Zartman and I went over the pertinent message traffic and he briefed me on the plans for the operation. The four ships would arrive individually in the rendezvous area and maneuver independently on random courses until after dark, when they would be unobservable by any local fishing craft that might be in the area. Then, at 2000, the four ships would form up in a column with Rowan in the van as guide and proceed at twenty-five knots on a course that headed for the Point Do Son light, some seventy miles away, which marks the entrance to the Haiphong Channel.
It was a remarkable anomaly that the Do Son light had remained operational as a navigational aid for the duration of the war. Its obvious purpose had been to guide the munitions-laden cargo ships from China, the Soviet Union, and other Communist bloc countries to the wharves of Haiphong. Because of their neutral flags, there they could lie, untouched by U.S. bombs, and be unloaded between the air raids on Haiphong. When the mining of the port occurred on 8 May 1972, the flow of war material by Communist bloc shipping through Haiphong ceased. Yet the light remained on, flashing its identifying signal beacon by which the carrier planes could double check their on-board navigation and which would prove to be an important asset to Task Unit 77.1.2 as it maneuvered around the shallows, shoals, and mined areas in the approaches to Haiphong.
About ten miles off the coast, the two task elements would separate, with the Providence and Robison peeling off to close their assigned targets, which were generally southwest of Cat Ba. The Rowan and Newport News would continue on a north-northeast course to the entrance of the Haiphong Channel and conduct a firing run on an easterly course just outside of the five-fathom curve.
The Newport News, as the heavy hitter of the force, had the most important targets, nine in total, which included the fuel dump and vehicle storage at Cat Ba Airfield, the Do San radar, Haiphong SAM sites, the Cat Ba military supply dump, fire-control radars and coastal gun batteries. Several of these targets were at the extreme range of her 8-inch guns, however, and this required the cruiser to penetrate the Haiphong Harbor approaches as far as her twenty-seven-foot draft would allow.
The Rowan’s primary mission was to screen the Newport News, but it had two preassigned targets for her 5-inch guns, both coastal defense sites. Hopefully the presence of a significant force of U.S. warships in such close proximity to Haiphong would stimulate the coastal defense radar network to provide targets for the Rowan’s Shrike ARMs. The designated targets were from the CinCPac-JCS target list, but all of the ships were authorized to respond to active coastal defense artillery with counterbattery fire without constraints. The ammunition allocation for the Newport News’ preplanned targets was 285 8-inch high-capacity rounds and 191 5-inch rounds. Once within detection range of the coastal radars during the approach, the column would make random changes in course and speed to avoid presenting the enemy with a clear picture of intentions while still making good the scheduled arrival time.
The rendezvous of the four warships was accomplished on schedule, and the approach to the objective area was as planned with no evidence of detection by local fishing or commercial craft. At 2200 the Newport News went to general quarters in preparation for the night’s mission. This was a prudent move, providing plenty of time to check out all gunnery and engineering systems and to conduct emergency drills.
For my battle station, I joined the captain on the bridge and reassured him that I would stay out of his hair. As captain of the carrier Enterprise five years earlier, I knew how annoying it could be to have a flag officer on your bridge offering gratuitous advice and comments. In general, Navy regulations and customs of the service do well in making it clear that a captain remains in command while maneuvering his ship regardless of the senior officers aboard. In World War II, I had seen Cdr. Joshua Cooper, skipper of the destroyer USS Bennion, order the embarked squadron commander off his bridge when the commodore gave orders directly to the officer of the deck, who happened to be Lieutenant Holloway. The commodore immediately left the bridge, and the skipper eventually went on to become an admiral.
The Do Son light appeared on schedule, in its proper place and emitting its prescribed signal. As we raced north at twenty-six knots to approach the turn point for the firing leg, the ship’s speed suddenly slowed to twenty-five knots without any change in power settings, and her longitudinal pitch rocked forward several degrees. The ship had crossed the ten-fathom curve and, at a depth of less than fifty feet, was reacting to the bottom effect. This only served to further remind me that only five miles to the north was an extensive minefield that had been laid by our carrier aircraft nearly four months earlier. But it was too late to have any concerns about a stray mine that might have broken loose from its moorings. That possibility was infinitesimally small, or so we had been told.
At 2321 the Newport News rang up twenty-five knots and came right to a heading of 070 as the main battery of nine 8-inch guns and the port 5-inch mounts swung out. We were about two and a half miles southeast of Do Son light and on our firing course. Captain Zartman gave the order to commence firing.
With the first impact of the cruiser’s rounds, the shore batteries opened fire in return. Their guns were not using flashless powder as we were, so their muzzle blasts could be clearly seen as aim points for the ship’s counterbattery fire. The number of enemy guns was surprising, their flashes lighting up a full 45-degree arc of the horizon off the port bow. The enemy incoming shells were falling in our vicinity, too — not too close, but the splashes were clearly visible. The cruiser had stationed sailors in the rigging as spotters to record and report the enemy’s fall of shot.
At 2330 we turned right to a course of 091 degrees to run parallel to the five-fathom curve, which was only a mile or two north. By now the battle was fully joined and all combatants were engaged. The Providence and Robison, on our starboard quarter, had commenced their firing runs. The Rowan, up ahead of us, was banging away with her 5-inch guns in rapid fire against the coastal defenses and had launched two Shrikes at active gun-laying radar sites. Our spotters reported several splashes close aboard, scattering shrapnel fragments on the weather decks. The cruiser increased speed to thirty knots.
Equipped with a steel helmet and earplugs, I stepped outside of the pilothouse to the port wing of the bridge. From this open area the full range of sensations and the panorama of the battle could be experienced — the rush of the wind, the hot blast of the guns, and the acrid smell of gun smoke. The open vista of the wing of the bridge afforded a clear view of the North Vietnamese coast with the muzzle flashes from the shore batteries and the explosions of our projectiles.
What really captured my attention were the incredible towering cones of brilliant tracers rising ten thousand feet into the sky. They were coming from the antiaircraft batteries at Cat Ba, Haiphong, and Hanoi, firing at Navy planes in the area. At the apex of each cone of tracers was a Navy plane attacking its assigned target or transiting the Haiphong-Hanoi area for an armed reconnaissance of one of the main supply routes from China, northwest of Hanoi. With the volume of this AA fire, it seemed inconceivable that an aircraft could penetrate those curtains of fiery tracers and survive. In spite of the torrent of gunfire, the pilots did not consider these defenses very effective against night attackers. The tracers were from automatic weapons, which are relatively smalclass="underline" .50-caliber, 20mm, and 37mm guns. These weapons have a limited range and are normally not radar controlled. The gunner aims at where he thinks the enemy plane must be, based upon the engine’s noise and the airbursts of the larger, radar-controlled AAA.