational Summary Report nos. 1503, 1504, Air Ministry War Room,

2, 3 January 1945 [AFHRC-512.306A] . The most detailed, but not

necessarily most accurate, account is Norman Franks, The Battle of

the Airfields (London: Kimber, 1982) .

37. Gerbig, Oblivion, 99-103, 116; USAF Historical Study 85, 286;

IX Air Defense Command, 78-79 ; History, 352d Fighter Group, January 1945 [AFHRC-Gp-352-Hi] ; History, 366th Fighter Group, January 1945 [AFHRC-Gp-366-Hi] .

38 . US Army Air Defense School, "Air Defense," 2:158-63; Welborn, "Over-all Effectiveness," 9, 29.

39. Note nos. 30 and 33, US Army, Antiaircraft Artillery [L] ; US

Air Forces in Europe, "Air Staff Post Hostilities Intelligence Requirements on German Air Defenses," report, vol. 1, sec. 4, 14 September

1945, 17 [AFHRC-519.601 B-4] .

40. Walter Grabman, "German Air Force Air Operations Defense:

1933-1945," circa 1957, 3, 18, 40a, 81, 83-84 [AFHRC-K113.107-

1641; D. von Renz, "The Development of German Antiaircraft Weapons and Equipment of all Types up to 1945," study, 1958, 102

[AFHRC-K 113.107-194] .

41 . Ian V Hogg, German Artillery of World War II (London: Arms

and Armour, 1975), 162, 167; R. A. Devereux, "German Experience

with Antiaircraft Artillery Guns in WWII," study, 19 July 1946 [AULM36686U] ; US Air Forces in Europe, "Post Hostilities Investigation,"

1 :3 [AFHRC-519. 601 A-1 ] .

42. Hogg, German Artillery, 170, 172; US Air Forces in Europe,

"Post Hostilities Investigation," 1 :5 ; Peter Chamberlain and Terry

Gander, Antiaircraft Guns (New York: Arco Publishing, Inc., 1975),

22.

43. Hogg, German Artillery, 173-78; Chamberlain and Gander, Antiaircraft Guns, 23-24 ; US Air Forces in Europe, "Post Hostilities

Investigation," 1 :10, 22.

44. Matthew Cooper, The German Air Force, 1933-1945 (London:

Jane's Publishing Co. Ltd., 1981), 185; Samuel E. Morrison, History

of US Naval Operations in World War II, vol . 9, Sicily-Salerno-Anzio:

January 1943-June 1944 (Boston, Mass. : Little, Brown and Co., 1954),

215-16 ; Albert N. Garland and Howard M. Smyth, The US Army in

World War II: The Mediterranean Theater ofOperations, Sicily and the

Surrender of Italy (Washington, D.C. : Office of the Chief of Military

History, 1965), 375, 379, 412; John Terraine, A Time For Courage:

The Royal Air Force in the European War, 1939-1945 (New York:

Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc., 1985), 579.

45 . Assistant Chief of Air Staff, Intelligence Historical Division,

64
The Ploesti Mission of 1 August 1943, USAF Historical Study 103

(Maxwell Field, Ala. : Historical Division, June 1944), 16, 50, 99

[AFHRC-101-103] ; Report of Army Air Forces Evaluation Board

"Ploesti," 15 December 1944, vol. 6:7-8 [AFHRC-138 .5-12 VI]; Report of Mediterranean Allied Air Forces (MAAF), "Ploesti: Summary

of Operations Results and Tactical Problems Involved in 24 Attacks

Between 5 April-19 August 1944," 13 January 1945, 1-3 [AFHRC628.424-1] .

46 . AAF Evaluation Board, "Ploesti," 2, 4, appendix E; MAAF,

"Ploesti," 2; History, 1st Fighter Group, June 1944, 2 [AFHRC-Gp1-Hi]; History, 82d Fighter Group, June 1944, 2 [AFHRC-Gp-82-Hi] .

47. MAAF, "Ploesti," 1-3; AAF Evaluation Board, "Ploesti," ii ;

Fifteenth Air Force, "The Air Battle of Ploesti," report, n .d., 83

[AFHRC-628 .424-2] .

48. Von Renz, "Development of German Antiaircraft Weapons,"

380; US Air Forces in Europe, "Post Hostilities Investigation," 8 :11 ;

USSBS report, European War, no. 115, "Ammoniakwerke Merseburg,

G.m.b.H ., Leuna, Germany," March 1947, 7-16, 21 [AUL940.53U58re #115]; Frank W. Anderson, Jr., "German Antiaircraft

Defenses in World War II,"Air University Quarterly Review, Spring

1954, 85 .

49. US Air Forces in Europe, "Post Hostilities Investigation," 5 :2 ;

Report of Army Air Forces Evaluation Board European Theater of

Operations, "Flak Defenses of Strategic Targets in Southern Germany," 20 January 1945, 25 [AFHRC-138 .4-74] ; Report of Mediterranean Allied Air Forces, "Flak and MAAF," 7 May 1945, 9 [AFHRC622.3813-1] ; Report of Fifteenth Air Force, "Comparative Analysis

of Altitudes and Flak Experienced During the Attacks on Vienna 7

and 8 February 1945," 3-4 [AFHRC-670.813-5] .

50. Von Renz, "Development of German Antiaircraft Weapons,"

257 ; US Air Forces in Europe, "Post Hostilities Investigation," 7:7,

37; USSBS, The German Flak Effort Throughout the War, 13 August

1945, 16, 19 [AFHRC-137.310-4] ; Johannes Mix, "The Significance

of Anti-Aircraft Artillery and the Fighter Arm at the End of the War,"

Flugwehr and Technik, February-March 1950, 5, 10; Thomas I . Edwards and Murray A. Geisler, "Estimate of Effect on Eighth Air Force

Operations if German Antiaircraft Defenses Had Used ProximityFuzed (VT) Ammunition," report no. 1, Operations Analysis, AC/AS3, Headquarters Army Air Forces, Washington, D.C., 15 February

1947 [AFHRC-143 .504-1]; US Air Forces in Europe, Walter von Axthelm, "Interrogation Report," vol. 12, area 1945, 26-27.

51 . Von Renz, "Development of German Antiaircraft Weapons,"

65
340-43, 353 ; Ernst Klee and Otto Merk, The Birth ofthe Missile : The

Secret of Peenemunde (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1965), 65 .

52. Von Renz, "Development of German Antiaircraft Weapons,"

355; von Axthelm, 24; US Air Forces in Europe, "Post Hostilities

Investigation," 3:43-44.

53 . Von Renz, "Development of German Antiaircraft Weapons,"

357 ; US Air Forces in Europe, "Post Hostilities Investigation," vol.

12, fig . 61, 8, 9, vol. 1 :23 ; Willy Ley, Rockets, Missiles & Space Travel

(New York: Viking Press, 1951), 222, 223, 393.

54. Von Renz, "Development of German Antiaircraft Weapons,"

362; US Air Forces in Europe, "Post Hostilities Investigation," 12:7,

fig . 60; Military Intelligence Division, "Handbook on Guided Missiles: Germany and Japan," no. 461, 1946 (hereafter cited as MID

461); Klee and Merk, 68, 86; Ley, 395 .

55 . MID 461 ; US Air Forces in Europe, "Post Hostilities Investigation," 12 :8, fig . 61 ; Ley, 223, 394.

56 . Von Renz, "Development of German Antiaircraft Weapons,"

362 ; US Air Forces in Europe, "Post Hostilities Investigation," 8:10,

12 :7, fig. 61 ; MID 461 ; Ley, 395 ; Klee and Merk, 68 .

57. The V-1 was almost 47 feet long and had a takeoff weight of

28,229 pounds . Ley, 390, 393 .

1 58. Ibid. ; US Air Forces in Europe, "Post Hostilities Investigation,"

12:6 ; Klee and Merk, 66-68, 125 .

59. USSBS, German Flak, 2, 5, 19; von Axthelm, Interrogation Report, 44; Mix, "Significance of Anti-Aircraft Artillery," 22 .

60 . Army Air Forces Statistical Digest: World War II (Washington,

D .C. : Office of Statistical Control, December 1945), 255-56.

61 . Thomas Edwards and Murray Gelster, "The Causes of Bombing

Errors as Determined From Analysis of Eighth Air Force Combat

Operations," report no. 3, Operations Analysis, AC/AS-3, Headquarters Army Air Forces, 15 July 1947, 3, 19 [AFHRC-143 .504-3] ; "Report by Mr Butt to Bomber Command on His Examination of Night

Photographs, 18 August 1941," in Charles Webster and Noble Frankland, The Strategic Air War Against Germany, 1939-1945, vol . 4, Annexes andAppendices (London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1961);

Minutes of the Flak Conference conducted at Headquarters United

States Strategic Air Forces in Europe (A-2), London, 1-1 I June 1945

[AFHRC-519.646-2] .

62. USSBS, "German Flak," 19; Harry Smith, "Flak Evasion," Electronic Warfare, April-May 1970, 18-19, 36; Eighth Air Force, "Reduction of Losses and Battle Damage," operational research report,

12 February 1944, 15, 50 [AFHRC-520.310-6] .

63. Eighth Air Force, "Special Report of Operations in Support of

66
First Allied Airborne Army : 17-26 September 1944," 9-13 [AFHRC520.310 VII].

64. Albert H. Davis et al., 56th Fighter Group in World War II

(Washington, D.C. : Infantry Journal Press, 1948), 79-81 ; History,

56th Fighter Group, summary report, 18 September 1944 [AFHRCGp-56-Hi] ; John B . B . Tussell, Jr., "Flak versus Fighters," The Coast

Artillery Journal, July-August 1946, 43; Eighth Air Force, "Special

Report of Operations in Support of First Allied Airborne Army," 18 .

65. Eighth Air Force, "Special Report of Operations in Support of

First Allied Airborne Army," 43-44.

66. Headquarters US Strategic Air Forces in Europe, Office of the

Director of Operations, "Neutralizing German Anti-Aircraft Defenses," study, 14 November 1944, 1-3 [AFHRC-519.525-1].

67. Elwood R. Quesada, "Effect of Antiaircraft Artillery on IX Tactical Air Command Operations," The Coast Artillery Journal, September-October 1946, 29 .

68. Ibid. ; Historical Division, Department ofthe Army, Utah Beach

to Cherbourg (6 June-27 June 1944) (Washington, D.C. : Government

Printing Office, 1947), 171-73.

69. Joint report no . 4, "German Flak and Allied Counter-Flak Measures in Operation Varsity" [W-Operational Research in Northwest

Europe, MID 479]; "History of Air Defense," Air Defense Magazine,

April-June 1977, 22 . Little information is available on Soviet flak

defenses . James Hansen writes in "The Development of Soviet Tactical Air Defenses," International Defense Review, May 1981, 53, that

the Soviets increased their antiaircraft weapon by a factor of eight

between 1941 and 1945 . He asserts that the Soviets credit flak with

40 percent of their 7,000 aircraft claims.

70. Kirkpatrick, Archie in the AEF, 179, 93, 100.

71 . Garland and Smyth, The US Army in World War II, 175-82;

Charles R. Shrader, "Amicicide: The Problems of Friendly Fire in

Modern War" (Paper, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth,

Kans., 1982), 67-68 .

72. Shrader, "Amicicide," 69 .

73 . Aircraft Identifiers Gree, 2757, and Brentrall, 2759, to commandant, subject : "Aircraft Identifiers Aboard Merchant Ships, 9

June 1944" ; "Analysis of Reports Concerning the Engagement of

Friendly Aircraft by Our Own Ground or Shipborne Forces and Also

All Reports Covering the Engagement of Our Own Ground Forces by

Friendly Aircraft," Item No. 4, "Attacks on Friendly Aircraft by

Ground and Naval Forces," Annex A to 21 Army Group/225/Ops, 29

July 1944; History, 65th Fighter Wing, "Light, Intense and Accurate:

US Eighth - Air Force Strategic Fighters vs. German Flak in the ETO,"

67
89 [AFHRC-Wg-65-Su-Re]; US Army Air Defense School, "Air Defense," 2:38, 169 ; War Diary of Brig Gen Richard E. Nugent, November 1944, 12 [AFHRC-533 .13-2] ; Shrader, "Amicicide," 34, 45,

66, 70; DavidMets, Master ofAirpower (Novato, Calif. : Presidio Press,

n. d.), 268.

74. Report of General Board, US Forces, European Theater, "Antiaircraft Artillery Techniques," 10 .

75 . US Fleet, Antiaircraft Action Summary-October 1944, Information Bulletin no. 27, 9-2 [AFHRC-180.102-27] .

76. Shrader, "Amicicide," 70-71 .

77. Buford Rowland and William B. Boyd, US Navy Bureau ofOrdnance in World War II (Washington, D.C. : Government Printing Office, n.d.), 219-20, 231, 235, 238, 245-47, 258, 266; Robert Sherrod,

History ofMarine Corps Aviation in World War II (Washington, D.C. :

Combat Forces, 1952), 401 .

78. Rowland and Boyd, US Navy Bureau, 221-34, 266; Chamberlain

and Gander, Antiaircraft Guns, 40; Information Bulletin no. 27, 1-5 .

79 . Rowland and Boyd, US Navy Bureau, 220, 266, 283, 286; US

Fleet, Information Bulletin no. 27, 1-5 .

80. US Army Air Defense School, "Air Defense," 2:192.

81 . Ibid., 197-98; Chamberlain and Gander, Antiaircraft Guns, 34;

Report of General Headquarters, United States Army Forces Pacific,

Antiaircraft Research Board, "Survey of Japanese Antiaircraft Artillery," 3-5, 59, 65, 66, 72 [L]; United States Pacific Fleet and Pacific

Ocean Areas Flak Intelligence Memorandum Number 4, "Japanese

Antiaircraft Materiel," 11 April 1945 [NHC].

82. AAF Statistical Digest, 221-27, 255-61 ; A. H. Peterson, R. G.

Tuck, and D. P. Wilkinson, "Aircraft Vulnerability in World War II"

(Working paper, Rand Corporation, Santa Monica, Calif., rev. 12 July

1950), table 8 [AUL-M30352-9] ; Office of Information, Document 3

May 1967 in "Korean Combat Statistics for Three-Year Period," 19

June 1953 [NHC].

83 . US Army Air Defense School, "Air Defense," 2 :293 ; AAA Research Board, "Survey of Japanese AAA," 192; Chief of Naval Operations, Air Intelligence Group, Flak Information Bulletin no. 10,

June 1945, 28 [AFHRC-180.104-10].

84. AAF Statistical Digest, 226, 261 ; Air Intelligence Report no. 8,

15-17 ; Twentieth Air Force, "Flak Damage on Various Types of Missions," and "Final Analysis of Flak Loss and Damage for Operations

Against Japan," Air Intelligence Report, vol. 1, nos. 26-27, November-December 1945, 3-7 [AFHRC-760.607].

85 . Flak downed a number of the top aces. In World War I, ground

fire downed the top ace, the Red Baron, Manfred von Richthofen (80

6 8
credits). In World War 11, the leading American ace in Europe, I

S. Gabreski (28 credits), crashed while attacking an airfield; t

killed George E. Preddy, Jr. (26.8 credits) ; while German flak d

others such as Hubert Zemke (17.8 credits) and Duane W. l

(17.3 credits) . Japanese AAA killed Robert Hanson (25 credit

third-ranking Marine ace. Flak also got two of the top Britisl

Brendan Finucane (32 credits) and Robert Tuck (29 credits).

6 9

CHAPTER 2

THE POSTWAR YEARS, 1945-65

Rapid demobilization of the American military followed

the war's end. As the magnificent, if not lavish, US war

machine disappeared, not much was left in its place . Americans thought little of either war or the military as they

engaged in their peacetime pursuits, thereby leaving the US

armed forces with minimal tangible strength. The two driving forces of national policy during this period were tight

budgets and trust in the atomic bomb. America based its

defense on confidence in overall American superiority and

distance, but most of all, on faith in the bomb . Specifically,

the United States had the atomic bomb and a means to

deliver it ; the Soviet Union had neither.

The offensive problem seemed relatively simple to American airmen, compared with what they had just faced in

World War II. Instead of vast formations of aircraft, now

only one aircraft (with the equivalent bomb load of thousands of World War II bombers) needed to be employed .

The penetration problem also appeared easier; for in contrast to dense German defenses covering a target area of

hundreds of miles, the Soviet Union had relatively sparse

defenses to cover thousands of miles. Another factor favoring the offensive was that jet aircraft offered performance superior to that of World War II aircraft. Probably

most important, instead of opposing a foe with essentially

equivalent technology and the potential to develop superior

technology, the United States now faced a nation considered to be years and years behind the United States. The

most serious problems for the American airmen appeared

to be those of range and basing.

7 1
American technological superiority also provided the key

to the airmen's defensive problems. Few airmen thought

the Soviets would get nuclear weapons in short order. In

addition, they believed the Soviets could not quickly master

the problem of weapons delivery over intercontinental

distances.

American antiaircraft (AA) defenses shrank along with

the entire American military. By late 1947 the US Army

had only two battalions of antiaircraft artillery. Active

American air defense took three directions in the late 1940s.

The most expensive of these, aircraft, falls beyond the scope

of this study. The other two directions were antiaircraft

guns and missiles .

The postwar story of antiaircraft guns is primarily that

of phaseout. At first, postwar budget cuts and the existence

of World War II equipment disguised the gun's fate. The

United States did develop one new antiaircraft artillery

piece in this period, the 75-mm Sky Sweeper (fig. 38).* The

pilot model appeared in 1948, and the weapon went into

service in March 1953 . 1

Antiaircraft guns proved useful in the Korean War, despite the almost utter lack of air opposition, primarily as

ground-support arms. In the military buildup prompted by

the Korean War, the Army deployed 66 battalions of AA

guns for continental defense. Nevertheless, following tests

in 1955, the Army dropped its quadruple .50-caliber guns.

The dual 40-mm guns lingered on in service into the early

1960s before being transferred from the Regular Army into

the National Guard. The Hawk (homing all-the-way killer)

missile took over the job of the 40-mms and the 75-mm

Sky Sweeper. 2

*It could fire at a rate of 45 to 55 rounds per minute (rpm) with a muzzle velocity

of 2,825 feet per second (fps) and could reach a vertical altitude of 18,600 feet .

72
The Korean War

The Korean War was far different from what the planners

anticipated-unlike their experience of World War II or

their forecasts of World War III. In the Korean War, American airmen did not face dense, technically advanced,

ground-based antiaircraft defenses or an extensive air-toair threat; nor did they conduct strategic nuclear operations

against a major power. Instead, both sides limited the Korean War politically and militarily. The United States

(through the United Nations) fought a second-rate and

third-rate power, albeit with major power backing, without

nuclear weapons and without strategic targets. American

airmen waged an air war primarily of close air support

(CAS) and interdiction against weak and obsolete ground

defenses . American flyers engaged modern fighters, but in

action geographically remote from the main theater of

operations .

73
Compared with the defenses the Allies encountered in

World War II, Communist ground-based defenses in Korea

proved weak in numbers and technology. American intelligence estimated their foes possessed only 252 heavy flak

pieces and 673 light pieces in May 1951, increasing and

peaking at 786 heavy and 1,672 light guns in January

through February 1953 . These totals barely exceeded the

numbers that the Germans deployed around some of their

key targets late in World War II . The equipment itself was

vintage World War II. Although the airmen faced a few 76-

mm guns, the principal Communist heavy flak weapon was

the Soviet 85-mm Model 1939 gun capable of firing 15 to

20 20.1-pound shells per minute at 2,625 fps to an effective

ceiling of 27,000 feet. Later, the Communists supplemented

these guns with 85-mm Model 1944 guns that had an additional muzzle velocity of 325 fps and an increased altitude

capability of 4,000 feet. In the later stages of the war, some

of these guns were controlled by radar. The main light flak

piece was the 37-mm automatic weapon. The Communists

also used large numbers of 12 .7-mm machine guns. Beginning in October 1951 Allied airmen reported unguided flak

rockets that reached 10,560 feet. But there are no indications of any successes with this weapon, and reports of their

firing faded out by December 1952. 3

How effective was Communist flak in the Korean War?

It did not prevent air operations but it did make them more

expensive . Hostile fire and operations at increased altitudes

to counter flak reduced bombing accuracy. The US Air

Force estimated that dive-bombing accuracy declined from

a 75-foot CEP* in 1951 to 219 feet in 1953,4 which meant

that more sorties were required to destroy a target. American losses to enemy action totaled 1,230 Air Force, Marine

Corps, and Navy aircraft, all but 143 were claimed by

ground fire.' US Air Force losses to flak on a sortie basis

*Circular error probable-An indicator of the delivery accuracy of a weapon system,

used as a factor in determining probable damage to a target . It is the radius of a circle

within which half of a missile's projectiles are expected to fall .

74
declined during the course of the war from a rate of .18

percent in 1950 to .07 percent in 1953 . Overall American

(Air Force, Marine Corps, and Navy) combat losses of 1,230

aircraft on 736,439 sorties amounted to a rate of .17

percent. 6 *

A further breakdown reveals that US Air Force losses

were not evenly spread-fighter-bombers sustained 58 percent of aircraft losses, although they logged only 36 percent

of sorties, and jets suffered less than did propeller-powered

aircraft. The jets took fewer hits because they operated at

higher speeds and altitudes than did the propeller aircraft .

The Navy's gull-wing F4U Corsair of World War II took

hits at twice the rate as did the straight-wing jet F9F and

thus was considered 75 percent more vulnerable. Similarly,

the US Air Force's famous propeller-powered F-51 Mustang

(fig . 39) was much more vulnerable than the jet-powered

*In addition to the 689 Air Force and 541 Marine Corps/Navy combat losses to

enemy action, there were 776 Air Force and 588 Marine Corps/Navy losses on operations not due to enemy action .

7 5
F-80 Shooting Star (fig . 40). In the period July through

November 1950, the Mustang had a loss rate of 1 .9 percent*

compared with the Shooting Star's loss rate of .74 percent.'

The Air Force assessed the loss rate of prop aircraft to be

triple that of jet aircraft . A breakdown of losses in the

month ofAugust 1952 indicated that light flak was the main

problem. In that month flak destroyed 14 Fifth Air Force

aircraft and damaged 153 others. The Air Force credited

light flak with 79 percent of the downed aircraft and 45

percent of the damaged aircraft, small arms with 7 and 52

percent, and heavy flak with 14 and 3 percent . 9

In early 1952 American losses to ground fire prompted

remedial action. One factor in the equation involved how

close the aircraft flew to the ground ; but despite the wealth

*The US Air Force knew the F-51 was vulnerable to ground fire because of its liquidcooled engine and air scoop beneath the fuselage . One World War II study of fighters

in the European theater indicated that the P-51 (as it was then designated) was three

times as vulnerable to the flak as was the P-47.' The author was told that the decision

to employ the F-51, not the more rugged P-47, in Korea was based primarily on the

availability of parts.

76
of data from World War II, it apparently took an operations

analysis study in early 1952 to bring this fact to the attention of the decisionmakers . One study indicated that in the

first four months of 1952, Fifth Air Force aircraft sustained

half of their ground-fire hits below 2,500 feet. 10 Following

a Communist flak success on 10 July 1952 the Fifth Air

Force ordered a minimum recovery altitude of 3,000 feet.

Similarly, in reaction to B-26 (fig . 41) losses north of the

battle lines, the Fifth Air Force established a 4,000-foot

attack altitude for light bombers with only selected crews

permitted to operate lower. In August, the Navy adopted

a 3,000-foot minimum pullout altitude. This policy resulted

in a decrease in American aircraft losses ." In the first four

months of 1952, Fifth Air Force studies concluded that

ground fire destroyed or damaged 21 .6 aircraft per 1,000

sorties; whereas in the period 1 September 1952 through

30 April 1953, the rate decreased to 11 .1 aircraft per 1,000

sorties. Analysts attributed 19 percent of the decrease to

77
the altitude policy and a further 32 percent to target diversification. As a counterpoint, the Fifth Air Force removed the altitude restriction for two weeks in June 1953

and suffered the consequences. During that month the unit

suffered its highest 1953 monthly losses-18 aircraft to

ground fire, including 12 of its newest fighter-bombers, the

F-86F.' 2

Another policy adopted by the Fifth Air Force in June

1952 limited the time over the target. It mandated that,

with the exception of air defense and F4U aircraft, pilots

were to make only one run over a target for each type of

external ordnance carried; and it forbade strafing. In August

1952 the Fifth Air Force modified the policy by restricting

general support and interdiction mission to one pass and

close air support to two passes.

'3

American airmen also employed more direct methods

against enemy antiaircraft artillery. Apparently, the Marines tried flak suppression tactics in late 1951 or early

1952-Marine spotter aircraft could temporarily divert

strike aircraft to hit flak positions. In June 1952 the Marines

published a procedure that put suppressive fire on flak positions 30 seconds before their aircraft began their divebombing runs. Thereafter, Marine aircraft losses dropped.

14

At about the same time, the Army and Air Force adopted

similar tactics, although there is no indication that there

was any coordination among the three services . Prior to

July 1952 the Army and Air Force operated under procedures established in plan NEGAT, which curtailed friendly

artillery fire during an air strike and restricted almost all

artillery fire within a 2,500-yard radius of the target.

Friendly guns would mark targets with smoke or white

phosphorous shells and, between the time the spotter aircraft left the area and the fighter-bombers arrived, fire

against known antiaircraft positions. Prompted by the loss

of two C-119s (fig. 42) to American artillery fire in June

1951, the policy emphasized safety from "friendly" fire .

