We're living in a flight sim Rennaissance Age

This may or may not be the time or the place or the way to say this but -
There were a lot of young men and women who served their countries in Viet Nam.
Enough has been said about the nature or the merits of the conflict there that we can assume no more needs to be said about that.
But those people served - whether drafted or enlisted - and deserve to be remembered well for their part. Especially given the disparagement and pain most had to endure if they survived it, and that their families endured regardless.
It would be fitting if at least some of that service and those people could be remembered in a Viet Nam based flight sim.
It's the one theater so far that has been ignored.
I am not one to glorify warfare - but to recognize sacrifice and to honor the memory of so many who went or were sent into SEA never to return.
Here is DaNang AFB in 1967 - To get a sense of what flying in combat in SEA would be like, you could base the entire sim in DaNang. From there almost every type of aircraft flew and almost every type of mission was flown.
If you served in that conflict I thank you for that service to our country. The US is about to celebrate another birthday. Our history is a mixed bag of successes and failures. The truth is always a bit colder and harder than we'd like it to be.
But two things can't be denied - Those who serve this Country or our Allies deserve the highest regard, and the fallen deserve to be remembered.
 
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Well said Heywood. Totally agree. I spent two weeks in Normandy to honor our soldiers. One of the highlights of my life. Whether we do it with personal visits or as you mention a flight sim, all ways of honoring those who serve are honorable and even life changing.
 
I live just a few miles from Fort Rosecrans where my father is interred - you can't stand at the wall overlooking those rolling hills and rows after rows of stark white crosses, representing mostly young lives interrupted in their prime - in the service of their country, and be unmoved..or as you say - unchanged.
and of course it didn't mean to me at 25 what it does today at 63. All the years in between that we have lived are the ones they never had the chance to know for themselves.
 
This is a quote from Nineline at DCS from last year "Its been said that its a matter of when not if. We are waiting for our Terrain SDK to mature enough to do it properly and to the best ability. We are not going to announce it until its happening for obvious reasons. I cant imagine DCS World to never dip its toes in that region though for sure. "

Keep an eye on DCS - with the new Phantom addon seemingly selling well, it seems likely that this may one day be a reality.

Any plan for the map of Vietnam?

Since you guys are making this, I just have to ask, is there a plan for the map of vietnam? Also, any chance we can get "Fortunate sons" as the main menu music for F-4 module? 🙂
forum.dcs.world forum.dcs.world
 
While I appreciate heyooood's comments and thoughts, I have no desire to relive anything SEA. I flew B-52's over Vietnam from Thailand and Guam. I later for two years, sat on nuclear alert every three to four weeks awaiting the klaxon that would send us to burn Russan cities to the ground, as our cities and homes would be burned. I then managed to get into the RF-4C cockpit and just take pictures.

I, myself, never experienced the shame and humiliation many GIs experienced. I flew directly from Guam to Texas. It was the men and women who entered the country in San Francisco who received the worse of the taunts and disrespect for being part of McNamara’s war.

Even in DCS I rarely bomb anything. I mostly just fly patterns, doing touch and goes. As I approach my 77 year on earth I find that my views on war, especially the Vietnam war, have changed from when I was 24 and I told my mother (who was worried about me going there) that I would rather die in Vietnam doing something I believed in than in a car accident in the USA. At the time, more people were dying in automobile accidents than in Vietnam.

I apologize if I have dumped water on this thread. I am not trying to dampen or diminish anyone’s enjoyment from flying in a Southeast Asia environment and reliving the time. It is just, I knew more than one person whose name is on that wall in DC. I knew too many who came back broken in body and spirit. And, I still have images in my head of those bombs exploding.
 
