PENTAGON BATTLE FOR THE RF-4C

With an RF-4C Reunion pending in Austin, Texas, some of you pilots and others who flew or were associated with this magnificent flying machine may want to know how it came about to be selected by USAF. I was there and participated in what turned out to be a battle royal so here is my experience in the Pentagon with the RF-4C decision.

In 1959 I graduated from the Air Command and Staff Course at The Air University and was assigned to AFOOP, Air Force Operations, Reconnaissance Group, in the subbasement of the Pentagon. I thought my best fit would have been Reconnaissance Requirements because I had extensive reconnaissance experience; 91 photo recon combat missions, P-38, WWII; First jet photo recon squadron, P-80 and RF-80, 1945; Chief Pilot aerial survey company, 18-months 1946-47; 100 tactical reconnaissance missions, RF-80 and RF-86 Korea; RF-100 overflight mission in Europe, 3-years. Unfortunately, I had a bad relationship with Colonel Fred Dyer, Commander, Reconnaissance Requirements, ever since I was a member of his accident board that charged him with pilot error. However, one of my best friends, Major Bert Dowdy, a fellow 1959 ACSC classmate got the requirements job and we worked closely together.

I was the lowest ranking Major in the Reconnaissance Group when I reported in for duty. The Commander told me that I would be responsible for all day tactical reconnaissance squadrons: active, National Guard and Reserve. And another officer was responsible for all the night squadrons. The rest of our officers were managing highly classified world-wide reconnaissance projects. The first paper I picked up indicated the day before Colonel Dyer, Reconnaissance Requirements, had signed off on the RF-105 as the follow-on tactical reconnaissance replacement.

When I went through the document I found the RF-105 offered little if any advancement over the RF-101 that was in the pipeline. The cameras and sensors had to be in a bathtub affair that provided very little space. The forward shooting camera arrangement did not show the horizon and there were not enough stations to provide the necessary configurations. Also, the F-105 was old technology and the radar provided little if any low altitude navigation assistance and was primarily an air-to-air radar. I told my boss that the RF-105 was not the answer for a follow-on tactical reconnaissance airplane and pointed out the deficiencies. He agreed, and told me to prepare a briefing for the AFOOP Commander (a Major General who later became a full General but I can't recall his name)

When I finished briefing the AFOOP Commander, he said to me, "You have told me why you don't believe the RF-105 will be a suitable follow-on tactical reconnaissance aircraft, but you have not told me the airplane you want to replace it. Come back with a replacement and we will talk." How can you fault that kind of logic? It hadn't even occurred to me to include a recommended aircraft. I looked around to see what was available. There was the North American Navy R-5A that had a limit of five "Gs" max, and another limited bathtub arrangement for sensors and a very poor sensor selection. I dismissed it out-of-hand. Then there was the McDonnell F-110 being marketed as an interceptor. These two were the only aircraft available.

I called the local McDonnell representative and asked him if he would come in and give us a briefing on the reconnaissance version of the F-110 if he had one. Again, the cameras suggested by McDonnell were nothing new but I was really surprised by the performance of the airplane. It was a 2.25 Mach airplane with a 60,000 foot altitude service ceiling, good range, two cockpits, and a very large nose compartment when the radar was removed. I lost no time in getting all the information down and prepared my briefing for our Commander.

When I briefed the General I got another dose of his logic. He asked me how many aircraft we needed for tactical reconnaissance. I told him the first buy would be for 87-airplanes. Then he said, "The Air Force is not going to purchase 87 completely different airplanes compared with the rest of the inventory. If you want this McDonnell airplane you better get the fighters involved. If they also want the airplane you have a good chance of getting it for tactical reconnaissance. Go brief them."

The AFOOP Tactical Division was the largest in our Directorate. They had four full Colonels, and about 20-Lt.Cols and Majors. I arranged to brief their Commander, a Colonel who later became a three star general and the Commander of Ninth Air Force. I briefed him on why we didn't like the RF-105 and why we wanted the reconnaissance version of the McDonnell F-110. I also told him that the AFOOP Commander had told me to brief them to see if they had any interest in a fighter version of the F-110. Bear in mind that they had already signed off on about 600 additional F-105s even though they were getting more and more dissatisfied with the airplane. The first combat wing was yet to become combat ready, it was a maintenance nightmare and far too many manual systems for a single pilot. On top of that the airplane had a terrible accident record. I believe he was more surprised than I was at the performance factors of the F-110. "Are you sure those figures are right?" he asked me. I told him I got them from McDonnell. He got up from his desk, thanked me and said that he was going to Edwards Air Force Base and fly the F-110 in the near future.

