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In the heart of the Vietnam War, Ubon Royal Thai Air Force Base was the home of the 8th Tactical Fighter Wing, “the Wolfpack.” The Wolfpack had around a hundred F-4D aircraft in four fighter squadrons; it was a 24-hour-a-day sorties machine, responsible for emplacing the sensors comprising McNamara’s electronic fence across southern Laos and part of North Vietnam. Sensor planting operations carried out by one squadron were almost exclusively conducted around sunrise, low level along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. One of the squadrons flew almost exclusively at night, the bellies of their Phantoms painted flat black. Very important for flying at night; not so good during the day.
The other two squadrons flew about three quarters of their sorties during the day. They had the only capability in theater to drop laser guided bombs (LGB) or electro-optical guided bombs (EOGB). These weapons were game changers, especially the LGBs, usually hitting less than 20 feet from their targets. Truck drivers and AAA gunners hated the LGBs.
Ubon was thought of as a fighter base, but there was much more going on than fighter ops. The Thais had T-28s used in counter-insurgency operations. They did their own thing, certainly, since it was their country. About the only thing we knew about their ops was they took off with full rocket pods and gun magazines charged, and they came back empty. I believe their ops were focused on some of the communist overflow out of Laos and Cambodia into Thailand. The Thai pilots would also occasionally use our officer’s mess, mostly the back room where games of chance may have been played.
Ubon was a busy place during the Vietnam war.
There were other operations at Ubon. Elements of the 23rd Tactical Air Support Squadron (TASS) were on the airfield. They flew the Cessna O-2 Spymasters performing visual reconnaissance along the Ho Chi Minh Trail and forward air control of interdiction sorties in some pretty highly defended areas. Tchepone was one of those spots where AAA was concentrated to protect supply dumps, truck parks, and key stretches of road. It was sort of a chicken and egg thing: which came first, the AAA or the fighters? The Nails flew both night and day, using white phosphorous rockets to mark targets during the day and “logs” at night, dropped on the ground near a target providing reference for fighters to strike: “bomb 50 meters north of my smoke, during the day, and log during the night.”
The O-2s, call sign, Nail were an on-the-fly adaption of a commercial aircraft. Chock full of radios, UHF, VHF, FM, and HF, they served as eyes, ears, and voices with fighters from Thailand, as well as Air Force and Marine units in South Vietnam, called away from their primary job of providing Close Air Support (CAS) for US and South Vietnamese ground forces. CAS got priority, as it deserved, but occasionally F-4s, F-100s, and A-4 would be tasked to add to the interdiction activities “out of country.” The Nails usually flew with one pilot during the day and with a navigator on board at night, using a Starlight Scope to search along and adjacent to the trail for mostly “movers” in convoys traveling to resupply Viet Cong or North Vietnamese forces engaging friendlies in South Vietnam.
The O-2 did good work but as the threat increased, especially as the enemy introduced larger AAA guns and handheld heat seeking missiles, the Nail mission became increasingly difficult. The answer was the introduction of the OV-10 Bronco in the hot areas during the day. It was a considerable improvement, but the intensity of the threat, especially along the Laotian-North Vietnamese border, made life for the OV-10 difficult. This caused the introduction of jet FACs flying F-100s, F-4s, and in the case of the Marines, two-seat versions of the A-4 Skyhawk. AAA-mad SAMS made life hard for the Fast FACS, but speed and maneuverability were advantages; on the other hand, dwell time in the target area and the difficulty of acquiring targets under jungle canopy and camouflage were disadvantages. Tradeoffs were made to support the out of county interdiction campaigns in Laos and in North Vietnam when the Washington leadership decided to carry the war to the North, or not.
I must not forget Ubon got some other aircraft on the field, including the first AC-130 gunships in theater, a major improvement on the AC-47 and AC-119 gunships used with great effect for night CAS in South Vietnam. Spooky AC-47s and AC-119 Shadows and Singers were loved by the ground troops: long time on target, side-firing miniguns were really effective in the South; not so much where the AAA was much more intense.
So the answer was a highly modified C-130 Hercules, which was transformed to Spectre, a step up in capability with a much more robust airframe, avionics, and sensors effect at night and more muscle, including multiple 20mm gatling guns, a 40mm cannon, as well as good old (I do mean old) Army 105mm cannon. Heavyweight armament, better performance in terms of speed/altitude, and avionics allowing night ops made it more efficient than F-4s with dumb bombs and CBUs for relatively wide area coverage of AAA and soft targets like trucks. The Spectres typically flew as singles, but with one or more F-4s escorting and providing suppression of AAA, often firing on the blind side of Spectre when he was in a turn searching for targets or engaging with one or more of his side firing armament. The night escort, call sign Owl, came out of Ubon’s night sorties.