But the policy satisfied neither airmen nor soldiers and

78
became even less acceptable to both as the Communists

burrowed deeper into the ground, brought up increasing

flak pieces, and learned American air support procedures.

Not only did fighter-bomber losses remain high, but the

procedures left a large area along the front without artillery

support for eight to 45 minutes during the air strike. Following a meeting between the two services in July 1952,

the Army eased the restriction on artillery fire to a minimum time, although it retained prohibitions on the use of

proximity-fuzed fire and high-angle fire when aircraft were

in the area. The airmen now saw that the danger from

enemy guns exceeded the danger from "friendly" guns .

In their next step, the Americans actively engaged the

flak. On 6 August 1952 the Air Force and Army produced

plan SUPPRESS, which set out procedures to neutralize

suspected and known antiaircraft positions. While retaining

the July artillery restrictions, SUPPRESS permitted the

fighter-bomber pilots to either accept or reject artillery support. The gunners would hit suspected positions with proximity-fuzed fire before the strike and then signal the end

79
of proximity-fuzed fire with a radio call and a white phosphorous or colored smoke round. The artillery would continue the bombardment with impact-fuzed ammunition.

During a one-month experiment with these procedures in

IX Corps (25 September through 25 October 1952), the US

Air Force lost only one aircraft on 1,816 CAS sorties, compared with planning figures of one loss for every 380 CAS

sorties. (Army artillery fired 679,000 rounds in connection

with the air strikes.) This marked decline in aircraft losses

came despite the tripling of Communist flak guns in the

area facing the IX Corps.

The Eighth Army and Fifth Air Force also adopted the

policy, which became effective on 2 December 1952 . Under

the slightly modified procedures, a light aircraft (a T-6 Mosquito) led the fighter-bombers into the area, marked the

target, and after the fighter-bomber pilots identified the

target, called in artillery fire (fig. 43) . All known antiaircraft

guns within 2,500 yards of the target would be hit first with

proximity-fuzed shells and finally with a white phosphorous

or colored smoke round . The barrage continued with impact-fuzed shells for three minutes as the aircraft attacked.

Despite problems such as fighter-bomber pilots not always

being ready to exploit the suppression fire, and increased

numbers of Communist flak guns, fighter-bomber losses

remained acceptable. CAS sorties per fighter-bomber loss

rose from 917 in December 1952 to 1,285 in January 1953,

to 2,981 in late March and early April, then dropped to

1,281 in June and, finally, rose to about 1,515 in July."

Clearly, the Americans had forgotten much of their experience with flak in World War II. The airmen's flak countermeasures came as a response to losses and not from any

study of the situation or from previous experience. Not

until late in the war, after almost two years, did the Army

and Air Force establish effective coordinated tactics . No

one attempted to coordinate, or to compare notes, with the

Marines or Navy. But even having done all of this, the

question is how much did the American airmen learn. In

80
a study of the lessons from the air war in Korea, the US

Air Force did not even mention enemy flak among the almost 100 items, but included such areas as heckling attacks,

rescue operations, and Communist passive defense. Surely

flak was more important and more costly to the US Air

Force than that. It is this attitude that led Air Force Chief

of Staff Thomas D. White to tell his top commanders in

October 1957 that the US Air Force had never respected

flak but that it could no longer ignore it . He insisted that

the airmen find out more about antiaircraft defenses, and

find it out quickly."

8 1
Antiaircraft Missiles

At the same time US military forces were enduring the

post-World War II reduction and then the trauma and frustrating limited war in Korea, a major technological development was evolving. This device, which would greatly

improve air defense and radically change air warfare, was

of course the surface-to-air missile (SAM). A number of

countries attempted to follow up on the German efforts in

the field, but for 20 years these first-generation missiles

were notable more for their promise than for their performance. The large and unwieldy missiles demonstrated

limited mobility. Initially, they used liquid fuel with its

problems of handling, reliability, reaction time, and storage .

The early missiles were guided by command systems in

which one radar unit acquired and tracked the target, a

second tracked the missile, and a computer made missile

corrections to ensure interception . Although this awkward

system could down aircraft flying at relatively high altitudes, steady courses, and moderate speeds, it had little

ability to kill fast-moving, low-flying, maneuvering targets .

(It must be remembered, however, that air defenders saw

formations of high-flying aircraft as the threat .) The command guidance system was also vulnerable to electronic

countermeasures.

A number of projects emerged from American designers." The US Army sponsored the widest variety of missiles . These missiles can probably best be divided

generically into three families based on the missile's mobility : large, immobile SAMs; mobile missiles; and manportable systems. The earliest of these Army projects was

the Nike family, begun in 1945 by Bell Laboratories. The

first of these, the Nike Ajax (fig. 44), stood 34 feet high

and weighed 2,455 pounds with its booster (21 feet and

1,150 pounds without it) . It carried a 300-pound warhead

at Mach 2.25 to a maximum slant range of 25 miles and

an altitude of 60,000 feet. Ajax became the first operational

82
US SAM in December 1953 and served with US forces

overseas and with at least five friendly foreign countries.

Western Electric, the prime contractor (Douglas built the

airframe), delivered about 15,000 of the missiles . About

5,500 of them were fired, apparently none in anger. The

Ajax program cost just over $1 billion before the United

States phased it out in favor of its successor, the Nike

Hercules .

In 1953 the US Army's Ordnance Corps, Bell Laboratories, Western Electric, and Douglas began work on the

Nike Hercules (fig. 45). The same basic technology was used

on the Hercules as was used on the Ajax, although the former was somewhat larger (measuring 41 .5 feet and weighing

about 10,400 pounds with its booster) and used solid propellants. Hercules performed better than the Ajax, carrying

a 119-pound warhead to a maximum slant range of 80 miles

at Mach 3.65 and an altitude over 150,000 feet . Hercules

8 3
8 4
became operational in July 1958, when it began to replace

the 58 Ajax battalions . One demonstration of the missile's

capability came in September 1960 when one Hercules intercepted another flying at 100,000 feet and 30 miles from

its launch . The United States built over 9,000 Hercules

missiles at a program cost of about $1 .9 billion .

A second family of missiles was somewhat smaller and

much more mobile. In March 1953 Raytheon began development of the Hawk (fig. 46). It went into production

in 1957 and into operation in July 1959. Shipped to Israel

in 1964, the Hawk downed its first hostile aircraft, a MiG21, in May 1969.

11 Hawk measured 16 .5 feet in length and

weighed about 1,300 pounds at launch, and therefore it was

easy to transport . Guided by a continuous-wave semiactive

radar homer (rather than the more easily jammed pulse

radar), it carried a 163-pound warhead at Mach 2 .2 to a

slant range of 22 miles and an altitude of 40,000 feet . The

Hawk program cost about $1 billion ($969 million) for just

85
over 13,000 missiles. The most notable aspect of the Hawk,

however, is its adaptability . It has been modified, improved,

and fielded in a number of advanced variants, some of

which remain first-line equipment today.

The third family of antiaircraft missiles, man portable,

began with a contract to Philco-Ford in 1958 . The Redeye

system (fig. 47), which looks like the World War 11 bazooka,

is housed in a device serving as both container and launcher.

The missile system measures about 3 .5 feet in length, 2 3/4

inches in diameter, and weighs about 28 pounds. The operator acquires the target visually and fires when an aural

signal indicates that the infrared homing system has locked

onto the target. When fired, the missile is boosted 20 feet

or so from the launcher before the rocket ignites, thus protecting the operator from rocket blast. Redeye travels at

Mach 2.5 with a maximum range of 1 .6 miles and 9,000-

feet altitude . The missile went into production in 1964 and

became operational that same year.

86
The Navy also developed antiaircraft missiles . In December 1944 the chief of naval operations directed that work

on the Bumblebee project begin at the Applied Physics Laboratory at Johns Hopkins University. This work resulted

in the development of the Terrier and Talos missiles. The

Convair Terrier measured 27 feet and weighed 3,000

pounds with its booster (14 .8 feet and 1,100 pounds without) . The Navy first fired the missile on September 1951

and put it into production the next year. It became the first

US Navy SAM when it achieved operational status on the

USS Boston in 1956 . The Terrier carried a 200-pound warhead at Mach 2 .5 to a slant range of 10 miles and an altitude

of 40,000 feet. The United States built about 3,000 ofthese,

and they served with the United States and two foreign

navies.

The Bendix Talos also emerged from the 1944 Bumblebee

project. It was larger than the Terrier (31 .3 feet and 7,000

pounds with booster, 21 feet and 3,000 pounds without),

which accounted for its better performance . Talos could

carry a 300-pound warhead at Mach 2.5 over 60 miles slant

range and reach an altitude of 87,000 feet. First fired in

1950, it became operational on the USS Galveston in 1959

(fig . 48). Bendix built almost 1,500 of these missiles

(McDonnell built the airframe) at a program cost of $648

million.

The third naval missile was the Convair Tartar (fig. 49) .

It began, and was first fired, in 1956. Tartar went into

production in 1958 and became operational three years

later. The missile measured 15 feet in length and weighed

1,200 pounds. It could reach a slant range of over 10 miles,

an altitude of 40,000 feet, and a speed of Mach 2 .5 . Convair

built over 3,600 of these missiles at a cost of $495 million.

It served with the United States and four foreign navies.

The Army's airmen also engaged in SAM work, even

before they achieved independence. In April 1946 the AAF

had three SAMS under development out of a total of 28

87

missile projects . Boeing designed the ground-to-air pilotless

aircraft (GAPA) to defend against aircraft, and the missile

could reach a range of 35 miles and an altitude of 60,000

feet. The airmen test-fired about 100 of these missiles . Two

other AAF projects were the University of Michigan's Wizard and General Electric's Thumper, both designed to reach

ranges of 550 miles and altitudes of 500,000 feet. In 1947

the US Air Force relegated the two antiballistic missile projects to "prolonged study" status. By March 1948 the Air

Force canceled the Thumper. Wizard continued as a study,

but Boeing replaced the GAPA project with Bomarc

(Boeing, University of Michigan Aeronautical Research

Center) in 1949.' 9

Bomarc was essentially an unmanned aircraft . In fact,

the airmen initially designated the missile XF-99 as it would

any experimental fighter. The large (46 .8-foot length, 18-

foot span) and heavy (15,500 pound) missile was radiocontrolled with an active radar-homing device . The US Air

Force first fired the IM-99A (fig . 50), as it was redesignated,

in 1952 . In 1958 it completed an interception controlled

1,500 miles away (fig . 51) . Two years later, it became operational. Bomarc could reach Mach 2 .8, and it had a 250-

mile slant range. The US Air Force first fired the "B"

model, redesignated MIM-10B, in May 1959 . Although 1 .7

feet shorter than the "A" model, it weighed 532 pounds

more and had greater performance ; specifically, it could

reach slant ranges of 440 miles. In its most memorable flight

it intercepted a Regulus II target drone at 100,000 feet, 446

miles from its launch point . That July IM-99B became operational . In all, Boeing built 700 Bomarcs at a cost of $1 .6

billion.

Other countries also engaged in designing, building, and

testing SAMS. The British got their first SAM, Bloodhound,

into service in 1958, the Thunderbird in 1960, and the

Seaslug in 1962 . These first-generation missiles had command guidance systems and were large in size (about 20

8 9
feet in length) .* The French worked on the PARCA and the

MATRA R422-B; whereas the Swiss (Oerlikon) built the

RSD 58, again all first-generation missiles . Meanwhile, the

Soviets were also making progress with SAMs; but this must

be put into the context of its testing in combat in Southeast

Asia.

*British SAMs are addressed in chapter 4 in a discussion of the Falkland War.

90
NOTES

1 . Robert F. Futrell, United States Air Force Operations in the Korean

Conflict: 1 July 1952-27 July 1953, USAF Historical Study 127 (Maxwell AFB, Ala. : USAF Historical Division, Air University, 1956), 87;

US Army Air Defense School, "Air Defense: An Historical Analysis"

(U), June 1965, vol . 3:30-33 [AUL-M39991-4]. (SECRET-Information extracted is unclassified .)

2. US Army Air Defense School, "Air Defense," 3 :33-34; Max Rosenburg, "The Air Force and the National Guided Missile Program:

1944-1954," study, 1964, 36, 42 [AFHRC-K239.046-15] ; Joseph

Russo, "ADA in Retrospect," Air Defense Trends, July-September

1975, 12.

3 . Futrell, Historical Study 127, 41, 43; Far East Air Forces Intelligence Roundup (12-18 January 1952), vol . 2:11-12; Far East Air

Forces Intelligence Roundup (29 December 1951-4 January 1952),

vol. 3 :8 [AFHRC-K720.607A]; Andrew T. Soltys, "Enemy Antiaircraft

Defenses in North Korea," Air University Quarterly Review, Spring

1954,77-80 .

9 1
4. Futrell, Historical Study 127, 165 .

5 . Ibid., 80.

6. Commander in chief, US Pacific Fleet, Korean War. (25 June

1950-27 July 1953) US Pacific Fleet Operations, chap. 3 [NHC]; "Carrier Operations Evaluation Report No. 6, Interim, 1 February 1953-

27 July 1953," 44, 68, reproduced in William E. Hodge et al., "Theater

Air Warfare Study" (Thesis, Air War College, Maxwell AFB, Ala.,

1977), 39 [AUL-MS43117-H688t]; "Far East Air Forces Report on

the Korean War," study, bk. 1 :63, 82, 97 [AFSHRC-K720.04D]; US

Navy Office of Information, "Korean Combat Statistics for ThreeYear Period" [NHC].

7 . A. H. Peterson et al ., "Aircraft Vulnerability in World War II,"

Rand report RM-402, rev. July 1950 (Santa Monica, Calif. : Rand

Corp.) fig . 13 [AUL-M30352-9] .

8 . Pacific Fleet Evaluation Group, research memorandum, "The

Relative Risk to Anti-Aircraft Fire for Jet and Propeller Driven

Ground Attack Aircraft in Korea," March 1952 [NHC] ; Robert F.

Futrell, United States Air Force Operations in the Korean Conflict. 25

June-1 November 1950, USAF Historical Study 71 (Maxwell AFB,

Ala. : USAF Historical Division, Air University, 1952), 57 [AFHRC101-71].

9. "FEAF Report on Korean War," 128; Fifth Air Force Intelligence

Summary, 15 September 1952, 26 [AFHRC-K730.607].

10. Futrell, Historical Study 127, 152; Fifth Air Force, Operations

Analysis Office, operations analysis memorandum, "A Survey of

Fighter Bomber Tactics and Flak Losses," January 1952, 7 [AFHRCK730.3101-1] ; Pat Meid and James Yingling, US Marine Corps Operations in Korea 1950-1953, vol. 5, Operations in West Korea (Washington, D.C. : Historical Division, US Marine Corps, 1972), 64, 69.

11 . Futrell, Historical Study 127, 152; Meid and Yingling, West

Korea, 5 :70.

12. Futrell, Historical Study 127, 152-53.

13. Meid and Yingling, West Korea, 5 :70, 492n .

14. Ibid., 70-72 .

15 . Futrell, Historical Study 127, 219-22; History, Far East Air

Forces, July-December 1952, vol. 1 :58 [AFHRC-K720.01] ; "FEAF

Report on Korean War," 39.

16 . Futrell, Historical Study 71, 116; "FEAF Report on Korean

War," 39-41, 128-33 ; Memorandum by Thomas S. Power to Gen

James B. Knapp, subject: Commanders' Conference, Patrick Air Force

Base, 30 September-1 October, 4 October 1957, 2 ; "Strategic Air

Command Participation in the Missile Program from March 1957

92
through December 1957," USAF Historical Study 70, vol. 2 [AFHRCK416.01-70] . (SECRET-Information extraction is unclassified.)

17. The remaining material is drawn from the sections on the specific missiles in Ted G. Nicholas, U.S. Missile Data Book, 1982 (Fountain Valley, Calif. : Data Search Associates, 1981); and Jane's All the

World's Aircraft 1956-57; 1957-58; 1958-59; 1959-60; 1960-61 ; 1961-

62; 1962-63; 1963-64; 1964-65; 1965-66; 1966-67; 1967-68 (New

York: Jane's Publishing Co. Ltd.) .

18. Chaim Herzog, The Arab-Israeli Wars: War and Peace in the

Middle East (New York: Random House, 1982), 225 .

19. US Army Air Defense School, "Air Defense," vol . 3 :48-50;

Rosenburg, "National Guided Missile Program," 71, 75, 76, 79, 83,

117-18, 150.

9 3

CHAPTER 3

VIETNAM

The Vietnam conflict was another war that pitted Western armies and high-technology arms against numerous tenacious foes in primitive terrain. The technology brought

with it many advantages, the most significant of which were

firepower and mobility. Air power was the most important

and visible manifestation of this technology. The guerrillas

relied on dispersion, camouflage, mobility, and night operations to neutralize the impact of air power as well as

airfield attack and ground-based weapons to directly defend

themselves .

French Operations

Compared to the later American involvement in Indochina, the French conducted smaller military operations

with less-modern equipment . The French had but 107

World War II vintage combat aircraft (fighters, fighterbombers, and bombers) during the decisive 1954 battle of

Dien Bien Phu. Here, the French attempted to duplicate

their 1953 success at Na San where they used some of their

best troops as bait to lure the guerrillas into the open to be

cut down by air and artillery fire .

The Vietminh, however, learned the lessons from their

previous defeats and increased their antiaircraft protection.

The Communist antiaircraft artillery (AAA) forced French

aircraft, which had initially flown at 600 to 1,800 feet, to

fly at 2,700 to 3,000 feet decreasing French effectiveness.

The guns also took a toll on French aircraft. During attacks

on the Vietminh supply lines for two weeks after 24 No95
vember 1953, 45 of 51 French aircraft were hit by Communist AAA and two were downed. Not surprisingly, flak

and air power played a vital role in the actual siege . The

Communists opened the battle by attacking French airfields

throughout Indochina with artillery and infiltrators and

damaged a number of aircraft . A Vietminh artillery bombardment on 10 March initiated the direct attack on Dien

Bien Phu and within four days closed the garrison's airstrips. Meanwhile the Communists assaulted the French

positions as they fended off French air attacks.

The air portion of the battle saw French aircraft duel

Communist flak. Communist antiaircraft guns, 16 Vietminh and 64 Chinese, forced French aircraft higher and

higher and disrupted the accuracy of both weapons and

supply delivery. Thus, the Vietminh countered French aerial firepower and forced over 50 percent of French airdropped supplies to miss their mark and fall to the

Communists. Radar-directed guns hit aircraft flying as high

as 10,000 feet . During the battle, the Vietminh downed 48

French aircraft and damaged another 167. More important,

they cut off the fortress from the outside and neutralized

one of its most potent weapons . Thus AAA played a critical

role in the decisive battle of the first Indochina War.'

American Operations through 1968

American involvement in Indochina began in the 1950s,

with the dispatch of advisers and equipment. Again the

insurgents, this time called Vietcong (VC), lacked air power.

The South Vietnamese used American helicopters, which

gave them a tactical advantage over the guerrillas (fig . 52) .

However, the Communists employed discipline and .50-

caliber machine guns to counter the choppers, as they demonstrated during the December 1962 battle at Ap Bac. Despite superior numbers and helicopters, the South

Vietnamese suffered heavy losses, including five helicopters

96
destroyed and 14 others hit . The VC continued to exact a

steady toll on the aircraft attacking them. On 24 November

1963 in An Xuyen province, for example, Communist

ground fire hit 25 aircraft and downed five .

The American presence and air activity steadily increased, and with this increase came losses. The United

States suffered its first combat aircraft loss on 2 February

1962, when a C-123 (fig . 53) flying a low-level training

mission failed to return. The United States lost 11 aircraft

to hostile causes in 1962 and 23 aircraft the next year. The

first US Navy loss occurred in Laos in June 1964, one of

60 American aircraft lost in combat in Indochina in 1964 .

The air war expanded in May 1964 as the United States

began a continuing program of Air Force and Navy reconnaissance flights over Laos. Nevertheless, the Gulf of Tonkin incident in August 1964 marked the start of the

American air war in Vietnam, as it led to the first air strike

against North Vietnam (fig. 54). Two of the 80 attacking

9 7

Navy planes involved in the reprisal attack went down.

Considering the meagerness of the North Vietnamese defenses in terms of quantity and quality at this point, these

losses should have been a warning signal to the decisionmakers of what was to come. The air war escalated further

with armed reconnaissance and fixed-target strikes in Laos

in December 1964 . In February 1965 American reprisal

strikes on North Vietnam resumed on a "tit-for-tat" basis .

The full-scale bombing offensive against North Vietnam,

code-named Rolling Thunder, began in March 1965 . 3 On

the first mission, 2 March 1965, North Vietnamese gunners

downed four of the 130 attacking US and South Vietnamese

aircraft. Although the North Vietnamese lacked the most

modern equipment, they had no surface-to-air missiles

(SAMs) and few jets; they did have numerous conventional

antiaircraft artillery weapons. So, while they could not stop

the air attacks, they did make them costly.

From the start America used air power against the North

as a political tool: first during the reprisal raids and then

during the Rolling Thunder campaign. The objectives of

the latter were to stiffen the morale of the South Vietnamese, interdict Communist supplies, inflict punishment and

cost on the North Vietnamese, and demonstrate American

will. 4

But many, then and now, adamantly proclaim the operation was restricted, some say decisively, by the civilian

decisionmakers . Sortie levels were controlled, areas of

North Vietnam were put off-limits to air attack, bombing

halts were frequent, and targets were carefully selected from

Washington; for example, MiG fields were off-limits until

1967, as were missile sites until they downed an American

aircraft. In addition, the campaign was graduated, robbing

the airmen of the elements of shock and surprise, permitting

the North Vietnamese to build and adjust their defenses.'

The airmen were also hindered by other factors, the most

significant was their unpreparedness to fight a sustained,

conventional air campaign. 6 American aircraft were un9 9
suited for these operations. Ironically, "strategic" bombers

were used against "tactical" targets in the South, while "tactical" fighters were used against "strategic" targets in the

North. The lack of all-weather aircraft presented a considerable burden in the air war against North Vietnam, especially in the winter monsoon season (December through

mid-May) . The only American all-weather aircraft were the

Marine/Navy A-6 (fig . 55) and Air Force F-111, the former

entering action in 1965, the latter in 1968 . America fought

a conventional air war with tactics and aircraft designed

for nuclear warfare. The best example of this mismatch was

the F-105 (fig . 56). A fighter with an internal bomb bay, a

contradiction in terms, it was the US Air Force's workhorse,

flying many of the missions over the North and receiving

the most damage.'

100
The United States, for all of its technological prowess,

was ill-equipped in other areas as well. At the beginning of

the air war, the United States was still using unguided

(dumb) munitions, just as airmen had used in World War

1! Thus, aircrews had to overfly their targets, which proved

dangerous and often fatal.' Second, the United States had

neither sufficient nor adequate electronic countermeasures

(ECM). Although Strategic Air Command (SAC) B-52s were

reasonably equipped, Tactical Air Command (TAC) fighters

were not. The irony therefore is that, until late in the war,

the better-equipped B-52s operated unopposed over South

Vietnam while throughout the war, fighters flew against the

growing and much tougher defenses in North Vietnam .

Another factor, perhaps the most important, was that the

Americans underestimated the power of the defense and

the abilities of the North Vietnamese. The airmen focused

on the weapons on which airmen always focus, where the

glamour and glory is, fighters and air-to-air combat. It is

true that the North Vietnamese built up their air force. But

this air force proved as elusive as the Vietcong, using guerrilla tactics of hit and run, and fighting only when circum101
stances were favorable. With the major exception of

operation Bolo in January 1967, when US fighter pilots

ambushed the MiGs and destroyed seven without a loss, 9

American airmen did not engage in major air battles and

thus were unable to rack up scores as they had in World

War II and Korea . 10 Air-to-air combat was neither frequent

nor important in the Vietnam air war.

The principal Communist weapon against US aircraft

was AAA. American airmen not only underestimated North

Vietnamese defenses, they especially underestimated the

impact of flak. Both were serious mistakes .

The North Vietnamese fielded a formidable groundbased air defense system . In early 1965 the North Vietnamese manned about 1,200 antiaircraft guns, which they

increased to almost 2,000 guns within six months. These

guns accounted for about 80 percent of 169 American fixedwing aircraft lost in 1965." Between 1965 and 1973 flak

engaged one-fourth of all flights over North Vietnam and

accounted for 66 percent of US aircraft losses over the

North.

12

The farther north the airmen operated, the more intense

were the defenses. Although only 20 percent of US sorties

over Indochina in 1965 were against North Vietnam, 62

percent of its combat losses were there. The following year,

1966, proved only a little better, with about 30 percent of

the total Indochina sorties and just under 60 percent of

losses occurring over the North . The area north of 20 degrees latitude, especially around the Hanoi-Haiphong area,

proved most dangerous . In the period September 1966

through July 1967, the United States flew less than 30 percent of its North Vietnam attack sorties north of 20 degrees,

yet lost 63 .5 percent of its aircraft there.

13

The American airmen initially used nuclear warfare tactics that they had practiced in the late 1950s and early

1960s: high-speed, low-altitude approaches and a rapid

climb (pop-up) to bombing altitude just before reaching the

target. One adjustment to using conventional ordnance was

102
to make multiple passes over the target. But intense ground

fire and the resulting losses forced a change. Therefore the

airmen raised approach altitudes to 15,000 to 20,000 feet,

from which the aircraft dive-bombed their targets, and limited attacks to a single pass.

