Operation Linebacker II saw more than 200 American B-52 bombers fly 730 sorties and drop over 20,000 tons of bombs on North Vietnam over a period of 12 days in December 1972.

By Brad Lendon, CNN

Published 7:09 PM EST, Sat December 17, 2022

CNN — It was one of the heaviest bombardments in history. A shock-and-awe campaign of overwhelming air power aimed at bombing into submission a determined opponent that, despite being vastly outgunned, had withstood everything the world’s most formidable war machine could throw at it.

Operation Linebacker II saw more than 200 American B-52 bombers fly 730 sorties and drop over 20,000 tons of bombs on North Vietnam over a period of 12 days in December 1972, in a brutal assault aimed at shaking the Vietnamese “to their core,” in the words of then US national security adviser Henry Kissinger.

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