I had a full-time job in the 433rd, one of the F-4D squadrons, flying around four out of every five days. But I still had some days off and here wasn’t much to do—no TV, no internet, only one movie a day (maybe the same one for several days in a row)—it was not easy to make-up softball teams. I had time on my hands and looked for things to do. One thing was bagging rides with the Nails on their day missions in Laos. Unless they were checking out a new guy, the right seat was empty. I don’t remember the number of O-2 missions I had, but I remember two very well.
The O-2 had great visibility, but not many defensive options.
I often flew with Jim, a medium senior captain who’d gotten a FAC assignment out of the C-130. He was a pro, and I learned a lot watching and listening, searching for targets, communicating with airborne control agencies (like Cricket, a C-130 configured as an Airborne Command and Control node), talking the fighters onto the target and eventually marking with one of his willie pete rockets, and then making corrections on the bombs dropped by the fighters. Later on, when I was an F-4 Wolf FAC I benefited from the very valuable O-2 OJT.
On one of my first sorties, we were in orbit near Tchepone awaiting inbound F-100s from Tuy Hoa. Even with helmets on the cockpit was hot and noisy, especially with several radios on for comm or just to monitor, so the back windows on the O-2 were open. They were the kind like you’d have in an old coupe auto: angled and hinged at the front so they would partially open into the slipstream, providing some ventilation (and noise) in an otherwise warm to hot cockpit. So, I leaned back and shut the window on my side.
Jim, my pilot, responded immediately: “get that GD window open.”
“OK,” I replied.
The he replied, “that’s my RWR gear!” Explanation—no Radar Warning Receiver on the O-2 but with the windows open you could hear the AAA popping when it went off behind you. Oh, I get it. Most gunners, especially those without radar-aided tracking (which you can hear in an RWR) would miss with their first burst, typically three or seven rounds depending on the gun. They would not pull enough lead, but quickly correct, like a hunter shooting a clay pigeon or bird. Hearing the pop, pop, pop, the pilot would jink to a new heading and change altitude. He also almost always flew in a slight crab or in a bank, to throw off the gunner’s aim. That was my first vivid memory of an O-2 ride: pop, pop, pop, then dirty smoke puffs hanging behind the twin tail booms.
The second memory was different. I was on another sortie in the Tchepone area when Jim got a call from Cricket that there was a single Navy A-6 Intruder inbound with a full load of Mk82 bombs. The Intruder had range and payload comparable to the Air Force’s F-111, which had a faster top speed, but they were comparable in many ways, both having state of the art avionics and true all-weather, night capability. Intruders seldom showed up in our part of the war, Laos being a long drive from the carriers on Yankee station off North Vietnam, so this was an unexpected resource for our mission.
The A-6 was a few minutes out and Jim had time to pick out an area suspected as a truck park off the trail, hidden under jungle canopy, all telltale tracks off the road swept clean. Jim was planning on the Intruder making two passes across the area, increasing the chance of a hit with two sticks of MK82s. The Intruder checked in on UHF, giving his call sign as Cupcake 503 (the noun was assigned to a specific squadron, the number reflected the last three digits of the aircraft’s tail number). I wasn’t familiar with Navy call signs, but Cupcake was different. Most AF call signs were autos (Buick, Rambler, Ford) or often fish (Shark, Barracuda, Skate, and so forth)—no Cupcakes.
Note: this was before Top Gun, before every pilot or weapons system operator had his one personal call sign, particularly for use in interflight communication or on the ground. Back in the day we had Leftys, Puds, Dustys, and so forth but now everyone has their own.
Cupcake checked in with his play time and ordnance. Lots of play time, but he had a time to be in the queue for landing on his carrier, and plenty of ordinance. Strangely, even in the static of UHF radios, I recognized Cupcake’s voice. I asked Jim if I could give him the brief, he OKed it, so I got on the mic and provided target type and coordinate, safe area for bail out, preferred run-in heading and threats observed—light weapons, 37mm and 57mm, no SAMs observed or thought to be in the area.
An A-6 and an O-2 meet over the skies of Laos. What are the chances the pilots know each other?
Then I paused, and said, “You ever live on Debolt Street?” He rogerd, and I knew it was a guy who’d been my neighbor for around fifteen years of my life. He’d graduated a year before me, gone to Yale, and ended up a Navy ROTC grad and a Navy pilot. So breaking protocol I said, “well your bombs better be good, because I’m going to make a personal report to your parents.”
Short pause, and he said, “that you Steve?”
I said, “Yes, and you’re cleared in hot.”
