Drone War Vietnam

Drone War Vietnam
Here we look at a Pen and Sword release titled Drone War Vietnam

Introduction

The following introduction is as provided by Pen and Sword:

While the use of drones is now commonplace in modern warfare, it was in its infancy during the Vietnam War, not to mention revolutionary and top secret. Drones would play an important – and today largely unheralded – role in the bloody, two-decade US air war over Vietnam and surrounding countries in the 1960s and ’70s. Drone aircraft spotted targets for manned US bombers, jammed North Vietnamese radars and scattered propaganda leaflets, among other missions.

This book explores that obscure chapter of history. DRONE WAR: VIETNAM is based on military records, official histories and published first-hand accounts from early drone operators, as well as on a close survey of existing scholarship on the topic.

In their fledgling efforts to send robots instead of human beings on the most dangerous aerial missions, US operators in South-East Asia in the 1960s and ’70s wrote the first chapter in the continuing tale of autonomous warfare.

Review

This offering from pen and Sword covering aerial drone warfare during the Vietnam War is authored by David Axe. This release is a hard backed book offering 176 pages and 106 colour & black and white illustrations. First impressions are that the book is of a good quality and well written, covering a subject that is rarely covered or even acknowledged.

We do not give aerial drones a second thought these days as they are a common piece of equipment used to both monitor areas of conflict and in some cases attack targets. The long loitering times and small size makes them good at not being detected and have the benefit of not putting a pilot at risk. During World War 2 Joseph Kennedy was killed in an early drone experiment when a B-24 Liberator was loaded up with explosives to be used as a guided bomb. This attempt made use of television transmitting images to the aircraft guiding it to its target, but needed a pilot to take off and Joseph Kennedy  was killed when the aircrafts safety device made the aircraft explode prior to the crew bailing out.

Move forward to the Vietnam War, a time when I knew that drones where used but I always thought these were just used as training targets for ground and air weapons systems. Boy was I wrong in that understanding. Drones were being developed to perform the same roles then as they are today due to the Soviet supplied surface to air missiles that had begun taking a high toll on aircrews used during the conflict. This title provides you with a well written insight into drone development and use through the Vietnam War and looks a little in the lead up to their development.

I addition to written information there are a good number of photographs showing many facets of the drones and their use. Perhaps the images that will catch the eye are the ground launched methods and the book is out at a time when ICM has released many models of these drones. I really hope that ICM and all of the businesses in Ukraine manage to recover from events in their country.

Conclusion

This title from Pen and Sword provides the reader with a great deal of information that will make the ICM drone releases much more useful. I had not realised that so many different versions were produced and the roles they performed were so varied as well. This book adds a new facet to the hobby for displaying models of these aerial drones performing roles that we knew nothing or little of previously.