ANH Trench run: wtf were the Rebel pilots doing?

[Destructionator XV]

I just got the sudden urge to watch ANH again, so I did. It is an excellent film, but there are a few things that bothered me. The big one is what the hell were the X-Wing pilots doing during the attack on the Death Star?

They all just seemed to fly in a straight line waiting for Darth Vader to pick them off one by one. None looped around or turned back to attempt to return fire, none even seemed to take very extensive evasive action. They all just went in that line complaining about not being able to hold it. It looked to me that the only things the wingmen did was buy a few more seconds for the leader, with their lives.

Is there a reason for that or were they just hopeless?

[SirNitram]

My guess comes from the novelization; description of the jamming effects in the trench include a mention of how maneuverability is impaired. This would suggest evasive maneuvers at those speeds would smash them into the walls(Like the TIEs did).

[Elheru Aran]

Trench wasn't *that* wide either; two TIE's flying side by side would've been a litle tight, and X- and Y-wings have more of a wingspan. If they want to maneveur, they'd have to hop up above the surface... making them sitting ducks for the guns. They had to take the trench run as they did precisely because they had no other real option-- if they'd had other fighters to run CAP against the TIE's and some bombers or attack starfighters to take out the guns, there'd have been more creative flying, but as it was they were stuck. Took the best option they could take with what they *did* have.