Critical Analysis: Operation Rolling Thunder
The following research into Operation Rolling Thunder, conducted by the American Air Force during the Vietnam War, address the primary research question of what constitutes effective use of military force? In resolving this question, a review of empirical studies, research articles, and textbooks, drawn from scholarly databases, will seek to qualify the success of the operation, drawing on a narrative that reviews key variables defining the conflict. The variables will include the following: political and military objectives, leadership, weapons systems/military technologies, force employment, combat readiness, doctrine, law, rules of engagement, and the identification of interpretive structures, in addition to accounting for reactionary responses by the enemy. Additional assessment will include a review of transfer of learning within United States (US) military leadership, identifying success/failures in conducting Operation Rolling Thunder into post-Vietnamese military actions, supporting future operational success. As the research will take a position that Operation Rolling Thunder failed in achieving its primary objectives, a qualitative inquiry into the “what”, “hows”, and “whys” serve as a cautionary example to be used by future political and military leaders (Yin, 2009).
Leadership
The chief architect of Operation Rolling Thunder was US President Lyndon Baines Johnson who in 1965 accelerated the involvement of American military forces in Vietnam by ordering a series of coordinated and continuous air strikes. The air strikes were a precursor for increased strength on the ground, with Johnson following the air campaign with more ground troops. As Johnson drew a line in the sand in Vietnam, seeking to halt the spread of communism through Southeast Asia, Operation Rolling Thunder was designed to send a clear message to the Soviets during the cold war. With US allies in the region gauging the prestige and credibility of the promises that US President’s Kennedy, Johnson, and later, Nixon would make to the South Vietnamese. What became central in seeing the operation through to end, regardless of the outcome, which turned out to be negative, was secondary in supporting and validating the credibility of US foreign policy and its ability to back its dictates and positions through force. This approach to warfare by Johnson supported the evolution of a psychological imperative which attached itself to the operation, supporting the credibility and resolve by US politicians through the military to achieve its goals and objectives (Kearney, 2002).
The politics of the Vietnamese conflict pitted the Soviets, Chinese, and the North Vietnamese against the US and South Vietnamese. In seeking to establish dominance and control over the region, early in the conflict, Operation Rolling Thunder was designed to send a clear message to Hanoi, along with the military action aimed at undermining the North’s continued insurgency. The use of strategic bombing, a widely accepted course of action by both Johnson and key military leaders, suspected that a tiny country, recently emerging from the First Indochina War, and the defeat of the French would be reluctant to undermine its recovery through newly found economic opportunities. However, a slight divergence in political opinion on the use of force emerged, where political leaders sought to divert and re-educate the north, where the military focused on breaking the North’s will to fight. It is clear in hindsight that the North would never capitulate, either by inducements, coercion, or outright aggression, which was delivered through Operation Rolling Thunder.
Additional considerations facing the US and Southern leadership was the possibility of the Soviets and Chinese becoming primary participants in the war, as opposed to continuing to fight a proxy war through the North Vietnamese. As Johnson escalated the conflict to include extensive bombing of the North, he was undeterred, willing to take the risk that the conflict could widen and evolve into World War III (Wilson, 2001).
Political Objectives
As Operation Rolling Thunder called for proactive military aggression, Johnson sought to support the long term viability of Saigon’s government, where it was initially believed by senior US leadership that the South could on its own contain the advancement of the North. Having been proven wrong, with increased incursions by the North into the South, the US Joint Chiefs of Staff began cultivating an aggressive posture with decisive military action, which in-turn would allow the government of the South to survive. As a result of the failures by the South, both politically and militarily, Operation Rolling Thunder sent a loud and clear message in the region that this US ally would not be abandoned. As Johnson sought to break the North’s will to fight through the increased infusion of military resources, coinciding with the extended bombing campaign, using the Viet Cong attack on a U.S. air base at Pleiku as the precursor for the intensified military action, Johnson was given his pretext for advancing the war by the North (Lewy, 1978).
It is clear that Johnson in balancing the art of politics with the might of the US arsenal, it must have been very enticing to believe that this operation would immediately resolve the conflict, with Northern leadership in Hanoi unwilling to bear the loss of life, and submit to the fear of the US. The politics of Operation Rolling Thunder, initially designed as an eight-week air campaign, co-authored by President Johnson and Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara, supported air strikes below the 19th parallel. However, if the initial campaign failed to reach its objectives in crippling the insurgency, aided by DRV support, there was political and military support for enhancing the scope of the mission, and attacking targets in the North below the 19th parallel. This overt threat was believed to put Washington in the driver’s seat in dictating the course of the war, however, in failing to properly escalate the bombing campaign, choosing to leave key political and military targets untouched, the North remained emboldened and they were not forced to the bargaining table as was initially perceived and believed an expected outcome of Operation Rolling Thunder.
