 Come and sit by my side at the briefing. We will sit there and tickle the bee. Then we'll head for the Red River Valley. And today I'll be finding clean. Three lieutenants coming in behind this. Yeah, they just finished their hundred and hundredth mission. Actually, they got cycled through to go back up to rest cap one of our other pilots that was shot down earlier. So they've just got a hundred and one missions. And we're real proud of them because first of all, not many lieutenants fly the 105. And secondly, to get a hundred missions in it is outstanding, we think. So we're going to meet them here at the end of the runway and take them on up to the parking space. Give them a bottle of champagne and imagine their three happy boys. When all is said and done, you really cannot adequately relate a war. War is too potent, too personal. War is living and laughing and crying and dying. It has always been the man who fights, who can best report a war, if he will. True, his story may be confused, sometimes harsh, sometimes boisterously non-committal. But it is real. This is one segment, one small insight into our present war. This is the 105 story, the story of pilots flying over the Red River Valley in the heartland of North Vietnam. Beyond this river barrier, a great concentration of hostile weapons awaits the arrival of Air Force fighter bombers. Any mission north of the Red River requires a special courage known only to the men who must fly again and again into the area until they reach the magic number 100. 100 missions, a completed tour. These are the men of the 388th tactical fighter wing during the month of November 1966. He says, well, what are they doing? He says, well, how do I tell if they're friendly? He says, well, if they come up with their hands over their heads, they'll be friendly. He says, no, what are these guys got a gun? That guy says, well, how far are you from him? He says, well, they're standing right here by me. And he says, well, they must be friendly. He'll have 100. Well, I thought I was going to kill myself initially. You want to know the truth? Geez. FOD. Instructor pilot. Where? T-38s, Williams Air Force Base, Arizona. I figure I'll arrive there and I'll be real quiet and all that. And I'll go in and all the students will nudge each other. And when they meet me and I'll be their instructor and they'll fly with me and they'll nudge each other and say, what did Lieutenant Rasmus do before he came here? And I'll, you know, he'll be all quiet and no one will know until finally there'll be graduation. And we'll show up in mess dress. And there I'll be with my air medals and my DFCs and my Silver Star and my commendation medal and my Vietnam service medal and all this stuff all the way across. And I'll walk in with a slight limp. And they'll say, tell me about it. Oh, it was nothing. It was nothing. You know, with that for a week after, every time I crawl in the airplane, I get, you know, pull my leg in and I'll rinse a little. And I'll say, what is it? I'll say, oh, it's just an old war injury. Forty-five, forty-four. Right. Forty-five, forty-four, forty-two. Are you good? Yeah, I'm good. Get another one. How many is that? Well, it's forty-two and forty-three now. Major in height. One mission, one counter, one for the month. Finally made the board. Ninety-nine hard ones to go. Oh, I'll get forty-three this afternoon. I'll go to put them on for my after number ninety. Very good. So you're going to get two today, huh? One more and I'll be able to make a big one. One more you'll be able to pull red. He's been here about six months. It averages about six months for the tour. Yeah, even though we're roughly a hundred miles from any sort of civilization, morale is high here. I've noticed that. The men know what they're doing and why they're here. Well, if they're, we still have to be over here. Come right back and do what you never need. You come right back and do another hitch. You bet I will. It's a very good way of life. I served in World War II in the Southwest Pacific. Yes, I personally try to discourage it. The man has put in a hundred missions to go to North Vietnam to go home, get a rest and then come back. However, I have one pilot here that's just insistent on taking another hundred. And he's here. His name is Lieutenant Rector. Yeah, I want to come back down. How come you got to stay here? Yeah, it worked hard. Are you going to stay here, Lizzie? Yeah, mommy wouldn't have had any far to do with that. Yeah, okay, there's the deal. You know, you're the flying's good. You don't have all the little pecking rules and regulations you have to put up with in the States. Maybe we did two months ago. It's still a lot better in his vector now. I just, you know, I enjoy it. And it's the kind of deal like everybody says, yeah, I'm waving a flag, but I'm not. But at the same time, you know, where are you going to stop at it, you know? Where's Communist? Are you going to wait until they're in the Philippines or in Australia or San Francisco or Des Moines, Iowa, you know? You can stop it here or wait until somewhere later on. I don't think most of the people think about that. They like me, you know, what happens, you know? If I get shot down to me, they'll never get me anyway. Our bombing objectives, I believe, can be very distinctly divided into two phases. Our introduction program conducted in the southern portion of North Vietnam in an attempt to deny movement of the enemy into South Vietnam. And our strategic, if you will, objectives in the northern portion of North Vietnam in terms of attacking principal lines of communications, the northeast and the northwest railroads, which comprise the two most major railroads in North Vietnam. Also, POL installations and other military supply and storage areas located in the delta regions of North Vietnam. This flight line at night is a pretty active place. There's more work done at night, actually, than there is the daytime, because the daytime is completely taken off with launching and recovering airplanes. I don't have much time for anything else. Of course, there's a turnaround. There's a lot of bomb loading for the second go around noon, but nothing like at night. You know, put it on an airplane, it doesn't come in commission. You have to take it off and put it on another one. Pretty frustrating. They get it done somehow. I don't know how, but they do. We have a remarkable delivery rate here. I can't remember the last time I got a maintenance non-delivery. We're always getting there. They do a real backup job. This target is the Yen Ben Railroad. It's the largest railroad in all of North Vietnam. Its function is to control all the traffic coming in from the north-east railroad and the northwest railroad into Hanoi. It then