Khe Sanh Day Mission
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Of the 185 missions I flew out of Nakhon Phanom, only one was flown during daylight hours. As a result, this particular mission remains vivid in my memory. During February 1968, Juni Tengan and I were one of four crews assigned to provide close air support to the Marines at the Khe Sanh Combat Base (the red pin on the map below).
Located in the northern part of South Vietnam, Khe Sanh had come under constant attack by North Vietnamese troops since late January. For several days, rainy weather and fog had hampered much of the air support that the Marines needed to defend the base. It was thought that the Nimrods, with the A-26, could be effective in this situation.
I remember our pre-mission briefing being short and to the point. After getting into the Khe Sanh area, we were to contact a forward air controller (FAC) for specific targets. Since there were several thousand enemy troops surrounding the base we could expect almost anything in the way of antiaircraft weapons.
Upon our arrival in the Khe Sanh area shortly before noon, we made radio contact with the FAC. Finding a break in the clouds to the west of the base, we descended to a lower altitude. We could now see the base and several hilltops where the Marines had established outposts.
I remember thinking here we are under all these white clouds with an airplane painted black on the underside. What a nice target for enemy AAA crews. The FAC described our target area which was on the very edge of the base perimeter close to the opposite end of the airstrip from our position. He said there was a concentration of enemy troops digging ditches up to the edge of the base. Just on the other side of the wire some Marines were dug in observing this activity.
Our bomb load was 4 x 750lb finned napalm and 4 x 500lb unfinned napalm on the wing pylons plus some fragmentation bombs in the bomb bay. Juni was concerned about a bomb going into the Marines position: he turned to me and said “We need to go in low for this and use the four 500lb napalms.” He then started a dive and leveled off just above the tops of the trees and bushes along the base perimeter. As we were doing this the FAC was on the radio yelling “Nimrod, Nimrod, you’re going too low, Pull up! Pull up!”
As we flew along the edge of the base you could clearly see the bunkers that the Marines were in. All of a sudden we see one Marine jump up on top of a bunker. He had his weapon above his head waving us on. I remember he had his helmet on but no shirt. You would have thought we were at a football game going for a touchdown!
About the time we passed our cheering Marine I set up the armament switches and Juni started firing all 8 of our guns in hopes of keeping the enemy troops heads down. As we got closer to our target area I glanced out about 11 o’clock and saw four or five troops trying to move some type of gun, on wheels, across a small clearing. They did not pay any attention to us. Juni then did a quick pop up to about 200 feet and I selected up the outboard pylons in quick sequence stringing the napalm along a 100 yard line. As the area erupted in fire the FAC was ecstatic, saying our drop was perfect.
We pulled up to the base of the clouds and the FAC began directing us in on several artillery positions and enemy bunkers to the north of the base. We made 4 attacks using the finned napalm then finished up by dropping the fragmentation bombs. Several times during these attacks the FAC said we were being shot at but neither Juni nor I saw any tracers.
When we arrived back at NKP and did a post-flight check of the aircraft, we found several holes in the aft fuselage area. One bullet had gone right up through the middle of the bomb bay.
Later, in talking about the mission, Juni and I both decided that flying at night had its advantages.