During this short exchange Jim had put down two willie petes and directed Cupcake to hit his smoke. First pass in and off target, picking up some small arms fire and “light 37mm” optically-directed AAA, we could see the puffs as he rolled in, and the sparkle of gunfire on pull-off. He was well above the four thousand foot above ground level we stayed above, honoring the intense small arms fire on almost any bombing pass. Good bombs, “now make another pass, come in from the west this time.” He did and as he rolled in there were some secondary explosions from the target area—probably from ammo storage or a truck or two hit by frag from Cupcake’s first pass.
Another good pass, then he was off target and headed back to the carrier. I read the coordinates of the target and assessment of the attack: 100% of bombs on target, several fires and explosions, likely from stored ammo and POL. “Nice work, Navy.”
Independently we both wrote home to our parents, still neighbors in our hometown, and it made the Republican Times as “Two high school friends meet over Laos.”
A few weeks later he and his bombardier/nav came to Ubon via a Carrier on Board Delivery (COD) off the carrier, through Saigon, and C-130 rides for an overnight. I enjoyed introducing my Navy guests to my squadron as the Cupcake I had over Tchepone.
Many years later a mutual friend asked about the odds of our meeting, saying probably a million to one. I thought about that, and replied, “No, much worse than that. Me on a bag ride on a given day and time in an O-2, he on a weather divert into Southern Laos, over a place smaller than our hometown and with more AAA than we had shotguns, a place few Navy jets ever ventured into, both a half a world away from our home—no, much more than a million to one.”
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Steve, I’m sure Cupcake had a callsign for you as well! Inquiring minds want to know!!!! BTW, although we Nails flying the OV-10 had RWR gear, we didn’t have the luxury of an open rear window to warn you that you were getting shot at by an ‘eyeball’ gunner! Therefore, we ‘jinked’ all the time using the rudder pedals to yaw the nose and vary our altitude. That made for some interesting exchanges between your inner ear and your stomach — continually looking through your binoculars while scanning the ground below and then throw in the yawing and pretty soon your stomach began listening to your inner ear telling it that you were feeling a little woozy and you might need a ‘barf bag’! Eventually, you flew enough that your inner ear and stomach would agree that it was just their imagination and let you off the hook. I only got airsick twice, once when I had a new guy in my back seat and I had to ask him if he would pass me the ‘barf bag’ I had told him to bring along. The second time was on a non-combat mission where I was just riding along in the back seat as another new guy flew us from Korat back to NKP. The only problem was I had imbibed in a few too many adult beverages the night before (I had found out earlier that day that my DEROS was just a week away — I was going home!) and didn’t get to bed until the wee hours of the night. Ahhh, the follies of youth!
Dale, did you previously work for Northrop Grumman in Colorado Springs about 2011-2012?
Yes, I did. I arrived in the Springs in 2011 and left in 2013.
Drop me a line on the side. We worked the GTIMS program together.
Mawright20’Hotmail.com
Thank you for your service. I am a civilian aircraft mechanic that trained under Army, Navy, Air force and Coast Guard aviation technicians at our maintenance school. We had two QU-22’s in our inventory of aircraft to work on and they were amazing. The information shared about the mission of the aircraft was very basic. Over the years I have always kept an ear open to gain a better understanding of its role. Thank you for sharing your experience. I hope in some small way the QU-22 helped advance your mission or increase your margin of safety.
Amazing coincidence!! What was distinctive about Cupcakes’ voice that triggered the recognition? Great description of the FAC role and threats! Tnx
Cupcake is/was the call sign for VA-65 Intruder squadron based in Oceana, VA. Most likely flying from the USS America or USS Saratoga…both East Coast Carriers that served in Vietnam. I will never forget my visit to UBON and ride with “Nail” and “Specter”!! They had me loading the 40MM Naval gun all night long. Captain USN retired
It was Spectre … wink wink nod nod.
I learned from an other Naval aviator that Cupcake was actually the name of a Tiger mascot of the squadron—clearly an honorable title.
Thanks for reading and any feedback is valued!
BTW I was a Wolf FAC back in the day, our credo was,” the lion may be the king of the jungle, but you won’t find a Wolf in a circus!
Neat story, Steve. Hard to believe it was half a century ago, is it not? I was Mike 58, flying covert missions over Cambodia for MACV/SOG in O-2s. When I wrote my two books about that year, I made my alter ego’s name Rusty Naille, in tribute to my brother FACs in Thailand. Their unit bar was the infamous Nail Hole and their official unit drink was the Rusty Nail, naturally. Your story was forwarded to me by a former A-6 guy and good friend. I’ll raise a sunset glass to you and all our brethren. Thanks again.
