Word from Willie – 2023 – June

Editor’s Note: Karl has had a great life as an AF Officer and contractor and deployed all over the world to include tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. His perspective on life as a young Lt is a worthy read!

My Father was in the military (Army and Air Force) for 32 ½ years until he retired as a Chief Master Sergeant in 1974. I attended Texas A&M University and was in the A&M Corps of Cadets from 1967-1971. When I was commissioned as a 2nd Lt in the USAF in 1971, I thought that I was really up to speed on how to lead a group of people – I was the all knowing kind of officer that would call the right shots every time to fix any problem. At least, I felt this way until my first real assignment after completing five months of technical school at Chanute AFB Illinois learning the ropes on becoming an Aircraft Maintenance Officer.

A few weeks after the North Vietnamese invaded the South during Easter week, 1972, I received my orders to report to the 388 Tactical Fighter Wing in Korat Royal Thai AFB. President Nixon had just ordered the initiation of the Linebacker I air offensives over areas of North Vietnam which had never been targeted before.
The intent was to provide some incentive and motivation to pressure the North Vietnamese to pull back and halt their ground invasion. I was assigned to be the maintenance officer for the 18 F-4E Phantom II fighter-bombers of the 34th Tactical Fighter Squadron. Our job was an important one – to keep our aircraft in condition to fly two kinds of missions: (1) air-to-air missions against the North Vietnamese MIGS determined to stop our air attacks in coordination with their Surface-to-Air missiles (SAMs) and numerous anti-aircraft gun batteries; and (2) air-to-ground missions to support the South Vietnamese Army in holding the line and regaining lost ground, and to be a part of the F-105G Wild Weasel Hunter-Killer team against the many SA-2 SAM sites up North.

What I quickly learned was that it was not so much my knowledge or activities that made the operation work day after day, but one’s ability to understand the task, the limits of your resources to handle the task (people, spare parts, time, etc), and the pulling of these things and people together in a team approach to achieve the mission objectives. I found that most of the enlisted force were highly dedicated and ready to give their maximum effort – given that their leaders would properly delegate responsibilities to the lowest levels possible, provide the necessary guidance, protect their work force from being interrupted by others (bureaucrats, other agencies, sometimes even senior leadership), and give them the leeway to operate (which meant) stay out of their way unless they needed you to deal with obstacles they could not deal with). On a hot, humid, dusty and noisy flight line in 1972, my first group of co-workers taught me how to listen, lead and trust them to perform mission impossible types of tasks.

Our aircrews depended on us to provide them with fully operational equipment for their missions over the high threat environment in the dangerous skies of North Vietnam. Up until that first assignment, I had read numerous books and seen many lists that attempted to define the attributes of good, effective leaders. During the early stages of my one year tour in Southeast Asia, I had narrowed the list to basically three simple rules that guided me in every situation I found myself in for the next 25 years in the Air Force – for problems large or small. First, know your stuff; second, Be a Man, and third, always look after your People.

Knowing your stuff simply means to know your specialty, whom you must deal with in the daily process, and the structure of your organization (who had the powers to make things happen and make decisions). Know your business so that when your people came to you and ask, “What should we do in this circumstance?”, you can tell them. If you don’t know the answer, then tell them honestly, “I don’t know, but I’ll find out.” This works the same whether it’s going up or down the chain of command. Never try to bluff your way through serious situations. Bluffing in matters like air operations or safety is a surefire way of getting people hurt or even killed.

Be a man, there are no such things as great leaders; simply ordinary people tasked with tackling great challenges. An officer must be one of fair play, especially when his people are assigned the most difficult, back-breaking jobs. Avoid being a person who tries to pass on to the next fellow the most difficult jobs and won’t do them himself. If your unit ends up stuck with the short end of the stick, set the example and work as hard as your people under all conditions. If it is hot outside, avoid hiding in an air-conditioned office, or if it is raining during monsoon, get out there with them. Be truthful and never compromise integrity – you can be wrong on many occasions and survive, but even a small breach of integrity will cast doubts on your overall character and ability to lead.

The third rule – look after your people. This means many things you wouldn’t normally. think about. In the field, it means supplying your people with the proper equipment and things to be able to perform the job, training, clothing, water, and food. Let them know that if you are going to demand the maximum effort from them, you are going to do the maximum support for them as well. Pay attention to things like their annual performance reports and promotion recommendations. Link up their achievements to real needs of the Air Force and avoid using jargon that no one else understands. Basically, look after them and they will look after you. Avoid becoming just a manager of technology and become a true leader concerned with the welfare of the people.

These were my three simple rules – it amounted to doing the right thing, paying attention to details, large and small, and don’t do anything to embarrass your family, your service and your school. As General Robert E. Lee told his troops on April 1865, “Do the best that you know how to do – your nation demands of you no less than that!”

