First published in 1992. From the foreword: "Search and rescue has always been important to the United States Air Force, whose aircrews deserve nothing less than the fullest possible commitment to save them and return them home. The motto of Air Force search and rescue, "So Others May Live," is one of the most compelling of all military mottoes. It embodies this spirit of altruism and, as events have proven, also indicates the service's intention to furnish life-saving SAR for civilian as well as military purposes. Search and rescue flourished during World War II as lifeguard ships and submarines joined patrolling aircraft in saving lives and sustaining morale, especially in the Pacific Ocean Areas. The rotary-wing, turbojet, and avionics revolutions made modern SAR a reality. Foreshadowed by the Korean War, the helicopter became the principal form of air rescue vehicle in Vietnam. In three major conflicts, SAR forces gained a reputation for bravery, dedication, and self-sacrifice, as they ventured repeatedly into hostile territory to pluck fallen aircrews to safety. The USAF rightly continues to place a top priority on search and rescue, seeking better ways to perform this function through the use of advanced equipment and aircraft (such as the multipurpose MH-53J Pave Low helicopter) and improved training of personnel. This reprint of a classic work offers the reader an exciting and exacting history of the evolution of combat search and rescue in America's longest and most grueling war: the conflict in Southeast Asia."

The Vietnam War was a defining event for a generation of Americans. But for years, misguided cliches about its veterans have proliferated. Philip F. Napoli's "Bringing It All Back Home" strips away the myths and reveals the complex individuals who served in Southeast Asia. Napoli helped to create Tom Brokaw's The Greatest Generation, and in the spirit of that enterprise, his oral histories recast our understanding of a war and its legacy.
Napoli introduces a remarkable group of young New Yorkers who went abroad with high hopes only to find a bewildering conflict. We meet, for instance, a nurse who staged a hunger strike to promote peace while working at a field hospital and a black soldier who achieved an unexpected camaraderie with his fellow servicemen in racially tense times. Some of these soldiers became active opponents of the war; others did not. Tracing their journeys from the streets of Brooklyn and Queens to the banks of the Mekong, and back to the most glamorous corporations and meanest homeless shelters of New York City, Napoli uncovers the variety and surprising vibrancy of the ex-soldiers' experiences.

During the Vietnam War, hundreds of American POWs faced years of brutal conditions and horrific torture at the hands of communist interrogators who ruthlessly plied them for military intelligence and propaganda. Determined to maintain their Code of Conduct, the prisoners developed a powerful underground resistance. To quash it, the North Vietnamese singled out its eleven leaders, Vietnam's own "dirty dozen," and banished them to an isolated jail that would become known as Alcatraz. None would leave its solitary cells and interrogation rooms unscathed; one would never return. As these men suffered in Hanoi, their wives launched an extraordinary campaign that would ultimately spark the POW/MIA movement. When the survivors finally returned, one would receive the Medal of Honor, another became a U.S. Senator, and a third still serves in Congress. A story of survival and triumph in the vein of Unbroken and Band of Brothers, Defiant will inspire anyone wondering how courage, faith, and brotherhood can endure even in the darkest of situations.

Bu Ku Kilo A Glimpse into the Book Bu Ku writes a tell all reflection on his tour of duty in Viet Nam 1967- 1968. In his 55 war stories Bu Ku brings to the surface the good, bad and ugly situations encountered 44 years ago on the unpopular battlefront of Nam. Viet Nam, that is. Bu Ku uses the army colorful language of the day to tell the story in a authentic war fashion, using explanatory slang and cuss words were the norm during the war and Bu Ku feels needed to tell the story in a realistic fashion. A projected glimpse into the lives of army vets as they fought and died in a controversial bloody conflict that took the lives of over a million Vietnamese people and 58,000 American soldiers. In the end America left in disgrace. Although the soldiers fought valiantly and repelled and destroyed tens of thousands of the Viet Cong VC and North Viet Nam Regulars NVA. In the end our political will crumbled Nixon just got us out. It was a sad coming home for most vets and even now 44 years later the scars are still everywhere. Just about everyone has a Viet Nam Vet story to tell. Some ugly and some good and so it goes. Bu Ku says, " Read my story. You will be enlightened at the events that took place . It may help you understand or get over your cross you may still be carrying on your bleeding shoulders. That conflict called Nam Bu Ku Kilo

