... I was astonished to spy an extensive convoy of trucks coming south from the Chinese border on the coast road with their lights on. It was a long convoy and reminded me of the U.S. News & World narrative where McNamara displayed a 50-truck convoy photo to reporters. The truck drivers seemed to know that we would not attack them, as they made no effort to extinguish their lights. North Vietnam might have been aware that we had strict orders from the Target Master to only attack a deserted railroad and ignore meaningful targets. I questioned our astute leaders as to what rationale they had adopted to send us on an extremely high-risk mission to bomb what would probably be an empty railroad and bypass a lucrative target. The North Vietnam contestants had scads of time to hide any rolling stock on a railroad that would be extremely troublesome to locate. I was upset that we had to battle against lethal missiles and to provide a live target for the AAA sites.

I had to admit that it was exhilarating to fly so close to the ground in the bright moonlight and I surmised that it was impossible for the enemy radar to paint our bird at this altitude. It gave me a feeling of gratifying invincibility to know that we could fly undetected anywhere in North Vietnam, under a full moon, and our rivals could not see us. It was exciting to watch the moonlit ground as we flew very low through the valleys and sped toward the railroad. I turned south toward Hanoi, exactly as planned, at 10 ½ minutes to meet RL. We were looking for the railroad tracks in the moonlight, when a spectacular fireworks demonstration ignited in the sky towards Hanoi.

We observed an extraordinary sight miles to the south, as the whole sky was suddenly awash with flaming red fireballs and brilliant white flashes ---- Read Full Story Here...