They took great care in planning and execution so that the targets, such as a power station, were precisely struck and so that there was not collateral damage to the civilian population.
There was great danger in carrying out these missions because of that fact and because the North Vietnamese knew which targets would be struck.
The NV, accordingly, pre-focused their guns and ground- to-air missiles on the flight paths of the aircraft. There were extremely dangerous missions.
In Rockefeller's assertion of pilots’ disdain for civilian casualties, Rockefeller takes exactly the line of the North Vietnamese propagandists in that war, and, indeed, that of our enemies in all wars and conflicts including the first Gulf War.
To top it off, Rockefeller is currently chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. This is a very sad example of an American.
There is no intelligence in the senate.