"Abandoned in Place" provides a snapshot of the Vietnam POW/MIA issue. From the signing of the Paris Peace Accords, in January 1973, ending American involvement in the war in Southeast Asia to the "dysfunctional" POW/MIA accounting effort of 2014. With the period 1980 -1981 a clear line in the sand. As the U.S. government refocused its efforts from the rescue of surviving POWs to the recovery of remains. "Abandoned in Place" painstakingly details the intelligence available in 1980 that led to the conclusion American POWs survived in Laos, six years after the end of the Vietnam War. Using never before seen documents, the author reconstructs events leading up to a CIA reconnaissance mission, doomed from the start, to confirm the presence of POWs held deep in the Laotian jungle. As the CIA team headed toward the camp, members of the Joint Special Operation Command trained for a strike of surgical precision. Its mission rescue the POWs held at the camp known as Nhom Marrott. A lack of political will, bureaucratic failures, and leaks forced a stand-down order, condemning any surviving POWs. The author highlights the post Nhom Marrott government accounting effort, focusing on several specific POW/MIA cases. Crippled by a "mindset to debunk" officials ignored evidence of capture and survival in captivity. They edited witness statements to support pre-conceived conclusion of death and dismissed Vietnamese admissions of capture. This despite overwhelming evidence POWs not only survived but also continued to lay down signals in hopes of eventual rescue. Early Reviews - Col. Don Gordon (USA-Ret) Special Operations Command, J2 Director of Intelligence 1980-1983 - "O'Shea leads readers to form their own reasoned conclusions. She writes the most comprehensive and thoroughly researched compendium, private or government, classified or unclassified, about this complicated and emotional subject. It is an event long needed to be told accurately and with respect for the missing in action and their families. O'Shea is fidelis to that cause. She carefully distinguishes fact from speculation. Abandoned in Place is a meticulously detailed, thoroughly verified, and reliable story, well told. It describes plans to rescue about 35 United States Military servicemen strongly believed held in a prison camp in Laos in 1980. Step-by-step, O'Shea builds a strong case that some US military likely remained under North Vietnamese and Lao control after the war." Former Senator and Vice-Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs Bob Smith - "Lynn O'Shea has provided the best in depth analysis ever written and brilliantly combined over 25 years of personal research, evidence and a chronological portrayal of the facts to prove, without any doubt, that America left men behind in Southeast Asia at the end of the Viet Nam War. When we were told that the North Vietnamese, Lao and Viet Cong had complied with the Paris Peace Accords in 1973 and returned all of our men, the evidence shows that was an outright lie and many of our government leaders and the intelligence community knew it." Dr. Jeffrey Donahue, Brother of Major Morgan Donahue - "Lynn masterfully connects a mind-boggling array of dots to not only affirm the truth of the Indochina POW-MIA issue but also to rigorously convey how and why the U.S. government knowingly left men behind and then covered it up. Lynn has woven together tens of thousands of documents and countless hours of interviews to produce a cogent and unassailable profile of one of the most tragic episodes of modern American history. The how and why have never been so brilliantly researched, documented and conveyed."