'4

The air war changed dramatically on 24 July 1965 when

a Soviet SA-2 missile downed an Air Force F-4 (fig . 57)

and damaged three others. Proving this shootdown was no

fluke, two days later an SA-2 destroyed an American drone.

US reconnaissance (fig . 58) spotted construction of the first

SAM site in early April and watched it and three other sites

progress throughout the spring (figs . 59 and 60). But the

decisionmakers would not permit the airmen to attack the

missile sites, one of the many political restrictions on the

air war. Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara argued

that if the airmen attacked the SAM sites, they must also

attack the MiG fields, which would be a major escalation

of the air war. The leaders also feared that such attacks

might cause Soviet casualties. Besides, one of McNamara's

chief assistants, John T. McNaughton, believed that the

SAMs only represented a bluff and would not be used."

The Soviet antiaircraft missile evolved from German

103
World War II programs. The first Soviet SAM, the SA-1,

was a German Wasserfall with ground (command) guidance. It became operational in early 1954 . The West first

saw its successor, the SA-2, in 1957. The Soviets designed

this missile to defend against high-flying, essentially nonmaneuvering, strategic bombers. The SA-2 measured 3 5

104
feet in length and weighed 4,875 pounds with its booster.

It could carry a 288-pound warhead at Mach 3 .5 out to a

slant range of 24-25 miles and was effective between 3,000

and 60,000 feet (fig . 61). The SA-2 first achieved prominence by knocking down an American U-2 over the Soviet

Union in the spring of 1960 and downing another U-2 over

Cuba in October 1962 (fig. 62).' 6

Despite knowledge of the missile since 1957, and its potential (similar to the Nike Ajax), the United States made

only mixed progress with countermeasures. Tight budgets

in the late 1950s hampered these efforts. Airmen assigned

high priority to countermeasures against the SA-2 in budgets for fiscal years 1964 and 1965, but had nothing effective in hand when the need arose . As a result, in 1964, some

105

airmen believed that aircraft could not operate in SAMprotected areas . Although it is easy and partially correct to

blame the tight funding, it is also true that the airmen

underestimated the requirement for countermeasures. Although the US Air Force equipped strategic bombers with

warning and jamming devices in the late 1950s, it did not

similarly equip tactical fighters and bombers. Whatever the

reason-money, obsession with nuclear weapons delivery,

electrical power requirements, trust in fighter maneuverability and speed-the tactical air forces were unprepared

for combat."

The potential SAM threat grew as the North Vietnamese

incorporated more missiles into their inventory. North

Vietnamese SAM battalions increased from one in 1965 to

25 the next year, to 30 in 1967, and to 35-40 in 1968 . This

growth in units permitted the North Vietnamese to increase

their missile firings from 30 per month in the first 11

months of operation to 270 per month between July 1966

and October 1967. The latter month, with between 590 and

740 SAMs fired, was the peak month of firing until the

Linebacker II operations of 1972 . From October 1967 to

the bombing halt on 1 April 1968, SAM firings averaged

220 per month. During this period, the American airmen

observed 5,366-6,037 SAMs, which downed 115-128

aircraft . 's

Despite the increase in SAM firings, their direct effectiveness declined. In 1965 it took almost 18 SAMs to down

each American aircraft, a figure that rose to 35 in 1966, to

57 in 1967, and to 107 in 1968. A number of factors contributed to this decline.' 9

The airmen quickly learned that the SA-2 could be outmaneuvered. The Soviets designed the SA-2 to destroy highflying, nonmaneuvering, strategic bombers; but until 1972

it engaged primarily low-flying, very maneuverable, tactical

fighters . On clear days, alert airmen could spot SA-2

launches as the missile was large, described by most flyers

as a flying telephone pole, and left a visible smoke trail .

107
The pilots would rapidly dive toward the missile, and when

it changed direction to follow the aircraft, the pilot would

pull up as abruptly and as sharply as possible . The SA-2

just could not follow such maneuvers. But such action required sufficient warning, proper timing, and, of course,

nerve and skill . To give pilots adequate time to maneuver,

procedures prohibited the pilots from flying too close to

clouds between them and the ground. Later, the airmen

received electronic devices that gave a visual and aural

warning when a SAM radar was tracking (painting) an

aircraft. 2 °

The American airmen also directly took on the missiles .

On 27 July, 46 US Air Force fighter-bombers attacked two

missile sites, met disaster, and according to a CIA report,

hit the wrong targets. North Vietnamese gunners downed

three aircraft while a midair collision accounted for two

others. Nevertheless, the anti-SAM attacks continued . In

the first nine months of 1966, the airmen launched 75

strikes against 60 sites and claimed to have destroyed 25

and damaged 25 . Such attacks proved unprofitable because

of the mobility of the SAMs-they could be relocated

within hours .

One effort to counter North Vietnamese SAMs was

standoff ECM: aircraft crammed with electronics gear that

orbited a distance from the defenses and interfered with

Communist radar and SAM signals. The Marines employed

EF-1011s in this role between April 1965 and 1969. The

Douglas Skyknight was ancient, having first flown in 1948

and seen action in the Korean War as a night fighter. It

was joined in the ECM role in late 1965 by another Douglas

product, the Skywarrior, which first flew in 1952. The Navy

employed the Skywarrior as an electronics warfare aircraft

designated as the EKA-3B. The Air Force adopted the Navy

aircraft and also used it in the ECM role as the EB-66C,

which carried a crew of seven, including four ECM operators in a crew compartment fitted in the bomb bay. Joined

by other ECM versions of the B-66, it served throughout

10 8
the war. However, the North Vietnamese moved their

SAMs, forcing the EB-66 in turn to move away from North

Vietnam to orbits over both Laos and the Gulf of Tonkin.

In January 1968 a Vietnamese MiG downed an EB-66C

(fig . 63). 22 In late 1966 the Marines introduced the EA-6A

in the jamming role .

A third American measure against the SAMs was codenamed Wild Weasel . The Air Force installed radar homing

and warning (RHAW), electronics equipment that could

detect SAM radar and indicate its location, into F-100Fs,

the two-seat trainer version of its fighter-bomber. Wild

Weasel I went into action in November 1965, flying with

and guiding conventionally armed F-105s against SAM positions. These operations, known as Iron Hand (SAM

suppression), preceded the main force by about five minutes, attacked and harassed the SAMs and thus permitted

operations at 4,000-6,000 feet above the light flak into

which the SAMs had forced the American aircraft .

109
In April and May of 1966 the American airmen first used

the Navy's AGM-45A Shrike missiles (fig . 64). Now the

anti-SAM crews had a standoff weapon that homed in on

the SAM's radar signal . However, the Shrike had limited

range and maneuverability and could be confused. These

liabilities reduced the antiradiation missile's (ARM) effectiveness as did Communist countermeasures. The North

Vietnamese crews soon learned that by limiting emissions

and coordinating several radars, they could still operate the

SAMS and yet limit their vulnerability to the Wild Weasels .

Just as the North Vietnamese used decoys to neutralize and

ambush American air strikes, SAM operators sometimes

turned on their radar to provoke an ARM launch and then

turned it off before missile impact . The Shrike's kill rate

declined from 28 percent of those launched by Air Force

and Navy crews in 1966 to 18 percent in the first quarter

of 1967. In the fall of 1967 SA-2 crews began using optical

aiming, which rendered American ECM efforts useless;

however, optical aiming required visual conditions, which

also reduced SAM effectiveness . In March 1968 the Americans introduced the longer-range and more capable AGM78 Standard ARM. Although it was constrained by reli-
ability and size problems, nevertheless, the AGM-78 gave

American airmen another weapon against the SAM. 24

In the summer of 1966 Wild Weasel III appeared in the

form of the two-seat F-105 trainer, redesignated F-105G

(fig . 65) . Iron Hand operations were now easier as com

patible aircraft were flying together. In late 1966 US airmen

began using cluster bomb units (CBU-antipersonnel munitions) against North Vietnamese positions. But in the

period following the 1968 bombing halt, 1969 until summer

1972, free-fall munitions were removed from Iron Hand

aircraft, degrading their effectiveness . By then, however, the

airmen had another weapon with which to combat the

SAMs. 2 s

The Navy in mid-1966 and the US Air Force in October

tested ECM pods carried beneath the fighters. A formation

of fighters using the pods, the Navy's ALQ-51 and the Air

Force's QRC-160-redesignated ALQ-71-seriously inhibited radar-directed deferfses. The pods permitted opera-
tions between 10,000-17,000 feet, above the reach of light

and medium flak. Put into service in January 1967, the

pods further neutralized Communist defenses. But unfortunately for the airmen, the formation required for the best

ECM results made the aircraft vulnerable to MiG attack.

The various jamming devices forced the SAM operators to

adopt a new procedure, track-on jamming. They fired the

SA-2s at the jamming signal, but as it gave azimuth and

not range information, it proved much less accurate than

the normal method.

American Operations through Linebacker I

The 1968 Tet offensive changed the war for the United

States. As a result, President Lyndon B. Johnson capped

American troop levels, stopped American bombing of the

North above 20 degrees north latitude, and then, just before

the November election, stopped all bombing of the North.

Americans elected Richard M. Nixon president, who began

to withdraw US troops and turn the burden of the war over

to the South Vietnamese. As a result, American aircraft

losses, especially fixed-wing machines, declined. 2 '

The air war raged in other areas besides North Vietnam ;

however, losses in the North were proportionally the greatest. American combat losses on a per sortie basis were next

highest over Laos, then South Vietnam, and lowest over

Cambodia. But because American airmen flew most oftheir

sorties over the South, this is where most of the aircraft

fell. Between 1961 and 1968, 859 aircraft were lost to hostile action over the North compared with about 1,709 over

the South. One sharp difference was the proportion of helicopters destroyed in the two areas . Only 11 went down in

North Vietnam, but about 1,073 helicopters (or about 63

percent of all aircraft lost in the South) were lost in South

Vietnam.

The helicopter proved to be vulnerable even in the less112
lethal antiaircraft environment of South Vietnam where

most American rotary-wing aircraft operated (fig. 66) . The

vulnerability of the chopper is highlighted by the deaths

associated with it . During the course of most of the war

(1961-71) in all of Southeast Asia, about 62 percent of the

deaths from combat aircraft losses and 66 percent of noncombat aircraft losses were attributed to helicopters. These

numbers may overemphasize the point because helicopters

were employed in large numbers, as troop carriers, near the

ground, and where ground fire was intense, all of which led

to high personnel losses (figs. 67 and 68). Helicopter vulnerability was dramatically demonstrated in the 1971 South

Vietnamese invasion of Laos (Lam Son 719). Although official figures put losses at 107-122 and the number of helicopters damaged at 600, some put these figures much

by repairing many damaged machines that did not deserve

such efforts . One source states that the Communists

downed 5,600 Army helicopters, but the Army successfully

retrieved two-thirds ofthese. One critic puts total helicopter

losses at 10,000.9

In March 1972 the North Vietnamese attempted to knock

the South Vietnamese out of the war with a massive conventional invasion. The Communists used weapons heretofore not seen in the war in the South: tanks, 130-mm

artillery, and the SA-7 (fig. 69). The latter is a shoulderlaunched, man-portable, heat-seeking missile with a range

of just under two miles and able to reach almost 10,000

115
feet. The SA-7 gave the guerrillas a potent weapon against

air power and put the slow-moving, low-flying aircraft, especially helicopters and propeller aircraft, at considerable

risk. It knocked down a number of helicopters and observer

aircraft and in June a AC-130 . Between 29 April and 1

September, the Communists fired 351 SA-7s at American

aircraft in 221 incidents and downed 17 fixed-wing and

nine rotary-wing aircraft . Aircraft flying low and slow

proved especially vulnerable to the SA-7s . It took 1 .8 missiles to down each helicopter compared to 10 required for

each slow-moving fixed-wing aircraft kill (all propeller aircraft except for one A-37), and 135 missiles to destroy one

F-4. The American airmen used flares to decoy the SA-7,

but most effective of all, they increased both their speed

and altitude. Thus, although the number of aircraft downed

was not great, the SA-7's major impact was to force American aircraft to fly higher where they were less effective and

to put some aircraft, such as the A-1, out of business.

The Communists employed their SA-2s differently during

the 1972 campaign. They preceded their invasion by deploying SA-2s to cover the demilitarized zone, and on 17

February 1972, fired 81 missiles which downed three F-4s.

In March SA-2s downed two AC-130s over Laos and the

next month an EB-66 . The SA-2s also took on the B-52s

which now ventured further north . The Communists fired

23 SAMS on both 21 and 23 April in defense of Vinh and

destroyed a B-52, the first Boeing bomber lost to Communist fire. During Linebacker (later called Linebacker I),

the code name for the renewed air attacks of the North in

1972, the Communists fired 2,750 SA-2s at US aircraft and

downed 46 planes."

Just as North Vietnam changed the rules of the game, so

did the United States. Nixon's policy of detente gave him

flexibility that his predecessor-who feared direct inter

vention by the Soviets, or more likely, the Chineselacked.

12 The president authorized the mining of North

Vietnamese ports, long requested by the military, and used
air power as it had not been used before. The airmen used

air power more effectively because they had fewer political

restrictions, although some targets and areas continued to

be denied to them."

Thus, US air power played a major role in stopping the

invasion by inflicting terrible losses on the North Vietnamese forces . As never before, American airmen had targets

they could see, hit, and destroy. The airmen also had better

weapons.

Although the airmen introduced no new aircraft since the

1968 bombing of North Vietnam, they did use other equipment that improved bombing effectiveness . These devices

put more bombs on target, thus reducing the exposure of

friendly aircraft to hostile fire . The airmen began long-range

aid to navigation (LORAN) bombing in 1970, which made

it possible to operate in the worst weather conditions and

still get bombs within hundreds of meters of the aiming

point.

14 Although this was not precision bombing, it did

permit bombing during bad weather.

The most spectacular new equipment introduced were

guided munitions (smart bombs), which could get bombs

within meters of the target . A number of bridges that had

withstood numerous, costly American strikes quickly fell

to these new weapons . For example, on 13 May 1972 four

flights of F-4s attacked the formidable Thanh Hoa Bridge

with guided bombs, dropping its western span and causing

other critical damage. There were no US losses in the attack,

whereas the previous 871 sorties had cost 11 aircraft and

had not neutralized the bridge . The airmen considered the

guided bombs to be 100 times as effective as unguided

weapons against bridges and 100-200 times as effective

against hard targets such as bunkers ."

The Americans employed new ECM and anti-SAM tactics to combat the formidable Communist defenses . Against

North Vietnamese electronics, they employed more chaff,

a World War 11 device that still worked. Chaff had been

seldom used because the Navy feared its impact on their
shipborne radar and the US Air Force lacked a suitable

dispenser. In June 1972 American airmen introduced the

ALE-38 chaff dispenser (fig. 70), and in August chaff

bombs. Both devices greatly enhanced US ECM capabilities

and reduced the vulnerability of chaff dispensing aircraft .

The US Marines introduced a new jamming aircraft, the

EA-6B (fig . 71), into action in July 1972 . 36

The Americans also .changed their anti-SAM tactics (Wild

Weasel) from Iron Hand, four F-105s using antiradiation

missiles. In August the US Air Force formed hunter-killer

teams consisting of two F-105 hunters armed with ARMS

and two F-4 killers armed with CBUs. 3 '

If the airmen operated successfully over North Vietnam,

they nevertheless paid a price . During the April through

October 1972 bombing, the US Air Force flew 9,315 sorties

and dropped 155,500 tons of bombs on the North and lost

63 planes. In all, the United States lost 111 fixed-wing aircraft in combat, apparently in equal proportion to AAAs,

MiGs, and SAMS. In addition to aircraft losses, the airmen

11 8
paid another price: only 2,346 of the total sorties were directly attacking enemy installations ; the others were in support. In fact, the ratio of support aircraft was even higher

than these numbers indicate (3 .4:1), as they do not include

tanker and reconnaissance aircraft.

As the bombing took its toll in the North and the invasion

of the South stalled and then was pushed back, negotiations

prompted Kissinger's "peace-at-hand" comment on 26 October. But, as close as the peacemakers got to an agreement,

they did not get a treaty.

Linebacker II

On 14 December President Nixon gave the North Vietnamese 72 hours to get back to serious negotiations "or

else." The "or else" was a three-day bombing offensive

against North Vietnam, which Nixon ordered that day and

then changed on 19 December to an indefinite period. The

object of Linebacker 11, the code name for the December

119
bombing, was to get negotiations going again. 39

US airmen returned to the home of the SAMS, AAA, and

MiGs on the night of 18 December.4° For three consecutive

days the script was about the same. F-111 attacks on airfields and various other targets began at 7 :00 P.M . and lasted

about nine and one-half hours.4l About 20 to 65 minutes

later, the first ofthree waves of B-52s unloaded their bombs

(fig . 72). The second wave followed about four hours later

and was, in turn, followed by the third wave about five

hours later. Each wave consisted of between 21 to 51 B-52s

supported by 31 to 41 other aircraft, and each wave flew

exactly the same pattern: the same heading from the west

and, after a sharp turn after bombing, the same exit heading

to the west. There were also daylight attacks by Air Force,

Marine, and Navy aircraft.

The bombing rocked Hanoi, but the aircraft losses rocked

the airmen as well. During the first three days of the operations, 12 aircraft went down, not a large number and

seemingly bearable; however, the B-52 losses, three on the

120
first night and six on the third, were shocking. The B-52s

were, after all, America's primary strategic nuclear bomber,

the foundation of the air-breathing leg of the Triad. Up to

this point, the US Air Force had lost only one B-52 to enemy

fire, although 17 had been lost to other causes. Although

the overall B-52 loss rate of 3 percent of effective sorties

on the three missions appears acceptable, the loss rate on

the third mission was 6.8 percent, and the nine B-52s represented almost 5 percent of the 170 to 210 B-52s the US

Air Force had deployed in Southeast Asia and over 2 percent of the 402 in service in 1972 . 42 This is reminiscent of

the summer and fall of 1943 over Germany.

The B-52 losses highlighted a number of problems . First,

the B-52 fleet was of mixed quality, consisting of 107 of

the older but modified "D" models and 99 of the later "G"

models . Only half of the "G" models had upgraded ECM

equipment, which proved to be one of the critical factors

in determining which aircraft were hit by the SAMs, the

big killers ofthe B-52s (fig. 73) . 43 Even though the defenders

fired more SAMs at the B-52Ds, the B-52Gs were hit and

12 1
downed more often, five destroyed on the first three

missions .

A second problem was that the B-52s were controlled, or

better put, overcontrolled, from SAC headquarters in

Omaha. SAC formed the basic battle plan and tactics literally thousands of miles from the actual combat. Initially,

SAC had a policy of no maneuvers on the bomb run, although such maneuvers often permitted aircraft to elude

the SAMS. 44 SAC also mandated a "press-on" procedure

which dictated that bombers continue their missions despite the loss of engines, computers, and most critically,

ECM equipment .45 Not surprisingly, with one headquarters

controlling the bombers and another the support aircraft,

there was a lack of coordination between the bombers and

their escorts, including two instances in which B-52s fired

on US aircraft. 46 Other coordination problems included US

radios jammed by EB-66 ECM and friendly radar severely

degraded by B-52 ECM.

Losses indicated that the ECM, the key to fending off the

SAMS, was inadequate. First, B-52 ECM protection markedly declined in the 100-degree turn immediately after

bomb release because the bank reduced the effectiveness of

the bomber's spot jammers . 48 Second, winds that differed

from forecasts in direction and speed upset the ECM protection of the chaff corridors . For example, on 20 December

only four of 27 B-52 cells received chaff protection at the

bomb-release line, and all of the B-52s downed were 5 to

10 miles from chaff cover. 49 Third, the North Vietnamese

gunners surprised the American airmen by using a radar

designed and deployed for gun control (designated T8209)

to guide the SA-2s . The American airmen lacked equipment

to both warn of and jam this "new" I-band radar.

The North Vietnamese took advantage of the stereotyped

tactics by salvoing barrages of SAMS at the point where the

B-52s executed their posttarget turns. The SAM operators

limited radar guidance to the last five to 10 seconds of

intercept, which made the tasks of the ECM operators and

122
Wild Weasels very difficult ." The American losses indicated that the airmen had to modify their operations.

Thus the Air Force formed a tactics panel and changed

tactics.

12 Although most US aircraft continued to fly their

missions about the same way, this was not true for the B52s. On the four missions between 21 and 24 December,

only 30 B-52Ds were employed in a single wave. In addition, the planners varied the timing, headings, and altitudes .

The airmen increased the amount of chaff, attempting to

lay a chaff blanket instead of a chaff corridor. Thus, instead

of 15 percent of the bombers receiving chaff protection at

the bomb release point, now 85 percent did . In all, US

airmen dropped 125 tons of chaff during Linebacker II .

Night hunter-killer teams were first used on 23 December

to nullify the SAM threat; however, bad weather permitted

only marginal results . The Air Force also quickly installed

jammers and modified ARMs for use against the I-band

radar that had surprised them .

13 But the American airmen

initially lacked the AGM-45 A-6 suitable for this job and

did not get these missiles until 27 December. The AGM78 (fig. 74) which also could be used against this band of

radar, was in short supply even before the commencement

of Linebacker 11. 54

The airmen hit Hanoi with these new tactics on 21 December and lost two B-52s and one A-6A. During the next

three nights bombs fell on targets in Haiphong and north

of Hanoi. The new tactics and new targets paid off as the

airmen lost only three aircraft on these three missions.

There was no bombing on 25 December, perhaps a gallant,

certainly a diplomatic gesture that allowed North Vietnamese defenders to rearm .

The attack on 26 December was one of a kind. The

United States sent 120 B-52s, the most on any of the Linebacker missions, against targets in Hanoi and Haiphong.

Although supported by 99 aircraft, two B-52s went down.

Both followed SAC's "press-on" procedures, attacked in

broken cells-formations of two rather than the normal

12 3
three bombers-and thus lacked adequate ECM power.

The remaining three missions (27-29 December) employed 60 B-52s each night, but otherwise fit the same pattern. Five aircraft (two B-52s) went down on 27 December.

There were no losses on the last two days.

In all, the B-52s dropped about 15,000 tons of bombs,

while tactical aircraft added another 5,000 tons of bombs."

Because there were only 12 hours of visual conditions during the 12-day operation, the airmen aimed the bulk of their

ordnance by nonvisual techniques such as radar and

LORAN. 56

Despite North Vietnamese claims of 81 aircraft destroyed

124
(38 B-52s), Linebacker 11 cost 27 aircraft of which 15 were

B-52s. 57 Compared to the 3 percent expected losses ,58 the

overall loss rate of below 2 percent and a B-52 loss rate

slightly above 2 percent were acceptable . Thus, airmen favorably compared the loss rates in Vietnam and especially

those of Linebacker 11 with those in World War 11 and

Korea. Such a comparison, however, disregards the fact that

Vietnam-era aircraft were much more expensive than their

predecessors, at the same time inventories and aircraft production were much smaller. 59

The American airmen throttled two parts of the North

Vietnamese air defenses. The small Communist air force

launched 32 aircraft, attempted interceptions with 20, but

scored no hits on the B-52s, and downed only two F-4s for

the loss of six MiGs. 6° American tactics (ECM, night, and

high-altitude operations), bad weather, and fighter escorts

nullified the MiGs. All but the latter did the same to North

Vietnamese AAA, which damaged only one B-52 and

downed three tactical aircraft .61 But if the American airmen

adequately handled the fighter and flak threats, the same

cannot be said of the SAMs.

During Linebacker 11, the North Vietnamese fired 1,285

SAMs which downed all 15 B-52s lost, as well as three other

aircraft .

12 The American airmen, however, did not target

the SAM sites until the sixth mission on 23 December and

did not attack them again until 27 December when B-52s

and F-111 s attacked the most effective single SAM site,

credited with downing five to nine B-52s . 63 US Air Force

hunter-killer units also attacked this site, designated by the

Americans as VN 549, with at least nine AGM-45s and two

AGM-78s. But VN 549 survived, and therefore, on 27 December briefers instructed the American bomber crews to

fly well clear of it . Rumors, never confirmed, circulated

that it was manned by Chinese gunners. The B-52 and F111 attacks on SAM sites continued on the last two days

of the operation, along with F-4 attacks on SAM storage

facilities . Despite these efforts, intelligence estimated that

125
only two sites were 50 percent damaged, eight were undamaged, and results against three were unknown . 64 It

should be noted that only 3 percent of the bombs fell on

SAM targets as compared with 5 .3 percent that fell on airfields. 65 The saving grace was that by 29 December the

North Vietnamese had run out of SAMs, leaving the North

essentially defenseless . 66

Clearly Linebacker II was an outstanding feat of arms.

After years of restrictions and frustrations, American airmen were able, in typical blunt American fashion, to directly take on and defeat a formidable air defense system.

For the United States, and especially the airmen, this was

a proud, satisfactory way to end the war, or at least end

American involvement . But the tactical aspects, the victory,

should not obscure the fact that strategic bombing did not

achieve decisive ends in Vietnam: the final treaty was substantially the same as the agreements made in October.

