On Wed, 14 Jul 2004 14:36:09 -0500, Jack
wrote:

ArtKramr wrote:

Flak is not related to commitment. It is statistical happenstance that
controlled the skies over Germany.

Given the difference in operating flotillas of bombers, unable to
deviate from their chosen path or altitude in order to avoid flak, and
operating smaller flights of more maneuverable jets with very different
weapons delivery parameters and limitations, Art's point is well made.

The fighters seem to have had similar stats in other wars, in that those
pilots who lived through the first dozen or so sorties tended to have
much better survival rates thereafter. For bomber pilots it's much more
a roll of the dice on any given mission, with survival rates changing
only slightly as the number of missions survived increases.

Did Buff pilots fly enough sorties over well defended targets in SEA for
a statistically significant comparison?

AAA fire comes in a lot of flavors and flak was not exclusively a WW
II Germany phenomenon. Heavy gun flak at altitude is a scary thing,
and as you mention, the ability to maneuver helps to defend against
it.

But, there's flak and there's flak. Some is aimed fire, some is
barrage. Some is optical and some is radar guided. Anti-aircraft fire
ranges from small .30 and .50 caliber automatic weapons up through
huge guns at 100 or 130MM.

Optically guided flak can be defeated by jinking, random changes in
heading and altitude that destroy the lead computation of the gun.
Barrage flak simply fills a block of airspace and the best option is
to simply expedite your passage through the area.

Modern defense systems integrate multiple weapons, as Art can attest.
Guns and enemy aircraft are better than either one alone. Add some
SAM's in radar or IR flavors and you compound the issue further.

As Steve mentioned, the stats in SEA were that your first ten or
fifteen missions were your most vulnerable. It also turned out that
for a mission count tour, the last five or ten were equally dangerous.
The beginners were likely to make mistakes while the end-of-tour guys
often began to feel invulnerable and sought to win the war
single-handedly.

BUFFs only went into the heavily defended areas of North Vietnam
during Linebacker II. During the eleven days of Christmas they lost
fifteen (and a couple of others crashed on recovery outside of the
target area.) According to Michel in "Eleven Days of Christmas", the
B-52s flew 795 sorties of which 372 went to Hanoi. The loss rate was
1.89 %. All 15 of the losses were within a 13 mile radius of Hanoi and
the loss rate there was 4.3%


Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (USAF-Ret)
"When Thunder Rolled"
Smithsonian Institution Press
ISBN #1-58834-103-8