Every Marine who has served in Vietnam has been heavily involved in efforts to improve the situation of the Vietnamese people. The civil affairs actions of the III Marine Amphibious Force have been every bit as important as the combat actions. In this reference pamphlet, which follows an earlier history of the first year of Marine Corps civic action in Vietnam, the story of the second year of civilian aid policies, programs, and activities is related. The use of civic action by the Marine Corps to accomplish its assigned mission is nothing new. Examples of how the Marines have employed civic action in the past can be found by reading accounts of their exploits during the 1920s in Haiti, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic. From these accomplishments and astute observations made by men such as Major Earl H. Ellis and others, accounts of "lessons learned" about civic action can be found recorded in the Small Wars Manual of 1940, which points out: "The motive in small wars is not material destruction. It is usually a project dealing with the social, economic, and political development of the people. It is of primary importance that the fullest benefit be derived from the psychological aspects of the situation. That implies a serious study of the people, their racial, political, religious, and mental development. By analysis and study the reasons for existing emergency may be deduced; the most practical method of solving the problem is to understand the possible approaches thereto and the repercussion to be expected from any action which may be contemplated. By this study and the ability to apply correct psychological doctrine, many pitfalls may be avoided and the success of the undertaking assured." With the basic concept of small wars in mind, the Manual of 1940 goes on to point out: "The purpose should always be to restore normal government or give the people a better government than they had before, and to estabJ.sh peace, order, and security on as permanent a basis as practicable. In so doing one should endeavor to make self-sufficient native agencies responsible for these matters. With all this accomplished, one should be able to leave the country with the lasting friendship and respect of the native population." The concept of civic action may be simply stated, but the organization and application of carrying out an effective program becomes a difficult matter. This difficulty in application can be seen through the scope and magnitude of the U. S. Marine Corps civic action effort in the I Corps area of South Vietnam. There the Marine Corps came face-to-face with the age old problem of guerrilla warfare; winning the confidence of the population which is vital in defeating the insurgent. It was in the field of winning the confidence of a large civilian population, while at the same time fighting a war, that the Marine Corps was least prepared when its troops landed in South Vietnam.

This publication tells the story of the United States Ari Force's involvement in the region form the end of the second World War until the major infusion of American troops into Vietnam in1965. During these years, and most noticeably after 1961, the Air Force's principal role in Southeast Asia was to advise the Vietnamese Air Force in its struggle against insurgents seeking the collapse of the Saigon government. This story includes some issues of universal applicability to the Air Force: the role of air power in an insurgency, the most effective way to advise a foreign ally, and how to coordinate with other American agencies (both military and civilian) which are doing the same thing. It also deals with issue unique to the Vietnamese conflict: how to coordinate a centralized, technological modern air force with a feudal, decentralized, indigenous one without overwhelming it, and how best to adapt fighter, reconnaissance, airlift, and liaison planes to a jungle environment.

The U.S. Air Force reached its nadir during the opening two years of the Rolling Thunder air campaign in North Vietnam. Never had the Air Force operated with so many restraints and to so little effect. These pages are painful but necessary reading for all who care about the nation's military power. Van Staaveren wrote this book near the end of his distinguished government service. He was an Air Force historian in Korea during the Korean War and he began to write about the Vietnam War while it was still being fought.

The Air Force presents this volume, a truly monumental effort at recounting the myriad of widely separate but not unrelated events and operations that took place during the spring invasion of Vietnam in 1972. The authors present an illuminating story of people and machines that fought so gallantly during this major enemy offensive.

Throughout the War in Southeast Asia, Communist forces form North Vietnam infiltrated the isolated, neutral state of Laos. Men and supplies crossed the mountain passes and travelled along an intricate web of roads and jungle paths known as the Ho Chi Minh Trail to the Viet Cong insurgents in South Vietnam. American involvement in Laos began which a photo-reconnaissance missions and, as the war in Vietnam intensified, expanded to a series of air-ground operations from bases in Vietnam and Thailand against fixed targets and infiltration routes in southern Laos. This volume examines this complex operational environment. United States Air Force. Center for Air Force History.

The war in Vietnam, spanning more than twenty years, was one of the most divisive conflicts ever to envelop the United States, and its complexity and consequences did not end with the fall of Saigon in 1975. As Peter Sills demonstrates in "Toxic War," veterans faced a new enemy beyond post-traumatic stress disorder or debilitating battle injuries. Many of them faced a new, more pernicious, slow-killing enemy: the cancerous effects of Agent Orange.