Conclusions

The American airmen were unprepared for the war

fought in the skies over Southeast Asia: unprepared in terms

of the political restrictions levied on them, the scant targets

they had to attack, and the nature of a long conventional

war they had to fight. As the realities of battle forced them

to change both their tactics and equipment, the airmen had

to relearn the lessons ofthe past, and in the process suffered

substantial losses. They again found that enemy antiaircraft

defenses, SAMs (but most of all AAA) rather than aircraft,

presented the major obstacle to air operations. They again

learned how dangerous it was to fly close to the ground in

the face of intense ground fire. They again realized that

attacking enemy antiaircraft positions (SAM and AAA) was

dangerous and of dubious value. Most of all, they saw that

the tactics used in World War II and Korea were relevant

for modern air warfare.

126
SAMs greatly enhanced the power of the defense and

represented new difficulties to the airmen. Their impact

must be measured not only by the number of aircraft they

destroyed, but in two other ways. First, SAMs forced aircraft into the teeth of the guns, which were very effective.

Second, to counter the missiles, the airmen had to expand

the total number of support sorties, a requirement which

increased as the war progressed. Another disturbing weapon

introduced was the man-portable SAM. Although not possessing great lethality, it was easily concealed, highly mobile, and it gave one man the power to down a multimillion

dollar aircraft .

Countermeasures helped keep American aircraft losses

to a manageable rate. One Air Force officer estimated that

ECM reduced losses by 25 percent, while a Navy officer

put the figure at 80 percent.68 Nevertheless, air operations

were expensive both in losses and effort. Communist gunners proved a worthy and resourceful foe, although limited

by second-rate Soviet equipment. Yet, despite the able

Communist air defense tactics and their adaptation to the

changing tactical situation, the American airmen gradually

increased their edge. The big improvement for the offensive

side came with the use of ECM and antiradiation and standoff weapons . These increased accuracy and decreased

losses . In the full-scale operations of Linebacker Il, the

American airmen showed that massive application of modern aircraft with modern equipment could succeed against

defenses limited in numbers and quality. 69

NOTES

l . Bernard Fall, Hell in a Very Small Place: The Siege ofDien Bien

Phu (Philadelphia, Pa. : J. P. Lippincott, 1966), 31-34, 49, 133, 144,

454-55; William Leary, "CAT at Dien Bien Phu," Aerospace Historian, September 1984, 178-80, 183 ; Robert F. Futrell, The United

127
States Air Force in Southeast Asia: The Advisory Years to 1965 (Washington, D.C. : Office of Air Force History, 1981), 19-20, 116; V J.

Croizat, trans ., A Translation from the French: Lessons of the War in

Indochina, vol. 2, Rand Report RM-5271-PR (Santa Monica, Calif. :

Rand Corp., May 1967), 292, 302.

2. Futrell, The United States Air Force in Southeast Asia, 158-59,

163, 196.

3 . Benjamin F. Schemmer, "Vietnam Casualty Rates Dropped 37%

after Cambodia Raid," Armed Forces Journal, 18 January 1971, 30;

Michael McCrea, "U.S. Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force FixedWing Aircraft Losses and Damage in Southeast Asia (1962-1973),"

Center for Naval Analyses study, August 1976, 2-1, 2-13, 2-19, 2-20

[AUL-M31914-22] ; Futrell, The United States Air Force in Southeast

Asia, 116.

4. The Pentagon Papers, ed. The Senator Gravel (Boston, Mass. :

Beacon Press, 1975), 3:269; Lon O. Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile

Age (Washington, D.C. : Smithsonian Institution Press, 1985), 11 .

5 . The Pentagon Papers, 3 :294-95; Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 15, 18; U. S. Grant Sharp, Strategy for Defeat: Vietnam in

Retrospect (San Rafael, Calif: Presidio Press, 1978), xiii-xiv, 271 ; Lou

Drendel, . . . And Kill MiGs: Air to Air Combat in the Vietnam War

(Carrollton, Tex. : Squadron Signal Publishers, 1984), 8 ; David Halbertstam, The Best and the Brightest (New York: Random House,

1972), 367-68; Richard Kohn, chief of Air Force history, interview

with author, June 1986.

6 . For especially sharp criticism of the airmen, see Hanson Baldwin,

"Introduction," in Jack Broughton, Thud Ridge (Philadelphia, Pa. : J.

P. Lippincott, 1969), 12-13; and Dana Drenkowski, "Operation Linebacker II," Soldier ofFortune, September 1977.

7. This aircraft was poorly designed, having essentially no backup

for its vital hydraulic controls. Of 617 US Air Force aircraft lost over

North Vietnam, 280 were F-105s . McCrea, "Fixed-Wing Aircraft

Losses," 6-47. In addition to a total of 334 F-105 combat losses in

Southeast Asia, there were 63 operational losses . John Granville,

"Summary of USAF Aircraft Losses in SEA," Tactical Air Command

study, 1974, 22, 36, 57 [AFHRC-K417.042-16] .

8 . Broughton, Thud Ridge, 22, 96; William W. Momyer, Air Power

in Three Wars (Washington, D.C. : Department ofthe Air Force, 1978),

126.

9. This was half of North Vietnam's MiG-21 inventory . R. Frank

Futrell et al ., eds., Aces and Aerial Victories : The United States Air

Force in Southeast Asia, 1965-1973 (Washington, D.C. : Government

Printing Office, 1976), 35-42 .

12 8
10 . The Navy MiG kill ratio in Vietnam was 3 .86:1 (54 MiGs destroyed) and the Air Force's was 2.15:1 (129 MiGs destroyed). "Southeast Asia Air-to-Air Combat," Armed Forces Journal International,

May 1974, 38 . In World War II, USAAF fighters had a 3.55:1 edge

in air-to-air combat against Germany and 4.25 :1 against Japan. The

Navy and Marine Corps' ratio against Japan was 12 .97 :1 . United

States Army Air Forces, Army Air Forces Statistical Digest: World War

II (Washington, D.C. : Office of Statistical Control, 1945), 255-61,

263-68; Adm Louis E. Denfeld, chief of naval operations, US Navy,

address on the occasion of the 37th anniversary of naval aviation, 9

May 1949 [NHC]. In the Korean War, US Air Force fighter pilots ran

up a 6 .82:1 score of victories to losses in air-to-air combat. Larry

Davis, MiG Alley: Air to Air Combat Over Korea (Carrollton, Tex. :

Squadron Signal Publishers, 1978), 70; USAF Creditsfor the Destruction of Enemy Aircraft Korean War, USAF Historical Study no. 81

(Maxwell AFB, Ala. : Albert F. Simpson Historical Research Center,

Air University, 1975).

11 . A further 15 percent fell to SAMs, 7 percent to MiGs, 2 percent

to friendly causes, and 10 percent to unknown causes. McCrea,

"Fixed-Wing Aircraft Losses," 6-29, 6-46, 6-55; Granville, "Summary

of USAF Aircraft Losses," 11 .

12. Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 13; Paul Burbage et

al ., "The Battle for the Skies Over North Vietnam," in Air WarVietnam (Indianapolis, Ind. : Bobbs-Merrill Co., Inc., 1978), 224;

Schemmer, "Vietnam Casualty Rates," table 351 ; Institute for Defense Analyses, Jason study, "The Bombing of North Vietnam," December 1967, 2:49 [Box 247, Lyndon B. Johnson Library, Austin,

Tex .] .

13. Report of the Central Intelligence Agency, "The Effectiveness

of the Rolling Thunder Program in North Vietnam: 1 January-30

September 1966," November 1966, A-2, A-16; CIA, "Report on Rolling Thunder," 1966, 6 [Both Box 221, Lyndon B. Johnson Library,

Austin, Tex.] ; Institute for Defense Analyses, Jason study, "The

Bombing of North Vietnam," 3:49-50 ; Raphael Littauer and Norman

Uphoff, eds., The Air War in Indochina, rev. ed. (Boston, Mass. : Beacon Press, 1971), 283 .

14 . McCrea, "Fixed-Wing Aircraft Losses," 2-3; Futrell, Aces and

Aerial Victories, 4 .

15. Cable to White House Situation Room, 12/16437 May, 1 ; Intelligence Memorandum, "Status Report on SAMs in North Vietnam," 29 June 1965, 1-2; and Memorandum, "CIA Appreciation of

SA-2 Activity in North Vietnam During Late July," 1 August 1965,

1, in CIA Research Reports: Vietnam and Southeast Asia, 1946-1976,

12 9
ed. Paul Kesaris (Frederick, Md. : University Publications, 1983); Futrell, Aces and Aerial Victories, 5; Notes of Lyndon B. Johnson, White

House meeting, 16 May 1965, 3 [Lyndon B . Johnson Library, Austin,

Tex.] ; Thomas D. Boettcher, Vietnam: The Valor and the Sorrow (Boston, Mass. : Little, Brown and Co., 1985), 232.

16. Apparently the Soviets fired 14 SA-2s at Francis G. Powers in

1960: 12 missed, one destroyed a MiG-19, and one got the U-2, R. A.

Mason, ed., War in the Third Dimension: Essays in Contemporary Air

Power (London: Brassey's, 1986), 105 . John W. R. Taylor, ed., Jane's

All the World's Aircraft, 1967-68 (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Co.,

1967), 521-22 ; C. M. Plattner, "SAMs Spur Changes, in Combat Tactics, New Equipment," Aviation Week, 24 January 1966, 26, 30; US

Army, "Air Defense Artillery Reference Handbook," study, 1977, 18-

19 [AUL-M39991-9]; Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 15;

Laurence R. Jensen, "Use of Intelligence Information to Determine

Countermeasures Requirements for the SA-2" (Thesis, Air Command

and Staff School, Maxwell AFB, Ala., 1966), 9-10 [AUL-MU35582-

7 J54u].

17. Jensen, "Use of Intelligence," 28-42; Richard Rash, "Electronic

Combat: Making the Other Guy Die for His Country!" (Thesis, Air

War College, Maxwell AFB, Ala., March 1983), 7, 92 [AUL-M43117-

R224E]; Momyer, Air Power, 138 .

18. McCrea, "Fixed-Wing Aircraft Losses," 2-10; Granville, "Summary of USAF Aircraft Losses," 10-11 ; US Pacific Fleet, "An Analysis

of SA2 Missile Activity in North Vietnam from July 1965 through

March 1968," staff study 8-68, October 1968, 2 [NHC] .

19. Momyer, Air Power, 136.

20. Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 16; Peter B. Mersky

and Norman Polmar, The Naval Air War in Vietnam .(Annapolis, Md. :

Nautical and Aviation, 1981), 61 ; Bryce Walker, Fighting Jets (Alexandria, Va. : Time-Life Books, 1983), 112; M. J. Armitage and R. A.

Mason, Air Power in the Nuclear Age, 2d ed. (Urbana, Ill . : University

of Illinois, 1985), 108.

21 . Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 18; CIA, "Effectiveness

of Air Campaign," B-22; Maj Paul Burbage et al., "Air Superiority

Tactics Over North Vietnam," (U) (Thesis, Air Command and Staff

College, Maxwell AFB, Ala., 1975), 13 [AUL-M43034-2] . (SECRETInformation extracted is unclassified .)

22 . Futrell, Aces and Aerial Victories, 4-5; Nordeen, Air Warfare in

the Missile Age, 13 ; Gordon Swanborough and Peter M. Bowers,

United States Navy Aircraft Since 1911 (New York: Funk and Wagnalls

Co., 1968), 177-78; Gordon Swanborough and Peter M. Bowers,

United States Military Aircraft Since 1908, rev. ed. (London: Putnam,

130
1971), 267-69 ; Julian S. Lake and Richard V. Hartman, "Air Electronic Warfare," U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, October 1976, 46;

"US Marine Corps Forces in Vietnam: March 1965-Sept 1967, Historical Summary," vol. 2 :36 .

23. Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 16; Burbage, The Battle

for the Skies, 240.

24. McCrea, "Fixed-Wing Aircraft Losses," 2-24, 2-29 ; USAF Pacific Command Scientific Advisory Group, "Shrike Missile Effectiveness under Rolling Thunder Operations" (Working paper 1-67,

headquarters of the commander in chief Pacific, Scientific Advisory

Group, January 1967), 1 [AUL-M42294-2] ; USAF Pacific Command

Scientific Advisory Group, "Shrike Effectiveness under Rolling Thunder Operation, First Quarter, 1967," (U) (Working paper 7-67, assistant for operations analysis, Headquarters Pacific Air Forces, April

1967), 1 [AUL-M38434-13 #67-9] . (SECRET-Information extracted

is unclassified.) Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 18-19; Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, uncoordinated draft, "Linebacker Study," staff study, January 1973, 7 [AFHRC-K712.041-19] ;

Burbage, The Battle for the Skies, 247.

25. Report of Tactical Air Command, Directorate of Fighter Operations, "SEA Tactics Review Brochure," April 1973, 2:77-79 [AULM41737-283] ; Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 19, 22; Swanborough and Bowers, United States Military Aircraft, 471 ; Momyer,

Air Power, 130.

26. McCrea, "Fixed-Wing Aircraft Losses," 2-24; Nordeen, Air

Warfare in the Missile Age, 23-24; Burbage, The Battle for the Skies,

240; Momyer, Air Power, 127; Lake and Hartman, "Air Electronic

Warfare," 47.

27. Littauer and Uphoff, The Air War in Indochina, 283.

28 . Schemmer, "Vietnam Casualty Rates," table 351 .

29. Ibid. ; Carl Berger et al ., eds., The United States Air Force in

Southeast Asia: 1961-1973 (Washington, D.C. : Office of Air Force

History, 1977), 116; Armitage and Mason, Air Power in the Nuclear

Age, 92; James Coath and Michael Kilian, Heavy Losses: The Dangerous Decline ofAmerica's Defense (New York: Penguin Books, 1985),

136-37; Warren R. Young, The Helicopters (Alexandria, Va. : TimeLife Books, 1982), 140; Peter Mersky, US Marine Corps Aviation: 1912

to the Present (Baltimore, Md. : Nautical & Aviation, 1987), 244. In

Vietnam, one helicopter was hit for every 450 sorties, one downed

for every 7,000 sorties, and one lost for every 20,000 sorties. Peter

Borgart, "The Vulnerability ofthe Manned Airborne Weapon System,

Part 3 : Influence on Tactics and Strategy," International Defense Review, December 1977, 1065 .

13 1
30. Claude G. Morita, "Implication of Modern Air Power in a

Limited War" (Report of interview with Gen John W. Vogt, Jr., commander, Seventh Air Force, Office of Pacific Air Forces History, 29

November 1973),23-24 [AUL-M38245-228] ; John A. Doglione, "Airpower and the 1972 Spring Invasion," Air War-Vietnam, 142, 197 ;

Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 64; G. H . Turley, "Time of

Change in Modern Warfare," Marine Corps Gazette, December 1974,

18; Center for Naval Analyses, "Documentation and Analysis of U.S.

Marine Corps Activity in Southeast Asia: 1 April-31 July 1972,"

1 :110-11 [Marine Corps Historical Center]; Lake and Hartman, "Air

Electronic Warfare," 47.

31 . Doglione, "Airpower and the 1972 Spring Invasion," 132; Berger, The USAF in SEA, 168; Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age,

64; House, Hearings before the Subcommittee of the Committee on

Appropriations, 93d Cong., 1st sess., 9 January 1973, 10; Center for

Naval Analyses, "Summary of Air Operations in Southeast Asia: January 1972-31 January 1973," OEG/OP508N, January 1974, 4-17, 4-

19 .

32. Seymour Hersh, The Price ofPower: Kissinger in the Nixon White

House (New York: Summit Books, 1983), 506; Richard Nixon, RN.-

The Memoirs ofRichard Nixon (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1976),

606-7.

33 . Guenter Lewy, America in Vietnam (New York: Oxford University, 1978), 410; Hersh, The Price of Power, 526.

34 . TAC, "SEA Tactics Review Brochure," II, 68.

35 . Guided weapons were expensive, limited by the weather, and

few in number. Directorate of Operations Analysis, Headquarters Pacific Air Forces, Project Contemporary Historical Examination of

Current Operations Report, "Linebacker: Overview of the First 120

Days," 27 September 1973, 21, 27 [AUL-M38245-221 ] ; Nordeen, Air

Warfare in the Missile Age, 59, 63. One problem encountered with the

ECM pods was that they created interference with the electro-optical

guided bomb (EOGB) guidance system. A wire screen quickly solved

that problem. Patrick J. Breitling, "Guided Bomb Operations in SEA:

The Weather Dimensions, 1 February-31 December 1972," Contemporary Historical Examination of Current Operations Report, 1 October 1973, 3, 24 [AUL-M38245-223]; Jeffrey P. Rhodes, "Improving

the Odds on Ground Attack," Air Force Magazine, November 1986,

48; Delbert Corum, "The Tale of Two Bridges," in Air War-Vietnam,

85-86 ; Morita, Vogt interview, 6.

36. Momyer, Air Power, 129; Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, "Linebacker Study"; Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age,

24; Senate, Committee on Armed Services, Hearing Fiscal Year 1974

13 2
Authorization, 92d Cong., 2d sess., 13-20 March 1973, pt. 6 :4275.

37. TAC, "SEA Tactics Review Brochure," II, 78. During the period

of 10 May through 10 September 1972, the United States lost 63 fixedwing aircraft in combat over the North: 21 to AAA, 22 to MiGs, and

20 to SAMs.

38 . Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, "Uncoordinated

Draft," 7, chap. 8; Burbage, The Battle for the Skies, 267; Directorate

of Operations Analysis, "Linebacker," 70-72; DOD, OAD, "US Aircraft Losses in SE Asia," October 1973, table 351, 5 ; R. Mark Clodfelter, "By Other Means: An Analysis of the Linebacker Bombing

Campaigns as Instruments of National Policy" (Master's thesis, University of Nebraska, 1983), 77; Center for Naval Analyses, "Summary

of Air Ops in SEA: Jan 72-Jan 73," 4-1, 4-8, 4-19, and 4-23 .

39. Marvin and Bernard Kalb, Kissinger (Boston, Mass. : Little,

Brown and Co., 1974), 412 ; Clodfelter, "By Other Means," 105, 111 ;

W. Hays Parks, "Linebacker and the Law of War," Air University Review 34 (January-February 1983) : 16 ; Nixon, Memoirs, 734.

40. Broughton, Thud Ridge, 36 .

41 . Briefing Books IV (U), Headquarters US Air Force, details on

the Linebacker II missions, 2 vols., December 1972 [AFSHRCK143 .042-12]. (SECRET-Information extracted is unclassified.)

42. Norman Polmar, ed., Strategic Air Command. People, Aircraft

and Missiles (Annapolis, Md. : Nautical & Aviation, 1979), 126; Granville, "Summary of USAF Aircraft Losses," 18; James McCarthy and

George Allison, Linebacker IL A View from the Rock (Maxwell AFB,

Ala. : Airpower Research Institute, 1979), 12; Karl Eschmann, "The

Role of Tactical Air Support: Linebacker II" (Thesis, Air Command

and Staff College, Maxwell AFB, Ala., 1985), 70-72 [AUL-M43122

E741 r] .

43. Eschmann, "The Role of Tactical Air Support," 49, 70-72;

McCarthy and Allison, Linebacker II, 86. On these first three missions,

1 .6 percent of the "Ds" and 4.9 percent of the "Gs" went down per

sortie . In the entire 11-day campaign, the "Ds" suffered 1 .8 percent

and the "Gs" 2.7 percent losses . About 10 percent of the missiles fired

against the "Gs" impacted, whereas only 3 percent of those fired

against the "Ds" did likewise. Headquarters US Air Force, Briefing

Books, December 1972; Briefing, Headquarters Pacific Air Forces,

"Operations Analysis: Linebacker II Air Operations" (U), 31 January

1973 [AFHRC-K168.06-232]. (SECRET-Information extracted is

unclassified .) The gunners on B-52Gs were stationed in the tail, where

they used either electronic or visual sighting. McCarthy and Allison,

Linebacker II, 70; Eschmann, "The Role of Tactical Air Support," 49.

44. This policy quickly changed beginning with the second wave on

133
the second day. McCarthy and Allison, Linebacker II, 46-47.

45. Robert Clement, "A Fourth of July in December: A B-52 Navigator's Perspective ofLinebacker II" (Thesis, Air Command and Staff

College, Maxwell AFB, Ala., 1984), 18, 49 [AUL-M43122 C626f] ;

McCarthy and Allison, Linebacker II, 30, 32 .

46. Headquarters USAF, "Linebacker USAF Bombing Survey,"

1973, 35 [AFHRC-K717.64-8] ; TAC, "SEA Tactics Review Brochure,"

II, 77; Eschmann, "The Role of Tactical Air Support," 60.

47. Eschmann, "The Role of Tactical Air Support," 60, 63; Clodfelter, "By Other Means," 121 .

48 . TAC, "SEA Tactics Review Brochure," II, 76.

49 . Strategic Air Command Briefing, subject : Chaff Effectiveness

in Support of Linebacker II Operations, March 1973 [AFHRCK168 .06-223] .

50. Ibid .

51 . TAC, "SEA Tactics Review Brochure," II, 76 .

52 . "The Battle for the Skies Over North Vietnam: 1964-1972," 94

[AFHRC-K239.043-14].

53 . SAC, "Chaff Effectiveness," March 1973 ; TAC, "SEA Tactics

Review Brochure," II, 76.

54 . SAC, "Chaff Effectiveness," March 1973; for a general discussion ofthe changes, also see Clement, "A Fourth ofJuly in December,"

49 ; Eschmann, "The Role of Tactical Air Support," 75-76; McCarthy

and Allison, Linebacker II, 97, 121 ; History, 388th Tactical Fighter

Wing, October-December 1972, 27, 32-33.

55. B-52s flew 708, F-Ills 148, A-7s 226, and F-4s 283 effective

sorties. Headquarters US Air Force, Briefing Books, II .

56. During periods of limited visibility, the TAC fighters scored

some remarkable successes, most notably hitting two especially difficult targets, the Hanoi thermal plant and Radio Hanoi . The latter,

protected by a 25-foot-high and 10-foot-thick blast wall, had survived

the bombing of 36 B-52s. F-4s got four laser-guided bombs inside the

walls and destroyed the target . Clodfelter, "By Other Means," 120;

assistant chief of staff, Intelligence (ACSI), "Linebacker 11 : 18-29 Dec.

72" (U), supporting document III-K1 [AFHRC-TS-HOA-74-197] .

(TOP SECRET-Information extracted is unclassified.)

57. History, Air Force Intelligence Service, 1 July 1972-30 June

1973 : Linebacker II Summary III, K2 ; Center for Naval Analyses

study, "U.S . Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force Fixed-Wing Aircraft

Losses and Damage in Southeast Asia (1962-1973), Part I : List of

Aircraft Lost," report no. CRC 305 (Alexandria, Va. : Defense Documentation Center, 1977), 191-93, 223, 488-92 [AUL-M31914-22

#305 (a) v. I] . Eschmann, "The Role of Tactical Air Support," 103-

134
4, lists 30 aircraft destroyed, including three lost in accidents. Futrell,

Aces and Aerial Victories, 17, states that 27 US Air Force aircraft were

lost. The North Vietnamese claimed 81 United States aircraft (34 B52s). Gareth Porter, A Peace Denied: The United States, Vietnam, and

the Paris Agreements (Bloomington, Ind. : Indiana University, 1975),

161-62; Richard Holloran, "Bombing Halt Brings Relief to B-52

Crews in Guam," New York Times, 2 January 1973, 3 . Drenkowski,

"Operations Linebacker Il," pt. 2, 55, says that 22 to 27 B-52s were

destroyed .

58. Clodfelter, "By Other Means," 108; Clement, "A Fourth of July

in December," 47.

59. Headquarters US Air Force, Briefing Books, I and II .

60. Eschmann, "The Role of Tactical Air Support," 108; Berger et

al., The USAF in SEA, 60; Drendel, And KillMiGs, 47,73 ; SAC, "Chaff

Effectiveness," March 1973 ; McCarthy and Allison, Linebacker II, 65,

116; Futrell, Aces and Aerial Victories, 125.

61 . Eschmann, "The Role of Tactical Air Support," 46.

62. Center for Naval Analyses, "Summary of Air Ops SEA: Jan 72-

Jan 73," 4-17. The North Vietnamese did not have the most modern

equipment; in the 1973 Middle East War the Egyptians and Syrians

inflicted heavy losses on Israeli aircraft with Soviet SA-3 and SA-6

missiles and ZSU-23-4 guns, equipment not employed in the Vietnam

War. See chapter 4 . The North Vietnamese may have improved and

manned their defenses without the help or knowledge of the Soviets .

Porter, A Peace Denied, 161 ; Jon M. Van Dyke, North Vietnam's Strategy for Survival (Palo Alto, Calif. : Pacific Books, 1972), 61, 217.

63 . On the third day of the campaign, a SAC commander ordered

a search for North Vietnamese SAM storage facilities. Within 18

hours, the intelligence people began to find them, whereupon SAC

requested JCS permission to bomb them. Permission for all but one

was forthcoming, although it took another 24 to 36 hours. As a result,

these targets were not hit until 26 December. McCarthy and Allison,

Linebacker II, 97-98 .

64. Ibid., 155; Eschmann, "The Role of Tactical Air Support," 94;

George Allison, "The Bombers Go to the Bullseye," Aerospace Historian, December 1982, 233 ; History, 388th Tactical Fighter Wing,

October-December 1972 .

65 . While several helicopters and transports were destroyed on the

ground, intelligence claimed that only two to three MiG-21 s were

damaged. The bulk of the bombs fell on railroad yards (44 percent)

and storage facilities (30 percent). ACSI, "Linebacker II"; Headquarters USAF, "Linebacker USAF Bombing Survey," 3, 14, 16-17,

40-43 .

