Case Studies in the Achievement of Air Superiority - Air Force ...

AIR SUPERIORITY
FIGURE 10-2
Air Command Arrangements in Southeast Asia, 1966-1972
CINCPAC
SAC
CINCPACFLT
COMUSMACV
CINCPACAF
7th FLT
7th FLT 7th AF 13th AF 3rd AF
I always looked at air superiority as the ability to do with airpower what we wanted
to do while the enemy couldn’t do the same thing. With this perspective, there was
no question that we could bomb North Vietnam at will while the [North Vietnamese]
could not carry out similar operation^.^^
Indeed, by April 1968 the Seventh Air Force was on the way toward developing
a system of air battle management far superior to that which had
existed in 1965. As General Momyer, Seventh Air Force commander during
most of ROLLING THUNDER, noted, the U.S. never lost air superiority over
North Vietnam:
Notwithstanding the truth of this statement, ROLLING THUNDER did reveal
some significant problems in the area of air superiority. The first was that
the USAF lacked an air superiority fighter in the same category as the
MiG-21. The second was that it took too long to develop and deploy a
number of innovations important to air superiority tactics. The third problem
was in the area of training: not enough time was spent preparing F-4
pilots for dogfights with MiGs. Finally, U.S. air-to-air missiles were not
effective enough.
On the other hand, ROLLING THUNDER demonstrated that regular
aerial refueling was suitable in tactical operations: indeed, the development
of aerial refueling operations during ROLLING THUNDER (and.
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