In 1968 I thought it was awful that we lost door gunners. In 1970 I was flying cobras anfd other stuff but only as a maint officer. In 1971 I was a test pilot flying cobra's that the US Army did not own but the marines did. Twin engined heavy gunned, and in 1972 I was flying prototypes with Tow missiles and bigger engines and still wanted gunners for the break but we'd learned to cover each other by then.
By 1973 I was flying Iranian cobras with larger engines and better firepower and roundels on the side that said I was flying a foriegn aircraft.
I used to love to go to Ft hood and blow the shit out of stuff on cold springs range and strut with my Bell helicopter test pilot patches and let the regular army guys look on in envy.
In 1977 we started up-gunning the cobra to even larger engines and I became an armament design engineer at bell and made it so the marine version could carry bombs and have about the firepower of a German stuka

Time moved on and one of my last jobs in 2001 was designing the cockpits on the latest cobras. The ones they are just starting to field. You asked me what I thought losing my gunners? Well bud I'll tell you. there was never a feeling as good as the one you got when a pro in back said " clear left sir"

^5 and salute
BT