13 5
66. Clodfelter, "By Other Means," 127. The airmen had also run

out of worthwhile targets in the Hanoi-Haiphong area . McCarthy and

Allison, Linebacker 11, 163 .

67. It would be ahistorical to maintain, however, that the same terms

could have been reached in October.

68. Momyer, Air Power, 126; Senate, Fiscal 1974 Authorization Hearing, pt. 6:4253 .

69. American antiaircraft gunners tracked very few targets during

the course of the Vietnam War. There were at least two incidents of

North Vietnamese aircraft attacking American ground or sea forces.

Although some US Army AAA units served in the war, none fired

their weapons against hostile aircraft. The Navy credits its gunners,

however, with downing three North Vietnamese MiGs. The first fell

to a Talos missile fired from the Long Beach in November 1968, the

second to a Terrier fired by the Sterett on 19 April 1972, and the third

to a Talos fired by the Chicago on 9 May 1972. History, Seventh Fleet,

1972, enclosures 1, 20, 25 (NHC] ; McCrea, "Fixed-Wing Aircraft

Losses," 2-30 .

136
CHAPTER 4

RECENT EXPERIENCE

Recent experience offers several instances where groundbased air defense systems made the difference . This chapter

discusses the Arab-Israeli War, American air strikes in the

Middle East, Indian-Pakistani Wars, the Falkland War, and

other recent and ongoing conflicts .

Arab-Israeli Wars

Of the numerous non-American conflicts since 1945,

none have stirred more military interest than those between

Arabs and Jews . Their number, Western sympathies, Israeli

successes against great odds, and the employment of modern equipment on a large scale are all factors which generate

this interest . Israeli predominance in the air attracts particular attention. For Israeli, air power plays and continues

to play a vital role in their successful military record.

1948, 1956, and 1967

Although Arab and Jew have been fighting each other for

a long time, the airmen's interest focuses on their conflicts

since 1967, in which air power has played a significant role.

Both sides employed aircraft in the 1948 and 1956 wars,

but these forces consisted of small numbers of obsolete, or

obsolescent, aircraft . In 1956 the Israelis lost 10 to 15 aircraft out of a total inventory of 136-155, most to ground

fire, and claimed eight aerial victories .' In the 1967 and

1973 conflicts, however, the combatants used modern

137
equipment and air power became critical, if not

predominant.

It can be argued that air power won its most striking

victory of all time in the June 1967 war. Preemptive strikes

by the Israeli Air Force (IAF) on the first day destroyed the

bulk of the numerically superior Arab air forces on the

ground, permitting Israeli armor and close-support aircraft

to decisively crush the numerically superior Arab ground

forces. On that first day, the IAF destroyed 85 percent of

the Egyptian Air Force and a total of 410 Arab aircraft in

exchange for 19 aircraft lost (all but two or three to ground

fire) . This short, sharp war cost the Israelis a total of 40 to

50 aircraft (all but three to 12 to ground fire). In contrast,

the Arab air forces lost about 450 aircraft, mostly on the

ground, including 60-79 to Israeli aircraft and about 50 to

Israeli ground-based air defenses. 2

Although the Egyptians had 18 to 25 batteries of SA-2s,

those batteries had no direct effect on the battle . Their SAM

operators fired perhaps 12 missiles but registered no kills,

although possibly one hit. The unclassified sources do not

mention a breakdown of Israeli credits for their surfacebased air defense systems, but apparently an Israeli Hawk

downed an IAF A-4 on 5 June . The damaged fighterbomber apparently penetrated a restricted area around an

Israeli nuclear facility.'

1967-73

The Israelis gained a phenomenal military victory and

new territories in the 1967 War, but they did not win peace.

Soviet resupply of her Arab clients led to a drawn-out land

and air war of attrition along the Suez Canal, the new border between Egypt and Israel. Between July 1967 and January 1970, the IAF lost 15 aircraft (13 to ground fire) while

it claimed 74 Egyptian and Syrian aircraft . In September

October 1969, the IAF took out the Egyptian SAMS. In

138
January 1970 the Israelis received US ECM pods and,

within three months, neutralized the Egyptian air defense

system by destroying three-fourths of its early warning

radar.

The Soviets countered in early 1970 by sending more

missiles, including the SA-3, to Egypt. Although the SA-3's

range was about one-third to one-half that of the SA-2 (slant

range of 13-17 miles compared to SA-2's slant range of 25-

30 miles), the former could operate against lower-flying

aircraft . The missiles became operational in April 1970,

and by the end of June the Egyptians had a total of 55 SAM

batteries. Soviet technicians, operators, and pilots bolstered

the Egyptian air defenses, which, in essence, they took over.

The air war heated up in late June when SAMs downed

three IAF aircraft in one week. Meanwhile, the IAF attacked the Egyptian SAMs and destroyed five batteries. On

8 July 1970 the two opponents agreed to a cease-fire; and

although the battle subsided, tensions remained and the lull

permitted the Egyptians to rebuild their defenses along the

canal. In the war of attrition (July 1967 to May 1973), the

Israelis lost 27 aircraft (25 to ground fire) and the Arabs

lost 162 aircraft (13 to Hawks and 24 to 37-mm and 40-

mm guns).

1973

The joint Egyptian-Syrian attack on Israel on 6 October

1973 took both the world and the Israelis by surprise. Because of the overwhelming superiority of the IAF, no one

expected the Arab armies to win; therefore, no one expected

them to attack. Conventional wisdom held that air superiority was vital to victory. After all, aviation had ruled the

battlefield since 1939, or, put another way, victory was possible only under friendly or at least neutral skies . This view

conveniently overlooked the various guerrilla wars and

most especially the Vietnam War. During the first days of

139
the conflict, the two Arab states used their air forces sparingly. They relied primarily on ground-based air defense

systems and were modest in their air plans, attempting only

to gain local and limited air superiority. On day one, the

Egyptians flew 200-240 sorties while their armies advanced

under a protective umbrella of surface-based air defense

weapons.

This umbrella was massive, mixed, and mobile. The

Egyptians emphasized their surface-based air defense force

(formed as a separate service in 1968), which has three

times as many personnel as did their air force and which

comprised one-fourth of their total armed forces . The Syrian air defense was smaller in size, but much denser because

its battlefield was smaller. The Syrians manned perhaps 47

SAM batteries (32-35 SA-6s and the rest SA-2s and SA3s), while the Egyptians operated 150 batteries, of which

46 were SA-6s. 5

The Arabs fielded not only a large number but also a

great assortment of Soviet equipment. The vast number of

guns was imposing, although the most modern was the

small number of four-barrel 23-mm ZSU-23-4 . The missile

arsenal included the SA-2 and SA-7 employed in Vietnam,

the SA-3 employed in the war of attrition, and a new missile, the SA-6 (fig . 75). The Arab air defense system was

more than just large and varied, for, unlike the immobile

North Vietnamese defenses (except for light AAA and SA7s), the Arab air defenses could move, as the ZSU-23-4 and

SA-6 were vehicle mounted, and the SA-7 and SA-9 were

man portable . What must be emphasized is that the impact

of the Arab air defenses came from the combination of

numbers, mixture, mobility, and modernity, as the IAF

soon found out.'

The SA-6, the most modern of these weapons, had been

observed in 1967 but had not been seen in action. It was

a relatively small, smokeless missile weighing about 1,200

pounds, permitting three to be mounted on a converted

(PT-76) tank chassis. The missile was faster (2.5-2.8 Mach)

140
and much more sophisticated than the other Soviet SAMs,

as it used radar to guide its initial flight and rapidly changed

frequencies, and then homed in on its prey using heat-seeking sensors. (The SA-6 used a filter, as did the SA-7, to

counter the use of flares intended to decoy its infrared sensor.) Although its 17-25 mile slant range is comparable to

the SA-2's and SA-3's, the SA-6 could kill aircraft flying at

low altitudes . Therefore, the combination of newness, mobility, high speed, sophisticated guidance, and low-altitude

capability gave the SA-6 a powerful potential . While it did

not produce the 97-percent kill rate promised by the Soviets, it downed many aircraft and forced IAF aircraft into

Arab AAA, especially the ZSU-23.'

The ZSU-23-4 (fig . 76) was a very effective AAA piece.

Mounted on a modified PT-76 tank chassis, its four 23-

mm barrels could fire at a maximum rate of 4,000 rounds

per minute, although gunners never just held the trigger
down but instead were trained to fire in short bursts of 75

or so rounds. A radar with a 12-mile range directed the

guns, which could reach an effective range of about 4,000

feet. There were also optical sights. Similar to the SA-6, the

weapon's chief assets were its low-altitude capability, mobility, and the fact that the West had not previously observed it in action. 8

Following the initial Arab assault, as expected, the Israelis

quickly launched tank and aircraft counterattacks to blunt

the advance of the invading Arab armies, to succor the

outnumbered and outgunned forward defenders, and to

shield Israel's mobilization. However, Israel's tankers, airmen, equipment, and tactics failed against Arab missiles

and guns . On the Suez front, the IAF lost four aircraft in

their first strike; and on the Golan Heights front, they lost

four out of four aircraft on the first wave and two of four

aircraft on the second wave. Some claim that Arab gunners

downed as many as 30 to 40 Israeli aircraft on the first day

of the war.

During the first three days, the IAF lost dozens of aircraft

142
at the Suez front, perhaps as many as 50. These heavy losses

(twice the rate of the 1967 war) shocked the Israelis, who

for the moment stopped flying within 10-15 miles of the

Suez Canal. But the grave military situation required the

IAF to continue its efforts, especially on the critical Syrian

front. During the first week, the IAF lost a total of 78-90

aircraft, a sizable percentage of their force and of what were

to be their overall losses. 9

The SA-7 had little direct impact on the battle and probably served most as a nuisance to the Israelis and a morale

booster to the Arabs . Despite an infrared (IR) filter, the

shoulder-fired SAM downed only two fixed-wing aircraft,

although it damaged 30 others. Aircraft could outrun and

outmaneuver the missile, as US airmen had proved the year

before. In addition, the SA-7 lacked killing power; it hit

aircraft in the tail, where its small warhead did not inflict

serious damage. A vehicle-mounted arrangement, the SA8 fitted with eight SA-7s, was no more effective.'°

On the other hand, the SA-6 proved especially effective

both directly by destroying a sizable proportion of IAF aircraft and indirectly by forcing Israeli aircraft into Arab

AAA fire . The SAM's rapid speed and its new and changing

frequencies were difficult to counter. The overconfidence

of the Israelis, their neglect of ECM (at one point, the IAF

stripped ECM from their aircraft for greater economy,

speed, and maneuverability), and US restrictions on ECM

sales left the IAF in a serious bind . Israeli improvisation

was speedy and effective, yet costly.' 1

The IAF used a variety of means to deal with the SAM

threat. To spoof heat-seeking missiles, the IAF employed

aircraft maneuvering, such as violent maneuvers, turning

toward the missile, to present the IR seeker a "cold side,"

and maneuvering aircraft to cross in the sky creating a "hot

spot." In addition, Israeli airmen dropped flares and even

jettisoned fuel and then ignited it in order to decoy the

heat-seeking missiles. Spotters in helicopters warned pilots

of missile launches . The IAF also used chaff, first carried

143
in speed brakes, later in a more conventional manner, improved American ECM pods, and standoff jammers operating from the ground, helicopters, and transports .

In addition, the Israelis directly assaulted the SA-6s. The

SA-6's low initial trajectory encouraged the IAF to divebomb the SAMs from very steep angles: desperate measures

improvised for a desperate situation. The IAF also fired

Shrike antiradiation missiles.

12

The Israelis turned around the air war, and to a degree

the ground action, by taking out the Arab SAMs. Concentrating first on the Syrians, the IAF destroyed half of their

SAMs in four days. One source claims that the Israelis

knocked out a Syrian control center which seriously hampered the Syrian missile defenses . The Syrians were defeated and only political restraints prevented a much greater

Israeli victory.'

The solution to the IAF's problem on the Egyptian front

came from an unexpected source, the Israeli Army. The

Egyptians made one major thrust from their formidable

position along the canal and suffered a decisive defeat on

14 October in the largest tank battle since World War II.

The Israelis quickly followed up their tactical victory. In

the early morning of 16 October, Israeli forces crossed the

canal and in short order created havoc in the Egyptian

Army. By midday, the Israelis had destroyed four SAM

sites; and by the next morning, the IAF was operating in

full support of the ground forces. In reverse of the accepted

practice, the Army made it possible for the Air Force to

operate . The Israelis now had the initiative and could easily

have inflicted an overwhelming defeat on the Egyptians.

But, the major powers intervened, which led to a cease-fire

on 22 October. The Israelis won the war and in the process

destroyed approximately 40 of the 55-60 SAM batteries

that the Egyptians had in action. This destruction was inflicted by the IAF, as well as by Israeli ground forces.

14

Nevertheless, the ground-based air defenses took a substantial toll . The combatants lost about the same number

144
of aircraft to SAMs and flak, the Arabs 40 to 75 (one or

two dozen to Hawks) and the Israelis perhaps 82 to 100.' 5

The ground defenses also claimed a number of friendly

aircraft. Israeli gunners apparently downed two of their own

aircraft, which were probably Mirages mistaken for the

same type aircraft the Egyptians received from the Libyans.

The Arabs destroyed 45 to 60 of their own. On 8 October,

for example, Syrian SAMs destroyed 20 Iraqi MiGs, while

Egyptian SA-6s may have downed 40 Egyptian aircraft.

Thus, the Arab SAMs destroyed more Arab aircraft (45-

58) than Israeli aircraft (39-44). This accounted for about

10-12 percent of total Arab losses.

16

Helicopters again proved vulnerable. Israeli air and

ground defenses devastated an Egyptian commando strike

carried out by approximately 50 Mi-8 helicopters on the

first day of the war, downing 20-35 of them . The Israelis

claimed the destruction of 3 5 Egyptian choppers in the first

days of the war. An Egyptian attack on the critical Israeli

canal bridge on 18 October ended with all five helicopters

downed. On the Arab side, SA-7s claimed six IAF rotarywing aircraft ."

The IAF clearly won the air war, destroying about 450

Arab aircraft, while losing about 107 aircraft in combat,

115 overall. Compared to the 1967 war, the Arabs lost about

the same number of aircraft, although many more in the

air, while the Israelis lost twice as many. On a sortie basis,

however, IAF losses actually declined from 4 percent in

1967, to just over 1 percent in 1973. Arab losses in 1973

were just under 5 percent."

Although the IAF beat the Arab air forces in the air, it

failed to use air power as it had in the 1967 war. Close air

support (CAS) proved limited and disappointing, especially

in the first three critical days of the war. One study stated

that aircraft did not unequivocally damage or destroy one

tank. Even if this decline in CAS effectiveness is overdrawn,

air power clearly influenced the war less in 1973 than it

had in 1967. A dense, mobile, mixed, surface-based air de145
fense system thwarted possibly the best-trained and highestmotivated air force in the world and inflicted severe losses

on it . Just as American airmen underestimated North

Vietnamese air defenses, so had the Israeli airmen underestimated Arab air defenses. Both paid the price. The 1973

war seemed to indicate that the balance between the offense

and defense (specifically aircraft versus ground defenses)

had swung in favor of the latter. Aircraft appeared to have

lost much of their battlefield dominance . 19

1982

The IAF action in Lebanon in the summer of 1982 altered

the apparent shift of superiority toward ground defenses.

Lebanon existed in a state of chaos from the occupation

by militias of right and left, Palestine guerrillas and Syrians,

and from fighting among these groups and between them

and the Israelis. The Syrians rebuilt their military forces

from the defeat of the 1973 war and, in so doing, almost

tripled their ground-based air defenses, increasing them

from 30 to 80 batteries and manning them with their best

personnel . In late April 1981 the Syrians moved 19 batteries

of missiles, including SA-6s, into Lebanon's Bekaa Valley.

Here the Syrians established a dense and, what appeared

from the record of the 1973 war, formidable air defense

system.

In early June 1982 the Israelis invaded Lebanon, primarily fighting the Palestine guerrillas but also engaging the

Syrians . The Israelis battered the latter, despite their large

arsenal of apparently modern Soviet equipment and the

"lessons" of the 1973 war. In this brief but intense action

the Israelis won a lopsided victory, destroying 80 to 90

Syrian aircraft* and 19 to 36 batteries of missiles, for the

destruction of three to six Israeli aircraft.

"Israelis ground fire downed at least one Syrian jet (a Vulcan gun got an Su-7) and

two helicopters .2'

146
On 9 June the IAF took on the Syrian air defenses in the

Bekaa Valley with a complex yet carefully planned, coordinated, and executed attack . The Israelis used air- and

ground-launched drones as decoys to activate Syrian radar.

This allowed the Israeli EC-135s to obtain the location and

frequency of the Syrian radars and in turn to rapidly relay

this information to strike elements. The Israelis thereby

coupled real-time intelligence with rapid response to give

their pilots precise locations of the SAMs and accurate tuning information for their jamming equipment. In the electronics war, the IAF used ECM pods, chaff rockets, possibly

chaff from drones, and standoffjammers in CH-53, Boeing

707, and Arava transports . The Israeli airmen employed

diversionary tactics, precise timing, sharply executed lowlevel tactics, and weapons such as ARMs, standoffweapons,

iron bombs, and cluster munitions . In addition, the Israelis

used a new surface-to-surface ARM, the Wolf missile .

Ground forces fired artillery, launched ground assaults

along the front, and just before the air attack took out a

control center with a commando raid. The Syrians did not

help their own cause, as they failed to dig in, poorly sited

their radar, and ignited smoke screens that guided rather

than confused the IAF. On the first day, the IAF destroyed

17 missile batteries and severely damaged two others. The

Syrians pushed more SAM units into the Bekaa Valley, but

to no avail. On the second day of the action, the IAF destroyed 11 more missile batteries . On 24 July the Israelis

knocked out three batteries of SA-8s. A few days later, they

destroyed some SA-9s (fig . 77). Reportedly, the IAF destroyed four SA-9 batteries in September.

American Air Strikes in the

Middle East, 1983-86

American strikes in the Middle East a little over a year

later were much less successful. The United States intervened in Lebanon in 1983 and that December the US Navy

147
responded to Syrian firing on American reconnaissance aircraft with 12 A-7Es and 16 A-6Es. The naval aviators used

tactics proven in Vietnam: they penetrated at 20,000 feet

then descended to 3,000 feet for their attacks. To counter

Syrian heat-seeking missiles, they dropped numerous decoy

flares-but to little effect. The American flyers encountered

intense defenses, more than expected, and Soviet SA-7 and

SA-9 missiles had been modified to counter the decoy flares .

The Syrians launched 40-50 SAMS, which downed one

A-7 and one A-6 and damaged another A-7. While the Navy

blamed the losses on changes in Soviet missile sensors, the

Israelis criticized American planning, tactics, and experience. Later Syrian fire against US aircraft was met by ship

fire. 24

This less than satisfactory experience jarred the Ameri148
cans and probably influenced the next US air operation,

the April 1986 raid on Libya. One factor driving American

planning was to avoid the SA-7s, which meant operating at

night . There were, of course, other reasons for night operations, such as achieving maximum surprise, avoiding a

major engagement with Libyan air defenses, avoiding casualties to both Soviet advisers and Libyan civilians, and

revealing as little American ECM as possible. But night

operations also meant that only two American aircraft

could be effectively used : the Air Force's FB-111 and the

Navy's A-6. While the A-6s were aboard carriers cruising

in the Mediterranean, the FB-111 bombers were stationed

in Britain, 5,600 miles away (a 14-hour flight) . The FB-111 s

would require aerial refueling because of the distance and

government overflight restrictions .

US airmen flew a large strike force of 32 bombers (18

FB-111 s and 14 A-6s) supported by almost 70 aircraft . The

large supporting force was required because Libyan air defenses were both large and sophisticated for a third world

country. Besides MiGs, the defenses consisted of 100 batteries of SA-2s, SA-3s, and SA-6s (about 30 to 60 batteries

were operational), as well as SA-5, SA-8, SA-9, and French

Crotale missiles, and perhaps 450 AAA guns .

The American aircraft successfully penetrated Libyan defenses, suppressing and evading fire from Libyan SAMs and

AAA and encountering no aerial opposition. The airmen

used low-level and high-speed tactics, the FB-111 s at 400

feet and 500 knots, the A-6s as low as 200 feet and 450

knots, and they dropped both laser-guided and iron bombs.

One FB-111 went down, the cause not publicly known. Although the Libyans received 30 to 45 minutes notice from

Maltese air controllers that unidentified aircraft were heading for North Africa, apparently Libyan radar did not activate until about four minutes before the 2 :00 A.M. attack.

Standoffjamming by EF-111 s and EA-6Bs, on board ECM,

and about 50 antiradiation missiles almost completely nullified Libyan radar. The mission was both a technical and

14 9
political success : the airmen got their bombs on target,

losses were light, and since the air attack, there has been a

lack of terrorist activity openly and directly associated with

the Libyans. Thus, the 12-minute raid demonstrated that

the American military could hit difficult targets despite distance and other natural obstacles as well as penetrate fairly

numerous and sophisticated defenses with light losses."

Indian-Pakistani Wars

In September 1965 war erupted on the Asian subcontinent between India and Pakistan and burned itself out in

23 days. Both sides fielded small air forces equipped with

a few modern aircraft (Indian MiG-21 s and Pakistani F104s), but most aircraft were at least a decade beyond their

prime (Indian Hunters and Vampires and Pakistani F-86s) .

Just as the ground war ended in a stalemate, so did the

air war. But even at this writing (1988) it is difficult to sort

out from the conflicting claims exactly what happened. The

Pakistanis claim to have destroyed 110 Indian aircraft35 in air-to-air combat, 32 by antiaircraft guns, and the

rest in attacks on airfields . They admit to losing 19 aircraft,

eight in air combat, two to their own AAA, and nine to

other causes . The Pakistanis admit that Indian guns

downed a few aircraft, but claim none of the F-86s engaged

in almost 500 CAS sorties were lost, although 58 were damaged. The Indians claim 73 Pakistani aircraft destroyed and

admitted losing 35 . The Indians fired a few SA-2 missiles

and claimed one C-130 . The Pakistanis dispute this claim,

stating that they did not lose a C-130 to the SAMS, and

counter that the SA-2 got an Indian An-12 transport . The

Pakistanis do admit that an SA-2 damaged an RB-57F at

52,000 feet .

In December 1971 the two countries fought another brief

(two-week) war. By this time both sides had upgraded their

air forces in quality and quantity but still fielded forces that

150
were relatively small and of mixed vintage. This war resulted in Pakistan's losing what is now Bangladesh.

Again the combatants' claims markedly conflict, and

these differences remain along with the political problems.

Indians claimed to have destroyed 94 Pakistani aircraft for

the loss of 54 and stated that one aircraft fell to an SA-2

missile . The Pakistanis claimed the destruction of 104 Indian aircraft at the cost of 26 planes. They admit losing

three to four aircraft to flak as well as two aircraft to friendly

fire. The Pakistanis assert that 49 of their 104 kills were

registered by AAA. Another source states that half of the

lost Pakistani aircraft fell to ground defenses .

The Falklands, 1982

More recently, another brief campaign in a remote part

of the world captured the public's attention. The Falklands

campaign surprised the civilian and military alike because

Argentina and Britain went to war, because Britain successfully liberated the islands over such a great distance,

and because Argentina inflicted startling losses on the British forces . The conflict pitted a small, well-trained, and wellequipped modern force of a European nation operating

7,000 miles from home against a larger, less well-trained

force with a mixture of old and modern equipment of a

developing nation. It provides us with another look at air

defenses in operation.

From the standpoint of the air war, the Argentines fielded

an air force of mixed capabilities equipped with old Canberras (fig . 78) and A-4s, counterinsurgency Pucaras, and

the more modern Mirages and Super Etendards . For

ground-based defenses, the Argentines had, in addition to

automatic weapons, British (Sea Dart, Seacat, and Blowpipe) and Franco-German (Roland) surface-to-air missiles .

Although the British used the old Vulcan bomber (fig .

79), their primary combat aircraft was the vertical-takeoff15 1

and-landing Harrier (fig . 80). The Royal Navy ships operated a mixture of gun defenses and SAMs (Seacat, Seawolf,

Sea Dart, and Seaslug). British troops ashore used three

SAM systems: Blowpipe, Stinger, and Rapier. 3 o

The Argentine air defense proved minimal against the

British Harriers and helicopters. However, it should be

quickly noted that, in contrast to the Argentine Air Force,

which flew and fought without ECM, the British employed

both airborne ECM (jammers aboard Vulcan bombers and

chaff dispensers on Sea Harriers) and shipborne ECM (jammers and Corvus chaff rockets) . The British used antiradiation missiles (Shrikes) against the main Falkland-based

Argentine radar without success, but the missile did destroy

one other radar set.31 The Argentine air arms lacked similar

weapons. Argentine fire destroyed 22 British aircraft, 13 of

which were helicopters destroyed aboard ships sunk or

15 3
damaged by air attack. Argentine ground fire destroyed all

but one of the remaining nine, a Scout helicopter downed

by a Pucara. The British flew 2,000 sorties, but state that

they lost only five Harriers in combat: one to a Roland

missile, one to small arms, and three to 35-mm antiaircraft

fire. Small arms or Blowpipe missiles accounted for three

Gazelle helicopters. One source claims that the Argentines

engaged two of their own helicopters-not unlikely, as both

sides flew the same kinds of machines.

