W volunteered for service in VN not once, but twice, as I recall the material that emerged in the wake of the Dan Rather bogus letter episode. He was turned down because the aircraft he had trained in, the F-102 Delta Dagger (a tricky plane to fly, or so I’ve been told), had been phased out of VN service, the air war was winding down, and the USAF already had plenty of suitably qualified pilots coming out of their newly accelerated training program.
Thanks. All’s I heard on last nights news report was that he was turned down after he volunteered for Vietnam because he did not have enough flight hours logged.
I have read the same thing about the F-102 being ‘a handfull’ to fly. The son of a Hollywood actor (Dean Martin?) was killed in the early 70s flying a F-102 as a member of the California Air Guard. F-102’s were built for continental air defense mission and were not fighter-bombers. I remember seeing pictures of F-102s in revetments in the first year or two of Vietnam, and then they were withdrawn when it was decided that we didn’t need them there in the air defense role but could do with the F-110.