Montrose - Daily Press

When Max Ibach enlisted in the Air Force at the age of 19 in 1951, he, like many before him, had the notion that combat would be the grand adventure of a lifetime. Ibach, an operations officer with the United States Air Force's 559th Tactical Fighter Squadron stationed in Cam Ranh Bay, South Vietnam in 1966, flew into the harsh reality of war.

When most people think of the Vietnam War, they think of combat in the jungle. But, as with most wars in the 20th century, the battle was fought on many fronts. For Ibach, the war was fought through the air.

During his 10-month stint, Ibach flew 175 combat missions. Because of the peril involved, for every 20 missions he and his fellow men survived, they received an Air Medal and a month off a 12-month tour. There were missions where no fighter pilots died, although rare, and many more where the squadron bled airplanes and pilots. Twenty-three of the men Ibach arrived with in Vietnam did not return. Some, like Ibach's best friend Terrance Hastings Griffey, remain missing in action today.

Courtesy PhotoIbach at age 34 in Vietnam, dressed in a tiger stripe flying suit with an arm draped over an AIM-9 Sidewinder Air-to-Air missile. Advertisement

Griffey was a graduate of the first Air Force Academy class. He died when his plane exploded over a low target in South Vietnam. Neither his or his weapons system officer's bodies were ever recovered. Ibach said villagers in the area claimed to have buried two bodies at the crash site, but a recovery team searched the area after the war and found no evidence of the aircrew.

This was the dark side of war. The reality that led to 58,189 names on the Vietnam Memorial Wall, and that doesn't even include the 200,000+ wounded.

For Ibach, aerial combat over Vietnam was never boring. From mid-air fuelings to flying into combat zones where chaos often ensued, Ibach said it was nothing like what's seen on TV and movies. That chaos could be heard on missions listening to the strike radio frequency on coordinated attacks.

Ibach said strike frequency was always a blaze of sound — the sound of those being shot down, emergency radio beepers, pilots calling in and off target, and other pilots screaming for everybody to shut up so they could hear what was happening.

The enemy hid targets in populated areas and unlike the sophistication involved with aircraft today, it wasn't so in Vietnam in the 60s and 70s. Ibach described it as swinging a huge blunt club over an area — killing things they didn't intend to kill. Collateral damage.

"We didn't have smart bombs back then like they have now, instead all our bombs were dumb and unguided," Ibach recounted.

Pilots and crew had to block out the fear of combat while retaining enough skill to get the bombs on target. Meanwhile, nearly everybody on land was shooting at them as pilots had to steer through multi-flak layers as well as MIG Fighters and Surface-to-Air Missiles (SAMs).

Ibach said there were generally in excess of 1,000 antiaircraft guns and up to 20 SAMs sites around any high value target. It was the thought of flying through this before missions that didn't allow much in the way of sleep the night before.

"If anyone ever tells you they were not afraid in combat, they are either insane or lying," Ibach said. "I know because I was scared every second I was there. We had to conquer fear on every mission."

Ibach had plenty of brushes with death. On one mission, a 57mm antiaircraft shell came through the lower RADAR bay and lodged in his instrument panel, about 30 inches from his nose. It didn't detonate.

Another day over Laos, he was hit by his own bomblets from a defective cluster bomb, often referred to as steel rain. Upon returning, the maintenance crew counted 300-plus holes and the repair notation read, "too many holes to count."

Ibach, 76,  is now about as far away from combat as one can get. He suffers from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), as do many veterans who return from combat. It's almost unavoidable after taking the lives of others.

"If you have a conscience, you can't kill that many people without having it affect you mentally and emotionally," he said.

But it hasn't stopped him. He is a novelist now, having written 15-plus romance novels for publication since 2004 and has resided in the area the last 10 years.

Everyone who served in Vietnam has a story to tell, even the ones with their names on the Wall. With the Moving Wall in Montrose, we should all take the time to hear those stories. To find out more about the brave men and women who fought and are currently fighting for freedom on foreign soil.

The stories serve as a reminder that this country has healed following what is widely considered one of the most unpopular wars in American history. That even though we as a country didn't necessarily treat our veterans with the respect they deserved upon returning from Vietnam, that it is never too late to show respect, especially for those who made the ultimate sacrifice.

Comments