The effectiveness of the Argentine Air Force provided

one of the big surprises of the war, especially considering

its limitations . The Argentine airmen flew mostly outdated

aircraft during daytime, in clear weather, without ECM,

and at the limits of their range. In addition, with the exception of five French-made Exocet missiles, they dropped

gravity bombs on targets (mainly ships) that they had not

been trained to engage. Nevertheless, they sank six ships

and damaged perhaps eight others . British losses could have

been far worse, but one-fifth, perhaps three-quarters, of the

Argentine bombs failed to explode due to faulty fuze settings, defective fuzes or bombs, and most of all, to extremely low-level and short bomb releases . The Argentine

pilots demonstrated their courage and dedication by their

repeated attacks despite the formidable odds and high

losses . For example, between 21 and 25 May they lost 19

aircraft on 117 sorties."

The British also operated under a number of severe handicaps in the campaign . The British supply line stretched

7,000 miles between the Falklands and Britain, relieved

only by the sparse, American-operated base on Ascension

Island . The British had only two small carriers available to

support the campaign . (The British planned to reduce even

this small force . Thus, had the Argentines delayed their

action, British difficulties would have been far greater.)

Their small decks forced the British to rely for air superiority on a handful of Harriers, an aircraft neither designed

nor equipped for such a role. British ship designs also

154
proved flawed in that damage control systems were inadequate and some of the ships lacked armored cables. Initially only two ships in the invasion fleet carried modern

missiles (Seawolf) for defense against low-level attacks.

Combat revealed the biggest British problem to be the

lack of early warning aircraft . Although the British brilliantly and rapidly improvised to make good other serious

deficiencies (such as adapting the land-based Harrier GR3 to operate off aircraft carriers, expanding air-to-air refueling capabilities, mating the Sidewinder to the Harrier,

and installing ECM aboard the Vulcan), this one glaring

gap remained. And the inadequacy of early warning proved

costly to the British . In short, the British entered the conflict

ill prepared.

The British claimed the destruction of 72 aircraft in the

air, not an unreasonable number when compared with the

Argentine admission of 36 pilots killed in the campaign on

505 sorties. The Harriers downed 20 aircraft, small arms

as many as six, naval 4.5-inch guns one, and 45 fell to

various surface-to-air missiles .

As usual, these numbers are probably overstated . Three

recent books based on Argentine documents and interviews

put total Argentine air losses between 50 and 55 . Although

these authors boost the Harriers' credits up to 21 to 26 of

the air-to-air kills, they downgrade the surface-based weapons to 20 kills with an additional two to three attributed

to Argentine ground fire.

16

Although the British credit the Blowpipe with destroying

nine Argentine aircraft, these authors say the true number

is from two to four. The troops who carried the 47-pound

Blowpipe through the difficult Falklands terrain criticized

its weight (fig. 81).* The Blowpipe, like the SA-7 and American Redeye and Stinger (fig . 82), is operated by one man;

but unlike the heat-seeking Soviet and American devices,

*Understandable criticism under the circumstances, but it did give the troops some

protection against Argentine aircraft.

15 5
Blowpipe is optically guided. Its record proved it could do

the job, both ashore and afloat. One detachment aboard a

Royal Fleet auxiliary fired six missiles and claimed three

aircraft destroyed. The Argentines also used the Blowpipe

and claimed one Harrier and two helicopters with it . In

addition the British used the lighter weight Stinger but fired

only four missiles for one kill. (However, there is some

controversy about that particular credit .)17

The British initially credited the Rapier (fig. 83), the

other ground-based SAM employed by the British, with 13

156
kills, and later raised its kill ratio to 20 . Just as the Roland

kills are hotly disputed by the British, so are the Rapier

kills by those who have seen Argentine documents and

talked to Argentine pilots. (Perhaps this argument has more

to do with future sales of these weapons than history.) The

authors using Argentine sources put the Rapier credits at

one to three. While the British stated that the campaign

validates the weapon, the question of the actual kills cast

some doubt on these assertions . Although the Army unit

(T Battery) fired only with optical tracking, 40 percent of

its kills were in the tail-chase mode. The missile's unique

hittile (direct hitting missile) system (contact, not proximity

fuzed) worked well, as British gunners often had to fire over

their own men and ships (figs. 84 and 85). Firing over

15 7

friendly forces also highlighted another feature of the device, manual control (it is not a fire-and-forget weapon),

which proved useful because the operator could pull the

missile off a target if it flew behind friendly forces."

The British naval air defense concept consisted of Harriers as air cover, destroyers armed with Sea Dart missiles

as long-range defenses, and a close-in air defense of ships

armed with guns and other missiles (figs. 86, 87, and 88).

The British claim that Royal Navy SAMs downed a total

of 21 aircraft . The large Seaslug missile (fig . 89), which

entered service in 1962, received no credits. The two-stage

Sea Dart destroyed five to eight aircraft, but more impor15 9
tant, forced Argentine aircraft into low-level tactics. However, it could handle only one target at a time, as was

dramatically demonstrated when four A-4s attacked the

HMS Coventry. The destroyer's Sea Darts destroyed the

first two Argentine aircraft, but the third scored a direct

hit which sank the ship (fig. 90). According to the manufacturer, obsolescent radar and computers hampered the

missile. In addition, rougher seas than what the missile was

designed to operate over degraded the system's performance against low-flying aircraft. 39

The small, short-range Seacat began development in 1958

and is in service with a number of countries. Although

British sources credit it with eight kills, other sources put

this figure at one. The other short-range missile system was

the more advanced Seawolf. Although clearly a better sys160
tem than the Seacat, which it was designed to replace, there

were just too few available, on only two ships. (Argentine

duds hit both .) Nevertheless, this SAM received credit for

downing three to five aircraft and at least one air-to-surface

missile.

Regardless of the dispute over claims, the Royal Navy's

defenses proved inadequate: the Argentine Air Force came

close to driving off the British fleet. Clearly, the Argentines

came off better in the air-sea battle in terms of resources

expended. Each British ship cost tens if not hundreds of

millions of dollars ; the HMS Sheffield, for example, cost
$225 million . Argentine Exocets and aircraft cost far less,

on the order of $200,000 for the missiles, and perhaps $5

million for a modern jet fighter.41 But the British did win

the war and did achieve their national objective.

Ongoing and Recent Aspects

Since the dramatic actions in 1986, there have been no

major air operations. Three other aspects should be mentioned, however, before closing out this study: the Iran-Iraq

War, the invasion of Grenada, and guerrilla use of shoulderfired SAMS.

Another recent and ongoing war (as of 1988) is the conflict between two third world countries, Iran and Iraq. Both

have considerable quantities of relatively modern aircraft

and air defense equipment: the Iranians with American aircraft and British and American missiles (Hawk, Rapier, and

16 2
Tigercat) ; and the Iraqis with Soviet equipment, including

70 SAM batteries (SA-2, SA-3, and a few SA-6s) . Reportedly, both sides lost about 150 aircraft by the end of 1981,

most of the combat losses to ground weapons but apparently not through the efficiency of the enemy's air or ground

defenses. Neither side has proved able to make good use

of modern technology because of problems with parts,

maintenance, and training. In addition, the main objective

of both air forces seems to be to avoid attrition and defeat

and to deter attacks . The lessons of this conflict therefore

may be that modern equipment does not automatically

make modern forces, and that air forces without access to

secure support and resupply may adopt a defensive strategy

to preserve their limited forces .

163
The 1984 Grenada invasion will probably best be remembered for its nonmilitary aspects; nevertheless, air

power played a significant role in the short, one-sided operation. The United States faced neither hostile aircraft nor

any antiaircraft weapon greater than 23 mm-only small

arms and 24 ZSU-23 guns, and these lacked radar guidance .

Despite this imbalance, the defenders downed four helicopters (a fifth was destroyed after colliding with a damaged

copter) and severely damaged at least four others. The loss

of so many machines against such minor resistance here

and in the 1975 Mayaguez incident, during which eight of

nine helicopters that hit the beach were disabled, surfaces

the question of helicopter survival in combat operations.

Finally, in recent years guerrilla groups have claimed success against aircraft (fig . 91). Although it is difficult to separate guerrilla claims from their propaganda, a number of

aircraft have gone down in antiguerrilla operations in Angola, Chad, Nicaragua, and the Sudan. Whether they were

164
victims of SAMs, small arms, operational problems, or

propaganda pens, remains to be seen . In any case, the acquisition of shoulder-launched SAMs gives the guerrillas,

or the terrorists, a potent antiaircraft weapon. 44

Particularly effective is the American built Stinger. Airmen, Americans in Vietnam and Soviets in Afghanistan,

quickly found countermeasures to the first generation SA7 and Redeye missile. Both missiles are limited by lack of

electronic identification capability and three performance

factors: They are strictly tail and chase (revenge) weapons,

they are decoyed by flares, and they are restricted in maneuverability. The second-generation Stinger is a different

story. It is a foot longer than the four-foot Redeye and

weighs an additional 16 pounds. More important, the

Stinger has improved performance in all four areas. In addition to having an electronic IFF capability, the Stinger

165
has a forward firing capability, more resistance to decoy

flares, is faster, and outranges the two-mile Redeye by a

mile . General Dynamics began development of the Stinger

in 1971, and it became operational in 1981 . The missile's

biggest success has been in Afghanistan. In fact its impact

in that conflict prompted one reporter to write that: "What

the longbow was to English yeomen . . . the Stinger antiaircraft missile is to today's American-backed guerrilla

fighters .' 141

The war in Afghanistan clearly shows how missile technology has given the guerrillas a valuable weapon. The Soviets, while bogged down on the ground and largely

confined to the cities and fortified positions, made effective

and growing use of both fixed-wing and rotary-wing aircraft

against sparse rebel antiaircraft defenses including SA-7

missiles. Therefore, in March 1986, the American and British agreed to ship Stingers and Blowpipe SAMS to the Afghanistan guerrillas .

The American Stingers were initially criticized for their

weight and complexity, but after a month in which 11 were

fired without a miss, they quickly showed their effectiveness. In October the guerrillas reportedly downed two helicopters and one fighter and in November 11 helicopters

and one MiG-23 . These losses forced the Soviets to fly

higher and to operate at farther distances from their targets,

and restrict, if not abandon, their gunship strikes, markedly

reducing their military effectiveness. In February 1987 Air

Force Chief of Staff Larry D. Welch testified that "somewhere between 150 and 300 Stingers have absolutely driven

the Russian Air Force out of the skies in Afghanistan."46

The rebels claimed to have downed as many as 15 to 20

Soviet helicopters a month and by the summer of 1987 may

have downed one aircraft a day. During the fall 1987 offensive, the government reportedly lost 17 helicopters, an

An-22 transport, and four MiG-21 s to the Stingers .

The Stinger's impact goes beyond the aircraft losses . A

Western journal reports that 20 Afghanistan pilots refused

166
to fly against rebel positions defended by the Americanbuilt missiles. The Communists acknowledge the weapon's

effectiveness and how it changed the conflict. The leader

of the Afghanistan Communist party confirmed this defensive blow when he spoke of the siege of Khost, a city about

100 miles south of Kabul. He admitted that US and British

SAMs had halted Communist daytime air supply of the city.

Thus, the Communists have been forced to concede the

countryside to the rebels, concentrate their forces in Kabul

and other major cities, and make numerous moves toward

withdrawal from the conflict. In this confrontation the

American-built missile is playing a major role.

Summary

Any war is difficult to evaluate, but small wars are especially tricky. Because the amount of equipment used is

usually small, and for the most part less than the most

modern, it is difficult to extrapolate the findings into more

general and future uses . When these wars are fought by

other countries, the problems of interpretation increase.

Nevertheless, it is the only laboratory the soldier has, and

he must make the most of it .

The 1973 Arab-Israeli War presented many surprises,

from its origin to the way it was fought . The Arabs did not

follow the conventional wisdom but instead attacked a

country having a superior military without having first

gained air superiority. Initially, the Arabs used their air

forces sparingly and advanced under a dense and lethal

umbrella of SAMs and guns. This air defense proved effective and inflicted heavy losses on the Israeli Air Force.

Arab missiles and guns sorely tested the IAF; but the Israelis

changed their tactics, adopted new equipment, persisted,

and won . However, Arab air defenses did not permit the

Israelis to fight the air and ground war as they had done

in 1967 and as they would have liked. As a result of this

167
war, some commentators spoke of the demise of the tank

and aircraft, victims of the modern missile. The defense

seemed to be supreme.

But the wars of 1982 seemingly offered different lessons .

The IAF won a small but striking victory against Syrian

aircraft and SAMs. This came about through the use of

coordinated efforts of all arms and especially through the

use of high-technology equipment such as ARMS, remotely

piloted vehicles (RPVs), and electronics aircraft.

The implications of the war in the Falklands appear less

clear. It might be thought of as the converse of Vietnam;

that is, a relatively sophisticated but small British force

pitted against a larger but less-modern Argentine one. The

Argentines used mostly old aircraft and old bombs, without

ECM protection at the limits of their range. Not surprisingly, the British, with small numbers of aircraft and SAMs,

imposed heavy losses on these aircraft and aircrews. But

the Argentines did penetrate the defenses and did inflict

much damage to the more costly British fleet. Nevertheless,

the British won the war.

If these wars showed anything, they showed the potential

of high technology. At the same time, they indicated that

numbers and weapons handling are extremely important to

the final outcome . High-technology weapons demand highquality personnel.

NOTES

1 . Moshe Dayan, Diary ofthe Sinai Campaign (New York: Schocken

Books, Inc., 1965), 177-78, 221 ; Chaim Herzog, The Arab-Israeli

Wars: War and Peace in the Middle East (New York : Random House,

1982), 145 ; Trevor N. Dupuy, Elusive Victory: The Arab-Israeli Wars,

1947-1974 (New York: Harper and Row, 1978), 212; Stephen Peltz,

"Israeli Air Power," Flying Review International, December 1967,

1019.

2. Edward N. Luttwak and Daniel Horowitz, The Israeli Army (New

York: Harper and Row, 1975), 229, 230 ; Nadav Safran, From War to

168
War. The Arab-Israeli Confrontation, 1948-1967 (Indianapolis, Ind . :

Bobbs-Merrill Co., Inc., 1969), 324, 325; Murray Rubenstein and

Richard Goldman, Shield ofDavid (Englewood Cliffs, N .J . : PrenticeHall, Inc., 1978), 100; Robert Jackson, The Israeli Air Force Story

(London: Stacey, 1970), 218 ; Warren Wetmore, "Israeli Air Punch

Major Factor in War," Aviation Week, 3 July 1967, 22; Edgar O'Ballance, The Third Arab-Israeli War (Hamden, Conn. : Archon Books,

1972), 67, 75, 82 .

3. Jackson, Israeli Air Force, 153, 248; Wetmore, "Israeli Air Punch

Major Factor in War," 22; James Hansen, "The Development of Soviet Tactical Air Defense," International Defense Review, May 1981,

532; "Off the Record," Journal of Defense and Diplomacy, January

1988, 63 .

4 . Jackson, Israeli Air Force, 233 ; Luttwak and Horowitz, TheIsraeli

Army, 302, 321-23; Chaim Herzog, The War ofAtonement, October

1973 (Boston, Mass. : Little, Brown and Co., 1975), 8, 9, 232, 235-37,

253; the Insight Team of the Sunday Times (London), The Yom Kippur

War (Garden City, N.Y. : Doubleday and Co., 1974), 33, 36; Lon O.

Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age (Washington, D.C. : Smithsonian Institution Press, 1985), 134.

5 . Hansen, "The Development of Soviet Tactical Air Defense," 533 .

Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 149-50; Herzog, War of

Atonement, 256; Ronald Bergquist, The Role ofAirpower in the IranIraq War (Maxwell AFB, Ala. : Airpower Research Institute, September 1988).

6 . Herzog, The War ofAtonement, 256; Hansen, "The Development

of Soviet Tactical Air Defense," 533 ; C. N. Barclay, "Lessons from

the October War," Army, March 1974, 28; Charles Corddry, "The

Yom Kippur War, 1973-Lessons New and Old," National Defense,

May-June 1974, 508; Robert R. Ropelewski, "Setbacks Spur System

to Counter Israel," Aviation Week, 7 July 1975, 15; Amnon Sella, "The

Struggle for Air Supremacy: October 1973-December 1975," RUSI

Journalfor Defense Studies, December 1976, 33 ; Insight Team, Yom

Kippur, 189.

7. Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 149; Luttwak and Horowitz, The Israeli Army, 348 ; Herbert J. Coleman, "Israeli Air Force

Decisive in War," Aviation Week, 3 December 1973, 19; "U.S. Finds

SA-6 to be Simple, Effective," Aviation Week, 3 December 1973, 22;

Robert R . Ropelewski, "Egypt Assesses Lessons of October War,"

Aviation Week, 17 December 1973, 16; "SA-6-Arab Ace in the 20-Day

War," International Defense Review, December 1973, 779-80; Robert

Hotz, "The Shock of Technical Surprise," Aviation Week, 24 March

1975, 9.

169
8 . Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 149; Ropelewski, "Egypt

Assesses," 16 ; "Soviet Anti-Aircraft Gun Takes Toll," Aviation Week,

22 October 1973, 19.

9. Insight Team, Yom Kippur, 161, 184-85; Herzog, The Arab-Israeli

Wars, 281, 346; Herzog, The War of Atonement, 87, 256; J. Viksne,

"The Yom Kippur War in Retrospect," Army Journal, April 1976, pt.

1 :41 ; "Israeli Aircraft, Arab SAMs in Key Battle," Aviation Week, 22

October 1973, 14; Historical Evaluation and Research Organization,

"The Middle East War of October 1973 in Historical Perspective,"

study, February 1976, 145 [AUL-M42138-5]; Dupuy, Elusive Victory,

551 ; Bryce Walker, Fighting Jets (Alexandria, Va. : Time-Life Books,

1983), 149; Peter Borgart, "The Vulnerability ofthe Manned Airborne

Weapon System, Part 3 : Influence on Tactics and Strategy," International Defense Review, December 1977, 1066.

10. Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 165 ; Luttwak and Horowitz, The Israeli Army, 349; Coleman, "Israeli Air Force Decisive

in War," 19; "SA-7 Avoids Homing on Flares," Aviation Week, 5 November 1973,17; Robert R. Rodwell, "The Mid-East War: A Damned

Close-Run Thing," Air Force Magazine, February 1974, 39; Hotz,

"The Shock of Technical Surprise," 9 .

11 . Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 349, 3 51 ; Jeffrey Greenhunt, "Air War: Middle East," Aerospace Historian, March 1976, 22.

12. Rodwell, The Mid-East War, 39; Dupuy, Elusive Victory, 552;

Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 156; Luttwak and Horowitz,

The Israeli Army, 349; Insight Team, Yom Kippur, 187-88, 370; Coleman, "Israeli Air Force Decisive in War," 19; Bill Gunston et al ., War

Planes. 1945-1976 (London: Salamander, 1976), 58; Walker, Fighting

Jets, 149 ; Borgart, "Vulnerability, Part 3," 1064.

13 . Insight Team, Yom Kippur, 204; Walker, Fighting Jets, 150; Coleman, "Israeli Air Force Decisive in War," 18.

14 . One author states that the IAF destroyed 28 SAM sites and the

Israeli Army 12 others . Herzog, War ofAtonement, 242, 259; Insight

Team, Yom Kippur, 338; Herzog, Arab-Israeli Wars, 285, 341 ; Rubenstein and Goldman, Shield of David, 127, 129.

15. Herzog, Arab-Israeli Wars, 346-47 ; Herzog, War ofAtonement,

257 ; Luttwak and Horowitz, The Israeli Army, 347; Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 163-66; M. J. Armitage and R. A. Mason, Air

Power in the Nuclear Age, 2d ed. (Urbana, Ill. : University of Illinois,

1985), 134; Roy M. Braybrook, "Is It Goodbye to Ground Attack?"

Air International, May 1976, 234-44; Charles Wakebridge, "The Technological Gap in the Middle East," National Defense, May-June 1975,

461 ; "SA-6-Arab Ace," 779 .

16. "Bekaa Valley Combat," Flight International, 16 October 1982,

170
1110 ; Herzog, The War ofAtonement, 260; Insight Team, Yom Kippur

315 ; Thomas Walczyk, "October War," Strategy and Tactics, MarchApril 1977, 10; Martin van Creveld, The Washington Papers, Militar

Lessons ofthe Yom Kippur War. Historical Perspectives, no. 24 (Beverl,

Hills/London: Sage Publications, 1975), 31 ; Peter Borgart, "Vulner

ability, Part 3," 1064, 1066; Rubenstein and Goldman, Shield ofDavia

128; Herzog, Arab-Israeli Wars, 347 ; Ropelewski, "Egypt Assesses,'

16 .

17 . Rubenstein and Goldman, Shield ofDavid, 113 ; Dupuy, Elusiv,

Victory, 592; Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 151 ; Herzol

Arab-Israeli Wars, 266; Herzog, War of Atonement, 258; Lawrenc(

Whetten and Michael Johnson, "Military Lessons of the Yom Kippu

War," World Today, March 1974, 109.

18 . Herzog, The War of Atonement, 260-61 ; Corddry, "The Yon

Kippur War," 508 ; Historical Evaluation and Research Organization

"The Middle East War," appendix; Walczyk, "October War," 10; Wil

liam Staudenmaier, "Learning from the Middle East War,"Air Defense

Trends, April-June 1975, 18 ; "Israeli Aircraft, Arab SAMs in Ke,

Battle," 14; Rubenstein and Goldman, Shield ofDavid, 128 ; Borgart

"Vulnerability, Part 3," 1066. A number of factors contribute to the

discrepancy in losses . Besides the differences in the training, leader,

ship, motivation, and doctrine of the opposing forces, two other fac

tors stand out: Soviet equipment versus Western equipment, and thf

Arab lack of ECM equipment and Israel's use of it . Dupuy, Elusivc

Victory, 549; Coleman, "Israeli Air Force Decisive in War," 18 ; Nor.

deen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 162-63 .

19. Van Creveld, "Military Lessons," 31, 32 ; Luttwak and Horowitz

The Israeli Army, 350, 351 ; Hansen, "The Development of Soviet

Tactical Air Defense," 533; Historical Evaluation and Research Or.

ganization, "The Middle East War," 148, 177; Drew Middleton, "Mis.

siles Blunt Thrust of Traditional Tank-Plane Team," New York Times

17 October 1973, 19 ; John Finney, "New Missiles Are Enabling Infantry to Counter Planes and Tanks," New York Times, 2 November

1973, 19.

20. "Bekaa Valley Combat," 1110; William Haddad, "Divided Lebanon," Current History, January 1982, 35 .

21 . "Anti-Aircraft Defence Force: The PLO in Lebanon," Born it

Battle, no. 27, 7, 32 .

22. R. D. M. Furlong, "Israel Lashes Out," Interavia, August 1982,

1002, 1003 ; Clarence Robinson, Jr., "Surveillance Integration Pivotal

in Israeli Successes," Aviation Week, 5 July 1982, 17; Edgar Ulsamer,

"In Focus: TAC Air Feels the Squeeze," Air Force Magazine, October

1982, 23; Anthony Cordesman, "The Sixth Arab-Israeli Conflict,"

171
Armed Forces Journal International, August 1982,. 30. The IAF may

have destroyed as many as 108 Syrian aircraft. "Syrian Resupply,"

Aerospace Daily, 15 November 1982, 74 .

23. Furlong, "Israel Lashes Out," 1002, 1003; Robinson, "Surveillance Integration Pivotal in Israeli Successes," 17 ; Ulsamer, "In Focus :

TAC Air Feels the Squeeze," 23 ; Cordesman, "The Sixth Arab-Israeli

Conflict," 30; "Bekaa Valley Combat," 1110; Drew Middleton, "Soviet Arms Come in Second in Lebanon," New York Times, 19 September 1982, 2E; "Israeli Defense Forces in the Lebanon War," Born

in Battle, no . 30, 22, 45-47; "The Syrians in Lebanon," no. 27, 12,

28, 31-33 ; "SA-9 Firings Seen Part of Attempt to Probe Israeli Capabilities," Aerospace Daily, 8 November 1982, 45.

24 . Eugene Kozicharow, "Navy Blames Aircraft Loss on Soviet Sensor Change," Aviation Week, 12 December 1983, 25-26 ; Richard Halloran, "Navy, Stung by Criticism, Defends Cost of Bombing Raid in

Lebanon," New York Times, 7 December 1983, 1, 19; Thomas Friedman, "US Ships Attack Syrian Positions in Beirut Region," New York

Times, 14 December 1983, 1 .

25 . "US Demonstrates Advanced Weapons Technology in Libya,"

Aviation Week, 21 April 1986, 19 ; Fred Hiatt, "Jet Believed Lost, 5

Sites Damaged in Raid on Libya," Washington Post, 16 April 1986,

A25; Anthony Cordesman, "After the Raid," Armed Forces, August

1986, 359.

26 . Cordesman, "After the Raid," 358, 360.

27. Ibid., 355-60; "US Airpower Hits Back," Defence Update/73,

1986, 27-32 ; Hiatt, "Jet Believed Lost," A25; "US Demonstrates Advanced Weapons Technology in Libya," 20, 21 ; David M. North, "Air

Force, Navy Brief Congress on Lessons from Libya Strikes," Aviation

Week, 2 June 1986, 63; Judith Miller, "Malta Says Libya Got Tip on

Raid," New York Times, 6 August 1983, 1, 8.

