Lavelle was born on September 9, 1916, in Cleveland, Ohio, USA, where he attended Cathedral Latin High School, and graduated from John Carroll University in 1938 with a bachelor of science degree.

[8] When the Allies launched the Normandy invasion on June 6, 1944, the 373d Fighter Group's P-47s patrolled the air over the beachhead, and hit troops, tanks, roads, fuel depots, and other targets in the assault area until the end of the month.

While at McGuire Air Force Base, he established a community relations program which did much to ease the problems that normally befall an area where a military installation grows from approximately 1,500 to 10,000 personnel, becoming an honorary member of the local Lions International and Kiwanis Club.

In this position, Lavelle commanded a versatile, combat-ready force equipped with supersonic jet fighters and tactical missiles with nuclear, conventional and air-to-air capabilities.

[10] In December 1967, Lavelle was assigned to the Defense Communications Planning Group located at the United States Naval Observatory, Washington, D.C., where he served as the Deputy Director for Forces.

The Defense Communications Planning Group (DCPG) ran the secret development of seismic and acoustic sensors to detect truck traffic on the roads that made up the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos.

The idea was the brainchild of the Scientific Advisory Board and embraced by Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara, who made it a priority development under the direct control of Brown and using primarily Air Force funds to budget it.

[10] With his close relationship with Brown and knowing that McNamara wanted to accelerate the Igloo White operational date, Lavelle was able to divert valuable Air Force assets to his program.

Communiqués from the overall US commander in South Vietnam, General Creighton Abrams, to the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) in Washington sought authority to destroy the MiG threat and recommended immediate strikes on Bai Thuong, Quan Lang, and Vinh airfields.

[13] On November 8, 1971, Admiral Thomas H. Moorer, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, arrived in South Vietnam and personally approved a request from Lavelle to attack the MiG airfield at Đồng Hới.

[13] In a top-secret November 12 message to Moorer, Admiral John S. McCain, Jr., Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Pacific Command (Abrams' boss), warned, "I am deeply concerned over the mounting threat that the enemy's integrated air defense network has posed against the B-52 force."

[12] In a written statement submitted to the Senate, Lavelle said that Marshall reported that Vogt said that "field commanders had not been flexible enough in the use of existing authorities" and that "JCS would not question our aiming points (targets) on protective reaction strikes.

"[12] At the time that Lavelle arrived in South Vietnam, the North Vietnamese were concentrating forces and equipment near the Demilitarized Zone, preparing for what would shortly become known as the Easter Offensive.

[12] Lavelle later told Congress that he could have hit some of the targets within the rules of engagement by "trolling," sending aircraft into hostile areas as bait to provoke enemy fire.

[13] On January 23, 1972, 7th Air Force intelligence learned that the North Vietnamese planned to attack "a large aircraft" that night, presumably the B-52s which would be flying against targets on the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos.

[12] Slay communicated this direction to the unit which had flown the strike, the 432nd Tactical Reconnaissance Wing at Udorn Royal Thai Air Force Base, Thailand, commanded by Colonel (later General) Charles A. Gabriel.

[15] Nixon, in a February 3, 1972 conversation with an Ambassador Ellsworth F. Bunker, the US envoy to Saigon, explained that he did not want to publicize Lavelle's liberal interpretation of the Rules of Engagement.

After a visit from Peter Osnos of the Washington Post, Abrams said, "The wicket he appears to be on is that, for some insidious political reason, we have created the myth of this impending campaign.

Moorer emphasized the "extreme sensitivity" of this subject and asked that all crews be "thoroughly briefed that current authority permits protective reaction to be taken only—repeat only—when enemy air defenses either fire at or activated against friendly forces.

[12] Lavelle was accused of filing four false reports and conducting 28 unauthorized bombing raids (out of a total 25,000 sorties flown) against enemy air defense positions.

"[12] However, Democrat Senator William Proxmire of Wisconsin urged the Air Force to court-martial Lavelle, who, although retired, could still be recalled to active duty to stand trial.

On Wednesday, June 14, in a nearly half-hour Oval Office meeting, Nixon discussed the Lavelle affair with National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger.

In "The Private War of General Lavelle", Newsweek described a "widespread conspiracy" in which "scores of pilots, squadron and wing commanders, intelligence and operations officers, and ordinary airmen were caught up in the plot.

"[12] Seymour Hersh of the New York Times wrote that the case "raised grave questions about the Nixon Administration's grip on command and control over the skies of Southeast Asia.

"[11] Lavelle told the Senators that he lost planes and crews on two occasions when, without the North Vietnamese SAM using its own radar which U.S. pilots could detect, the networked system guided missiles to kills.

As described by the Caseys, "Nixon, running for re-election, apparently felt frustration at his inability to correct the injustice he thought he was witnessing in the daily Senate testimony on the Lavelle issue.

However, as has been noted above, it was General Lavelle's firm conviction that the enemy's greatly improved radar/missile network permitted U.S. planes to be placed in extreme jeopardy without advance warning and that, therefore, common sense and the law of survival compelled the assumption that SAM/AAA sites in North Vietnam were always "activated against" U.S. or allied aircraft.

The subcommittee stated that "This radical departure from orthodox military doctrine placed U.S. forces at a tremendous tactical disadvantage and contributed to prolonging the war.

[24] The commander-in-chief of SAC at the time the secret Cambodia bombings began in 1965 was General John D. Ryan, who in 1972 forced Lavelle to retire over 28 questionable missions flown over North Vietnam.

[13] In a letter responding to the Casey article, former Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird confirmed that he had authorized Lavelle to implement a liberal interpretation of the Rules of Engagement.