Two Souls Indivisible (3 page)

At the outset, using intelligence information, the squadron leaders identified a slew of targets, such as ammunition dumps, radar sites, airfields, bridges, industrial centers, power plants, and the flood control system of the Red River Delta. They mapped their routes and determined what bombs to use, but the plans were never implemented. Instead, they were ordered to blow up roads or mountainsides, sometimes to start a rockslide that would bury a passage. They were allowed to hit early detection radars, but those sites were soon removed from the target list. Cherry assumed the country's civilian leaders were choosing low-impact targets to avoid unnecessary destruction, but he also knew that this was no way to fight a war. During the Korean War, he bombed the Toksan Dam, flooding a valley to destroy bridges, highways, railroads, shelters, and an airfield. Civilians as well as combatants were drowned. It was horrible, but such attacks helped bring an end to the fighting.

In the early stages of the Vietnam War, Cherry knew the attacks were not crippling the enemy, and some of the assignments had a bizarre bureaucratic quality. In one case, the airmen were ordered to destroy a military complex near the city of Vinh, which it did by flying sixteen sorties (one sortie is one plane attacking one site). But Washington demanded that eighty sorties be flown, so the pilots had to fly another sixty-four—with nothing to bomb except rubble—to satisfy the order.

If the bombings seemed to produce meager results, they were by no means without risk. The enemy, Cherry discovered, had developed a sophisticated air defense system, which was shooting down American aircraft at alarming rates. The system itself featured surface-to-air missiles, antiaircraft cannons, a complex radar system, and computerized control centers, all provided by the Soviet Union. The city of Hanoi had the most formidable air defense in the history of warfare, though no place in the North was truly safe. Automatic and semiautomatic weapons were passed out to anyone in the countryside who could shoot at a plane. After Rolling Thunder's first six months, more than thirty airmen had been killed or were presumed missing; a dozen had been captured. Fred Cherry was almost among them. On one treetop attack, he encountered a barrage of small-arms fire. With his eyes closed and sweating through his flight suit, he somehow pulled up safely. He knew he was lucky to have survived, but for now he retained that special feeling, that mojo, that emboldens every fighter pilot. He was still invincible.

Using air power in driblets was part of America's strategy of fighting a "limited war." The attacks were meant to prod the North to the negotiating table, where U.S. interests—the preservation of South Vietnam's anti-Communist government—would be ensured. They were also meant to weaken the morale of the North's leaders, who might then call off the Southern insurgents. Fearing a broader conflict against China, U.S. officials believed they could win a "limited war" through a "graduated response" of military force.

But they underestimated the resilience of the North Vietnamese, who for two thousand years had been fighting foreign invaders—the Chinese, the French, the Japanese—as well as North Vietnam's willingness to endure devastating losses (three million people were killed in the war). To the Communists, the battle against the United States was a continuation of their battle against French imperialism—both were wars of attrition that the outsiders could not win. As Ho Chi Minh, who led the crusade, told the French on the eve of their colonial war in 1946: "You can kill ten of my men for every one I kill of yours, but even at those odds, I will win and you will lose." Whatever the outcome of the American war, U.S. casualties would be significant, and pilots were among the most vulnerable.

Cherry completed forty-six combat missions after three tours in Thailand. He was then told that his time in Asia was over as part of the normal rotation of pilots. In October 1965 he was given two weeks to return to the United States, where he would instruct pilots on the F-105 at McConnell Air Force Base in Wichita, Kansas. Cherry enjoyed teaching—it maximized his time in the air—but did not want to leave Asia. He was still optimistic that the war would be won and that the bombing missions, however hamstrung, were damaging the enemy. He also assumed that, at the age of thirty-seven, if he returned to the United States, he would never see combat again.

Cherry wanted to accompany his squadron on its next tour to Thailand, which was to leave on October 18. The night before its departure, he drove across the Yokota Air Base, near Tokyo, and stopped at the Yokota Officers' Club. He had one night to convince his commander that he should stay.

