One Hundred Stingers: A Novel of the Air War Over the Ho Chi Minh Trail

THE SECRET WAR OVER LAOS Before the first American bombs were dropped in North Vietnam, a clandestine air war was being waged in nearby neutral Laos. Almost immediately after the French were driven from Indochina, the regime of North Vietnam invaded their neighbor to establish a supply route that covered most of southeastern Laos. The infamous Ho Chi Minh Trail was the lifeline connecting the ports and supply centers of North Vietnam with the Communist forces in the South. Every night, the web of trails and roads came alive with troops and truck convoys - all heading for the battlefields of South Vietnam. The challenge of cutting off this flow of men and materiel eventually pitted the technology of United States air power against the implacable resourcefulness of the North Vietnamese regime. The fast-paced narrative follows a young US Navy flier as he experiences combat for the first time. His initial adrenalin rush from the thrill of close combat is quickly tempered by the loss of friends and a nagging sense of the deadly consequences of their mission. Convoluted Rules of Engagement often hinder their effectiveness and add to the young warrior’s ambivalence and frustration. Key settings move between Yankee Station in the Tonkin Gulf, day and night combat missions over Laos, and a few rowdy liberty periods in the Philippines. Combat scenarios are not limited to the standpoints of American fliers. Most integrate the actions and perspectives of a diverse array of adversaries on the ground – anti-aircraft gun crews, truck drivers, road workers, and foreign advisors. Between 1964 and 1973, US aircraft flew nearly 600,000 sorties against the Trail, dropping in excess of two million tons of ordnance on Laos—more than half of the total tonnage dropped by Allied forces during World War II. Nearly 500 fixed-wing aircraft and at least 200 helicopters fell to North Vietnamese guns over Laos. By the end of the so-called “secret war” nearly 600 Americans were listed as missing in the Laotian jungles. Today that number stands at 291. This breakthrough novel brings the costs of this conflict into personal terms.