10/7/2023 0 Comments Air force gunships vietnam![]() ![]() Unlike Korean War-era helicopters, which were powered by internal combustion engines, the Hueys and other Vietnam-era choppers had jet turbines (called turboshaft engines) powering their rotors, making them lighter, faster and much more powerful. At Fort Benning, Army tacticians developed the concept of the “air assault,” a helicopter squadron of troop transports and gunships that could bring the battle to even the most remote location. The first Hueys arrived in Vietnam in the late 1950s to run medevac missions (called “dustoffs”) for American military advisors, but it didn’t take long for the Army to see the potential of the Huey as a new kind of war machine for a new kind of war. ![]() The designation UH stands for “utility helicopter,” and no aircraft in the Vietnam War was more utilized than the Bell UH-1, the versatile workhorse known as the Huey. Here are six iconic helicopters from the conflict. Helicopters like the Bell UH-1 “Iroquois” (better known by its nickname, the “Huey”) were so ubiquitous in the jungles and rice paddies of Southeast Asia-Hueys logged more than 10 million flight hours-that they’ve become a symbol of the Vietnam War. The young men who flew those helicopters-many of them only 19 or 20 years old-had “absolutely the most dangerous jobs in the war,” he adds. “The Army went through helicopters at a ferocious pace during the Vietnam War,” says Robert Mitchell, director of the U.S. In total, nearly 12,000 helicopters saw action in the war and more than 5,000 were destroyed. military employed helicopters in Vietnam. The Vietnam War is known as the “Helicopter War.” While helicopters played limited roles in both World War II and the Korean War-mostly for medical evacuation (“medevac”) missions-helicopters were involved with nearly every facet of the war in Vietnam: troop transport, scouting, equipment hauling, search and rescue, and providing high-caliber air support for ground troops.Įvery branch of the U.S. ![]()
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