Bear Taylor 
RIPPLE SALVO… #716… USS CONSTELLATION CRUISES OFFSHORE SAN DIEGO FOR A SATURDAY NIGHT PRESIDENTIAL VISIT…LBJ tells crew: “Men may debate– men may dissent –men may disagree, and God forbid that a time should come when men of this land may not. But there does come a time when men must stand. And for America, that time has come.”… but first…
Good Morning: Day SEVEN HUNDRED SIXTEEN of a look back of fifty years to the days of Rolling Thunder and iron-sight dive bombing…
19 FEBRUARY 1968…HEAD LINES from The New York Times on a sunny Monday in the Big Apple…
TET OFFENSIVE/KHESANH: Page 1: “AIRPORT TERMINAL AT SAIGON STRUCK IN ROCKET ATTACK–A U.S. Serviceman Waiting For Flight To Return Home, Killed By Enemy Missile, 21 Hurt”… “The Vietcong struck sprawling Tan Son Nhut airport here (Saigon) again this morning after having bombarded cities, provincial towns and American bases yesterday. The enemy troops lobbed mortars and rockets onto the base sporadically through the night and kept thousands of American servicemen huddled in bunkers until dawn…. A 122mm rocket slammed into the civilian terminal which was crowded with United States Government and service personnel waiting to board a flight to the United States. One American serviceman was killed and 21 injured. Since yesterday, six Americans have been killed and 67 have been wounded in bold mortar and rocket attacks on the base, which is six miles from the heart of Saigon. The control tower was hit earlier this week… Tan Son Nhut has been a key target in the Vietcong offensive that began early yesterday with rockets and mortar strikes from the Central Highlands to the Mekong Delta. One provincial capital was under siege for hours and a bridge on the fringe of Saigon was turned into a savage battle zone… “Forty-seven locations throughout South Vietnam were attacked primarily by fire from mortars and rockets,’ said Lieutenant Colonel Malcolm Sussel of General Westmoreland’s staff. ‘Very rarely did they follow-up with a ground attack. I don’t think they achieved any great success. We expected something Saturday night. there were indications from informers, civilians, what not, that something was coming. The major commands were notified.’…The sharpest fight of the weekend began when 500 Vietcong troops attacked a provincial capital 90 miles west of Saigon.”... Page 1: “ALLIED COMMAND DIVIDED ON FOE’S AIM IN NEW RAIDS”... “The allied command was sharply divided today over the aims of the enemy’s new rocket and mortar offensive, in which dozens of cities, towns and military facilities came under shellfire….The command agrees on two points: that the enemy had enough resources to continue the attacks, and that the allies should remain alert to combat them. One group…feels that the Vietcong staged the bombardment to divert attention, men and materiel, from the Khesanh area, where they are believed to be preparing a major ground offensive….another group views the bombardment as a form of stepped up harassment with political rather than military objectives. And a third is convinced that the bombardment was a substitute for a second wave attack.”... Page 1: “Hanoi Paper Scores Johnson’s Formula For Talks”... “The Communist party newspaper Nhan Dan said today that the Vietnamese people ‘resolutely reject’ President Johnson’s San Antonio formula for opening negotiations… ‘United States demands for reciprocal acts by North Vietnam linked to any halt in American bombings’ is unacceptable. ‘The United States must end its acts of aggression, end bombing definitely and unconditionally, and cease all other acts of war,’ Nhan Dan continued.”… Page 1: “Hanoi Troops Set to Attack In Laos–Threat to Saravane Tied To Khesanh–Similarly To Giap’s Plan in 1954 Seen”... “North Vietnamese forces in Laos are poised to assault the provincial capital of Saravane. Their new aggressiveness is being linked to Hanoi’s plans against the United States Marine outpost at Khesanh… Ominous analogies are being drawn with the situation in 1954 when General Vo Nguyen Giap coordinated widespread attacks by his troops in Laos with the opening of his victorious battle against the French at Dienbienphu.”…
