President Richard Nixon’s daily briefing on Dec. 20, 1971, reported a buildup of North Vietnamese troops above the Demilitarized Zone và southbound troop movements on the Ho chi Minh Trail. The North Vietnamese air force was moving units south, including the newly established 927th Fighter Regiment, equipped with MiG-21PFM fighter jets. Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Adm. Thomas Moorer had advised Nixon in November that Hanoi’s air defense units were attacking AC-130 Spectre gunships and B-52 Stratofortess bombers supporting Laotian Maj. Gen. Vang Pao’s forces fighting communist Pathet Lao insurgents.
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Realizing that Hanoi intended to lớn start an offensive in 1972, Nixon ordered the armed services to reinforce their air power in Indochina. That same day Moorer approved airstrikes against military targets up to lớn the 20th parallel, essentially all targets south of Hanoi and the key port at Haiphong. Nixon & the Joint Chiefs thought the bombing would deter Hanoi from launching an offensive the kích thước of the massive Tet Offensive in 1968. They were wrong.
Communist buổi tiệc nhỏ First Secretary Le Duan—Hanoi’s actual leader since December 1963, even though Ho đưa ra Minh was technically the head of government until his death in September 1969—viewed 1972 as an opportune time for a large-scale offensive khổng lồ conquer South Vietnam. Le Duan believed that America’s anti-war movement would constrain Nixon’s response. Then, if the offensive succeeded as expected, Republican Nixon would be defeated in the November election or at least weakened in negotiations for a peace agreement. Le Duan’s memoirs speak of his preference for Democrats Hubert Humphrey, the 1968 presidential nominee, và George McGovern, who advocated for unconditional withdrawal and became the party’s presidential candidate in 1972.
Additionally, Nixon’s not-so-secret communications with Beijing to lớn establish better relations with China, one of North Vietnam’s major patrons, threatened a source of crucial tư vấn for Le Duan, which reinforced his need khổng lồ damage Nixon politically.
Having imprisoned most Communist tiệc nhỏ members who favored a peace agreement, Le Duan faced little opposition to lớn a new offensive. He calculated that Hanoi had the political will to continue fighting while America did not. In June 1971 he phối in motion the Spring-Summer 1972 offensive, also called the Easter Offensive. The North Vietnamese Army’s plans were completed by October.
Le Duan ordered his negotiators khổng lồ take a hard line in talks with their American counterparts. That ploy had worked with President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1968, but Nixon was a different leader. Diplomatically, Nixon promised the Soviet Union’s Leonid Brezhnev detente & China’s Mao Zedong U.S. Recognition if they pressured Hanoi into earnest negotiations. He visited Beijing on Feb. 21-28 1972, and canceled the peace talks on March 23 due lớn a lack of progress. Hanoi’s intelligence agents learned đài loan trung quốc was considering an aid cutoff lớn North Vietnam in exchange for diplomatic relations with the U.S.
Militarily, Nixon increased Hanoi’s costs and losses. He had expanded the bombing on Dec. 25, 1971, allowing strikes up khổng lồ the 20th parallel. Nixon also liberalized the rules of engagement with strikes on North Vietnam’s airfields & surface-to-air missile sites that threatened U.S. Bomber routes. The days of retaliation only for MiG & SAM attacks on U.S. Forces were over. Although the targets remained limited, the operations and tactics were not.
The bombing was just one component of Nixon’s plan to kết thúc the increasingly unpopular war. He believed a carrot và stick approach might draw Hanoi khổng lồ a peace agreement. The bombing campaign represented the stick. For the carrot, Nixon promised a total withdrawal of U.S. Forces from South Vietnam, provided Hanoi returned all prisoners of war và agreed to lớn an internationally supervised cease-fire throughout Indochina.
Previously, the U.S. Had refused to lớn withdraw all its forces unless Hanoi did the same. Nixon and Kissinger thought they were offering a good giảm giá khuyến mãi and hoped Hanoi would see it the same way. Le Duan did not. He believed South Vietnam was about khổng lồ fall, rendering Nixon’s “carrot” irrelevant.
Le Duan launched the Easter Offensive’s first phase on March 30, 1972, sending three divisions & supporting units across the DMZ and the Laotian border on their way lớn Quang Tri. Two days later, April 1 in Washington and April 2 in Vietnam, the Joint Chiefs authorized airstrikes above the 20th parallel, the same day Hanoi launched a corps-level drive toward Saigon.
On April 4, the president told national security adviser Henry Kissinger, “The bastards have never been bombed
Nixon intensified strikes on North Vietnam’s supply lines và logistics facilities and accelerated the air power nguồn buildup in East Asia. The U.S. Also increased air tư vấn to ground forces in the Army of the Republic of Vietnam.
On April 9-12, B-52Ds struck the oil facility và rail yard at Vinh, a đô thị between the DMZ & Hanoi. The bombers countered enemy radar with electronic jamming equipment and the largest corridor of chaff (tiny strips of tin foil dropped from the planes to lớn confuse radar) since World War II. Surprised crews in the North Vietnamese air defense system were overwhelmed. The oil facility was destroyed without U.S. Losses.
