USAF ground attack procedures

[Cahokia]

Hi fellow pilots,

I have a lot of questions regarding American ground attack procedures used during the Korean War.

At what altitude did pilots typically begin their attack runs for strafing, rocket attacks, and bombing runs?

Which gunsight mode did they use? Fixed, gyro, or both?

And many more...

The most important question is the following:

Are there any digitized manuals or official USAF documents from that period detailing these procedures?

Like many of you, I have found pilot handbooks, but they don't describe weapons employment or attack procedures.

 

[LukeFF]

Start here: 
 

 

[Dash,Polder]

25 minutes ago, Cahokia said:

Hi fellow pilots,

I have a lot of questions regarding American ground attack procedures used during the Korean War.

At what altitude did pilots typically begin their attack runs for strafing, rocket attacks, and bombing runs?

Which gunsight mode did they use? Fixed, gyro, or both?

And many more...

The most important question is the following:

Are there any digitized manuals or official USAF documents from that period detailing these procedures?

Like many of you, I have found pilot handbooks, but they don't describe weapons employment or attack procedures.

 

Going to be a unit level dogma, there is never one single universal standard, it simply wouldn't work.  War is anything but set to a standard since every units sector will differ according to terrain, weather, and the enemy units they are up against.  There are operational standards written at every level from DOD, than branch, to command, than wing, down to the squadron, each giving lots of latitude to the sub unit to make the final decision on a whole lot of operational procedures, tactics, and technique.  That way each weapons delivery system and it's type aircraft and weapon can be custom tailored to what actually works very rapidly, and feedback on what doesn't fed quickly back up the chain.  Probably wasn't that well defined back than, but that is the system that was birthed and evolved from those guys.

[LukeFF]

21 hours ago, Dash,Polder said:

Going to be a unit level dogma, there is never one single universal standard, it simply wouldn't work.  War is anything but set to a standard since every units sector will differ according to terrain, weather, and the enemy units they are up against.  There are operational standards written at every level from DOD, than branch, to command, than wing, down to the squadron, each giving lots of latitude to the sub unit to make the final decision on a whole lot of operational procedures, tactics, and technique.  That way each weapons delivery system and it's type aircraft and weapon can be custom tailored to what actually works very rapidly, and feedback on what doesn't fed quickly back up the chain.  Probably wasn't that well defined back than, but that is the system that was birthed and evolved from those guys.

Yes, that doesn't really help him. 🙂 This is from WWII but it should prove helpful.

Air Forces Manual No. 64 - Fighter Gunnery Rocket Firing Dive Bombing.pdf

[Cahokia]

Thanks a lot for the late WWII manual ! Does K-14C gunsight infos you shared come from a manual too ?

 

On 7/20/2026 at 11:18 PM, Dash,Polder said:

Going to be a unit level dogma, there is never one single universal standard, it simply wouldn't work

You're certainly right but did weapon manufacturer issued "employment guides" for their products ? A sight has various modes for a reason, right ?

[LukeFF]

5 hours ago, Cahokia said:

Thanks a lot for the late WWII manual ! Does K-14C gunsight infos you shared come from a manual too ?

No problem. 👍

The K-14C gunsight info comes from screenshots that were shared by one of our engineers internally when I asked how the cage/uncage sight command works.