Originally introduced by Dow and other chemical companies as a herbicide in the United States and adopted by the military as a method of deforesting the war zone of Vietnam, in order to deny the enemy cover, Agent Orange also found its way into the systems of numerous active-duty soldiers. Sills argues that manufacturers understood the dangers of this compound and did nothing to protect American soldiers.

"Toxic War" takes the reader behind the scenes into the halls of political power and industry, where the debates about the use of Agent Orange and its potential side effects raged. In the end, the only way these veterans could seek justice was in the court of law and public opinion. Unprecedented in its access to legal, medical, and government documentation, as well as to the personal testimonies of veterans, "Toxic War" endeavors to explore all sides of this epic battle.

The assassination of South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem on November 1, 1963, left a leadership void in Saigon that was never filled. Heads of state went through Saigon like a revolving door, yet none of them were able to successfully lead and govern the people of South Vietnam. On the other side of the globe, President of the United States John F. Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963. While the U.S. had a line of succession, President Johnson was relatively new to the Vietnam situation. Even though Johnson was new, he still had Kennedy's cabinet and advisers to aid his decisions. Despite this, by early 1964 two new leaders, Nguyen Khanh and Lyndon Johnson sought a solution to the decades long struggle in Vietnam. President Johnson inherited a three-front war in Vietnam. One front was North Vietnamese support of the Viet Cong (VC) insurgency in South Vietnam, and Johnson had to stop this support in order to defeat the VC. The insurgency itself constituted another front that had to be defeated in order to maintain a free and independent South Vietnam. The third overarching front was the creation of a stable and legitimate government in Saigon capable of governing the people of South Vietnam. The question for his administration was on which of these aspects to focus. Before Johnson could make that decision, he first had to decide if the U.S. should continue to aid Saigon; therefore, he had three options: leave Vietnam, continue in an advisory role, or escalate U.S. involvement. The political and military situations in Vietnam deteriorated to such a point through 1964-1965 that by February 1965 there were no good choices left from which President Johnson could choose. Johnson desired for there to be a stable South Vietnamese government before he committed U.S. forces to its defense; however, no such government emerged. The administration was unwilling to risk U.S. prestige, resources, and lives unless they were confident South Vietnam could succeed without U.S. support. Because of the instability in South Vietnam as well as the perceived risk of communist aggression, President Johnson decided that escalatory military actions would be limited and gradual. Therefore, President Johnson made the least bad decision he could in February 1965 by initiating Operation ROLLING THUNDER and committing the United States to the Vietnam War.

An oral history of American Support Troops, our hidden army, during the Vietnam War.

After relatively successful military interventions in Iraq in 1992 and Yugoslavia in 1998, many American strategists believed that airpower and remote technology were the future of U.S. military action. But America's most recent wars in the Middle East have reinforced the importance of counterinsurgency, with its imperative to "win hearts and minds" on the ground in foreign lands. In both Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. military has studied and experimented with the combined action platoon (CAP) concept used from 1965 to 1971 by the Marine Corps in Vietnam.

Consisting of twelve Marines, a medic, and dozens of inexperienced local militiamen, the American contingent of CAPs lived in South Vietnamese villages where they provided twenty-four-hour security and daily medical support for civilians, and fostered social interaction through civic action projects, such as building schools, offices, and wells. Defend and Befriend is the first comprehensive study of the evolution of these platoons, emphasizing how and why the U.S. Marine Corps attempted to overcome the inherent military, social, and cultural obstacles on the ground in Vietnam. Basing his analysis on Marine records and numerous interviews with CAP veterans, author John Southard illustrates how thousands of soldiers tasked with counterinsurgency duties came to perceive the Vietnamese people and their mission.

This unique study counters prevailing stereotypes and provides a new perspective on the American infantryman in the Vietnam War. Illuminating the fear felt by many Americans as they served among groups of understandably suspicious civilians, Defend and Befriend offers important insights into the future development of counterinsurgency doctrine.