Two days later, American aircraft struck oil & rail facilities around Hanoi và Haiphong for the first time since 1968, using B-52s followed by 100 fighter-bombers. The fires burned for two days. Similar raids destroyed weapons storage areas và oil facilities around Haiphong at the cost of two American planes downed by anti-aircraft artillery.
Yet Le Duan remained unimpressed. The Easter Offensive continued. Hanoi’s drive on Kontum in the Central Highlands halted on April 23, but that was due more lớn NVA hesitation than ARVN resistance. On April 30, the Joint Chiefs reported lớn Nixon that all aircraft were in place to lớn conduct a comprehensive bombing campaign against North Vietnam.
Hanoi’s Easter Offensive neared its peak as Kissinger met his North Vietnamese negotiating counterpart, Le Duc Tho, in Paris on May 2. South Vietnamese forces had abandoned their northernmost provincial capital, quang đãng Tri, the day before. Confident that victory was near, the North’s delegation proved intransigent and, according to lớn Kissinger’s memoirs, insulting. Nixon ordered the Joint Chiefs to lớn present him with options.
On May 4, Moorer offered a plan khổng lồ mine Haiphong Harbor. Nixon approved it immediately. The next day he got a briefing on the plan for a bombing chiến dịch initially titled Rolling Thunder Alpha. Nixon also approved it immediately.
The bombing campaign, renamed Operation Linebacker, was significantly different from Rolling Thunder (March 2, 1965-Oct. 31, 1968). Notably, in Rolling Thunder the targets were selected by Johnson & other administration officials based on recommendations from the Air Force và Navy và selected khổng lồ limit civilian casualties. In contrast, the planning for Linebacker was conducted by the Joint Chiefs of Staff và the execution was carried out by the commanders involved.
For dramatic effect, Nixon announced the bombing at 9 p.m. On May 8 lớn coincide with the launch of the airstrikes at 9 a.m., May 9, in Vietnam. While the president spoke slowly about the war on national television, the Linebacker campaign opened with the Operation Pocket Money. Aircraft from carrier USS Coral Sea laid a combination of 36 magnetic & acoustic mines (detonated by the metal or sound of overhead ships) in Haiphong Harbor’s two main shipping channels. Three destroyers shelled the anti-aircraft artillery positions southwest of Haiphong.
When Nixon was assured the planes had cleared North Vietnamese airspace, he announced to his TV audience that mining was underway & all accesses lớn North Vietnam’s major ports would be mined. The president added that he directed U.S. Forces khổng lồ cut off North Vietnamese rail and communications networks lớn the maximum possible extent. He stated that the air và naval strikes against North Vietnam would continue.
Meanwhile, the seemingly unstoppable North Vietnamese Army continued lớn overrun the ARVN soldiers protecting South Vietnamese towns. The NVA was attacking with artillery that had a much longer range than the guns of the ARVN defenders. Meanwhile, heavy rains & low overcast severely inhibited air-support operations. Gen. Creighton Abrams, commander of U.S. Forces in South Vietnam, strongly objected khổng lồ any efforts to divert B-52s away from their tư vấn missions for the ground war in the South.
B-52 radar-directed bombing was Abrams’ most effective all-weather close-air-support weapon. The bombers’ accuracy had improved over the years, enabling the planes khổng lồ drop their loads within 650 yards of friendly troops và strike fear in the NVA. In a change of policy, the Strategic Air Command no longer required B-52 crews to file international flight plans 72 hours before the sortie, taking away the advanced strike warnings that the NVA once received. Nixon accepted his commanders’ recommendation and reluctantly removed B-52s from Linebacker missions to lớn concentrate on bombing NVA forces in South Vietnam.
The Joint Chiefs & Strategic Air Command planners built Linebacker as a systematic air chiến dịch to dismantle North Vietnam’s transportation network and capacity to tư vấn military operations. It was designed to isolate the network’s central hubs in Hanoi and Haiphong by attacking both cities’ defenses, tearing up rail networks and destroying all military facilities and supplies in those areas. In that regard, Linebacker shared many features of the Rolling Thunder goals. However, four elements had changed since Rolling Thunder’s conception in late 1964: advances in technology, the increased strength of North Vietnam’s air defenses, the expanded size of its military infrastructure và the determination of America’s political leadership khổng lồ hit the North hard.
No component of Hanoi’s air defense system was excluded from attack. Airfields, command centers, radars, SAM sites và SAM storage facilities were struck. Radars & communications equipment were jammed. Chaff corridors were created khổng lồ blind the defenders. The American arsenal included jet fighters, on flights code-named “Wild Weasel,” equipped with sophisticated missiles that could detect, trang chủ in on và destroy the radar at SAM sites.
