War for the Hell of It: One Fighter Pilot's War in Vietnam By Ed Cobleigh Berkley Trade
Paperback, 288 pages
US$15.00
Vietnam-era combat pilots are too often overlooked. Their bombing campaign was one of our nation's costliest air offensives. Yet, for most Americans, it's the "grunts" on the ground who remain the face of U.S. military involvement in Southeast Asia.
Perhaps that's because so many Vietnam aviation narratives concentrate on technical details at the expense of human experience. In War for the Hell of It, Ed Cobleigh has given us an arresting emotional account of one pilot's personal war.
Forget The Right Stuff. Cobleigh pierces that popular image and takes us inside the helmet of a USAF fighter pilot, circa 1969. His memoir is much more than airspeed and avionics, operations and ordnance. This is a book about warriors; the author just happens to fight his war from the cockpit of an F-4 Phantom II fighter-bomber.
Cobleigh's account is unsentimental and unsparing. He's a relentless veteran, cold and competent. Over two tours and 375 combat missions he makes mistakes, he grows to hate the enemy, he loses friends, and he copes by resorting to denial and detachment. Yet, for all his hard-won cynicism, Cobleigh refuses to surrender his humanity, or his patriotism. He's motivated by loyalty. Winners get out alive, and survivors are obligated to tell the truth.
One reason Cobleigh's memoir is so compelling is because it's not a straight chronology. Readers who expect dates and specifications will be disappointed. Instead, Cobleigh wisely chooses to tell his story as a series of vignettes that capture vivid on-the-spot impressions. It so happens that the father of one of my high-school classmates served with the USAF in Vietnam. Navigator in a Phantom, he won the Distinguished Flying Cross. When he told us war stories, this is what they sounded like.
War for the Hell of It resonates with noted Vietnam memoirs like Michael Herr's Dispatches and Philip Caputo's A Rumor of War. If you enjoy this book, you might want to read Ed Rasimus's When Thunder Rolled, another fine USAF memoir that covers the same period.
It's past time that these men told their stories. We're fortunate articulate writers like Cobleigh and Rasimus have decided to share theirs.
Gaming the Book Much of the action described in War for the Hell of It can be experienced in Thirdwire's recent flight sim Wings Over Vietnam.
Sequel to Strike Fighters: Project One (itself the direct successor to venerable European Air War), WoV does an excellent job of reproducing the Rolling Thunder and Linebacker air offensives. Flight modeling is convincing, if a bit simplistic. MiGs are far more common than they were in the actual theater and don't offer tremendous opposition, even at the highest difficulty levels. Ground fire, on the other hand, is aggressive and lethal, accurately simulating air defenses over North Vietnam. Surviving a WoV campaign is very difficult indeed.
The game enjoys active support from developer Tsuyoshi Kawahito and a prolific user community. Thirdwire issued a new patch just last month. Hundreds of third-party aircraft, objects, terrain sets, and campaigns are also available, including a forthcoming Korean War mod and a hypothetical conflict in Madagascar.
Cobleigh's book lends a sobering perspective to WoV. It's hard not to remember his words while you're going Downtown in a virtual Phantom. Your tactics will likely improve, and you'll definitely gain a fresh appreciation for the sacrifices American pilots made.
Count your blessings everytime you hit Refly -- and say a prayer for the men who lost their lives in that difficult, divisive struggle.
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