28 . John Fricker, Battlefor Pakistan: The Air War of1965 (London:

Allan, 1979), 122, 124, 183, 184. Slightly different claims can be found

in Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 113 .

29 . John Fricker, "Post-Mortem of an Air War," Air Enthusiast,

May 1972, 230, 232; Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 103-4;

Borgart, "Vulnerability, Part 3," 1066; Pushpindar Chopra, "Journal

of an Air War," Air Enthusiast, April 1972, 177-83, 206.

30 . Great Britain, Ministry of Defence, The Falklands Campaign:

The Lessons (London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1982), annex

B [AUL-MU37324-18]; Dov Zakheim, "The South Atlantic: Evaluating the Lessons" (Paper delivered at Southern Methodist University

(SMU) Conference on The Three Wars of 1982: Lessons to be Learned,

Dallas, Tex., 15 April 1983), 29.

172
31 . Jeffrey Ethell and Alfred Price, Air War South Atlantic (New

York: Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc ., 1983), 146.

32 . Ibid., 180-81 ; David Brown, "Countermeasures Aided British

Fleet," Aviation Week, 19 July 1982, 18 ; "British Government on Performance of Roland, Rapier in Falklands," Aerospace Daily, 27 October 1982, 309 ; "British SAMs Credited with Most Kills in Falklands

Conflict," Aerospace Daily, 9 August 1982, 211 ; Sunday Times (London) Insight Team, War in the Falklands (Cambridge, Mass. : Harper

and Row Publishers, 1982), 201 ; Great Britain, Ministry of Defence,

The Falklands Campaign, 19, annex C ; Derek Wood and Mark Hewish,

"The Falklands Conflict, Part 1 ; The Air War," International Defense

Review 8 (1982): 978, 980; Brian Moore, "The Falklands War: The

Air Defense Role," Air Defense Artillery, Winter 1983, 19; "Blowpipe

Draws Commendation for Falklands Performance," Aerospace Daily,

12 August 1982, 239; David Griffiths, "Layered Air Defense Keyed

British Falklands Victory," Defense Week, 30 August 1982, 13 . The

French claimed that nine Roland missiles downed four Harriers and

damaged another, a claim fiercely disputed by the British . Interestingly, the British had attempted to sell their Rapier missile to the

Argentines. "Euromissile on Performance of Roland in Falklands,

Middle East," Aerospace Daily, 23 September 1982, 126; "Exocet,

Roland Combat Performance Rated High," Aviation Week, 1 November 1982, 26; Anthony Cordesman, "The Falklands : The Air War and

Missile Conflict," Armed Forces Journal International, September

1982, 40.

33. Brad Roberts, "The Military Implications ofthe Falklands/ Malvinas Island Conflict," report no. 82-140F, Congressional Research

Service, Library of Congress, August 1982, 15 [AUL-M42953-1-U#82-

140fJ ; Cordesman, "The Falklands," 33, 35 ; Steward Menaul, "The

Falklands Campaign: A War of Yesterday?" Strategic Review, Fall

1982, 87, 88; Wood and Hewish, "Falklands Conflict, Part 1," 978;

Ezio Bonsignore, "Hard Lessons from the South Atlantic," Military

Technology, June 1982, 32 ; John Guilmartin, Jr., "The South Atlantic

War: Lessons and Analytical Guideposts, A Military Historian's Perspective," 17; SMU Conference, April 1983; Ethell and Price, Air War,

120-21, 183, 217-18 ; Jesus Romero Briasco and Salvador Mafe Huertas, Falklands: Witness ofBattles (Valencia, Spain : Domenech, 1985),

172.

34. Guilmartin, "The South Atlantic War," 12; Ethell and Price,

Air War, 179.

35. I have relied primarily on the official British reports for the

statistics, Great Britain, Ministry of Defence, Falklands Campaign,

annex B. Also see the figures, which vary at times from these numbers,

17 3
in Wood and Hewish, "Falklands Conflict, Part 1," 980; Moore, "The

Falklands War," 21 ; Cordesman, "The Falklands," 32 ; Guilmartin,

"The South Atlantic War," 17.

36. Ethell and Price, Air War, 207; Briasco and Huertas, Falklands,

165-68, 173 ; Rodney A. Burden et al., Falklands: The Air War (London: Arms and Armour, 1986), 33-147.

37. Derek Wood and Mark Hewish, "The Falklands Conflict, Part

2: Missile Operations," International Defense Review, September

1982, 1151, 1154; Moore, "The Falklands War," 20; Christopher Foss,

"European Tactical Missile Systems," Armor, July-August 1975, 24 ;

Ethell and Price, Air War, 196-208 ; Briasco and Huertas, Falklands,

165-69; Terry Gander, "Maintaining the Effectiveness of Blowpipe

SAM," Jane's Defence Review 4, no. 2 (1983): 159.

38 . Some accounts claim that Rapier's radar interfered with the

Royal Navy's radar. After all, the British army did not expect to fight

alongside destroyers on the plains of central Europe! Others state that

the British sent the army unit to the Falklands without radar, in contrast to the RAF regiment that arrived later with Rapier and radar.

Whatever the case, the initial unit that went ashore in the campaign,

and the only one that saw action, fired optically guided missiles . "UK

Planned to Use Shrike Missiles Against Argentine Radars," Aerospace

Daily, 30 August 1982, 334; "Air Defense Missiles Limited Tactics of

Argentine Aircraft," Aviation Week, 19 July 1982, 21 ; Great Britain,

Ministry of Defence, The Falklands Campaign, 22; Wood and Hewish,

"The Falklands Conflict, Part 2," 1153 ; Moore, "The Falklands War,"

19; Ethell and Price, Air War, 196-208; Briasco and Huertas, Falklands, 165-69 ; Jacques du Boucher, "Missiles in the Falklands," African Defence, October 1983, 60.

39. John Laffin, Fight for the Falklands (New York: St. Martin's

Press, 1982), 92, 93; Great Britain, Ministry of Defence, The Falklands

Campaign, 9, annex B; Wood and Hewish, "The Falklands Conflict,

Part 2," 1151, 1154; Ethell and Price, Air War, 196-208 ; Briasco and

Huertas, Falklands, 165-69.

40. Cordesman, "The Falklands," 38; Great Britain, Ministry of

Defence, The Falklands Campaign, annex B; Insight Team, War in the

Falklands, 216; Ethell and Price, Air War, 196-208 ; Briasco and Huertas, Falklands, 165-69; Roger Villar, "The Sea Wolf Story-GW S25

to VM40," Jane's Defence Review 2, no. 1 (1981) : 75.

41 . Cordesman, "The Falklands," 34 ; Alistair Horne, "A British

Historian's Meditations: Lessons of the Falklands," National Review,

23 July 1982, 888.

42. Anthony Cordesman, "Lessons of the Iran-Iraq War: Part II,

Tactics, Technology, and Training," Armed Forces Journal Interna174
tional, June 1982, 70, 78, 79; "The Iranian Air Force at War," Bor)

in Battle, no . 24, 13; "The Iraq-Iran War," Defence Update, no. 4,

(1984) :43-44; Nordeen, Air Warfare in the Missile Age, 185-88 ; Rol,

ofAir Power in the Iran-Iraq War.

43. Stephen Harding, Air War Grenada (Missoula, Mont. : Pictoria

Histories, 1984), 9, 33, 36, 51 ; stated in Thomas D. Des Brisay, "The

Mayaguez Incident," in Air War-Vietnam (Indianapolis, Ind. : Bobbs

Merrill Co., Inc ., 1978), 326.

44. Jean de Galard, "French Jaguar Shot Down in Chad," Jane'

Defence Weekly 1, no. 4 (4 February 1984): 142; Charles Mohr, "Con

tras Say They Fear a Long War," New York Times, 16 June 1986, 8

Pico Iyer, "Sudan : Stranded Amid the Gunfire," Time, 1 Septembe:

1986, 34; William Claiborne, "S. African Military Says Intervention

in Angola Staved Off Rebel Defeat," Washington Post, 13 Novembe:

1987, A28.

45. John H. Cushman, Jr., "The Stinger Missile: Helping to Chang(

the Course of a War," New York Times, 17 January 1988, E2 ; Ra`

Barnes, ed., The U.S. War Machine (New York: Crown Publishers

1978), 234-35 ; Maurice Robertson, "Stinger: Proven Plane Killer,'

International Combat Arms, July 1985 ; General Dynamics, The

World's Missile Systems (Pomona, Calif. : General Dynamics, 1982).

46. "Soviets Press Countermeasures to Stinger Missile," Aerospacc

Daily, 6 August 1987, 205 ; "Disjointed Rebels Join Forces as The3

Oust Their Enemy," Insight, 25 January 1988, 21 ; Anthony Cordes.

man, "The Afghan Chronology: Another Brutal Year of Conflict,"

Armed Forces, April 1987, 156-60.

47. Cordesman, "Afghan Chronology," 158-60; Cushman, E2 ; Rone

Tempest, "Afghan Rebel Rockets Jar Government Assembly," Washington Post, 30 November 1987, A24; John Kifner, "Moscow Is Seen

at Turning Point in Its Intervention in Afghanistan," New York Times.

29 November 1987, 1 ; Peter Youngsband, "Grappling for the Advantage When Talk Replaces Gunfire," Insight, 7 December 1987, 43;

Robert Schultheis, "The Mujahedin Press Hard," Time, 18 May 1987,

51 ; Steven R. Weisman, "U .S . in Crossfire of Border War," New York

Times, 17 May 1987, E3 .

17 5

CHAPTER 5

SUMMARY, TRENDS, AND CONCLUSIONS

Ground-based air defenses have been a problem for airmen from the onset of manned flight . Although seldom able

to stop air power, air defenses have made air operations

both costly and dangerous. For just as aircraft have become

more capable so have air defenses. This extended offensive

versus defensive battle shows no sign of lessening, in fact,

every sign points to it becoming more complex and costly

as it continues.

Summary

Airmen have had to contend with ground-based air defense since it downed its first aircraft in 1912 . In every war

except World War I, more American aircraft have been lost

to antiaircraft artillery than to fighters ; nevertheless, air-toair combat has dominated the public's mind. The military

has suffered a similarly mistaken and romantic attitude

regarding the relative merits of hostile flak and fighters.

Probably this attitude denigrating AAA and the defense

(the idea that the bomber would always get through) peaked

in the 1930s and 1940s. During the early years of World

War 11, the offense did have the advantage and flak was

ineffective. But aviation advanced modestly between 1935

and 1945 . (For example, the B-17, which first flew in 1935,

was still frontline equipment in 1945, as were such fighters

as the Me-109 and Spitfire, which first flew in 1935 and

1936 .) These aircraft, and others like them, are more representative of air combat in World War II than the better

177
performing, and perhaps better remembered, B-29s and

Me-262s .

In contrast, the defense made great strides during the

war. Flak grew from an ineffective nuisance weapon into a

potent force by 1944 . Although AAA could not stop determined airmen, it could inflict heavy losses on the flyers,

disrupt accuracy, and in general make air operations much

more expensive. The notable antiaircraft successes, such as

British guns in the V-1 campaign, German flak defense of

the oil targets, and American defense of the Remagen

Bridge, clearly support this point . Compared to aircraft,

flak proved inexpensive and very cost-effective .

The two major technical advances responsible for this

improvement and success were radar and proximity fuzes .

Radar stripped the cloak of surprise and invisibility from

aircraft. It provided detection and warning of attacking aircraft, allowed control of defensive fighters, and permitted

more accurate all-weather, day/night firing of the guns.

Other devices increased the lethality of flak, none more so

than proximity fuzes.

As a result, airmen learned that AAA constituted a dangerous and powerful force. World War II also proved that

low-level operations in the face of flak were costly because

guns were increasingly effective at lower altitudes . Strafing

fighters were particularly vulnerable. Another air defense

difficulty involved correctly identifying friend and foe : ideally, not engaging the former and always engaging the latter .

Experience showed numerous instances, however, of friends

downed by "friendly" fire and gunners letting foes slip by.

To counter ground fire, the airmen adopted tactics that

would be used again and again in subsequent air wars. Besides avoiding flak areas, the flyers used surprise, the sun,

the terrain, and one-pass attacks. They also employed ECM,

specifically chaff and jammers. Finally, the airmen attacked

their tormentors; but direct action seldom proved effective,

although usually expensive. The trade-off of cheap guns

178
versus valuable aircraft made direct attack a high-risk and

low-return proposition .

So, during the course of World War II, the balance between air offense and air defense tilted toward the defense.

But events in the last stages of the war obscured these facts.

The introduction of jets radically improved aircraft performance, just as the atomic bomb enormously expanded

firepower. Therefore, both the public and military saw the

offensive as again supreme.

But the combatants used only the jet, not the atomic

bomb, in America's next war, Korea, which was different

from World War II and the wars that the prophets and

theorists had forecast . "Peasant hordes" stalemated the

strongest nation in the world on the periphery of Asia . With

the exception of the MiG-15, the Communists used only

limited numbers of obsolete equipment to thwart and impose considerable losses on the Allied airmen. Air power

was not decisive in the war. At the same time, the war

reemphasized many of the basic AAA lessons from World

War II-the lethality of flak, the danger of low-altitude

operations, and the usefulness of antiflak countermeasures.

In many respects, the Vietnam War repeated the same

pattern. Again, American airmen were unprepared for the

reality of combat and especially their chief opponent, AAA.

Again, the lessons of World War II and Korea had to be

relearned. Again, the air power of the strongest nation in

the world proved indecisive against Asian peasants armed

with simple weapons .

The one new air defense weapon introduced into combat

in Vietnam was the surface-to-air missile (SAM). Although

these missiles claimed relatively few aircraft, they made air

operations more difficult and expensive. American tactics

and equipment overcame the SAMS, but the missiles forced

the airmen to increase the number of support aircraft and

operate at low altitudes where AAA proved deadly.

American airmen learned to cope with the ground-based

defenses . They used electronic countermeasures (ECM), an179
tiradiation missiles (ARMS), and standoff weapons that

showed the impact of technology on modern combat . Linebacker II clearly demonstrated that modest numbers (compared to World War II or current Soviet inventories) of

second-rate air defense equipment could not stop large-scale

air efforts by a major power but could inflict both a burden

and loss on the attacker.

Shortly after the Americans closed out their involvement

in the Vietnam War, air operations in the Middle East

seemed to indicate the predominance of the defense. For

unlike the 1967 Arab-Israeli War in which the Israeli Air

Force was overwhelmingly supreme and triumphant, the

1973 war indicated the renewed power of the defense .

The Arabs violated the basic rules of war by attacking a

country with superior military forces while lacking air superiority. They advanced under a dense umbrella of SAMs

and guns, and they downed many Israeli Air Force aircraft.

Although the Israelis won the war, they suffered heavy aircraft losses and their air force was unable to influence operations as it had in 1967. Ground-based air defenses

seemed to have regained the edge .

Operations in 1982 between the Arabs and Israelis cast

doubt on these findings. In a short and sharp action, the

Israeli Air Force won an air battle against Syrian MiGs and

SAMs, a battle about as lopsided as their 1967 victory.

A few months earlier, on the other side of the world, the

lessons of another conflict were less clear. In the Falklands,

a small force from a Western power defeated a larger force

from a third world country. However, the Argentine Air

Force battered the Royal Navy despite the restrictions of

range, old aircraft, old bombs, and lack of ECM. Although

the British air defense imposed heavy losses on the attackers, the Argentines did get through to severely punish the

defenders .

18 0
Trends (Speculations)

What does all this mean? What are the lessons of the past

and what do they tell us about the future? Just as in weather

forecasting, it is probably a safe bet to expect more of the

same (and also to expect some unpleasant surprises). It

seems that we can expect to see more capable air defense

systems fielded in the future. The capabilities of missiles

on the drawing boards indicate that they will become harder

to jam, more difficult to evade, and more effective against

many more attackers. The key to advancements in air defense appears to be in the area of electronics. The devices

will become more complex as they become more capable.

Sensors will improve, and the almost total reliance on radar

will end. Different types of sensors will be tied together and

will give more data more quickly to the air defenders. All

of this will be much more expensive in terms of dollars and

trained manpower.

A second expectation is that effective air defense weapons

will spread in numbers and geography. We can expect most

countries to equip their forces with missiles, and sometimes

we will see our own weapons used against us . In addition,

man-portable SAMS will give antiaircraft protection to

guerrilla groups and will give terrorists a potent weapon.

Although costs of all weapons will dramatically increase

throughout the coming years, air defense will retain its cost

advantage over similarly modern aircraft. AAA always has

been cheaper than aircraft, and there is no indication that

this relative cost imbalance will change.

Future military conflicts may be decided not so much on

the combat performance of weapons (that is their probability of kill, time of flight, lethal radius, launch envelope,

ECM, and electronic counter-countermeasures-ECCM)

but on other factors. These will include nontechnical factors-numbers of weapons in the field and in the supply

depots as well as maintainability and reliability-and human factors-training, adaptability, and motivation.

18 1
What are the big payoff areas in the future? Improved

ECM will be useful but increasingly difficult because of the

introduction of multisensors on a large scale and ECCM.

Most of all, the airmen need capable and versatile standoff

weapons : the attacker must get away from the defenders.

These weapons offer the advantages of increased accuracy

(thereby requiring fewer sorties) and increased reach (permitting less risk to the airmen) . The air defenders also need

more ECM and ECCM. The big area of opportunity is in

the field of multiple sensors. Both the friendly air defenders

and their airmen partners would greatly benefit from the

introduction of effective identification equipment. Until

the problem of rapidly and accurately sorting out friends

from foes is solved, the effectiveness of both the offense

and defense will be greatly reduced. In short, the area that

needs to be exploited is electronics . Advances in civilian

technology indicate that much can be expected from electronics: less expensive, smaller, and more capable equipment. Therefore, the future seems to belong to those who

can best use, not just field, modern, high-cost, high technology in combat . This will decide the outcome of wars and

the balance between the offense and defense .

Conclusions

US Air Force assumptions about future conflicts have

proved to be in error. Since 1945 the Air Force has geared

itself for air-to-air combat and a nuclear exchange with a

major power. Although this is certainly America's most serious challenge, it has turned out to be the least likely one .

For the reality of war has proved to be far different. Since

World War II the US Air Force has fought in two wars

against minor powers, used conventional weapons, and

found its chief opposition to be ground-based air defense

weapons . Not only did the nature of war prove different

from the one anticipated, but the technology took a turn

182
away from the offense to favor the defense. The big contributor to this shift in the balance between the offense and

defense was the emergence of effective surface-to-air

missiles.

The airmen never appreciated the impact of groundbased air defense systems until it was too late . The US Air

Force used ECM, direct action, and tactics to nullify the

defensive threat but, in so doing and in relearning old lessons, suffered heavy losses. What should be emphasized to

all American military personnel, especially all airmen, is

that since World War I and especially since early 1944, US

airmen have lost more aircraft in combat to ground-based

air defense systems than to hostile aircraft . There is no

indication that the future will be any different.

Prospects seem to favor the air defender. Proliferation of

potent ground-based air defense systems throughout the

world will continue and intensify. In addition, these weapons will become more effective as the electronics revolution

makes them smarter. Aircraft weapons will also improve

but, relative to aircraft, air defense systems will become

cheaper. In brief, then, the airman will face a greater quantitative and qualitative threat in the future .

American airmen should realize that increased capabilities of ground-based air defenses challenge them in two

important ways . The first and most obvious way is to make

their job more difficult and dangerous, whether it be in a

major conflict with a major foe or in a minor conflict with

a minor foe. The other aspect is the impact of this air offense/defense balance on friendly powers, who will undoubtedly request US assistance for their air force

problems .

This study indicates the potential pitfalls of air defense

systems and possible solutions to counter these systems

from past and recent experience. For clearly, ground-based

air defense weapons are a vital issue to American airmen

of today and tomorrow. If our airmen are to be successful,

they must meet and master the challenge of these systems.

183

INDEX

Page numbers in bold indicate illustrations .

A-1: 116 Spitfire: 23, 49,177

A-4: 110, 138, 151, 160 Typhoon: 46, 49

A-6:100,123,148-49 Vampire: 150

A-7:134,148 Vulcan: 151, 152, 153,155

A-20: 55,56 Israel

A-37:116 Arava transport: 147

AAA. See antiaircraft artillery Soviet Union

AC-130:116 An-12:150

Accuracy degraded An-22:166

German Air Force Mi-8: 145

Battle of Britain : 5 MiG: 125

Great Britain, 1941: 43 MiG-15:179

United States Army Air Forces MiG-19:130

1944-45: 43 MiG-21: 85,

Korean War: 74 MiG-23:166

Leuna: 31 Su-7: 146n

Acoustical devices: 2 United States

Afghan War: 165,165-67 A-1:116

Aircraft losses, Soviet : 166 A-4:110,138,151,160

AGM-45. See Shrike A-6:100,123, 148-49

AGM-78. See Standard A-7:134,148

Air Corps Tactical School: 58, 60 A-20: 55, 56

Aircraft A-37:116

Argentina AC-130:116

Pucara: 151, 154 B-17:34,44,48,54,177

France B-24:29,34,47,54

Mirage: 145, 151 B-25: 50

Super Etendard:151 B-26:77,77

Germany B-29:54,56,178

FW 190: 23 B-52: 101,116,120,121,120-

Ju 88: 22 25,133-35

Me 109:177 B-66:108

Me 163:37 Boeing 707:147

Me 262: 178 C-47: 23, 47

Great Britain C-119: 78, 79

Canberra: 151,152 C-123:97,98

Gazelle: 154 C-130:150

Harrier : 153,153-55,159,173 CH-21:97

Hunter: 150 CH-53:113,147

Scout: 154 Choctaw: 114

185
186

EA-6A:109 Antiaircraft artillery

EA-6B: 118,119, 149 Cost effectiveness: 58

EB-66: 109,108-9, 116,122 Countermeasures, World War II :

EC-135:147 43-46

EF-10B:108 Direct attack

EF-111: 149 Vietnam: 109,111,118

EKA-3B: 108 World War II : 44-46

F-4:103,103,116-17,125,134 Impact during World War II : 58

F4U: 75,78 Antiaircraft gun, improvisioned,

F9F: 75 World War I: 3

F-51:75, 75, 76n Antiradiation missiles: 118, 127,

F-80: 76, 76 147,168,179

F-86: 78,150 Shrike : 110,110-11,111,123,

F-10OF: 109 125,144,153

F-104:150 Standard: 110-11,123,124,125

F-105:100,101,109,111,118, Wolf. 147

128 Antwerp, Belgium: 19-21, 50

F-111: 100,120,125,134 Ap Bac: 96

FB-111: 149 Applied Physics Laboratory: 87

H-34:114 AQM-34V:118

P-38:29 Arab-Israeli War. See Middle East

P-47: 23, 44-45, 50, 76n War

P-51:23,49-50,76n Aravatransports: 147

RB-57F: 150 Argentina

RF-4C: 104 Aircraft

T-6: 80, 81 Pucara:151,154

U-2:105,130 Falkland War: 151-62,168,173,

Aircraft losses 180

Allied to German antiaircraft ARM. See antiradiation missiles

artillery: 42, 45n Arnheim, Holland: 57

United States Ascension Island : 154

Korean War: 74-76,75n Asch, Belgium: 22-23

Vietnam War: 97,112,118, Avranches: 22

125,135

World War II vs. Japan: 54n B-17:34,44,48,54,177

Aircraft technology B-24:29,34,47,54

Interwar : 3 B-25:50

Air-to-air combat ratio: kills/losses B-26:77,77

Korean War: 129 B-29:54,56,178

Vietnam War: 129 B-52: 101, 116,120,121,120-25,

World War II : 129 133-35

ALE-38:118 Linebacker II

ALQ-51:111 B-52D and B-52G: 121,133

ALQ-71: 111 Electronic countermeasures:

An-12: 150 121-22

An-22:166 Losses: 120-21

AN/ALE-38:118 B-66:108
Baldwin, Stanley (quote) : 5 1942-43:10

Barrel liners, removable: 2 Battle of Britain: 5

Battle of Britain: 5 Falkland War: 153-57,159-61,

Battle of the Bulge: 22 173

Beeson, Duane W. : 69 Malta: 8-9

Bekaa Valley, Lebanon: 146-47 Tobruk: 7-8

Bell Laboratories: 82-83 V-1 campaign: 17-19

Bendix Talos: 87 Indian-Pakistani Wars: 150-51

Bloodhound: 89 Japan: 54

Blowpipe: 151,153-56,156,166 Middle East War

Falkland War claims : 154-56 1956:137

Boeing: 89 1967:138

Boeing 707: 147 1967-70:138

Bomarc: 89, 90, 91 1967-73:138-39

Breech mechanisms, automatic: 2 1973:145

British Bomber Command: 50 1982:146

British womengunners: 6, 7 Soviet Union

Bumblebee project: 87 World War11: 67

United States Army

C-47:23,47 3 December 1944:22

C-119:78,79 Avranches: 22

C-123:97,98 Battle of the Bulge: 22

C-130:150 Normandy: 21

Canberra: 151,152 Remagen: 23

Cape Canaveral, Florida: 91 World War I: 1-2

Cape Gloucester, Bismarck World War II: 23

Archipelago assault: 50 United States Navy

Carpet : 43 5-inch: 52

CBU. See cluster bomb unit 20-mm: 51

CH-21:97 40-mm: 52

CH-53:113,147 Talos:136

Chaff: 43, 44,117-18,122-23,143, Terrier: 136

147,178 World War I:1-2

Cherbourg, France: 46 WorldWar II : 5-6, 8-10,17-19,

Choctaw: 114 21-23, 29-32, 51-52, 54, 67

Churchill, Winston (quote) : 4 Cluster bomb unit: 111, 118

Claims Cologne: 29

Argentina: 153-54,173 Convair: 87

Falkland War: 152-57,159-61, Crotale:149

173

Germany D-day: 49

1940-41:27 Defense-offense resource ratio,

Leuna: 31 World War I: 1

Ploesti: 29-31 Dien Bien Phu

Vienna: 32 Aircraft losses, French: 96

Great Britain Guns, number of Communist: 96

1940-41:5-6

187
Impact of Vietminh antiaircraft Falkland War: 151-62,168, 173,

artillery: 95-96 174,180

Director, gun Aircraft losses

Great Britain: 7 Argentina: 154-55

Doolittle, James: 50 Great Britain: 153-54

Douglas: 83 Argentine Air Force, impact of:

Douhet, Giulio : 4,58 154

Claims

EA-6A:109 Argentina: 153-54,156,173

EA-6B:118,119, 149 Great Britain: 155-57, 159-61

EB-66:109,108-9,116,122 Dudbombs: 154

EC-135:147 Electronic countermeasures:

ECM. See electronic 153-55,168,180

countermeasures Great Britain

EF-10B:108 Claims : 154-57,159-61

EF-111:149 Improvisations: 155

EKA-3B:108 FB-111: 149

Electronic countermeasures: 33, Finucane, Brendan: 69

43, 54, 58, 147, 149, 168, 171, Foehn: 37

178-83 Fractricide: 46-47, 49-51, 59

Carpet : 43 Battle of Britain: 5

Chaff: 43,44,117-18,122-23, Cape Gloucester, Bismarck

143,178 Archipelago, December 1943:

Effectiveness, World War II : 50

44 D-day, June 1944: 49

Falkland War: 153-55,168,180 German Air Force, 1 January

Libyan raid: 149 1945: 22, 59

Middle East War: 143, 147,171 Korean War: 78

Pods: 111, 139,147 Middle East War: 138,145

Vietnam War: 101,107-8, 112, Pacific theater, December

117-18,121-23 1943-June 1944: 50

World War II : 43-44 Sicily incidents, July 1943: 47, 49,

Enzian: 37-38, 39 59

Exocet:154,162 United States Marine Corps: 51

France

F-4:103,103,116-17,125, 134 Aircraft

F4U: 75,78 Mirage: 145,151

F9F: 75 Super Etendard: 151

F-51: 75, 75, 76n Dien Bien Phu: 95-96

F-80: 76, 76 Surface-to-air missiles

F-86: 78,150 Crotale: 149

F-10OF:109 MATRA R422-B : 90

F-104: 150 PARCA: 90

F-105: 100, 101, 109, 111, 111, 118, Roland: 151, 154, 157, 173

128 World War I:1

Poorly designed: 128 Fuzes

F-111: 100, 120, 125, 134

188
Increased effectiveness, 8.8 cm flak-18/36/37 : 24n, 25

Germany: 33 20-mm: 33, 34, 35

Proximity: 17, 58,178 40-mm Bofors: 35

Falkland War: 157 50-mm: 36

Germany. 34,40-41 88-mm: 3, 24, 25, 26, 27, 30

Korean War: 79 105-mm: 25-26,30

Ratio, increased effectiveness, 128-mm: 26, 28, 30, 36

V-1 campaign: 17 Railroad-mounted: 26, 34, 36

United States Navy: 52 Romanian 75-mm: 30

Fuze setters Soviet 76.5-mm: 30

Automatic, Great Britain: 9 Guns, mix of

Continuous: 3 Ploesti: 30

FW 190:23 Guns, number of

1939: 24

Gabreski, Francis S. : 69 Hamburg: 32

GAPA: 89 Leuna: 31

Gazelle: 154 Munich: 32

General Electric: 89 Ploesti: 29-30,36

Germany Politz: 31

Air attack, l January 1945: 22, Vienna: 32

57, 59 Radar: 31, 43

Aircraft Gun-laying: 33

FW 190: 23 Rockets: 34, 37,58

Ju 88: 22 Spanish Civil War: 24

Me 109:177 Surface-to-air missiles

Me 163: 37 Enzian: 37-38,39

Me 262: 178 Foehn: 37

Air defense effectiveness, Rheintochter: 38-39,40

kills/sorties : 53 Roland:151,154,157,173

Antiaircraft artillery Schmetterling : 39, 41

Assigned to Luftwaffe,1934: Taifun: 37,38

24 Wasserfall: 39-41, 42, 104

Banned: 23 Units

Personnel: 41 JG 11: 22

Problems, 1944-45:41 V-1. See V-1

Strait of Messina, August 1943: V-2:19,39,41

27-29 World War I : 1

Claims World War II losses : 23

1940.41:27 Goering, Hermann: 37

Guns: 42 Great Britain

Leuna: 31 Air attack

Ploesti : 29-31 Cologne: 29

Vienna: 32 Leuna: 31

Fuzes: 33 Ploesti: 29

Proximity: 34, 40-41 Aircraft

Guns Canberra: 151,152

7.7-cm: 2 Gazelle : 154

189
Harrier : 153,153-55,159,173 Blowpipe: 151,153 - 56,156,

Hunter: 150 166

Scout: 154 Rapier: 153,156-57,158,162,

Spitfire : 23, 49,177 173-74

Typhoon: 46, 49 Seacat: 151,153,160,160-61

Vampire: 150 Sea Dart: 151,153,159-60,164

Vulcan: 151,152,153,155 Seaslug: 89, 153, 159, 163

Antiaircraft artillery personnel: Seawolf:153,155,160-61

6-7 Thunderbird: 89

Home Guard: 6 Tigercat: 163

Numbers: 6-7 Units

Territorial forces: 6 41st Squadron: 22

Women: 6,7 130th Squadron: 22

Battle of Britain: 5 350th Squadron: 22

Casualties caused by Germany: 610th Squadron: 22

19 British Bomber Command: 50

Claims T Battery: 157

1940-41 :5-6 V-1. See V-1

1942-43 :10 World War 1: 1

Battle of Britain: 5 Grenada invasion: 164

Falkland War: 153-57,159-61, Helicopter losses: 164

173 ZSU-23:164

Malta: 8-9 Grooved projectiles : 33

Tobruk: 7-8 Gulf of Tonkin incident: 97

V-1 campaign: 17-19 Guns

Falkland Islands war: 153-61,173 Germany

Guns 7.7-cm: 2

3-inch : 4 8.8 cm flak-18/36/37: 24n, 25

3.7-inch : 4-5,15,19, 24n 20-mm: 33, 34, 35

7.62-mm GPMG:159,161 40-mm Bofors: 35

20-mm:10,17 50-mm: 36

20-mm Bredas: 8 88-mm: 3, 24, 25, 26, 27, 30

40-mm Bofors: 8, 9, 10, 105-mm: 25-26, 30

Two-pound: 52 128-mm: 26, 28, 30, 36

Guns, mix of Railroad-mounted: 26, 34, 36

1943:10 Romanian 75-mm: 30

Battle of Britain: 5 Soviet 76.5-mm: 30

Guns, number of Great Britain

1938-40 : 5 3-inch: 4

1943:10 3.7-inch: 4-5,15,19, 24n

World War I : 1 7.62-mm GPMG:159,161

Gun technology: 9 20-mm:10,17

Radar: 4, 6,13 20-mm Bredas: 8

Rockets: 7n, 8,13,17 40-mm Bofors: 8, 9,10,17,162

Surface-to-air missiles Two-pound: 52

Bloodhound: 89 Soviet Union

76.5-mm: 30

190
85-mmModel 1939:74 Indian-Pakistani War, 1965:150

85-mmModel 1944:74 Aircraft losses : 150

ZSU-23:164 Claims : 150

ZSU-23-4: 135,140-42,142 Indian-Pakistani War, 1971: 150-51

United States Aircraft losses : 151

.50-caliber: 23, 51, 72 Claims : 151

1.1-inch: 51 Iran-Iraq War: 162-63

3-inch: 2, 4, 4 Aircraft losses : 163

5-inch/38-caliber: 52 Surface-air-missile units: 163

20-mm: 51 Iron Hand: 109,111,118

37-mm: 23,52 Israel (See also Middle East wars)

40-mm: 23,51-52, 72 Aircraft

75-mmSky Sweeper: 72,72n, Arava transport: 147

73 Italy

90-mm: 4,17,19, 21, 23, 24n Antiaircraft artillery, World

Vulcan: 146n War I:1

Gun technology

Great Britain 1943: 9 Japan

Interwar : 2-3 Air defense effectiveness,

kills/sorties: 53

H-34:114 Antiaircraft artillery: 53-57

Haiphong, North Vietnam: 124 Claims, World War II : 54

Hamburg: 43 Guns

Defenses of: 32 75-mm type 4: 53

Hanson, Robert: 69 75-mm type 88: 53

Harrier: 153,153-55,159,173 88-mm: 53

Hawk: 72, 85, 85-86,138-39,145, 120-mm: 53

162 150-mm: 53

Helicopter losses Guns, mix of: 53

Grenada:164 Guns, numbers of. 53

Mayaguez incident: 164 Johns Hopkins University: 87

Middle East War, 1977: 145 Johnson, Lyndon B. : 112

Vietnam War: 113-15,131 Ju 88: 22

Hill, Roderic:11,14,16

Hitler, Adolph: 11, 24, 37 Kissinger, Henry: 119

HMS Coventry : 160 Korean War: 72-81,129,179

HMS Fearless : 162 Aircraft losses

HMS Hennes:161 Jet compared with propeller:

HMS Intrepid: 162 75-76

HMS Sheffield: 161 United States : 74-75, 75n

Hunter: 150 Air tactics: 77-79

Antiaircraft artillery

Identification, friend or foe: 49,165 Countermeasures: 78-80

Identification problem. See Lessons: 81

fratricide United States Air Force

IFF. See identification, friend or Aircraft losses : 75n

foe Air tactics: 77-80

191
United States Marine Corps Canal crossing: 144

Aircraft losses : 54n, 75, 75n, 78 Claims : 145

Air tactics: 78 Electronic countermeasures:

United States Navy 143,171

Aircraft losses : 54n, 75, 75n Fratricide: 138,145

Air tactics: 77-78 Guns

Lam Son719: 113 ZSU-23-4:135,140-42,142

Lebanon strike, 1983 Helicopter losses : 145

Aircraft losses : 148 Loss discrepancy: 171

Air tactics: 148 Surface-to-air missiles

Leuna: 31 Direct attack o£ 144

Libya strike SA-6:135,140-41,143-45

Air tactics: 149 Units: 140

Antiradiation missiles : 149 Middle East War, 1982: 146-47,

Electronic countermeasures: 149 168,180

Surface-to-air missiles, number Aircraft losses: 146

of: 149 Air tactics: 147

Li6ge, Belgium: 20 Claims: 146

Linebacker I: 116-19 Electronic countermeasures:

Linebacker 11 : 107, 119-27,133,135 147

LORAN: 117,124 Guns

Low-level operations: 22-23, 29, 57 Vulcan: 146n

Surface-to-air missiles : 146

Malta: 8-9 MiG: 125

Market-Garden: 4445 MiG-15: 179

MATRAR422-B: 90 MiG-19:130

Mayaguez incident: 164 MiG-21: 85,

McDonnell: 87 MiG-23:166

McNamara, Robert: 103 Mirage: 145,151

McNaughton, John T. :103 Mitchell, William "Billy": 4

Me 109:177 Munich, defenses of: 32

Me 163:37

Me 262:178 Nancy, France: 50

Meyer, John: 23 Na San, Vietnam: 95

Mi-8: 145 NEGAT: 78

Middle East War, 1956:137 New Year's Day, 1945 German air

Middle East War, 1967:138,180 attack: 22

Middle East War, 1967-70:138 Night kills

Middle East War 1967-73: 139 Battle of Britain: 5

Middle East War, 1973:135, Nike Ajax: 82-83, 83,105

139-46,167,180 Nike Hercules: 83, 84, 85

Aircraft losses Nixon, Richard M. : 112,119

Israel, initial: 142-43, 145 Normandy: 21

Air defenses North Korea (See also Korean

Impact of: 145 War)

Air tactics Guns, number of. 74

Israel: 143-44 Rockets: 74

192
North Vietnam (See also Vietnam Regulus 11: 89

War) Remagen: 23, 57,178

Air defenses RF-4C:104

Underestimated: 101-2 Rheintochter: 38-39, 40

Antiaircraft artillery guns: 98 Ridgway, Matthew B. : 47

Rockets

Oil Campaign 1944: 57 Germany: 34, 37, 58

Operation Bolo: 102 Great Britain: 7n, 8,13,17

North Korea: 74

P-38: 29 Roland:151,154,157,173

P-47:23,44-45,50,76n Falkland War claims : 173

P-51: 23,49-50, 76n Rolling Thunder: 99-112

PARCA: 90 RSD 58: 90

Patton, George: 50 Rules of engagement

Pearl Harbor: 50n 9th Tactical Air Command, 1944:

Peenemunde:18 50

Philco-Ford: 86 Great Britain, V-1 campaign:

Pile, Frederick A. : 14 13-17

Pile mattress: 14,14,15

Pile portable platforms. See Pile Sabot devices: 34, 34n

mattress SAC. See Strategic Air Command

Ploesti: 29-31, 30, 32, 36, 57 SAM. See surface-to-air missiles

Claims : 29 Schmetterling: 39, 41

Politz: 31 Scout: 154

Powers, Francis G. : 130 Seacat:151,153,160,160-61

Preddy, George E., Jr. : 69 Falkland War claims: 160

Predictors, electric : 9 Sea Dart: 151,153,159-60,164

Propellants, flashless: 9 Falkland War claims : 159

Proximity fuzes. See fuzes, Seaslug: 89,153, 159,163

proximity Seawolf:153,155,160-61

Pucara : 151,154 Falkland War claims : 160-61

Shrike : 110,110-11,111, 123, 125,

Quesada, Elwood "Pete" (quote) : 4 144,153

Sicily : 47, 49, 59

Radar: 58,178 Smart bombs: 117

Falkland War: 153,160,174 Soviet Union

Germany: 31, 33, 43 Aircraft

Great Britain: 4, 6,13 An-12:150

Libya: 149 An-22:166

Middle East War, 1983: 147 Mi-8: 145

United States : 17 MiG:125

Radar homing and warning: 109 MiG-15: 179

Rapier: 153,156-57,158,162,173-74 MiG-19: 130

Falkland War claims : 156-57 MiG-21: 85, 128, 135, 150,166

Raytheon: 85 MiG-23:166

RB-57F:150 Su-7:146n

Redeye: 86,155,165-66 Claims

193
WorldWar II : 67 Enzian: 37-38,39

Guns Foehn: 37

76.5-mm: 30 Rheintochter: 38-39, 40

85-mm Model 1939:74 Roland: 151,154,157,173

85-mmModel 1944:74 Schmetterling: 39, 41

ZSU-23:164 Taifun: 37,38

ZSU-23-4:135,140-42,142 Wasserfall: 39-41, 42,104

Surface-to-air missiles Great Britain

SA-1:104 Bloodhound: 89

SA-2:103-5,104,105,106, Blowpipe: 151,153-56,156,

107-8,110,112,116,122,130, 166

138-41,149-51,163 Rapier: 153,156-57,158,162,

SA-3: 135,139-41,149,163 173-74

SA-5:149 Seacat:151,153,160,160-61

SA-6:135,141,140-46,149, Sea Dart: 151,153,159-60,16

163 Seaslug: 89, 153, 159, 163

SA-7:115,115-16,140-41,143, Seawolf. 153, 155, 160-61

145,148-49,155,165-66 Thunderbird: 89

SA-8:147, 149 Tigercat : 163

SA-9:140,147-49,148 Soviet Union

Spaatz, Carl: 50 SA-1: 104

Spanish Civil War: 24 SA-2:103-5,104,105,106,

Spitfire: 23, 49,177 107-8,110,112,116,122,

Squeeze bore: 34, 34n 130,138-41,149-51,163

Standard: 110-11,123,124,125 SA-3:135,139-41,149,163

Stinger: 153,157 SA-5:149

Afghan War: 165-66 SA-6: 135,141,140-46,149,

Falkland War: 155-57 163

Strait of Messina: 27-29 SA-7:115,115-16,140-41,14-'

Strategic Air Command: 101,122 145, 148-49,155,165-66

Su-7:146n SA-8:147,149

Super Etendard: 151 SA-9:140,147-49,148

SUPPRESS: 79 Switzerland

Surface-to-air missiles RSD 58: 90

Countermeasures United States

Air tactics: 107-12, 122-23, Bomarc: 89, 90, 91

125-26,143-44,147 Bumblebee project: 87

Antiradiation missiles : 110, GAPA: 89

110-11,111, 118,123,124, Hawk: 72, 85, 85-86,138-39,

125, 145,162

179 Nike Ajax: 82-83, 83,105

France Nike Hercules: 83, 84, 85

Crotale: 149 Redeye: 86,155,165-66

MATRA R422-B: 90 Stinger: 153, 155-56,157,

PARCA: 90 165-66

Roland: 151,154,157, 173 Talos: 87, 88, 136

Germany Tartar : 87, 88

194
Terrier: 87,136 452d Bomb Wing: 77

Thumper: 89 Fifth Air Force: 76-78, 80

Wizard: 89 Strategic Air Command: 101,

Switzerland 122

Surface-to-air missiles Tactical Air Command: 101

RSD 58: 90 United States Army

Air Corps Tactical School: 58, 60

T-6: 80, 81 Antiaircraft artillery

Tactical Air Command: 101 Post-World War II : 72

Taifun: 37,38 World War I:1-2

Talos: 87, 88,136 Claims

Tartar : 87, 88 3 December 1944:22

Terrier: 87,136 Avranches: 22

Tet offensive: 112 Battle of the Bulge: 22

Thanh Hoa Bridge : 117 Normandy: 21

Thumper: 89 Remagen: 23

Thunderbird: 89 World WarI:1-2

Tigercat :163 World War II: 23

Tobruk: 7-8 Guns

Guns .50-caliber: 23,72

Claims : 8 3-inch: 2, 4, 4

Mix of: 8 37-mm: 23

Number of. 8 40-mm: 23,72

Tokyo: 54 75-mm Sky Sweeper: 72,72n,

Tonkin incident. See Gulf of 73

Tonkin incident 90-mm: 4,17,19, 21, 23, 24n

Trenchard, Hugh: 4 Vulcan: 146n

Tuck, Robert: 69 Guns, mix of, Remagen: 23

Turnhout: 45 Guns, number of, Remagew. 23

Typhoon: 46, 49 Ordnance Corps: 83

Surface-to-air missiles

U-2:105,130 Hawk: 72,85,85-86,138-39,

United States Air Force 145,162

Aircraft. See specific Nike Ajax: 82-83, 83,105

designation. See also aircraft, Nike Hercules: 83, 84, 85

United States ; Korean War; Redeye: 86,155,165-66

Vietnam War Stinger: 153,155-56,157,

Aircraft losses 165-66

Korean War: 75n Thumper: 89

Surface-to-air missiles Wizard: 89

Bomarc: 89, 90, 91 Units

GAPA: 89 62d Coast Artillery: 4

Units 82d Airborne Division : 47

18th Fighter Bomber Wing: 75 Eighth Army: 80

315th Air Commando Wing: 98 First Army: 21-23

355th Tactical Fighter Wing: Third Army: 23

109 Ninth Army: 23

195
IX Corps: 80 20-mm: 51

World War 1 : 1-2 37-mm: 52

United States Army Air Forces 40-mm: 51-52

Air attack Surface-to-air missiles

Leuna: 31 Bumblebee project: 87

Ploesti: 29-31,30,32,36, 57 Talos: 87, 88, 136

Vienna: 32 Tartar: 87, 88

Aircraft. See specific Terrier : 87,136

designation. See also aircraft, Vietnamese aircraft shot down:

United States 136

Aircraft losses University of Michigan: 89

To German AAA: 42 USS Boston : 87

To Japan: 54n USS Chicago: 136

Air tactics: 58 USS Enterphse:100

Change of against Japan: 54 USS Galveston: 87,88

Leuna: 31 USS Helena: 52

Ploesti: 29-31, 30, 32, 36, 57 USS Long Beach: 136

Units USS McCormick: 88

Eighth Air Force: 43, 45 USS Sterett:136

8th Fighter Command: 50

Ninth Air Force: 45-46 V-1: 10, 11, 66,178

9th Tactical Air Command: 45, Bomber-launched: 18

50 Difficult target : 12

Fifteenth Air Force: 32, 45 Long-range version: 18

Twentieth Air Force: 54,57 Performance : 10

56th Fighter Group: 45 V-1 campaign: 10-21

352d Fighter Group: 22-23 Antwerp

366th Fighter Group: 22 Casualties : 21

Mediterranean Air Force: 43 Defenses of. 20, 50

United States Strategic Air Guns, mix of. 19

Forces in Europe: 45 Guns, number of. 19

United States Marine Corps V-1s launched against : 19

Aircraft losses V-1s reaching: 20

Japan: 54n Casualties inflicted by V-1s

Korean War: 75n Continent: 21

Korean War: 74-75, 78 Great Britain : 19

United States Navy Claims

Aircraft. See specific Balloons: 18

designation . See also aircraft, Continental defenses: 19

United States Defenses: 17-19

Aircraft losses Fighters: 18

Japan: 54n Guns: 17-18

Korea: 75, 75n Continental campaign: 19-21

Guns Great Britain

.50-caliber : 51 Balloons: 18

1.1-inch : 51 Casualties : 19

5-inch/38-caliber : 52 Claims

196
Defenses: 17-19 Major obstacle: 102,126

Fighters: 18 Underestimated: 101-2

Guns: 17-18 Antiradiation missiles

Defense plan: 11 Shrike : 110, 110-11,111,123,

Defensive deployment 125

Final: 16 Effectiveness: 110

Initial: 12 Standard: 110-11,123,124,125

Defensive problems: 13 Claims

Fighter units, number of. 13 Surface-to-air missiles, 1965-

Guns 68:107

Mixof. 13,17 Dien Bien Phu: 95-96

Move: 16 Dumb munitions: 101

Number of: 13,17 Electronic countermeasures: 101,

Plan to move: 15 107-8,112,121-23

Pile mattress : 14,14,15 B-52: 121-22

Rules of engagement: 13,17 Impact on losses : 127

V-Is fired against: 11,18 Pods: Ill

V-1s reaching: 19 Impact on operations : 112

Li6ge, V-ls launched against: 20 Problems: 132

V-2: 19, 39, 41 F-105 losses: 128

Vampire: 150 French involvement: 95-96

VC. See Vietcong Helicopter losses

Versailles peace treaty: 23 United States : 113-15,131

Vienna, defenses of: 32 Iron Hand: 109,111, 118

Vietcong: 96-97,101 Lam Son 719:113

Vietminh Linebacker I: 116-19

Antiaircraft artillery impact on Aircraft losses : 116,118

French aircraft, Ratio of support aircraft : 119

Dien Bien Phu: 95-96 Totals: 118

Vietnam War: 95-136 Linebacker II: 107,119-27,135

1972 invasion: 115-16 Aircraft losses : 119-27,135

Aircraft losses Air tactics, United States : 120-

1962-64:97 21, 125, 127

1961-68, United States : 112 B-52D and B-52G: 121, 133

Geographic area: 112 Electronic countermeasures:

Linebacker 1: 116, 118 122-23

Linebacker II : 125,135 Lack of coordination : 122

Air tactics MiGs nullified: 125

Anti-SAM: 107-12,117-18, "Press on" tactics: 122-23,133-

122-23,125-26 34

Changed: 126 SAC over-control: 122

United States : 102-3 Success: 127,134

Air-to-air combat: 102, 129 Tonnage dropped: 124

Air war LORAN: 117,124

United States unprepared: 126 Military restrictions on air war:

Antiaircraft artillery 99-101

Direct attack: 126 Na San, Vietnam: 95

197
198

U. S GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: 2002-737-561

North Vietnam von Braun, Wernher: 37

Air defenses: 101-2,127 von Richthofen, Manfred: 68

Guns: 98,102 Vulcan (British bomber) : 151, 152,

Surface-to-air missiles, 1965- 153,155

68:104,105,106,107-8,110, Vulcan (United States gun) : 146n

112,115,115-16,122,125,

127 Wasserfall: 39-41, 42,104

Operation Bolo: 102 Watson-Watt, Robert A. :15

Political restrictions on air war: Welch, Larry D. (quote): 166

99,103 Wesel: 46

Rolling Thunder: 99-112 Western Electric: 83

Objectives: 99 White, Thomas D. : 81

SA-2:104,105,106,107-8,110, Wild Weasel: 109,111,111,118,123

112, 116,122, 125 Window: 43. See also chaff

SA-7:115,115-16 Wizard: 89

Smart bombs: 117 Wolf: 147

Surface-to-air missiles Women gunners, Great Britain : 6, 7

Firings: 107,116,124 World War I : 1-2,2,3

Impact on operations: 127 World War II : 5-6, 8-10,17-19,

United States Navy shoots 21-23, 29-32, 43-46, 51-52, 54,

down Vietnamese aircraft : 54n, 58, 67,177-79

136 Lessons: 57

Tet offensive: 112

Weather: 100 Zemke, Hubert: 68

Wild Weasel: 109, 111) 111, 118, ZSU-23:164

123 ZSU-23-4:135,140-42,142