During the Johnson administration, Defense Secretary Robert McNamara emphasized large numbers of bombing runs, not the striking power of those sorties. Large numbers of flights with small strikes required less preparation, takeoff & recovery times, but gave the North Vietnamese a predictable series of piecemeal raids conducted in sequence. Linebacker’s mass raids with powerful ways to lớn suppress air-defense systems were an entirely different problem for Hanoi.
North Vietnam’s official history admits the defenders were not prepared for the kích cỡ of the strikes or the electronic warfare that supported them. North Vietnamese fighter pilots suffered accordingly. With better air control support, shorter transit-to-target times, the new “loose deuce” fighter formation (two fighters flying together lớn cover each other) and improved air combat training, U.S. Navy pilots achieved a 6:1 kill ratio.
One Navy F-4 Phantom II fighter-bomber team, Lt. Randall Cunningham & radar intercept officer Lt. J.g. Willie p. Driscoll, downed three MiG-17s on May 10 khổng lồ become America’s first aces of the war. The Air Force quickly improved the intelligence và warning support for its pilots. By July, it caught up with the Navy, adding three aces of its own: pilot Capt. Richard S. “Steve”Ritchie và weapons control officers Charles B. Bellevue và Jeffrey S. Feinstein, both captains.
After reviewing the first day’s results on May 9, the 7th Air Force commander, Gen. John W. Vogt, decided that all Air Force strikes in the Hanoi-Haiphong area would employ precision-guided munitions, “smart bombs.” With only six precision-guided systems available in Indochina, Vogt’s decision limited Air Force strikes in that area khổng lồ one a day, but accuracy and effectiveness markedly improved.
Vogt recognized that the new technologies required special training & experience. He initiated the specialization of air wings. The 433rd & 435th Tactical Fighter Squadrons became his primary precision-guided strike units. The 497th Tactical Fighter Squadron assumed the electronic warfare & chaff corridor mission. The 432nd Tactical Reconnaissance Wing focused on air-to-air missions, & the 338th Tactical Fighter Wing hunted SAMs because it had F-105G Thunderchief Wild Weasels & EB-66 Destroyer electronic warfare planes. The specialization paid immediate dividends as crew proficiency and tactics improved almost instantly.
The chaff-laying flights, although they required fighter escorts and jamming support, all but negated Hanoi’s SAM threat. SAM sites resorted to launching 30-50 missiles into aerial “engagement boxes” where they expected the U.S. Strike aircraft were flying. That wasn’t effective. North Vietnamese successes were limited lớn attacks on aircraft flying outside chaff protection.
Anti-aircraft artillery remained a threat, but the increasing availability of precision-guided bombs not only improved strike accuracy but also extended the safe distance from which an attack could be made.
Hanoi lost 17 key bridges in Linebacker’s first three weeks. The destruction of rail yards, petroleum tanks & weapons storage facilities quickly followed. Worse from Hanoi’s perspective, replacement supplies were not assured. Chinese và Soviet deliveries dropped by more than 50 percent.
Interestingly, neither đài loan trung quốc nor the Soviet Union protested the mining of Haiphong Harbor, the entry point for 90 percent of Hanoi’s war supplies. The bulk of the other supplies were transported on two single-track rail lines that ran from the Sino-Vietnam border and intersected at a rail junction đôi mươi miles north of Hanoi. The railroad connected lớn the đô thị via the 1.5-mile-long Paul Doumer Bridge, or Long Bien Bridge, over the Red River. That bridge was destroyed two weeks into Operation Linebacker.
The air chiến dịch was complemented by the Navy’s shelling of coastal facilities, radar and anti-aircraft artillery sites, and offshore shipping. On Aug. 27, the 7th Fleet flagship cruiser USS Newport News, the guided missile cruiser USS Providence và two destroyers shelled Haiphong’s coastal defense positions. Four North Vietnamese torpedo boats responded, only to lớn be sunk without inflicting any damage.
Concurrently, U.S. Và South Vietnamese aircraft hit Hanoi’s supply convoys on the Ho đưa ra Minh Trail và inside South Vietnam. In transitioning from guerrilla war tactics to traditional combined arms operations for the Easter Offensive, the NVA had acquired the logistical tail that American air power nguồn had been organized và trained to lớn strike.
By late July, NVA artillery units had khổng lồ ration daily ammunition allotments because the commanders could rely only on previously stocked supply caches.
American intercepts of radio communications indicated supply deliveries were down by 70 percent. NVA casualties mounted. Allied air support devastated units in combat. Some units reported losses exceeding 50 percent of their personnel và equipment.
The Easter Offensive had begun lớn sputter by late July. Kontum never fell.
ARVN forces advanced on quang quẻ Tri to lớn retake the city. Le Duc Tho agreed khổng lồ resume private talks on Aug. 4.
Early discussions went poorly with both sides exchanging recriminations. Progress remained elusive. The anti-war movement was gaining momentum, và the presidential election was only 10 weeks away. A frustrated Nixon dropped one of his key conditions—the complete withdrawal of NVA forces from South Vietnam. North Vietnamese negotiators remained intransigent. Nixon ordered the Air Force and Navy to lớn increase strikes around Hanoi & Haiphong.