The club itself, a one-story building, was once an American serviceman's paradise. In the 1950s, a lighted porte-cochere welcomed visitors, banquettes were covered in silk, and rattan furniture filled the Samurai Ballroom, scented with cigar smoke, perfume, filet mignons, and spiced red apple rings. By the middle 1960s, the club had lost some of its glamour. Gone were the exotic appointments, replaced by molded plastic furniture and Formica tables. The rugs were worn, the paint faded, the jukebox old. But the club was still the social hub for the entire complex of American operations officers, "ground pounders," paper pushers, and desk jockeys, while slot machines, live music, and rivers of Scotch provided the entertainment.

Cherry knew that his commander, Lieutenant Colonel William Peters, would be there. A ruddy-faced officer nicknamed Napoleon, Peters thought highly of Cherry, having recently recommended him for an air medal for his Vietnam missions. He also endorsed Cherry's promotion from captain to major. But when Cherry found him at the bar and asked to prolong his stay in Japan, Peters waved him off.

"Fred, you've done your job in Southeast Asia," he said, fingers wrapped around his glass. "Get your ass back home. You've got a job to do there."

Cherry pressed his case, arguing that he might never fly in combat again. "This is my last chance," he said.

They argued for several minutes until Peters finally relented. "Oh, goddamn it, Fred, go ahead," he said. "But get your damn ass back here in two weeks."

Cherry celebrated the news by meeting up with a close friend, Marvin Walls, a captain for the Reconnaissance Technical Squadron, which identified targets in photographs. Sitting at the L-shaped counter in the main bar, a mirrored wall lined with beer bottles, Cherry and Walls drank Scotch and toasted Fred's good fortune until the bar closed at 2
A.M.
Then they headed outside, and when Walls began walking down the steps, Cherry reached out and tapped his shoulder. Walls, five inches taller, stood several steps down from him, looked into his eyes, and saw something odd—not fear, but resignation. "I don't know," Cherry said. "I have a funny feeling about this. I don't know if I'm going to make it."

Walls had always known Cherry as cocksure; now, speechless, he embraced his friend.

Cherry didn't know what caused his sudden reversal of confidence or why he would even disclose his premonition. The moment would haunt him for years to come, but he had no time for fears. His wish for one more round of combat had been granted.

On the morning of October 22, Fred Cherry, his flight suit unzipped, attended a predawn briefing at the Tactical Operation Center of the Takhli air base. It was overcast and warm, and a fan hummed quietly. Cherry sat with four or five other airmen in what would be a highly unusual briefing. On a typical flight, Cherry would be assigned a target and be given at least half a day for preparation, learning the correct compass headings, air speeds, altitudes, the call signs of other planes, and a dozen other details. He would be responsible for drawing his own map, sketching in rivers, mountain ranges, railroads, and other navigation markers and creating the actual route. He would also have multiple photographs of the target, each from a different angle and distance, which would help him chart his route. Finally, he would typically fly in good weather.

None of those conditions existed that morning. Intelligence officers handed him his map and his route and said he'd be leaving in several hours. He was given only one photograph of the target, taken immediately above the site. The expected rain had canceled all other flights. The hastily conceived attack was formed after the discovery of a surface-to-air missile installation fifteen miles northeast of Hanoi.

A senior officer identified the installation on a map plastered on the wall, saying, "We have to knock it out as soon as we can."

A surface-to-air missile, or SAM, was a large munition shaped like a telephone pole and launched like a Roman candle, with wings attached to the side, fire blowing out the back, explosives packed inside, and radar guiding its trajectory. It was a devastating counterpunch to America's air attack, able to knock a plane down at 50,000 feet.

The first victim of a SAM was Air Force Captain Richard Keirn, who was shot down on July 24, 1965, and taken into captivity.
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Thereafter, when a SAM site was discovered, the United States immediately ordered a retaliatory bombing raid, known as an Iron Hand. Ironically, these missions to eliminate a dangerous weapon were perhaps even more dangerous than the weapon itself. Because a SAM's radar had difficulty tracking aircraft below three thousand feet, U.S. fighters flew low. In response, the North deployed gunmen with antiaircraft weapons—cannons—to protect the sites. It also created dummy (fake) installations, luring pilots into an ambush. On a single day in July, antiaircraft fire shot down six planes on Iron Hand missions.