PUEBLO INCIDENT: Page 1: “The United States Warned North Korea Today Against ‘Deliberate Aggravation of an already serious situation’ by any move to punish the 82 surviving crewmen of the intelligence ship Pueblo. Hints that the prisoners might be tried as criminals or spies were contained in a North Korean broadcast Friday. The North Koreans said that a ‘Joint letter of apology’ had been signed by all survivors of the ship, which was seized on January 23….The State Department challenged the validity of the ‘confession.’…. United States officials said there were still almost no signs of movement from North Korea in response to demands that the Pueblo and her crew be released.”…
19 FEBRUARY 1968…OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER… New York Times…No coverage… “Vietnam: Air Losses” (Chris Hobson) There were two fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 19 February 1968…
(1) CAPTAIN P.A. BRANDT and 1LT P.J. SEILER were flying an F-4C of the 390th TFS and 366th TFW out of Danang on a directed air support mission to Khesanh when hit by ground fire shortly after takeoff. The crew evaluated the damage as minor and pressed on to Khesanh. Unfortunately, the battle damage from the ground fire caught up with them and they were forced to eject about 10 miles south of Khesanh and were fortunate to avoid enemy troops awaiting rescue by Air Force helicopter. They survived to fly and fight again…
(2) Another RF-4C of the 460th TRW at Tan Son Nhut was destroyed by the Vietcong rocket attacks on the 19th…
From the Compilation “34TFS/F-105 History” by Howie Plunkett for 19-Feb-68: “F-105s from the 388th TFW struck Phuc Yen (JCS 61) airfield using radar signals from Commando Club. The ironhand flight providing support for the strike fired one Shrike at a Fansong signal located approximately one mile from Phuc Yen. Aircrew estimated some damage to the radar, which ceased to operate 70 seconds after missile launch….Another 388th flight under Commander Club control dropped 24 MK-117s on Yen Bai airfield in RP-5. There was no BDA due to weather (overcast from deck to 20,000′).” Major Sam Armstrong was on this flight and recorded that there were no MIG calls going or returning, but there was light 85-mm in the Yen Bai area. “All in all, a pretty uneventful mission.”… Plunkett: “Former West Point (All-American, Mr. Inside) football star, LCOL Felix (‘Doc’) Blanchard flew his first combat mission 5 days after arriving at Korat on 14 February.”…. “Major David Dickson of the 34th TFS flew his 86th mission, targeted against Route 7 in RP-3″…
RIPPLE SALVO… #716… NYT, 19-Feb-68, Page 1: Dateline: Palm Desert, CA, Article by Max Frankel…”JOHNSON CONFERS WITH EISENHOWER–BRIEFS HIM ON WAR–3-Hour Talk On West Coast Caps President’s Cross-Country Tour of Military Bases–(Including USS CONSTELLATION)”…
“President Johnson brought his impromptu weekend tour of military installations today to the golf course winter home of the most famous soldier of them all–former President Dwight D. Eisenhower. Seeking a non-partisan atmosphere for what he has been advertising as a time of decisive testing in Vietnam, Mr. Johnson conferred with his Republican predecessor for about three hours. Lieutenant Lewis W. Walt, deputy commander of the Marines, and Walt Rostow, the President’s special assistant, gave General Eisenhower an up-to-date briefing on the war. Mr. Johnson told the general the enemy was believed to have been badly hurt in the recent fighting. Presumably he told him in greater detail what he has been telling the combat troops on their way to war, and the Constellation sailors and fliers recently back from the battle zone.
WHY MEN MUST STAND
‘Men may debate–men may dissent–men may disagree,’ Mr. Johnson said on the deck of the aircraft carrier Constellation this morning, ‘and God forbid that a time should come when men of this land may not. But there does come a time when men must stand. And for America, that time has now come.’ Addressing the men among whom he had spent the night aboard the carrier, and with some whom he worshiped on her hangar deck this morning, Mr. Johnson continued: ‘In Vietnam today, the foes of freedom are making ready to test America’s will. Quite obviously, the enemy believes–he thinks–that our will is vulnerable. Quite clearly the enemy hopes that he can break that will. And quite certainly we know that the enemy is going to fail. So we have taken our stand–all that is asked, all that may be required.’
