Night Hunters: The AC-130s and Their Role in US Airpower

Introduction

1 Introduction D uring the Vietnam War the US military found itself confronted by various enemy tactics, diverse geographic features, a difficult climate , and constantly wavering political and diplomatic circumstances . In an effort to circumvent these roadblocks to victory, it developed new tactics and weapon systems. The US Air Force developed new aircraft, munitions, and targeting and radar systems specifically for the challenges it faced. Some of these systems would later become part of the military technical revolution of the 1990s. Among them were laser-guided bombs (LGBs), better known today as precision-guided munitions (PGMs), forward-looking infrared (FLIR) imaging systems, and low-level light televisions (LLLTVs). Most important to this study was the development of fixedwing gunships, specifically the AC-130. While other airframes and other kinds of close air support (CAS) and interdiction weapon systems preceded or flew with the AC-130s, this four-engine cargo airframe proved to be not only the longest-serving fixed-wing gunship, but also by far the most effective. The AC-130’s ability to transport heavier payloads at higher altitudes across longer distances made it the logical choice to be the final Vietnam-era fixedwing gunship and the only one that continues to fly in the twenty-first century. It employed many of the most advanced weapons, sensors, targeting devices, and fire control systems of the 1970s or of any era. Experts eventually transformed a total of forty-seven C-130 or JC-130A airframes into gunships, the first one being the AC-130A prototype, which became the test bed for the Gunship II program. With the success of the prototype, engineers and technicians modified the seven remaining JC-130A space and missile recovery aircraft intowhatbecameknownasPlainJanes.OnespecialC-130Awasmodifiedinto the Surprise Package, while ten other C-130As were converted under Project Pave Pronto, and eleven C-130Es were reconfigured into gunships during Project Pave Spectre. In the post-Vietnam era, ten of the eleven AC-130Es were modified to be AC-130Hs during Pave Spectre II. Between 1987 and 2004, seventeen AC-130Us or “U-Boats” were built from the ground up, making them the only gunships ever constructed from scratch and not melded onto an existing airframe. AC-130J/Ws are currently being built and deployed. There is no way to understand why the US built gunships without first comprehending the nature of the Vietnam War and the history of the fixed-wing gunship. The United States Air Force (USAF) entered the Second Indochina 2 | INTRODUCTION War as an organization in transition. After World War II, aviation technology entered into the jet age. On September 18, 1947, a separate US Air Force was born. By the 1950s, it was replete with a magnificent array of jets such as the F-86 Sabre and the F-100 Super Sabre. By the 1960s, other modern jet aircraft, such as the F-104 Starfighter, F-105 Thunderchief, and F-4 Phantom, were also in the active inventory. The Air Force also had new strategic jet bombers such as the B-47 Stratojet and B-52 Stratofortress, designed primarily to counter Soviet nuclear threats under the Single Integrated Operations Plan (SIOP) strategic strike capability. In the early 1960s, this policy of investing large amounts of money in strategic aerial weapons such as higher- and fasterflying supersonic jets and bigger and swifter long-range bombers began to change in earnest. As brushfire or guerilla wars erupted throughout the developing former colonial world, an increasing number of airmen began to examine methods of controlling these wars of national liberation and preventing the nations that emerged from falling into the arms of the Soviet Union. Within the Kennedy administration this was particularly true in the wake of the Cuban missile crisis of 1962, which nearly destroyed the world because both sides lacked the ability to initiate a measured response. Hoping to stem such potential nuclear confrontations in the future, policy makers began to move toward a more limited response to the spread of communism. However, within the Air Force many senior leaders believed that tactical fighters, most of which flew at supersonic speeds, would become the weapons of choice in these new-style wars. This was a vision that would evaporate as the circumstances of the Vietnam War evolved during the late 1960s.1 When the Air Force joined the war in Southeast Asia in the mid-1960s, airmen concluded that strategic bombers were not the decisive weapon their World War II predecessors believed they would become...