Gradual Failure: the Air War over North Vietnam, 1965-1966 - Book Review

Air & Space Power Journal, Winter, 2003 by Paul G. Niesen

by Jacob Van Staaveren. Air Force History and Museums Program (http://www.airforcehistory.hq.af.mil/publications.htm), 200 McChord Street, Box 94, Bolling AFB, Washington, D.C. 20332-1111, 2002, 388 pages, $60.00 (hardcover).

I have a vague recollection of hearing about the early years of the Vietnam War when I was growing up in Madison, Wisconsin. The war was in one of those faraway places, like Chicago or Kansas City--only warmer, and it rained more there. I heard about the first Operation Linebacker years later, as I went through ROTC. At that point, the question of whether Linebacker was a success or failure never made an impression on me. The point my instructors drove home was the intense control exerted by the civilian leadership over military operations. Moving through my Air Force career, I studied further aspects of the first Linebacker as part of my military education and in relation to my various jobs in readiness, weather, and operations. But the best overall coverage I've seen to this date is in Gradual Failure.

Clausewitz reminds us that war is an instrument of politicians. Many orders in-theater originated as decisions in headquarters thousands of miles from the front lines--in the Oval Office, operations centers in the Pentagon, or conference rooms in Hawaii or other locations. Van Staaveren effectively captures the thoughts of President Lyndon B. Johnson, Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara, Gen Earle G. Wheeler (then the chairman of the Joints Chiefs of Staff), and other prominent leaders and political figures.

The author's discussion of the attacks against North Vietnamese surface-to-air (SAM) missiles in 1966 is particularly striking. He addresses both the initial indecisiveness of American civilian leaders with regard to striking the SAMs and the subsequent limitations they placed on Air Force and Navy aircrews who targeted the missiles. American air planners realized the threat the SAMs represented and made plans to attack them--something that we take for granted today. But Van Staaveren vividly recounts how President Johnson and Secretary McNamara's desire to limit operations, always under the guise of not wanting to draw China or the Soviet Union into the war, stymied the effectiveness of military operations.

Just as Col John Warden emphasized the importance of attacking key industries and supplies in his "five-ring" theory during the first Gulf War, so did air planners identify petroleum, oil, and lubricants (POL) storage centers, cement factories, ports, aircraft-assembly points, and dams as critical targets during early Linebacker operations. Van Staaveren shows time and again that Johnson and McNamara feared that attacking these assets would force an escalation of the war, thus bringing in China and/or the Soviet Union. Eventually, the need to make progress in the war forced the president and secretary to approve selected POL storage points, dams, and other vital targets--but under strict control.

Aside from the control the politicians exercised upon operations in-theater, time and again Van Staaveren brings to the front an overarching international political aspect to Operation Linebacker--the political stability of South Vietnam during this period. His magnificent coverage of this aspect of the war helps the reader more clearly understand how and why limited numbers of South Vietnamese aircrews participated in US raids; why the United States periodically suspended operations either in selected areas or in toto; and why the general American political barometer read as it did when coup after coup unfolded in South Vietnam during this test period.

Gradual Failure is a must-read for all air and space power history buffs, and air planners will do well to delve into the lessons this air operation has to offer. Furthermore, people who aspire to public office can clearly see in this book the detrimental effects of having Washington call all the shots. The only thing really missing from Gradual Failure is an explanation of why the powers that be chose a defensive position as the name of an offensive operation. But that's part of the fog of war.

Maj Paul G. Niesen, USAF

Maxwell AFB, Alabama