Thanks for your comments John, you are definitely one of my hero's. I too have changed my views of the world and just about every in my 83 years. As a teenager, I joined the U.S. Army reserve while still in high school. Four days after graduation I was on my way to Fort Ord to save the world. Now I wonder if that is even possible. The world has changed considerably since we were boys but so has our thinking. Thanks again for your contribution to this thread. Tom
 
I doubt anyone who survived the Civil War could believe, if they were alive today, that there are constant re-enactments of those battles today. Or that too many who arrived on the beaches of Normandy in June 1944 would appreciate the many thousands today who play those landings over and over on their PC.
This would be true of any participants in any of these conflicts most likely - WHY? Why would anyone who was there want to revisit hell on earth?
But I also understand why people do it. Trying to understand the most impactful events in human history - invariably warfare - is difficult unless you are immersed in it.
In HS I spent many hours in the school library reading everything I could find on the Pacific in WWII, from every side. Japan, Australia, China/Burma/India, and the US. I wanted to understand humanity's largest naval and aviation war in what is probably the 50k years of human existence.
And all of it concurrent with the war in Europe - also the largest of its kind in our existence. It doesn't require simulation - a guy can read a book. But today you don't see many young people with a book in their hand. And you wont find too many 'young readers' with Kindle or similar.
Does it matter if a kid today knows what happened in SEA between 1958 and 1973? or from 1967-1970? Only if he wanted to serve in the diplomatic corps or State Department, and even then most people today don't really care to know their jobs - they just want the titles and accolades.
My intent with this topic was to discuss the number of recent announcements regarding new flight simulators in the works, to go with what we have now. A new Pacific Fighters-esq sim, a Korean airwar sim, Microprose Mighty Eighth, and with MS 2024 we'll finally have a true civilian aviation simulator with
an attempt to portray all of the many viable aviation jobs, which if done properly will be both a real eye opener and something to inspire future careers in reality.
It seems that the lone exception to the entire genre, civil or combat, is Viet Nam. That's a shame because there was some tremendous innovation in tactics, technology, training, and so on whether you are talking about Fighters, Ground attack, Heavy bombing, and all manner of helicopter types and uses (expanded by this conflict in ways that have carried forward since)
My point was to ask, given all that was changed forever in so many aspects of combat aviation across the complete spectrum of aircraft types by this one conflict - why wouldn't it be important to try to convey some of that in a simulator? Why hasn't it been done?
Probably because of the sheer scope of all that innovation. It was hell on earth - all warfare is. That hasn't stopped all of the other conflicts from being represented. Each of them characterized by horrors of their own.
I've personally gone back and forth on the subject of the depiction of warfare and war machines as objects of fascination. That all of these innovations and advancements in the course of human history are the result of warfare - instead of a dedication to improving life and wellness for human beings.
What I've boiled it down to here later in my own life is this. Without these innovations and improvements and if we're just to be subjected to the endless supply of tyrants through the ages and their slack jawed minions, the world would be a VERY dark, medieval place.
To me that's what makes these re-enactments and simulations important - the quote about those who ignore or forget the past being doomed to repeat it can ring loud at times.
 
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Thanks for that, John. I'm with you. And I understand.

I don't have the Syria map for DCS because people are still dying there daily due to the conflict there. I know too many people who were in Vietnam to want to simulate the experience. Give me hypothetical conflicts, thanks.

Even WW2 has a personal connection, with my grandfathers in the war, my great uncle shot down flying a Wellington, etc. But it's far enough back and so clearly good vs evil that I'll fly allied WW2 planes. (Planes like the MSFS Bf-109 get "captured" markings -- I'm curious about how they flew, but I'm not going to zoom around in a meticulous repaint of a Nazi ace's ride.)
 
Good comments all. When I left the USN and joined the USCG I did not add my Viet Nam ribbons to my rack. Did not think my presence there was such that I wanted any recognition of it. WWII my dad flew L-4s in Europe. I do not remember him ever mentioning anything about it.
 
