Retired Air Force Colonel Dick Anderegg received his commission via the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps at Hobart College in 1967, conducted pilot training in the T-37 Tweet at Laredo Air Force Base, Texas in 1968, and F-4 Phantom training at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida in 1969, and then was immediately sent to Southeast Asia to fly missions over Laos and North Vietnam. He left his wife in Fort Knox, Kentucky with her family and went to advanced jungle survival school in the Philippines. He arrived at Udorn Royal Thai Air Base in 1968, the day after Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon. Colonel Anderegg goes into great detail about flying the F-4 Phantom in combat. “I flew 170 combat missions and it brought me home every time.” He mentions the four air bases the USAF used in Thailand. He describes typical F-4 Phantom missions and tactics they used while over the Ho Chi Minh Trail, the Mu Gia Pass, Ban Karai Pass, and the Fish’s Mouth in northern Laos, including a detailed description of fast FAC missions that marked targets with smoke rockets for other fighters to attack and the use of laser guided bombs. He describes the immortality of youth, and he shares his opinion on why many combat veterans are reluctant to speak about their experiences in war. He is proud of his decision to serve and respects the decisions of those Americans who chose to protest. To future generations he forewarns, “Think twice when a politician in Washington tells you that going to war is a good idea. War is horrible, awful, and ugly; and should only, only, only be as an absolute last possible resort to something that is an existential threat to America.”

 

Key Words: ROTC, Civil Air Patrol, operations LINEBACKER I and II, advanced jungle survival school, Negritos, “Triple Nickle,” FNG, “counters,” fast FAC (forward air controller), General John P. Jumper USAF (Ret), Papa Whiskey Charlie (PWC) - Laser Guided Bomb, Kent State, Stars & Stripes, “fragged” (ordered), search & rescue (SAR), Mk-82 (500 lbs) bomb, cluster bomb, fuse extenders, “daisy cutters,” life-support (flying and survival equipment), surface-to-air (SAM), “the Golden BB,” protesters.