April 29, 1975 - Retreat from Vietnam - Incredible Stories You've Never Heard (war, 60's)

[quiet walker]

I heard one of the most incredible stories about the end of the Vietnam war on NPR's All Things Considered program this evening. Back then I was a young pipefitter apprentice working for the US Navy, and was not subject to the military draft that took many of my friends to the war in Vietnam. The war was a major part of my life, with friends gone and the images and stories on the TV every night. However I have never heard this story, the first of three on NPR. This is one of the most incredible documentaries I have ever heard. There is more promised tomorrow.

Forgotten Ship: A Daring Rescue As Saigon Fell : NPR
Joseph Shapiro and Sandra Bartlett August 31, 2010
Read, listen or download the transcript or podcast 13 minutes

"For Americans, the lasting image of the end of the Vietnam War came from the nightly news. On April 29, 1975, television showed the evacuation of Saigon as U.S. Marine helicopters swooped down to the U.S. Embassy and the roof of a nearby CIA safe house to rescue the last 1,000 Americans in the city and some 6,000 Vietnamese and their families who worked for them.

But there was another evacuation that didn't get as much attention. Tens of thousands of Vietnamese found other ways to escape in those frenzied few days. They left in boats and helicopters and headed to the South China Sea. They didn't know if North Vietnamese jets would sink their boats or shoot the helicopters out of the sky.

They did know that the U.S. Navy's 7th Fleet was out there, somewhere, and they headed out to the ocean hoping to be rescued.

One of those U.S. Navy ships was a small destroyer escort, the USS Kirk. As the evacuation began, the Kirk's military mission was to shoot down any North Vietnamese jets that might try to stop the Marine helicopters. The North Vietnamese planes never came.

The approximately 260 officers and men of the USS Kirk weren't prepared for what happened next.

Scores of South Vietnamese military helicopters filled the horizon ..."

[nightbird47]

A few years ago in the chat section of a totally unrelated board, someone asked a question about the war, specifically how could people have become so angry. It blossomed immediately into a very long thread with deep seeded feelings on both sides of the coin, just as ferverent as they were in the 60's despite the passage of time. And the op was astonished, and could not fanthom how that could be after so long. She was 19 and her experience of war from a distance was in this time with this society.

But one long time poster gave us his memories and it was enthralling and horrible. Some day I may go back and find it and save it again. The computer that it was on left out the window one day when I wasn't home.

He was also 19. He was in the marine guards who were sent to protect the embassy in Saigon during the evacuation. While others were cutting down a tree and destroying documents, he was positioned along a newly installed fence, holding out hundreds of desperate people who wanted to leave.

He described how they'd move in waves, and the fence would sway and they didn't know if it would hold. This was a small group of half-trained soldiers, young and scared and facing a mob. They had a rifle to hold it back and a fence that was none to secure. Once the crowd charged the fence and in panic they fired into the crowd. He said he didn't look. He didn't know if he killed anyone and didn't want to know but he was afraid the fence would fall and they'd be traumpled. He described them being the last out on the helicopters as the embassy was evacuated, and the fear it would be too late. It was so vivid. He had ptsd and still does, for this only in part, but he brought you there.

There is no substitute for eyewitness stories if you want the real feel of a time or an event. Its the way it smelled and felt and the emotions running and the way time was effected. Its the physical events too, but when you put them in someones mind, and they take you to the place and time you get a glimpse of it which is what makes history such a necessarry thing to remember.

[MICoastieMom]

It is a day we don't discuss in our family. My sister was a foster parent and one of the children she foster was a Vietnamese child airlifted out of Saigon. She remembered little of her experiences but every now and then something would trigger a memory.