After this briefing I got my friend Bert Dowdy involved in Reconnaissance Requirements and I briefed Colonel Dyer. He was interested but not ready to go back on his first decision. We were committed to the RF-105 unless something happened. We made several trips to Republic Aviation to see the Mockup of the RF-105 and started switching to modern sensors and talking about different cameras. At the same time we were calling McDonnell in and working with them on a reconnaissance configuration. When McDonnell sensed that there was a possibility of selling the F-110 for tactical reconnaissance they immediately put 85-engineers on development of the reconnaissance version of the airplane. Bert Dowdy and I flew out to the plant to talk about the early phase of a reconnaissance configuration.

A little background of interest. President Eisenhower told the armed forces, as the cold war was heating up, that the US and NATO would go immediately to the use of nuclear weapons if attacked. Our tactical fighters stopped gunnery training and concentrated on delivery of small nuclear weapons. But when President Kennedy came into office, January 1961, he told the armed forces that he wanted a conventional weapons response capability. Our entire Air Force had to switch back to aerial gunnery, ground attack with iron bombs and what a shock to SAC. They had to train all their B-52 and B-47 crews to drop iron bombs. This conventional weapons policy also meant an increase in tactical forces including reconnaissance.

General LeMay became Air Force Chief of Staff and the word went out that he wanted a second source to produce fighter and reconnaissance aircraft. Buying more F/RF-105s didn't appeal to him. At this point the fighters said they wanted the McDonnell F-110 and the designation of the airplane was changed to the F-4. The reconnaissance decision makers said that they wanted the RF-4. At this point the Pentagon battle began but we didn't know it yet. The Air Council approved the F/RF-4 and McDonnell put about every engineer they had on these weapon systems and hired more.

There was a reorganization of the AFOOP Reconnaissance Group and I was the only tactical reconnaissance officer transferred to the Tactical Division. I was to remain there for three years and I was responsible for all, day and night, active, National Guard and Reserve, tactical reconnaissance matters for our Directorate. The Reconnaissance Group was now called Special Activities and went completely classified. I got a seat on the Reconnaissance Board in the Requirements Directorate and I only had to convince my fighter pilot boss that my recommendations were good for tactical reconnaissance.

Bert Dowdy and I began to work closely together. We called in representatives from all the major commands to make recommendations for the configuration of the RF-4 which was given the designation of RF-4C. Major Paul Vanderhoek from USAFFE made a number of important recommendations. One was for a single-sideband communication capability for low altitude communication and several more. The configuration of the RF-4C was to be based on a general war in Europe, the most demanding scenario. All the sensor and camera development people on the Air Staff met to discuss the latest developments that could meet the production schedule of the RF-4C. AFSC, responsible for development of reconnaissance equipment did not have much to offer. Every idea, new camera or sensor, side-looking radar, night capability, terrain-following radar, navigation system, etc. was passed on to McDonnell who responded on feasibility within a very reasonable time. So the aircraft configuration was beginning to take shape.

Would you expect Republic Aviation to sit still with this second source decision? They pulled out every stop to avoid loosing millions on the great number of F/RF-105s that were planned for. Their opposition was almost a hundred percent political with their Senators and Congressmen complaining to the Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara and probably the President.

They were not the only ones to complain about the F/RF-4C decision. The Navy had ordered 100 North American F-5s (I don't remember the Navy designation) to use as nuclear bombers. The nuclear weapon was stored internally and ejected through a long chute above or below the tail pipe I don't remember which. The concept did not work so the Navy was stuck with 100 airplanes and no mission. It was decided to turn them all into Navy reconnaissance aircraft, the R-5A.

North American, seeing a chance to sell even more R-5As and F-5As too, also complained bitterly to Secretary McNamara and more or less demanded a competition or equal consideration between the F/R-5A, the F/RF-105 and the F/RF-4C. The Navy would have been delighted to diminish their big error in purchasing the 100 North American airplanes that didn't work and Republic claimed to have already done considerable work on the RF-105. At this point the battle began between the three weapon systems. Not only did we have to justify the RF-4C but we had to shoot down the other two systems.

The RF-4C was hands down the superior weapon system but Republic and North American kept copying all the advances we had made with the RF-4C configuration. We had McDonnell burning midnight oil in keeping up with our demands but when we improved our capability the other two systems added it to theirs. One day the Air Force received a letter signed by Secretary McNamara directing the Navy R-5A as the follow-on Air Force tactical reconnaissance aircraft. Many felt defeated at this point but we didn't give up. We found out that the letter was written by a member of McNamara's staff who was a former Vice President of North American. This made us believe that McNamara had not been given the full story. Also, we knew that the decision was political so we called upon the Air Force Secretary to intercede. In addition our generals went to bat for us then the Marine Corps came out in our support. The Marines wanted the RF-4B but had not made much noise until this letter came through. They supported the RF-4C and we finally got the Army to support the selection of the RF-4C. With the fighters firmly behind the F-4, we were now assured of the decision in our favor.