heywooood said:
I doubt anyone who survived the Civil War could believe, if they were alive today, that there are constant re-enactments of those battles today. Or that too many who arrived on the beaches of Normandy in June 1944 would appreciate the many thousands today who play those landings over and over on their PC.
This would be true of any participants in any of these conflicts most likely - WHY? Why would anyone who was there want to revisit hell on earth?
But I also understand why people do it. Trying to understand the most impactful events in human history - invariably warfare - is difficult unless you are immersed in it.
In HS I spent many hours in the school library reading everything I could find on the Pacific in WWII, from every side. Japan, Australia, China/Burma/India, and the US. I wanted to understand humanity's largest naval and aviation war in what is probably the 50k years of human existence.
And all of it concurrent with the war in Europe - also the largest of its kind in our existence. It doesn't require simulation - a guy can read a book. But today you don't see many young people with a book in their hand. And you wont find too many 'young readers' with Kindle or similar.
Does it matter if a kid today knows what happened in SEA between 1958 and 1973? or from 1967-1970? Only if he wanted to serve in the diplomatic corps or State Department, and even then most people today don't really care to know their jobs - they just want the titles and accolades.
My intent with this topic was to discuss the number of recent announcements regarding new flight simulators in the works, to go with what we have now. A new Pacific Fighters-esq sim, a Korean airwar sim, Microprose Mighty Eighth, and with MS 2024 we'll finally have a true civilian aviation simulator with
an attempt to portray all of the many viable aviation jobs, which if done properly will be both a real eye opener and something to inspire future careers in reality.
It seems that the lone exception to the entire genre, civil or combat, is Viet Nam. That's a shame because there was some tremendous innovation in tactics, technology, training, and so on whether you are talking about Fighters, Ground attack, Heavy bombing, and all manner of helicopter types and uses (expanded by this conflict in ways that have carried forward since)
My point was to ask, given all that was changed forever in so many aspects of combat aviation across the complete spectrum of aircraft types by this one conflict - why wouldn't it be important to try to convey some of that in a simulator? Why hasn't it been done?
Probably because of the sheer scope of all that innovation. It was hell on earth - all warfare is. That hasn't stopped all of the other conflicts from being represented. Each of them characterized by horrors of their own.
I've personally gone back and forth on the subject of the depiction of warfare and war machines as objects of fascination. That all of these innovations and advancements in the course of human history are the result of warfare - instead of a dedication to improving life and wellness for human beings.
What I've boiled it down to here later in my own life is this. Without these innovations and improvements and if we're just to be subjected to the endless supply of tyrants through the ages and their slack jawed minions, the world would be a VERY dark, medieval place.
To me that's what makes these re-enactments and simulations important - the quote about those who ignore or forget the past being doomed to repeat it can ring loud at times.
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My friend, you need not justify your original post. It was and still is a valid point. There are no SEA sims. Of course, if you want to re-fly many of its missions you will need a F-100, F-105, KC-135, and B-52 at a minimum on the USFS side. For the Navy, you would need the A-4, F-7 & F-8, as well as a Navy F-4. This, of course, doesn’t count Army helicopters such as the Huey.

My post was only one old man’s musings. I went to college for one reason. I wanted to be a USFS pilot. I wanted to go to Vietnam. I majored in AFROTC. Chemical engineering and later Chemistry were sidelines. I was proud to go. I still am proud of my service to my country.

I remembered an incident a few years later. I stopped off at a supermarket on my way home. I was wearing my flightsuit, which at the time we weren’t supposed to wear in public places like a grocery store, but we all did. 😊 Anyway, there was a Vietnamese bagger. He saw my uniform and asked if I had been in Vietnam. When I said yes, he grabbed both of my hands, shook them and thanked me profusely. While I was happy and surprised to be thanked, I remember thinking, Why? We only screwed up the region and lost the war. Still, it was nice to be appreciated.

Again, I have no problem with anyone reenacting Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, etc. You are correct about history. As humans, we all tend to forget the bad stuff. The job of historians is to look at history with an objective lens. Anyone who actually went to Vietnam and the neighboring countries has their own subjective view based on what they saw, hear, and read. Everything later is filtered through this distorted lens.
 
As a moderator, I'd like to thank everyone in this thread for keeping politics out and civility in. I had considered moving this to Newshawks or the Cantina, but it would probably become political and end up getting locked.

On a personal note, if feels odd to think that at nearly 59, I'm younger than a lot of others here. All combat veterans have my deepest thanks and respect. I was also in the USAF, but my time in was spent during the Cold War. Whenever the alert claxon went off, we just wondered if the world was ending this time. When the planes didn't take off, we breathed a sigh of relief and kept working.
 
