Responses to Nighthawks

I had no idea I would have all the comments I've received regarding Nighthawk Missions. I guess that after all these years, it just becomes a part of you and you think it's a normal part of the war and with all the movies and documentaries that have been made, everybody knows about them. That's not the reality of it all and I've decided that I better go ahead and explain it now.

For the most part, there were two kinds of Nighthawk Missions. One was a direct result of a night time attack on any of our firebases or patrols that were deep in the jungles of Vietnam. Those were the best kind as they directly resulted in saving lives of our men wherever they might be.

Many of you may have seen Platoon and will recall the night the NVA attacked the firebase. It was so bad that the commander had to call an airstrike with instructions to drop the bombs "inside the perimeter of the base". That's as bad as it can get for the guys who were stuck there with no way out other than to kill your way out.

The other kind of Nighthawk Mission had more to do with "hunting" than responding to a known threat at a known location. Sometimes they didn't produce anything at all except for some very nervous periods of time for the crew.

At other times, we were lucky enough to see some enemy activity through the night vision equipment we had on board. It would show the hear/perspiration coming from the VC as they paddled a sampan down the canals at night. Sometimes it would even show the heat reflection as they took a leak at the edge of the jungle. In either event that's how we located the enemy at night if they weren't giving away their position through the muzzle flashes as they fired their AK 47s or the tracers that were coming from the same.

As I have continued with the article about my experiences with the 199th, something occurred to me that I hadn't thought about until I wondered about the various experiences my Aircraft Commanders had prior to my arrival in the unit.

We seldom talked about it in the unit but I knew that some of the pilots were heavily effected by the deaths of two men with the 199th. One was the Commanding General and the other was the pilot I replaced.

As I look back on that and thought about my own experiences with the next unit I flew with, I understood the difference it made when the Aircraft Commander was one who lost a close friend who was killed in action. I know that it made a huge difference in me but I don't want to get into that at this time. I'll get into it after I finish my posts regarding the pilots in the 199th.

I hope this answers some of the questions I've been asked about Wollman, Femmer and Young as well as the experiences they had prior to the time I became their co pilot.

I think I'm going to take a day off as I had a bummer of a night last night when I rec'd a comment about a post I made on another military site I am active in. I may explain that later but I don't want to get off topic too much at this time. It kept me up until 3 a.m. and I'm really bushed by it all. Thanks