In some respects the fighters decided some basic configurations that we went along with. One was full pilot controls in each cockpit. They were so fed up with the F-105 situation that they wanted two pilots, one to be called the systems operator. In addition this would be an easy upgrade to move the pilot from the back cockpit to the front. To get two sets of pilot controls they had to specify two pilots. This also doubled the pilot training program that came in handy when Vietnam came along and we went to Navigators in the rear cockpit. They wanted the tail hook the Navy used and made other modifications to the Navy version. I discussed at length the value of the single-sideband, low altitude, communication capability we were getting but for some reason they didn't believe it was of much value. Were they ever wrong?

For every weapon system the Contractor must receive summarized aircraft configuration guidance from the Government. Bert Dowdy and I were given the task of writing this document. We came into the Pentagon one weekend, sat in my office and prepared these instructions. Each camera, sensor, etc. and other requirements had already been discussed time and again with all concerned but this was an opportunity to let the Contractor know how the Air Force was going to employ the RF-4C. Here are some of the important capabilities that you RF-4C lovers already know about:

1. The aircraft must be capable of day and night, all-weather tactical reconnaissance and have a 90 percent probability of successful sensor and aircraft operation on the mission before takeoff. a. The side-looking radar was only capable of a 50-foot resolution but we decided that 50-feet would show the ground zero of a nuclear weapon and be valuable with bridges and other targets when encountering zero or poor visibility. We called for side-looking radar, the most expensive sensor at $175,000, on every aircraft but later a Pentagon money man came to me and requested that we change the requirement to every other airplane so he could manage the funding. I told him that it would be OK for the first buy but after that all the aircraft should receive the sensor. It never happened so we ended up with the side-looking radar on every other aircraft. b. All film was to be 5-inch except for the mapping camera that was a precision camera, using 9-inch film in a controlled vertical camera mount. Some questioned the mapping capability but the world was not very well mapped in the early 196os. Also, we wanted to eject a roll of film to an Army unit using the mapping camera where the film was developed in the magazine. The Army continually claimed that we could not get them the intelligence fast enough. McDonnell never could make it work. c. We called for the very best infrared sensor available, the best panoramic cameras under development and were disappointed that no high altitude panoramic camera was on the horizon. The only thing suitable was a 12-inch focal length precision pan camera with over 100 lines of resolution. This proved unsatisfactory but years later they would develop a high altitude panoramic. d. We were amazed that Texas Instrument came up with a terrain following radar that worked and permitted the RF-4C to safely penetrate weather over mountainous areas to fairly low altitudes. e. When we told McDonnell we wanted flash cartridges of both sizes they gave the aircraft the capability. f. We didn't put enough priority on the viewfinder for the pilot and the first few production airplanes had to be retrofitted. g. Bert Dowdy and I went through every possible combination of cameras ending up with a series of camera combinations that we listed in the requirements document. This listing also resulted in the determination of how many cameras and magazines of each type the squadron of 18-RF-4Cs should be authorized.

2. We submitted the document to AFSC who sent it to McDonnell. After a couple of weeks and after studying their guidance, McDonnell requested that Bert Dowdy and I come to their factory and answer questions. We were on the stage looking at about 50-McDonnell engineers, representing various capabilities wanting more details in some areas and giving us their interpretation of some of the requirements. At that time McDonnell was also in the manned space business so they knew exactly how to ensure that the Systems Operator could test all of his capabilities from his station and meet that 90 percent requirement for success. The USAF had previously told McDonnell that we wanted to keep the nuclear strike capability already built into the airplane and to wire off the folding wings. Aerial refueling was the same for all F/RF-4s.

I haven't mentioned it but price was also a factor in deciding between the RF-4C and the other two competing aircraft. As a result that first buy from McDonnell for 138 airplanes was about as cheap as you will ever purchase a first line aircraft. We paid 3.4 million dollars program cost for each airplane that included all the simulators and support equipment. I'm sure the second and third buy were more expensive.

Did we know at the time that the RF-4C would be the last tactical reconnaissance aircraft purchased by the Air Force? We did not and before I left the Pentagon we had a long range requirement in for the RF-15. We also had one in for the RF-111 but the RF-4C had so much capability and performance that none of these long range programs materialized. We decided to phase out the RB-66 (night recce version) first and replace the squadrons with RF-4Cs. After that the RF-84s were replaced by the RF-4Cs leaving the Air Force with RF-4Cs and RF-101s. Because of the buildup in conventional forces our active duty squadrons went from 12 to 14.

Now you know more about the RF-4C than you wanted to know but all of you who have served on the Air Staff in the Pentagon know that most of the work is done by the Majors and Lt. Cols. so you are not surprised by what I have written. When I left the Pentagon for the Air War College I had no idea that it would be four years before I got to fly the RF-4C. General Blood latched on to me when I graduated and I spent three years in NATO, 4ATAF, and flying T-33s. I checked out at Shaw in both the RF-101 and the RF-4C and split my 148 combat missions in Vietnam between the two airplanes. These Voodoo pilots swear by the RF-101 but nothing can compare to piloting the RF-4C. What an airplane.

Cecil H. Rigsby Colonel, USAF (Ret) 8 July 2007