The Ravens: The True Story of a Secret War (69 page)

Vietminh guerrillas continue to infiltrate Laos.

1953
Vietminh forces invade Laos in March. Sam Neua is abandoned by the French and falls into Communist hands in April. Prince Souphanouvong establishes his seat of government there.

Vietminh advance through northeastern, central, and southern Laos in May.

French sign treaty with Royal government in October which obliges them to protect the country from invasion.

The French commander sends telegram to his government in November that he intends to reoccupy Dien Bien Phu to cover the approach to Luang Prabang.

1954
Battle of Dien Bien Phu begins in March and after a three-month siege the French are defeated in May.

Geneva Conference opens in May. Agreements are reached by July calling for cessation of hostilities in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos. Vietnam is divided into South and North at the 17th parallel.

1958
Prince Souvanna Phouma dissolves first neutralist government in July and is succeeded by Phoui Sananikone, favored by America as a military strongman and anti-Communist.

1959
The North Vietnamese create Group 559 to enlarge the Ho Chi Minh Trail through Laos, the traditional infiltration route into the south.

The U.S. State Department sets up a disguised military mission, known as the Program Evaluation Office (PEO), the members of which wore civilian clothes and were described as ‘technicians,’ even the U.S. Army general who headed it. Its task was no less than to create and train a viable Laotian army.

Chronology: Laos - The War Years

1960
Capt. Kong Le’s coup in August returns power to Souvanna Phouma. Gen. Phoumi Nosavan, backed by the CIA, forms opposition faction in Laotian panhandle.

John F. Kennedy elected president of the United States in November.

General Phoumi attacks Vientiane in December, creating a crisis in the country. The Soviet Union launches massive airlift to support the neutralist faction.

1961
Eisenhower warns the young president-elect that Laos is a major crisis - the first ‘domino’ in Southeast Asia.

The CIA begins the covert build-up of Meo forces under Gen. Vang Pao at the beginning of the year.

At the same time the U.S. sends the rightist forces in Laos six AT-6 Harvard trainer aircraft armed with machine guns and equipped to fire rockets and drop bombs.

The covert PEO infantrymen are replaced by 400 clandestine U.S. Special Forces personnel known as White Star Mobile Training Teams.

Kennedy announces U.S. support for the sovereignty of Laos in March, directly confronting the Soviet Union.

Geneva conference on Laos opens in May.

1962
An agreement on Laos is finally reached in Geneva and accords are signed in July.

American Military Assistance Command formed in South Vietnam. Advisers grow from 700 to 12,000 in less than six months.

1963
President Kennedy assassinated in Dallas in November. He is succeeded by Lyndon Johnson.

American military advisers in South Vietnam number 15,000.

1964
In response to a request from Prime Minister Souvanna Phouma for assistance in training the Royal Lao Air Force, the U.S. Air Force deploys Detachment 61st Air Commando Wing to Udorn, Thailand, in April. Code-named Waterpump, it also provided Air Commandos as forward air controllers.

A spring attack by Communist forces against Neutralists on the Plain of Jars prompts Kong Le to request air support. Leonard Unger, the U.S ambassador in Vientiane, releases the fuses to bombs previously delivered to the Royal Lao Air Force.

Prime Minister Souvanna Phouma agrees to low-level reconnaissance by U.S. ‘Yankee Team’ jets in June.

Barrel Roll, a bombing program to complement Yankee Team reconnaissance missions, is approved by the National Security Council and gets under way in December.

William Sullivan arrives in Vientiane at the end of the year, replacing Leonard Unger as American ambassador to Laos.

1965
Headquarters 2nd Air Division/13th Air Force is established at Udorn to serve as focal point for support of the air war in Laos.

The first night bombing mission is flown over the Ho Chi Minh Trail in April - the beginning of Operation Steel Tiger. By midyear, Air Force and Navy planes are flying 1,000 sorties a month.

Prairie Fire teams, dropping special forces troops onto the trail, are introduced.

The North Vietnamese set up a special unit, Group 565, to secure the vital Ho Chi Minh Trail from ground attack.

B-52s strike Mu Gia pass on the Ho Chi Minh Trail on December 11, the first time the bomber is used in Laos. Two marine battalions land in Vietnam, America’s first combat troops. By year’s end troop strength is nearly 200,000.

1966
Udorn headquarters redesignated 7th/l3th Air Force in April 1966 following the establishment of 7th Air Force at Tan Son Nhut airbase near Saigon, Vietnam.

The Steve Canyon Program, as part of Project 404, replaces non-pilot, Air Commando-enlisted Butterfly FACs flying in the right seat of Air America planes, with pilot officers using the call sign Raven.

The U.S. Air Force installs a tactical air navigation system on the mountain of Phou Pha Thi – ‘The Rock’ or Lima Site 85.

American combat troops in Vietnam reach 400,000 by year’s end.

1967
The original navigation equipment at Phou Pha Thi is replaced with an all-weather system, operated and maintained by Air Force personnel ‘in the black.’

American troop strength in Vietnam now reaches almost 500,000 as antiwar protest grows.

1968
The North Vietnamese and Pathet Lao launch their attack on Phou Pha Thi in January.

Richard Nixon elected president of the United States in November. Henry Kissinger chosen as national security advisor in December.

Gen. Vang Pao launches a counterattack against Phou Pha Thi and briefly recaptures the airstrip.

American troop strength in Vietnam reaches its peak at 540,000.

1969
The Communists threaten Lima Site 36 in late February, and after fierce fighting it is abandoned on March 1.

Secret bombing of Cambodia using B-52s begins in March.