With Johnson wanting to control the tempo, flow, and outcome of the war, the sheer aggression of the campaign while protecting certain areas within the north that were both necessary for the political and military survival of the north, highlights a conundrum. This conundrum, which appears more like confusion, resulted in lost opportunities that would have possibly achieved the initial determined and desired outcome. In limiting the scope of the initial operations, going so far as to having Johnson and McNamara personally okay primary and secondary targets of the bombing runs, a disastrous intersection between politics and the military in planning the strikes, led to minimal operational success through the use of force (Hallin, 1986).
Doctrine Law
As Simpson’s (2012) research offers insight into the fundamental principles of warfare, supporting a doctrine of law at is precipices, military activity is defined by two possible connotations.
“The first is the actual use of organized violence, typically by armed forces; the second is the way in which the force is understood by the audience, particularly the enemy” (Simpson, 2012, p. 15).
With war serving as an interpretive structure, meaning is assigned to the use of force, where language coinciding with action provides universality to a particular action, allowing this assessment to be conducted on Operation Rolling Thunder. As the individual narratives offered by Simpson (2012) provide a context in understanding military conflict, the application of doctrine law onto an Operation Rolling Thunder, which is far greater in context, as opposed to an individual review of a single patrol or exercise, acknowledges the scope and significance of the action. With Johnson choosing to engage in and later escalate warfare on the North Vietnamese, with the military actions seeking to bring the Hanoi government to the peace table, it is clear in the research that the enemy was aware of US military and political intentions.
In sustaining considerable losses, and simply outlasting the Johnson administration, and later, engaging the Nixon administration in the conclusion of hostilities, supported through Operation Linebacker II, an extensive aerial campaign which bombarded targets in North Vietnam, the use of sustained and excessive military force eventually led to what is commonly identified as a deeply flawed peace agreement. In what initially began as an eight-week operation, which was later revised and redacted by US politicians and military leaders, with the North Vietnamese government understanding the goals of these bombing campaigns, highlights a universality of understanding of both parties in the waging of the Vietnam War and its supporting combat actions which includes Operation Rolling Thunder (Tomes, 1998).
Military Objectives
The central military objectives sought as a result of conducting Operation Rolling Thunder included the following: validating the legitimacy of the South Vietnamese government, while supporting the moral of the population, minimizing the presence and support of the communists in North Vietnam, destroy ground forces and transportation system in the North, and the destruction of all industrial and military complexes capable of supporting communist and Northern insurgency into South Vietnam. As Vietnam served as a proxy war between cold war enemies, the US sought to minimize the spread of communism throughout Southeast Asia. In achieving these goals, which would have led to the downfall of Hanoi, the dismissal of Soviet and Chinese influence in the region, and leading to the unification of Vietnam under a democratic government, US military and political objectives would have fallen into alignment.
It would then have been argued that the war through design and delivery of Operation Rolling Thunder would have ensured American credibility and its ability to use force in achieving desired political outcomes through military action. However, by widening the war through the Rolling Thunder program, which led to an international outcry as a result of the massive destruction which led to widespread starvation, with the humanitarian crisis consuming the north, achieving these goals came at a significant cost to both the North and the US. With the North holding out, and the US being condemned for indiscriminate bombing tactics, with the passing of every day, the ability to achieve the initial military objectives became more difficult and problematic to achieve (Quek, 1995).
Combat Readiness
The premise of combat readiness is qualified in research conducted by Luttwak, (1981), which focused on the operational levels of war, acknowledging preparedness. As the aerial bombardment campaign began, the following forces were combat read and immediately utilized in the attempt to subdue the North into capitulation: The US Navy, and Republic of Vietnam Air Force and the US 2nd Air Division, which was later re-designated as The Seventh Air Force. The combat ready divisions that the South and US forces would go up against included The ground and aerial forces of The Democratic Republic of Vietnam. As each military unit prepared to engage one another, the focus of the ensuing combat was to
“deliberately seek to engage the largest aggregations of enemy forces, with their reciprocal attrition also having to be absorbed” (Luttwak, 1981, p. 64).
What also should have been considered in the strategic development of the operation but was overlooked, was the combat readiness of the North Vietnamese population, which were capable of surviving what would likely be designated as war crimes in contemporary society, with the indiscriminate bombing of the general population. As the North Vietnamese sought to engage in conflict which would produce a “zero sum” outcome, the populations combat readiness simply outlasted the technological and military superiority of the US (Quek, 1995).