Personally, the older I get, the less appetite for combat flight sims I have. I started flight sim with CFS1, then bought CFS3 and FS9 and so on. But I've also served my country during three operations (2x ex-Yugoslavia and Rwanda). I own DCS, CFS3 and Il-2 CloD. They're no longer on my rig. The trigger of my joystick is mapped to the brakes. I found that appropriate.

Cheers,

Priller
 
I remeber Strike Fighters Project 1 wich was mostly Vietnam based.
Strike_Fighters_-_Project_1_Coverart.png
 
I was also in USAF, and worked in Munitions Maintainance, known as the bomb dump. I went to Kadena AFB, Okinawa for 18 months, July 1970 - Dec 1971. Kadena was the PACAF depot for everything in & out of SEA USAF that would go "POP."

Like Heywooood, I was a WWII history buff in school, and continued on as I got older. I grew up in an aviation and auto environment, as my birth father and grandfather were both pilots and served in WWII, though not in combat. They were also modelers, as well as designers and workers at Convair, San Diego, California. Later, my stepfather was a hot rodder, and taught me mechanics, and fueled my interest in engines.

At 75 yrs old, I have also lost interest in playing the combat sims, but I enjoy being able to watch and fly the warbirds of all stripes. My munitions background makes me want to be able to carry, and drop those munitions at the training centers, but I am not interested in having to learn all the graphs and minute settings for each and every possible variation of flight. I'm a "kick the tires and light the fires" type. I love following the history stories of aircraft used in the SEA conflict, and flying them in the sim, but more as modern display type, rather than combat type flying. That is also the way I fly my Radio Control warbirds, as if they are putting on a display at an airshow.

The trigger on my joystick is also mapped to the brakes.
 
Tom Clayton said:
As a moderator, I'd like to thank everyone in this thread for keeping politics out and civility in. I had considered moving this to Newshawks or the Cantina, but it would probably become political and end up getting locked.

On a personal note, if feels odd to think that at nearly 59, I'm younger than a lot of others here. All combat veterans have my deepest thanks and respect. I was also in the USAF, but my time in was spent during the Cold War. Whenever the alert claxon went off, we just wondered if the world was ending this time. When the planes didn't take off, we breathed a sigh of relief and kept working.
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Tom, regarding the klaxon. I used to love it when the klaxon went off and I or several of the crew were out of the alert facility. We would all run and jump in the blue "6-pack" truck. All other traffic had to stop and give way to us. We would go barreling down the road, crashing through the gears with the big stick shift, to the airplane. We then jumped out and ran to the jet, climbing in. While the navigators decoded the message from ops we hit the cartridge start (think of a four by six inch shotgun shell, and soon the air was filled with black smoke, as six or eight B-52's started their engines.

Everyone sat there holding our breaths as the Navs read off the decoded message. Only once did we taxi. That was scary. However, it was only an exercise, and the alert was canceled as soon as we got to the runway. All the airplanes taxied down the runway and back to the alert pads.

We never got a klaxon on Sundays. We all knew that if it went off then, it was the real thing. I remember going to Mass wearing my flightsuit and carrying a “brick”( two-way radio) in my calf pocket. I would sometimes imagine what it would be like if the klaxon went off during Mass and I had to race down the isle to my truck. Thank goodness it never went off.
 
Priller said:
... I own DCS, CFS3 and Il-2 CloD. They're no longer on my rig. The trigger of my joystick is mapped to the brakes. I found that appropriate.

Cheers,

Priller
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I love the DCS aircraft modeling. They are as close as you will get to the real aircraft without being in the military simulator. As I stated earlier, I will usually takeoff, maybe fly a nav-leg or two. After RTB, I will do a straight in approach, usually an ILS, to a T/O, pull a close and then shoot patterns until I decide I have done enough, or I am disgusted with my flying that day and quit.
 
jmig said:
...we hit the cartridge start...
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I absolutely HATED cleaning those breeches - the KC-135A's use the same thing, but only on the inboard engines. Once those were up, they were throttled up and bleed air was used for the outboards. And the smoke might not kill you, but you'd probably wish it had!
 
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