As the Communists push toward Long Tieng, Gen. Vang Pao launches a counterattack on March 23. At the end of the first week in April he storms Xieng Khouang.

Ambassador Sullivan leaves Laos in March.

A Communist offensive against the town of Muong Soui on the Plain of Jars results in its loss in late June. A counter-attack led to heavy fighting throughout July, when government forces were again overrun.

Ambassador G. McMurtrie Godley III arrives in Laos in July.

Gen. Vang Pao launches his highly successful ‘Operation About Face’ in August, routing the enemy.

Kissinger meets secretly with North Vietnamese negotiator in Paris in August.

Xieng Khouang is reoccupied by government forces on September 12; Muong Soui is retaken on September 28.

Ambassador Sullivan and Air attaché Robert Tyrrell give testimony in October before a Senate subcommittee investigating the U.S. role in Laos.

American troop strength in Vietnam drops for the first time, reduced by 60,000 men.

1970
North Vietnamese forces capture Phou Nok Kok, the northeast entry point to the Plain of Jars, on January 12.

Xieng Khouang and its airstrip falls in February.

The B-52 is used in Northern Laos for the first time on February 17-18.

The enemy move on Muong Soui on February 24, and the town falls.

Kissinger begins secret talks in Paris with Le Due Tho in February.

The enemy attack Sam Thong on March 17.

The United States and South Vietnam invade Cambodia in April.

American troop level in Vietnam at year end: 280,000.

1971
Lamson 719, the invasion of Laos by South Vietnamese troops supported by U.S. air support and Army helicopters, jumps off on February 9.

The St. Valentine’s Day Massacre on February 14 at Long Tieng when U.S. fighters bomb Raven FACs and friendly Meo during an enemy attack.

American troop level in Vietnam at year end: 140,000.

1972
Prime Minister Souvanna Phouma proposes a new effort at peace negotiations in a letter in July to his half-brother Prince Souphanouvong, chairman of the Pathet Lao.

Peace talks begin in Vientiane in October.

1973
The Vietnam peace agreement takes effect January 28 (January 27, Washington time).

A peace agreement for Laos signed in Vientiane on February 21, providing for a cease-fire, an immediate end of U.S. bombing, and formation of a new coalition government.

Bombing operations are renewed on February 23 at the request of the Vientiane government after Communist cease-fire violations. B-52s strike enemy positions near Paksong.

Last American troops leave Vietnam on March 29.

Repeated enemy cease-fires bring back the B-52s on April 17, the final combat sortie by the U.S. Air Force after nine years of operations.

U.S. Congress in November overrides Nixon’s veto of law limiting the president’s right to wage war.

1974
New coalition government finally formed in Vientiane in April.

House Judiciary Committee opens impeachment hearings on Nixon in May.

Communist buildup of men and supplies in South Vietnam and Laos.

U.S. reconnaissance flights, monitoring the preparations for the Communist offensive, halted on June 4 when the Senate approved a bill, endorsed by the House of Representatives, to block funds for any U.S. military activities in Indochina.

Nixon resigns in August, replaced by President Gerald Ford.

1975
Pathet Lao attack Vang Pao’s forces in March.

North Vietnamese and Pathet Lao troops seize government-held positions north of Vientiane in March and April.

Saigon falls in April.

Pathet Lao openly announce a future program of genocide against the Meo (Hmong) in an article in their party paper on May 9.

The CIA convince Gen. Vang Pao to withdraw from Long Tieng. He leaves Laos on May 15 after a lifetime at war, never to return.

Communist troops enter Luang Prabang and Vientiane in August.

Prime Minister Souvanna Phouma resigns on November 28.

The ancient Lao monarchy is abolished in December, together with the 600-year-old system of village autonomy. The People’s Democratic Republic of Laos is proclaimed and the country becomes a Communist state.

1977
The Hmong’s last stronghold, the Phu Bia massif, is besieged by Vietnamese troops and shelled by 130 mm artillery. Unable to penetrate the defenses from the ground, the Vietnamese resort to aerial bombardment of napalm and possibly gas and chemical weapons.

1979
By the end of the year the exodus of the Hmong reaches its peak with 3,000 crossing into Thailand each month. A total of 300,000 Laotians have fled the country’s increasingly totalitarian regime, with at least 20,000 remaining “officials” interned in remote jungle camps for reeducation. Tens of thousands of North Vietnamese move into northern Laos as permanent colonizers, while 50,000 North Vietnamese soldiers remain scattered throughout the country.

1987
Thai security forces raid Ban Vinai refugee camp just south of the Mekong, and detain more than one hundred Hmong at gunpoint, the first batch of refugees to face the harsh fate of forcible repatriation to Laos.

Glossary

A-1
Douglas A-1 Skyraider, two-place or single-seat single-engine land- or carrier-based multipurpose attack bomber, capable of carrying up to 8,000 pounds of external ordnance, and equipped with four fixed forward-firing 20mm cannon. Considered obsolete by 1950, it was more appreciated by 1970 after its performance in Indochina.

A-7
Vought A-7 Corsair II, single-seat jet attack plane first used by the Navy and launched from carriers, and later used by the Air Force for support of friendly Laotian forces.

ABCCC
AB Triple C was the orbiting airborne command and control center that sent fighter-bombers to Ravens in Laos
(See
Cricket
and
Hillsboro).

abort
To suddenly cancel a flight or mission.

ADF
Automatic direction finder, a receiver that detects signal strength and provides bearings to low- and medium-frequency transmitters.