The B-52 is a big ol’ lumbering plane with 8 engines putting out a lot of hot exhaust. The North Vietnamese found out in the 1960s how easy they were to shoot down and did their best to do that a lot.
That in turn led to the development of Wild Weasel tactics. Nothing in the military stands still, much less technology and tactics. Although SAMS have gotten a LOT better since the SA-2, so have SEAD and DEAD (suppression of enemy air defense and destruction of enemy air defense). There’s a reason we didn’t lose a B-52 in Iraq or Afghanistan to ground fire or air-to-air action. The US doesn’t like losing very old, expensive, and irreplaceable bombers.
So the US Air Force goes in first with fliers performing SEAD and DEAD missions. After all the threats to the B-52s are removed, the B-52s are THEN sent in to bomb whatever targets are left. That prevents losing those old bombers.
