The Eleven Days of Christmas

by Michel, Marshall L., III

• ISBN13: 9781893554276
• ISBN10: 1893554279
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2002-02-01
• Publisher: Encounter Books

Summary

In December 1972, with an increasingly dovish Congress preparing to cut off all funding for the war in Vietnam, President Richard Nixon ordered the bombing of Hanoi by the Strategic Air Command's "big stick," its fleet of B-52 bombers. Never before had a B-52 been lost in combat, but the North Vietnamese SAM missile crews knocked them out of the sky in the first days of the engagement. Despite the losses, the surviving bombers kept coming, inflicting huge losses on the North Vietnamese. For eleven days the momentum swung back and forth, moving from what appeared to be a certain U.S. triumph, to a possible North Vietnamese victory, to the ultimate ambiguous denouement in which both sides won and lost.

Author Biography

Marshall L. Michel III flew 321 combat missions in F-4s and RF-4s from 1970 to 1973 (including the 1972 bombing of Hanoi)

Table of Contents

Foreword	vii
Prologue: Peace Is Our Profession	1	(10)
War Is Our Hobby	11	(10)
Getting Serious	21	(20)
``Attacks must be brutal . . .''	41	(12)
``Maximum effort, repeat, maximum effort . . .''	53	(18)
``Downtown, where all the lights are bright . . .''	71	(15)
The Night of the Fan Songs	86	(37)
The Second Day	123	(16)
The Slaughter of the Gs	139	(25)
Dien Bien Phu of the Air	164	(17)
Holding On	181	(12)
The Eighth Night	193	(11)
The Nights of Christmas	204	(13)
Denouement	217	(15)
Retrospective	232	(7)
Appendix One: Analysis	239	(4)
Appendix Two: Linebacker It ``Urban Legends''	243	(5)
Appendix Three: Number of SAMs Fired	248	(2)
Appendix Four: Key Organizations and Personnel for Linebacker III	250	(3)
Glossary	253	(6)
Acknowledgments	259	(1)
Reference Notes	260	(30)
Bibliographical Note	290	(9)
Partial Bibliography	299	(15)
Index	314