Cherry knew the risks of that day's mission. The low cloud cover gave him a two-hundred-foot ceiling, meaning he could avoid small-arms fire only by flying above the clouds. But that was impossible, as the clouds would have shielded him from his navigation markers and his target. The bad weather effectively left him more exposed. His route was also a concern. It forced him to follow the Northeast Railroad, the main supply line from China to Hanoi. While it may have been the most direct route, Cherry knew that it was heavily defended by antiaircraft weapons and that he was likely to draw fire.

The briefing itself lasted less than ten minutes, and Cherry then stayed in the command center to study some maps. A senior officer with eagles on his shirt collar approached him—Colonel Shook. Several days earlier he had been introduced to Cherry on the airman's arrival in Takhli. Though Cherry was wearing his flight suit, the colonel refused to accept his status, saying, "Well, duty officers don't fly."

Accompanying Cherry was a lieutenant colonel, who immediately corrected Shook, but Cherry believed the snub was racist. His flight suit made his status clear, but as the only black combat pilot in Takhli, he was not easily accepted by everyone.

That day, as Cherry pored over the maps, Shook approached him.

"What's the matter, boy?" he asked. "You're not up to it?"

Cherry was incensed but helpless. "Don't worry," he told the colonel. "I'll do my damn job." He stood up, grabbed the maps, and left the room.

Watching the incident was First Lieutenant Bruce Rankin, a pilot who would later wonder how the colonel's actions may have influenced the day's events. "The colonel may have denied Fred the opportunity to make a better flight plan," he later said. "It wasn't fair to Fred." Cherry himself would always regret that he didn't have a few more minutes to study his maps.

Cherry was supposed to take the afternoon mission; another pilot, Captain Michael Cooper, was to be a flight leader for the morning assignment. After the briefing, Cooper returned to his hooch. "If they launch me, give me a call," he told Cherry. "I'm going to take a nap."

Cherry was afraid the afternoon flight would be canceled and he would be denied a day of flying, so he told Cooper not to worry. "I'll take your line, and you cover me in the afternoon," he said. Despite his misgivings about the mission, he still felt invulnerable. Cooper, who believed the mission was reckless, didn't object.

Cherry was in his hooch when his call came. As he opened the door to leave, he stopped, returned to his desk, and removed his wallet, a loose credit card, and a pen with a U.S. government insignia. According to Air Force rules, a pilot was to carry only a military identification card, a dog tag, and a Geneva Convention card. If he was captured, the enemy could use personal information against him. Cherry had always ignored these requirements, but that day he felt different. He left his things behind.

At the flight line, he put on his antigravity suit. Resembling a pair of zippered chaps, it inflates during tight turns to prevent a sudden blood rush that could cause a loss of consciousness. He also wore his combat vest with a radio and battery, a .38 revolver, a hunting knife, flares, iodine pills to purify water, and diarrhea pills. His blue and white helmet and shaded visor came next. He secured his parachute when he was in the cockpit.

On the flight line, the pilots spun their engines in one plane after the next, filling the air with black smoke and creating a roar that was literally deafening. (Many pilots suffered some degree of hearing loss.) The F-105s had already been checked by the flight crew, but Cherry, as required, walked around the silver plane to inspect for leaks, foreign matter in the engine, or any other problem. The destructive power of a jet fighter was familiar and comforting: more than a hundred cluster bombs with pineapple wings were nestled in gray canisters beneath the wings; a 20-millimeter cannon, which fired six thousand rounds a minute, was perched on the plane's nose.

A young corporal checked the jet's weapons and gave Cherry a snappy salute. "You're loaded to the teeth, sir." Cherry saluted back.

He usually flew the same plane, and he worked with the technicians to keep his radar "perked," or clear, and to ensure that his computerized weapon system was highly tuned. While many pilots ignored the automated bombing system as too complicated, Cherry didn't. He believed it narrowed his margin for error, for it calculated the distance to the target and the optimum angle at which to release the weapons.