Rocky, As a former Nail, I can tell you that one of the infamous drinks at the Nail Hole was the ‘Standard Hammer’, which every Nail drank when they were introduced to the squadron. It was 6 parts vodka, one part Creme de menthe and when you became a Nail, you stood before the squadron in the Nail Hole, you were given your Nail callsign (I was Nail 49), handed a chromed nail (more like a spike, I still have mine) and you answered a series of questions: #1. “Who are you?” #2. “Where are you from?” #3. “Where did you go to school?” (duck if you were an Academy grad because you were going to take some incoming) #4. What have you been doing in the AF”? and #5. (the one that you had to answer right before you could either drink your Hammer or else pour it over your head…) “Why are you so GD glad to be here?” You always got feedback on every answer you gave and, if the squadron roared it’s approval to answer #5, you could drink your Hammer or pour it over your head. One night a Nail’s wife got hammered and her answer to #5 brought the house down when she answered, “It’s the only place I know I can get hammered and screwed on the same night!”
There are stories everywhere, and a number of call signs of considerable mystery. Glad to know about your and your mission.
One day I was working in the night frag shop and got a call on KY from my counterpart at Danang wanting to know what we carried on the Grey Creeper” escort. No clue here, he said, neither does Blue Chip (7th AF), guess I’ll go with CBU, It was a big game, and even the rule makers didn’t always know all about it.
Thanks for the info
Terrific story-well done, Steve!! Re: your comment on the A-6 and F-111 comparison… they were some good similarities , BUT……..we had a couple sayings there that we liked. Most common was “If your wings don’t swing, you ain’t chit!’— But my favorite vs. the often referenced A-6: The F-111 Penetrated Deeper, Lasted Longer, and Carried a Bigger Load… kinda says it all
Is this William A Martin from the 188th ?
Both good jets I remember both with great memories. If you had much time in the 111 you probably know of Eddie Bracken, MG retired. He was one ofd my heros on the air staff–spoke ops and logistics well, and watching Elephant Eddie chew down a stogie in our briefing room was always a learning experience
Thanks for the comments!
Thanks for sharing your experiences Steve. I flew two combat tours –
Sep 69-70 UC-123 out of Bien Hoa and Tan Son Nhut.
Feb 1971-72 the OV-10 out of NKP, DaNang, Phan Rang at the Group and then my last month and half back to NKP. Then upon completion of my 2nd tour, I took a 30 Delay Enroute on my way home. That enabled me to fly to Penang, rent a VW, drive south to checkout the topography.
Reading you story is greatly appreciated.
If you’d like to communicate – my contact information –
John Stipetich
713-385-7825 phone
[email protected]
Thanks to Kent Ewing for explaining that Cupcake was the callsign for an A-6 (VA-65) squadron. I was a Cupcake in the late ’70s and early 80s and proud of it. Cupcake was the name of a Bengal tiger and the squadron patch had a beautiful tiger coming at you out of it. I was also proud to fly with a Nail FAC during a week’s exchange with them from my squadron (VA-196) on Yankee Station in 1971 and commend them in the highest terms for their bravery in flying low and finding targets. RADM, USN RET
Stan, at the end of my tour as a Nail Oct ’73, I got to go aboard the Hancock in the back seat of an A-4. Spent five days (of what was supposed to be a 2 1/2 day visit) doing not much more than watching movies and swapping war stories while we skirted a typhoon. At one point they gave me an ensign’s uniform to wear (my flight suit was getting pretty rank and had to go to the laundry) and they introduced me to the CAG as a newly arrived ensign. Finally got a cat-shot and headed back to NKP before they switched me permanently to the USN.
Good gouge Admiral. Education is a life journey, thanks for helping me on my journey.
PS In my days at Langley I spent some time in the club at Oceana—some i don’t remember, but I will always give a salute to the aviators serving in the units commemorated in the memorial garden!
Great story
Thank you for sharing
Thanks for reading
Awesome story! Insane odds. Tks for sharing
Thank you for your service
Thanks for reading and your comment!
Steve, excellent story. I flew AC-119G “Shadow” Gunships out of TSN, RVN (Saigon) ’70-’71. Like you said, the ground troops loved us overhead, giving them close air support. We were our own FAC, meaning we could fire on our own, but we relied on the 02s and OV10 whenever we could to ID targets. The Vietnam Conflict had so many stories like you related among crews who knew each other or only had a one time chance encounter. The targets were not usually well defined, the Rules of Engagement foggy, but we did a heck of a job over there, on the ground, in the air and at sea. The memories are still fresh even after 50 plus years. Thanks for the story and for your service. I am proud to be among that “The Band of Brothers!” Marty Noonan
Steve,
May I post your story (with attribution) on the Super Sabre Society website? https://supersabresociety.com/
Of course! Good to hear from you. Tried your email but it bounced back. Let me have a current one !
Steve , curious the year this occured. My father was in VA-65 in 1967 – 1969 on the Forrestal and Kitty Hawk respectively. The Forrestal cruise was cut short by a tragic fire, but the 1969 Kittyhawk cruise put them flying over Laos quite a bit I believe.