Hognose Silent Warrior: The USAF's Airborne Intelligence War in the Final Air Campaigns of Vietnam

by G.F. Schreader

The Silent Warriors of the U.S. Air Force Security Service, the “back-enders” on SAC’s Hognose RC-135 reconnaissance planes, had quietly been in all the USAF air campaigns of the Vietnam War. Little is known about the critical role that a few thousand of these unheralded flyboys played in America’s air war against communist aggression in Southeast Asia during that era. They were merely one of the many integral pieces of the great puzzle that history knows as Vietnam. They performed their top secret role in a most spectacular fashion by intercepting enemy communications about troop and materiel movements on the ground, surface-to-air launches and anti-aircraft targeting, and MiG fighter pilot communications. The author was one among many of those American kids of the 60’s who were selected to join the privileged ranks of the air force’s elite. This is yet another untold story about Vietnam, one you may not have heard about before. It is America’s involvement as seen through a much different lens, a story about those who fought this war using intellect as their only weapon.
From the early 1960’s until the war was officially declared over after the fall of Saigon in 1975, there was a period of great advancement in America’s intelligence gathering efforts. It was an unprecedented endeavor to monitor, collect and process real-time data and information utilized for foreign intelligence and counterintelligence purposes. America’s skills were honed beyond expectations during this era, in particular the airborne intercept mission programs that expanded beyond utilizing older prop planes to newer jet models, like the RB-47, later the U-2 and SR-71 super spy planes, and in particular the Boeing 717 model configured as the RC-135 reconnaissance aircraft that could be manned with up to thirty-five crew members. Mostly enlisted personnel, these Silent Warriors, as they came to be called, were the crème-de-le-crème of the USAF. They were schooled in linguistics, electronic and signal intercept, cryptology, and many other disciplines unique to the world of intelligence. Thousands of them served in USAFSS units throughout SEA both on the ground and in the air. The author was schooled in the North Vietnamese language at one of the top government language institutes, and was ultimately assigned as a tactical-air intercept operator on board RC-135 aircraft performing the top secret Combat Apple missions. His expertise was intercepting and reporting in real time the communications of MiG fighter pilots in combat.
This book is the third and final in a series of three books chronicled as “Generations at War.” The author’s family has a proud history of military service to our country and to preserving our freedoms and the American way of life. There have been four successive generations in the Schreader family bearing the name George who have had a military connection, this author being the last of the four. He has compiled from the family archives the circumstances and stories of all four men, combining that family history in a series of three books. Three of the Georges have participated in historical battles of the modern era in the Twentieth Century, and one was given great privilege to honor those of the Civil War era.
This third book in the series is available hard copy through Amazon and Barnes & Noble, and e-book versions are available on Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble Nook. Other books in the series are also available from the same retail sources.

354 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 30, 2017

Reviews

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was instantly drawn to this book, because, like the author, I served as a Vietnamese linguist in the Air Force in Southeast Asia during the Linebacker II offensive in late 1972. While our services overlapped, our paths never crossed. I came on the scene a couple of years later than the author. We both spent time at Nakhon Phanom (NKP), Thailand -- he was TDY, I was PCS -- and we both flew missions on RC-135M recon aircraft out of Kadena Air Force Base in Okinawa, though I did not fly on the wartime Combat Apple missions Schreader describes in this book, since I would do my flying a few years later after cross training into another language.
Still, I can attest that Schreader hits the nail on the head in accurately describing every step of the way to becoming what the Air Force rather euphemistically called a Voice Processing Specialist. All the way from basic training at Lackland, to lengthy language school at the Defense Language Institute (DLI) in Monterey -- though I went to the South West branch in El Paso -- followed by intel training in San Angelo, Texas, then through the various aircrew training and survival schools, right to on-the-job training after arriving at the 6990th Security Squadron in Okinawa and ultimately the operational missions which form the meat of this book.
The detail is often exquisite. In describing the interior of the RC-135M aircraft, Schreader is specific right down to the placement of the intercept positions, crew bunks, aft lunch galley, and even the unforgettable smell of the aircraft. He also recounts flying on a number of EC-121 missions out of Korat, Thailand -- something I did not experience. The author recounts his duties as a Tac Op on all these highly classified missions so thoroughly that one has to wonder if he vetted the text through proper authorities before publication! Oh well, it's been almost 50 years.
So then why didn't I give the book 5 stars? Perhaps in trying to make the book of interest to those other than the very narrow audience who might have shared his experience, Schreader at length waxes philosophic about the meaning of the Vietnam War and even war in general, which I found a bit outside his area of expertise. His criticisms of characters like Jane Fonda and John Kerry are understandable given the times. But he wears his political heart on his sleeve a bit too much when he describes returning home and passing through California, which he calls, "a liberal cesspool, not much different then as it still prevails today." Furthermore, I have to wonder about his claim that while returning home through San Francisco International Airport he was met with, "a few wads of spit . . . from several leftover filthy war protesters . . ." Could it be that the spat upon vet has become such a pervasive legend that some returnees have developed false memories of it? Who knows? All I can say is I never saw anything like that when passing through the same airport around that time.
Still, all in all, Schreader's book is thoughtful and much more readable than your typical "I was there" war memoir. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

[Brad · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed the book and appreciated the author’s description of airborne intelligence during the 1960s. I was a special signals operator on the V and M models a decade later. The only “history” I received, was through anecdotal comments from older crew members I flew with. I did expect more details of his actual job, but this was still very informative. The occasional personal innuendo detracted somewhat.