During the Linebacker II air offensives in December 1972, the US put forth a maximum bombing campaign against North Vietnam. It is often referred to as the “1972 Christmas Bombings”. All the things I had learned about leadership during the Linebacker I Phase came to a head in this 12-day offensive. The North Vietnamese had agreed in October to negotiations in Paris to end the war after losing the initiative in their massive invasion when US air power devastated their forces. A manpower drawdown of US personnel occurred in the Fall of ’72 as the negotiations progressed – after all, it seemed as though the war was over. Our unit was drained from the losses of personnel to the point where we only had one crew chief for every three of our possessed aircraft. When President Nixon ordered the new offensive on 18 December; it was quite unexpected by those of us in the theater. The North Vietnamese had walked out of the peace talks, and President Nixon was determined to motivate them to return and sign the proposed agreements.

Most of the middle level supervisors (Captains and Majors) at our base had taken Christmas leave and returned stateside for 2-3 weeks (leaving the youngest officers to watch over things during what was supposed to be a quiet period). The senior officers in my section had left me, a 2nd Lt with 4-months of experience, in
charge of the Fighter Section (the F-4s and F-105G Wild Weasels at Korat). We spent the next 12 days on 12-16 hour shifts supporting hundreds of missions to escort the B-52 bombers that dropped thousands of tons of bombs on critical war sustaining targets near Hanoi and Haiphong.

We all knew that if we were successful in this massive show of force, then the North Vietnamese would be convinced that it was in their best interests to return to the peace table, and our POWs would be returned home as part of the deal. The round-the-clock bombings did shock the North Vietnamese into returning to the talks, and in only a few weeks, the final negotiations led to the end of active US involvement in the war. But this did not happen without some cost to our side – 41 airmen, Air Force, Navy and Marines, were killed in the process when we lost 15 B-52s, several fighters, and a EB-66 Electronic Warfare aircraft. The Vietnam War had consumed over 3,700 fixed wing aircraft and over 7,500 helicopters in eight years of combat. Some years later, I wrote a book entitled “Linebacker: The Untold Story of the Air Raids Over North Vietnam” which was published by
Random House Ivey Books in 1989.

It was intended to fully describe the planning and execution of the Linebacker campaigns, document the supreme sacrifices of the American warfighters involved, and provide a summary of the lessons learned for future war planning for air campaigns. This paid off later for the Desert Storm effort, as many aircrews, combat planners and strategists used the book throughout the Iraqi air war to avoid the pitfalls of some faulty tactics we had discovered in Vietnam. The point of all this is that my entire successful 26 year career in the Air Force was kickstarted in a remote, dirty jungle war that wasn’t even supported by a large percentage of the American public. In this environment, a young 23 year old Lieutenant was responsible for 70 troops averaging about 19 years each in age and had to learn how to master the art of motivating diverse groups of people to perform to their maximum limits and beyond. Now, as a 73 year old, I am aware that the young troops are still just as eager to listen to advice that doesn’t change with time or type of equipment. Only the faces change, not the basic human elements. By witnessing first hand some of the horrors of war (on both sides, American and Vietnamese) early in my service career, I committed myself and any team that I worked with to provide the best possible systems to our warfighters to increase their chances for survival and safety on the battlefield. As witnessed lately, the dedicated efforts of a relatively few number of Americans supporting the defense of this nation has resulted in the demise of our Cold War opponents and the emergence of the US as the only real super-power on the planet. I am proud to have been a part of all that, and will strive to keep us in that position.

There is a memorial plaque in Lexington Green, Massachusetts over the graves of those Minutemen who gave their lives for America in 1775. It reads: “To assert and defend their native rights. They nobly dared to be free! Peace, Liberty and Independence of the United States of America was their glorious reward!” That is what the US military is all about. Our military has one central responsibility, and it performs that superbly – to protect the security of our nation. Our combat and support troops average about 180 days a year deployed away from home and are serving in 100 countries around the world. Thousands of our finest sons and daughters are standing watch because they find pride and satisfaction in preserving our freedom, as Americans have done for the past 248 years. And let’s not forget those many Americans that did not get to come home when they lost their lives in defense of America. I knew some very good people who didn’t make it out of Southeast Asia, people who would have become well known citizens if they had survived. I think of them often and made my commitments to always do my best in their places so that their sacrifices would have some meaning and purpose.

So there it is…I’ve been a few places, done a few things. But quite honestly, mine is a really typical story. This country is full of people like me who simply did their jobs with a sense of purpose to insure that no one is allowed to take away our basic right to live freely and take care of our families. The other unsung heroes of America are the spouses of the people in uniform. They support their spouse in uniform day after day, with long periods of family separations in the process. That is one of the unfortunate aspects of a military career, but one understood by generations of spouses who undergo this sacrifice. My wife Charlotte certainly fell into this category due to my numerous TDYs to get systems developed and tested over long periods of time. Meanwhile, she was having to do both of our jobs in raising the children and taking care of the daily business of maintaining the household.

Thanks Karl and a well done from Word from Willie!