On 9/4/04 11:52 AM, in article ,
"Paul Michael Brown" wrote:

I'm curious about the US doctrine for anti-shipping attacks 25 years ago -
say, the late 70's/early 80's?

This topic is covered (fictionally of course) in Stephen Coonts novel "The
Intruders," which is set in the mid-70s. The protagonist is assigned to
study how best to attack a Soviet surface combatant (cruiser? destroyer?).
In the novel, no precision ordnance is available and the attack plan
requires flying into the evelope of both SAMs and AAA. When queried by his
skipper as to his conclusions, the protagonist says "I've become a big fan
of attack submarines lately."

I just read that book recently. Not the best of Coonts' books. Jake
Grafton just gets more and more spec ops, and frankly, even though , many of
the Intruder pilots I have known might *think* they could pull off the crap
that Grafton does, they couldn't. (Just my editorial opinion...)

The book is a compilation of a bunch of A-6E (and at least one Prowler)
mishaps. I was surprised to have met or known several of the folks who were
at the controls of many of them--kind of a rush for me.

I vote for more sea stories and less "Jake gets shot down and kills bad guys
with M-60's."

--Woody