Archie to SAM: A Short Operational History of Ground-Based Air ...

SUMMARY, TRENDS, AND CONCLUSIONS
events in the last stages of the war obscured these facts. The
introduction of jets markedly improved aircraft performance,
just as the atomic bomb enormously expanded firepower. Therefore,
both the public and military saw the offensive as supreme.
However, the combatants used only the jet, not the atomic
bomb, in America’s next war. Korea was different from World War
II and the wars that the prophets and theorists had forecast. The
peasant hordes on the periphery of Asia stalemated the strongest
nation in the world. This war was limited by both sides (at least
by the major players, the United States, China, and the Soviet
Union; the Koreans understandably had a different view) in
terms of means and objectives. With the exception of the MiG-15,
the Communists used only obsolete equipment to thwart and impose
considerable losses on United Nations’ airmen. Air power
was not decisive in the war. At the same time, the war reemphasized
many of the basic AAA lessons from World War II—the
lethality of flak, the danger of low-altitude operations, and the
usefulness of antiflak countermeasures.
In many respects, the Vietnam War repeated the same pattern.
Again, American Airmen were unprepared for the reality of combat
and especially AAA, their chief opponent. Once more, the lessons
of World War II and Korea had to be relearned. Yet again,
the air power of the strongest nation in the world proved indecisive
against Asian masses armed with simple weapons.
The one new air defense weapon introduced into combat in
Vietnam was the SAM. Although these missiles claimed relatively
few aircraft, they made air operations more difficult and
expensive. American tactics and equipment were able to overcome
the SAMs, but the missiles forced the Airmen to increase
the number of support aircraft and to operate at lower altitudes
where AAA proved even more deadly. American Airmen learned
to cope with the ground-based defenses. They used modified
tactics, ECM, and new technology, such as antiradiation missiles
(ARM) and standoff weapons. Linebacker II (December 1972)
clearly demonstrated that modest numbers (compared to World
War II) of second-rate air defense equipment could not stop
large-scale air efforts by a major power but could inflict both
a burden and a loss on the attacker.
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