Force Employment
With the US having gained air superiority before the start of Operation Rolling Thunder, the North Vietnamese relied heavily on anti-aircraft weapons, which included over 5,000 of the light 37 and 57mm variety. With the support of China and Russia, the anti-aircraft arsenal was expanded to include 85 and 100mm radar-directed weapons, such as the surface to air missiles (SAMS), which were credited with having played a role in reviewing 80% of the US aircraft which had been shot down. As previously noted, the US dominated the skies, however, infrequent deployment of Soviet MiG fighters utilized by the North Vietnamese Air Force were credited with several downing of The F-4 Phantom II, which afforded the US air dominance in delivering their bombs to target during the operation. The US flying arsenal included the following: U.S. Navy A-7B Corsairs, B-52 Bombers, Navy A-6A Intruders; A-4E Skyhawks; F-105Ds, and an USAF Iron Hand SAM Suppression Teams.
These were the principle forces that did battle over the skies, with the destruction of the SAMS a priority for the smaller, more maneuverable planes, which would allow the larger planes to deliver their bombs on previously identified targets, which would in-turn reduce civilian casualties and the subsequent outcry by the international community (Hankins, 2013; Miguela, & Gérard, 2011).
Rules of Engagement
While the US sought to limit the damage to civilians through risk assessment in a preview of bombing runs over the North, the Vietnam War lacked any significant rules of military engagement, with the exception of the political mandate which prohibited bombing north of the 19th parallel. As Hanoi realized the parallel offered a safe haven for weapons and its military, key resources were stored within these designated areas which the enemy knew as off limits to the US bombing squadrons. The result was frustration by US forces, with the conflict evolving into a cat and mouse game, with the 19th parallel offering sanctuary for north. As the war continued and in subsequent bombing campaigns, such as Linebacker II, these tactical planning mistakes, which has created a safety zone, and had likely prolonged the war, giving the enemy a clear and distinct advantage was removed as a consideration, opening up the entire country and parts of Cambodia to air assault by US forces (Caverley, 2010).
Weapons Systems/Military Technologies
One of the key advantages to the US in fighting a war over 3,000 miles away was the opportunity for the US to test its weapons systems and advancements in military technology. As war had evolved into numbers crunching, drawing on bomb damage assessment through photography, the effectiveness of military weapons such as the A-7B Corsairs and the U.S. Navy A-6A Intruders could be effectively analyzed. As SAM technology, developed by the Russians and Chinse were pitted against the navigational and bombing systems of the US planes, having made rapid advancement through the use of emerging technology, afforded a high stakes testing opportunity for the next evolution of advanced weaponry (Hankins, 2016; Plunkett, 2006).
Strategic Factors
In contrasting Collins, (2011) research on the significance of strategic factors in warfare, drawing on the foundational premises of Clausewitz, detailing the principles of war, it was clear from the onset of Operation Rolling Thunder that the US possessed the initiative, purpose, economy, and the ability to concentrate its firepower. However, in balancing the scales, the North Vietnamese, following Clausewitz’s precepts possessed time, maneuverability, flexibility, moral, simplicity, and unity. These attributes which embodied the attitudes of the North Vietnamese in absorbing what have must seemed the endless delivery of bombs during the campaign proved to be the stronger, strategic factors in procuring a favorable outcome. The advanced technology could not overcome a population that was unwilling to submit, offering a distinctive strategic factor that supported the eventual departure of the US from the region (Collins, 2011).
Tactical Factors
One of the key tactical factors that had been absent from previous large scale bombing campaigns was access by the press to the aftermath of the horrors in reviewing a night of US bombing during Operation Rolling Thunder. As US air commanders sought ways to validate bombing runs, while mitigating civilian damage through elaborate bombing assessment statistical models. As tactical factors such as civilian casualties among the North Vietnamese was causing civil unrest in the US, seeking the politicians and military to cease the campaigns, the end result were elaborate bomb assessment models which assigned a larger degree of success to every mission while mitigating the number of casualties. In creating a program of disinformation which ran concurrent with Operation Rolling Thunder, the ability for commanders to effectively analyze and tactically learn from one mission to the next was compromised. With the North realizing the pressure being applied to the military and politicians in the US to halt the bombing, tactics of the north to simply run, hide, and survive, until the US could no longer sustain the assault, proved to be tactically advantageous and successful (Hoa, 2016; Miguela, & Gérard, 2011; Plunkett, 2006).
Conclusion
In examining the interpretive structures which defined Operation Rolling Thunder and the whole of the Vietnam conflict, what emerged was a superpower succumbing to the will of a people who could not be broken. With the rise in technology during the 1960’s, supporting a Titanic ideology of one of the world’s great superpowers being unable to lose due to technical superiority, this fallacy, which was costly, was ultimately proven true and should serve as a cautionary tale for policy makers and strategists who consider going to war. As the US succumbed to the determination of the North Vietnamese at the Paris Peace talks, orchestrated by Nixon, post-Linebacker II, which has been argued that this intensive bombing campaign ultimately led to North capitulating could not be further from the truth. As Nixon sought an honorable peace and end to the conflict, Operation Rolling Thunder is a testament to negligence in planning, execution, and assessment by both the politicians and military planners (Proctor, 2011; Zeiler & McMahon, 2012).
