The Last Names On the Wall

THE OVERLOOK

By Tom Clavin

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This column is sort of a sequel to last week’s story about the last Americans to die in Vietnam, in April 1975. However, they were not the last Americans to die in the Vietnam War. That 50^th anniversary is next week.

The fall of Saigon almost coincided with the installation of another communist government in the region – that of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia. A brief conflict the next month between the United States and Khmer Rouge-controlled Cambodia, stemming from a hostage situation, would be the final combat action of the Vietnam War.

On May 12, 1975, a Khmer Rouge patrol boat approached the U.S.-registered container ship SS Mayaguez near the uninhabited Cambodian island of Poulo Wai. The communist gunboat forced the Mayaguez to stop via warning shots, including one from a rocket-propelled grenade. Khmer Rouge fighters then boarded the American vessel. The U.S. and the Khmer Rouge used different measures for how far territorial waters extended. Claiming that the Mayaguez had been sailing in Cambodian waters, they seized the ship and took its captain and 39 crew members hostage. SOS signals sent from the Mayaguez and an initial U.S. report on the situation reached Washington, D.C. by that afternoon.

The next day, U.S. Navy P-3 reconnaissance aircraft located the Mayaguez, which had been moved to Koh Tang, an island around 30 miles from the Cambodian mainland. Plans for a U.S. rescue operation were immediately put into motion. Koh Tang was put under constant surveillance, with the resultant sinking of Khmer Rouge patrol boats that fired on U.S. aircraft. A two-pronged rescue operation was developed: U.S. Marine units would board the Mayaguez with support from the frigate USS Harold E. Holt, while a separate U.S. Marine detachment would undertake an armed assault on Koh Tang, ferried by U.S. Air Force CH-53 and HH-53 helicopters. Both actions would begin early on the morning of May 15.

The boarding operation was a success, but U.S. personnel quickly discovered that the Mayaguez had been abandoned. U.S. attention shifted to the landing operations on Koh Tang, where Khmer resistance was proving to be much stiffer than anticipated. Estimates range between 200 and 300 enemy fighters. Three of the five helicopters in the initial U.S. landing were shot down, with two crashing on the northeastern beach of the island and one crashing into the ocean around a mile offshore. By the time the first assault wave was completed, eight of the nine U.S. helicopters had been destroyed or disabled, but 131 Marines and five Air Force crewmen had been successfully landed on Koh Tang.

Around three hours after the operation had begun, the situation involving the hostages from the Mayaguez developed rapidly. A fishing boat waving a white flag approached Koh Tang and was intercepted by the destroyer USS Henry B. Wilson. Aboard was the crew of the Mayaguez. The ship’s captain, Charles Miller, reported that the Khmer Rouge moved them to another island the previous day, briefly interrogated them, and then freed them. The crew’s captors hoped that this would encourage the U.S. to call off bombing runs on ports and naval bases on the Cambodian mainland, which had begun that morning.

With the Mayaguez recovered and the ship’s crew safe, U.S. operations shifted towards successful extraction of all military personnel on Koh Tang. This initially required the insertion of more troops to stabilize the situation on the ground, particularly because personnel on the island were split into three separate groups. Additional helicopter-delivered reinforcements resulted in a total of around 230 Americans on the island, enough to maintain a defensive perimeter while withdrawals were continuing.

Air Force helicopters extracted around 40 U.S. troops throughout the afternoon and evening of May 15, facing heavy enemy fire as the local perimeter continued to shrink with each successful transport. Gathering darkness also complicated operations, and the last 29 Marines finally left Koh Tang just after 8 p.m.

The final 41 names on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall represent 25 Air Force pilots and crew, 2 Navy corpsmen, and 14 Marines -- all killed in the operation to rescue the crew of the Mayaguez. Of these, 23 Air Force personnel were lost in a helicopter crash in Thailand in preparation for the rescue. The remaining 18 service members lost their lives on and around the island of Koh Tang.

Eventually, U.S. military and civilian officials conducted multiple missions to Koh Tang and the Cambodian mainland to search for further information on these 18 men. These included the first examination of the three downed helicopters that remained on and around the island and interviews with surviving Khmer Rouge in 1992, and trips in 2001 and 2008 that discovered burial sites. Remains found were successfully identified and repatriated to the U.S. However, to this day the whereabouts of the remains of five service members from the Mayaguez incident are unknown.

Tom Clavin is the author/co-author of 25 books, including, most recently, Bandit Heaven and, with Bob Drury, Throne of Grace, both published by St. Martin’s Press. To purchase copies, please go to your local bookstore or to Bookshop.org, Amazon.com, BN.com, or tomclavin.com.