The B-26Ks were delivered to the USAF between June 1964 and April 1965. The B-26Ks spent the first couple of years of their service on training units in the USA and in Central America.
In the spring of 1966, it was decided to deploy B-26Ks to Southeast Asia in an attempt to stem the flow of war material down the Ho Chi Minh trail from North Vietnam via Laos. Since northeastern Thailand was much closer to the intended area of operations in southern Laos, the US Government obtained permission for the Invaders to be stationed there rather than in South Vietnam. However, during the mid-1960s, Thailand did not permit the basing of bombers on its territory, and so in May 1966 the aircraft were reassigned the old attack designation of A-26A, thus bringing the Invader full-circle.
The A-26As deployed to Southeast Asia were attached to the 606th Air Commando Squadron, based at Nakhon Phanom Air Base in Thailand. The mission of the 606th was known as Lucky Tiger. The A-26A unit was officially known as Detachment 1 of the 603rd Air Commando Squadron on six months' temporary duty in Thailand. The operations of the A-26As over Laos were highly "black" and the national insignia were painted out in order to maintain some sort of plausible deniability if something went wrong and one of them were forced down. The area of the Laotian panhandle along the North Vietnamese border became known as Steel Tiger, and it became the primary target of the A-26As.
Most of the A-26A combat missions over Laos were interdiction missions flown at night, the North Vietnamese antiaircraft defenses that were installed along the Ho Chi Minh Trail making it too dangerous to fly slow-moving aircraft such as the piston-engined A-26A over the area during the day. The primary targets were truck traffic along the Trail. Sometimes the A-26As were equipped with AN/PVS2 Starlight scopes for enhanced nighttime visibility. Most of the time they were equipped with solid noses, but a few missions were flown with glass noses. By December 1966, the A-26As had claimed a total of 99 trunks destroyed or damaged. At the end of December, the aircraft were reassigned to the 634th Combat Support Group at Nakhon Phanom. In April of 1967, the A-26As were officially transferred over to the 609th Air Commando Squadron, which was part of the newly-formed 56th Air Commando Wing.
The A-26A could carry a maximum of 800 pounds underneath the wings plus 4000 pounds internally. However, the actual load carried on combat missions was usually somewhat less in order to gain maneuverability and to reduce stress loads.
A typical underwing load was a pair of SUU-025 flare dispensers, two LAU-3A rocket pods, and four CBU-14 cluster bomb units.
Later, the rockets and flares were often replaced by 500 lb BLU-23 or 750 lb BLU-37 finned napalm bombs.
The M31 and M32 incendiary clusters could also be carried, as well as M34 and M35 incendiary bombs, M1A4 fragmentation clusters, M47 white phosphorus bombs, and CBU-24, -25, -29, and -49 cluster bomb units.
General-purpose bombs such as the 250-lb MK-81, the 500-lb MK-82, and 750-lb M117 could also be carried.
In the summer of 1968, all Air Commando Wings were redesignated as Special Operations Units, and the 56th ACW became the 56th Special Operations Wing, with the 609th ACS becoming the 609th Special Operations Squadron.
The night interdiction tasks of the A-26A were gradually taken over by AC-130A and AC-130E gunships, and the Counter Invaders were phased out of active service by November of 1969. The losses had been fairly heavy, with no less than twelve out of the 30 that had served in Thailand at one time or another having been lost to enemy action. The 609th SOS was awarded the Presidential Unit Citation for extraordinary gallantry.
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Topic: A-26B/K - Docholiday (Read 75542 times)