controls all traffic going south. It's located five nautical miles north of Hanoi. Its defenses include a heavy concentration of AAA, and there are 26 known subsites in the area. Roscoe was brought here by a pilot from Kadina, who was temporarily assigned to the wing. When the pilot was shot down up north, Roscoe sort of became everybody's dog. The only dog allowed on base. Now Roscoe's a free agent and goes everywhere. Sort of a tramp with a big heart. But lots of guys, for instance, don't feel right unless he's sitting there in a commander's chair during the mission briefing. I say if he sleeps, it's going to be an easy mission. Give his ears perc up to watch out. We hear an awful lot about surface-to-air missiles. They're called SAMS or referred to as SA-2s. This is a picture of an SA-2 site situated in the immediate Hanoi area. A close-up of this particular target would look something like this. Very clearly, you can observe the presence of SA-2 missiles. And in this area, we find the radar van which controls the firing of the missiles and also tracks the aircraft along with providing guidance to the SA-2 missile. Our pilots are constantly faced in flying into North Vietnam with missile firings along with extremely heavy anti-aircraft. I kind of call it the dry throat mission myself. Usually I come out bound from the target and I'm just kind of sucking that water bottle dry, dry throat. It's about as scary a mission as I ever did. I think it tries you just about the maximum on the missions. If you can get a ridge between you and that radar site, they can't guide the missile engine. It's just what you get down in the Delta in the flat line. It's a 30-mile ring around the city of Hanoi. It's a bear because it's flat. You have no protection. I don't know how true it is. I'd say it's the most heavily defended place in the history of air warfare. I've been there and I believe it. The winds there from the surface to 5,000 feet along the coast are going to run about 25 knots out of the northeast. Did have an aircraft report right over the mountain there. He said this morning just about a McGee-up pass at 5,000 feet. He had a wind of 030 at 40 knots. Everybody wear your black belt today, guys. That war's it off by wear your flak mask. I'm coming to learn how much you're rushing. I hope you're the last guy in this one. You don't want to go. It shows the cut when we lock it. There ain't no way, right? No way. You got those flags you're going to tie between the wings? Or one of these? Yes, sir. Good morning. First of all we have in our vest is the radio, which is the most important item we have. Our second item I would say is the flares. The third is your weapon. They have their compass and a mirror for signaling and fine direction. The most important one upon bailout is the beeper. I hear yours too. Who did that? How many moms we got? 24. 30 moms. Who belongs to this one? 148. Don't kick my first act. That's where the adrenaline starts. About 35 miles from our turn. We're going to start a left turn and come over here just a little bit and get a little action right below me. We're getting close to the turn point. Roger, I'm turning right now. See you. Going into the right. Right off right. Right under us. Roger, let's go get it. 9 o'clock high, no sweat. Okay, this banjo's got a contact down in the Oregon area. I'm going up about 10 degrees and try to punch. Well, let me see, get me lined up first. Okay, keep turning left. Okay. I'm a little out now, he's strong. I'm going to get strong in a minute. Okay, I'm going in there. 12 o'clock and 1 o'clock. Have a look down on that radio. Take it down, take it down. So that's the line, it's 11 o'clock. We can take it down. Roger, man, just take it down there. We've got a light. See you twice. Let's get out of here. Roger, I'm going. 240. Right on the deck. We've been very successful here in taking pilots from SAC, ADC, training command. As long as they go through one of the tactical schools, one of the 105 schools of TAC Air Command, back in the states that received roughly 70 hours of the 105, they do a good job here. We do have a few youngsters right out of the training school, but most of our pilots have been in the Air Force 10 to 12 years or longer. And in fact, we have some grandfathers. We have some grandfathers here that are fighting this war. My best day was the 5th of July, when I attacked and destroyed four SAM sites in one 25-minute mission. And this came about because in escorting the strike flights, two SAM sites came up on our way in. We had to attack these boys to turn them off the air to get into the target area. While in the target area, another SAM site came up threatening the strike force. And of course, we attacked and got him. And then on the way back out, another SAM site came up to block our exit out of the target area, which was about 15 or 20 miles north of Hanoi. And we only had one part of rockets and a 20-millimeter cannon ammunition remaining. But he fired two SAMs at us and we managed to acquire them visually and put the rockets on him and machine gun him out of commission. This was the best day I've had. And I don't fear to go through another one of those. A little too much for an old man. So if I could, if I can swing a deal to get down south with working 100s or F-5s or A-1s or, jeez, I don't care as long as it's close air support. If I can swing that, I'm going to just try to go, or maybe back to the state's TV wide upgrade and down there, if not, I'll stick around and fly an 01 or an A-1. Check you out right up north, you know. You ever have thoughts that you might not make the honor? Oh, no. Yeah, but, uh, I've been drawing paper 16 years. It's my job. Well, I ask the guard, you know, you get up in the 90s and you got bed and a go and you say, well, I'm going home pretty soon, so I've got to tell these guys something. So you go lay in bed at night and you think of things to tell them. And I run south. Oh, my God. Now, wait a minute, wait a minute. Wait a minute. I'm going to tell you guys something right now. This is my speech and I don't need any more. Incidentally, I have a three hour speech prepared. Forget it. Something I'm damn proud to have, besides working with all you guys and your names here, I don't really need this picture frame with this. But, uh, whatever the guys you're fought with. Fighter bomber pilots at Karat Air Base, Thailand. For the flyer, living the hell over Hanoi, facing up to the odds, there is the simple yet poignant phrase, there ain't no way, there ain't no way, there ain't no way. But there comes the day for most, when the job is done. I won't even say to the rest of the guys, no, there's no way. There is a way. Major Diaz schedule in there. This morning is a little hard. Stay down there.