NEW ATTACK UNCERTAIN
“Mr. Johnson indicated to newsmen in his quarters aboard Constellation late last night that he did not know for sure that the Vietcong and North Vietnamese forces had begun the expected second round of their winter offensive. But he left little doubt, in private as well as in his public talks, that he accepted the judgment of the senior military commanders that there had been a significant shift in Communist strategy. This strategy, they believe, is aimed at breaking the back of the South Vietnamese Government and Army and the will of the United States to defend them. ‘They are going for broke,’ the President explained to reporters. ‘Heretofore, it has been a hit-and-run thing. In their first attacks on cities and American installations three weeks ago, Mr. Johnson continued, the enemy expected to capture and hold some places and to create all the havoc possible. ‘What they are going to do this time, we will just have to see,’ the President said.
“‘I don’t think anybody can predict. These things vary from time to time. At this time we don’t know what they are going to do. How extensive they make it is up to them.’ There was little doubt, however, about what the President was doing.
“He took off on short notice from Washington yesterday afternoon, adding some of his itinerary as he moved cross country, to put to rest some of the doubt and dejection about Vietnam that had become so evident in Washington. His attitude throughout the trip has been sober and determined. He has not joked much–except about unfortunate sailors who were at liberty from the Constellation and were thus ‘forced to sped Saturday night ashore ‘during his visit. Mr Johnson suggested repeatedly that the search for peace appeared to be exhausted and that therefore the time for debate had come to an end while brave Americans made their stand in battle.
“The President flew yesterday afternoon to the Pope Air Force Base near Fort Bragg, N.C. to watch elements of the 82nd Airborne Infantry Division depart for Vietnam. He then flew to the El Toro (Calif.) Marine Corps Naval Air Station, from which elements of the Fifth Marine Division also being airlifted into combat. Many of them, as Mr. Johnson noted with pride, were going for their second tours in the war zones, some as volunteers. The two divisions are supplying the 10,500 men Mr. Johnson is rushing to Vietnam to reinforce thin lines of defense at the request of General William C. Westmoreland, the American commander in the war zone.
‘SPIRIT OF THE OLD, PRIDE OF THE NEW’
“Mr. Johnson then made the half-hour helicopter trip from El Toro to the Constellation. The huge carrier, which returned from duty off Vietnam in December, sailed about 15 miles out to sea from San Diego to receive the Commander-in-Chief and to serve as a hotel and forum for ceremonies. Only about 60-per cent of her crew could be rounded up for the visit. The President had breakfast this morning with a score of sailors and fliers and then attended Protestant services on the hangar deck beneath a huge sign that read ‘Spirit of the Old, Pride of the New’…
“He addressed the crew on the flight deck, took a 21-gun salute and then wove his way by helicopter through the Santa Rosa Mountains to the idyllic oasis of Palm Desert, 120 miles east of San Diego. He was greeted on the El Dorado Country Club golf course beneath date palms and snow-capped ridges by General of the Army Eisenhower–ruddy and red beside the relatively pale complexion of Mr. Johnson, wearing a bright yellow shirt and sport jacket besides the austere gray of the President.
“The two men chatted briefly while posing for pictures, with General Eisenhower recalling that it was the writers, not the photographers, that used to cause him the most trouble in the White house. Then they strolled 100 yards to the Eisenhower home, a one-story modern desert structure like all the others in this wealthy resort. After what was descried as a good talk, the President and the general sat down to lunch. following lunch, they played golf on the short fairway course of the nearby Seven Lakes Country Club. the President later left for the Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington.”…. “The President landed at Andrews at 1:10 A.M. today, 19 February.”…
RTR Quote for 19 February: GEORGE WASHINGTON, General Order to the Continental Army, 2 July 1776: “Let us therefore animate and encourage each other, and show the whole world, that a Freeman contending for Liberty on his own ground is superior to any slavish mercenary on earth.”
Lest we forget… Bear
