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Ed Rasimus’s Followers (5)
Ed Rasimus
Born
September 29, 1942
Died
January 30, 2013
Genre
More books by Ed Rasimus…
“Flying fighters is simply an assignment, but being a fighter pilot isn’t. Being a fighter pilot is a state-of-mind. It’s an attitude toward your job, toward the mission, toward the way you live your life. You don’t have to fly fighters to be a fighter pilot. You’ve simply got to have the attitude. There are fighter pilots driving B-52s and fighter pilots hauling trash. They may not have the flash and glamour, but they are the best they can possibly be at the job they’ve got to do. There are pilots who fly fighters and there are fighter pilots. You guys want to be fighter pilots, not pilots flying fighters. Look for the difference.” This is profound stuff for the Korat bar. It makes sense to me. I’ve thought a lot about”
― When Thunder Rolled: An F-105 Pilot over North Vietnam
― When Thunder Rolled: An F-105 Pilot over North Vietnam
“As I turned to the chapters dedicated to operations in North Vietnam, the ridiculous gave way to the absurd. I couldn’t discern whether the enemy was the North Vietnamese or the U.S. Navy. The enemy might just as easily have been the State Department or even the Joint Chiefs of Staff. They all seemed to have a voice in the ROE, and the tone of the voice was seldom in favor of winning the war, defeating the enemy, or even ensuring the fighter pilot’s chances of survival.”
― When Thunder Rolled: An F-105 Pilot over North Vietnam
― When Thunder Rolled: An F-105 Pilot over North Vietnam
“have a high percentage of fighter pilots, but there was no telling about the new crop of retreads. It was tough for them, with very little time in the airplane and the responsibilities of rank and leadership thrust upon them. The delicate balance between flying skill and tactical judgment was difficult to learn. Learning to subordinate your own fear was even more problematic. I knew now that everyone faced it in some degree. How you dealt with it determined whether you were a fighter pilot or simply someone flying fighters. The flow of retrainees from the short courses had begun to affect our losses. Filling the squadrons throughout Southeast Asia took a lot of manpower. We were getting the bodies, but we were no longer getting the skill levels. You couldn’t prove it, of course, but things were happening that didn’t bode well for the future.”
― When Thunder Rolled: An F-105 Pilot over North Vietnam
― When Thunder Rolled: An F-105 Pilot over North Vietnam
Topics Mentioning This Author
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| THE WORLD WAR TWO...: E-Books and Others - Specials & Sales for Members Notice | 2106 | 524 | Oct 18, 2025 04:28PM |
