spartans_in_darkness

Tep SE6RETi'leeMINTHX1
were greatly exaggerated: about one thousand
died in the attacks.' North Vietnamese air defenses,
including MiGs, AAA, and SAMs, shot down
twenty-six aircraft, fifteen of them B-52s. Ninetythree
airmen were killed and another thirty-one
were captured. On one day, six of the attacking
bombers were shot down. Hanoi fired about
1,200 SAMs at the attacking aircraft.
(6//61) SIGINT support to Linebacker II was
extensive. Six ground intercept sites and four airborne
platforms provided coverage of the North
Vietnamese air defense network, with the bulk of
the effort coming from the Air Force Security
Service missions at Ramasun, Thailand, and
Clark Air Force Base, Philippines. The tactical, or
real-time, reporting of SAM and MiG warnings
came across the Teaball and the Red Crown control
nets. OPSCOMM, or the informal operator
radio teleprinter links, was used to pass other significant
intelligence to the cryptologic liaisons
attached to the air units."
(6//61) Overall, almost 500 SAM and MiG
warnings were passed to the attacking aircraft.
The MiG warnings, provided by the Teaball
system, proved the most
useful, giving azimuth,
range, altitude, and
the number of North
Vietnamese aircraft. The
biggest beneficiaries
were the tactical aircraft;
the North Vietnamese
MiGS only occasionally
attacked the B-52s,
although the big aircraft
actually shot down two
MiGS with their radarguided
tail guns. The
SAM warnings were not
as useful for the big
bombers. There was a
high concentration of
SAM complexes in the
Hanoi and Haiphong
areas. When the B-52s approached, the number
of SAM alerts often cluttered the air warning frequencies.
Also, the North Vietnamese were aware
of the American monitoring. On some occasions,
they were able to "spoof' the SIGINT system
through a combination of deception and emissions
control. 7
CU) The bombing surprised the American
public; there had been no advance warning.
Congress was still in recess. Unexpectedly, there
was little domestic reaction; nothing at all like the
reaction to the invasion of Cambodia. Much of the
criticism of the bombing came from the American
media and foreign sources, such as the Vatican.
As for the Americans and Vietnamese, both had
reached into their quivers and found they had run
out of arrows. The Vietnamese exhausted their
missile inventory and by the end of the bombing
offensive were virtually defenseless. On the other
hand, the United States was paying a heavy price
in aircraft and crews. As many as thirty-four additional
B-52s had been damaged during the offensive.
Senior Air Force officers and President
Nixon were concerned over the growing losses of
bombers and fatigue among the crew members."
(V) at) Guam. a SAC B-52 crewattends a Linebacker II btiefing.
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