ROBERT D. SANDER Invasion of Laos, Sander INVASION OF LAOS.indb i 1/3/14 12:00 PM Sander INVASION OF LAOS.indb ii 1/3/14 12:00 PM Invasion of Laos, Lam Son 719 Robert D. Sander University of Oklahoma Press : Norman Sander INVASION OF LAOS.indb iii 1/3/14 12:00 PM Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Sander, Robert D., 1946– Invasion of Laos, 1971 : Lam Son 719 / Robert D. Sander. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-8061-4437-5 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Operation Lam Son 719, 1971. I. Title. DS557.8.L3S26 2014 959.704'342 dc23 2013024356 Th e paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources, Inc. ∞ Copyright © 2014 by the University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Publishing Division of the University. Manufactured in the U.S.A. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the United States Copyright Act—without the prior permission of the University of Oklahoma Press. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Sander INVASION OF LAOS.indb iv 1/3/14 12:00 PM Preface For years I have harbored a sense that I fought in a lost battle of a lost war. In 1971 I was a helicopter pilot in Operation Lam Son 719, a South Vietnamese Army Corps attempt, supported by U.S. air power, to sever the Ho Chi Minh Trail. It was the culmination of a ten-year eff ort to halt infi ltration of North Vietnamese forces into South Vietnam. As a junior captain I certainly had little day-to-day knowledge of the battle plan or its progress and little infl uence over the operation’s outcome. What I did know when it was over was that many of my fellow aviators, all helicopter pilots, had been shot down, killed, or wounded in what seemed a failed operation. Th is book is not an autobiography. It is an eff ort to trace South Vietnam’s battle against infi ltration from the Com- munists in the north, to consider the national policies and directives restricting military eff orts, and to chronicle Operation Lam Son 719, the fi nal chapter in the anti-infi ltration battle. Lam Son 719 was a bloody aff air. Although historical sources con- tain varying casualty counts, the South Vietnamese force, the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) 1st Corps, appears to have suff ered more than 7,500 casualties, and the Communist forces approximately 13,000.1 It is diffi cult to determine the number of soldiers each side committed to the battle. Th e South Vietnamese had approximately 17,000 troops available for the operation, but not all of these soldiers were in the area of operations at any given time. As for the Commu- nists, reinforcements were rushed to the area of operations as the forces in contact were depleted, so a casualty rate is diffi cult to determine. While the overall U.S. casualties were low as compared to that of ix Sander INVASION OF LAOS.indb ix 1/3/14 12:00 PM Contents List of Illustrations vii Preface ix Introduction 3 1. Johnson’s War 13 2. Th e Truck Hunters 32 3. Nixon’s War 50 4. 1970: Th e Cambodian Incursion 65 5. Planning Lam Son 719 81 6. Dewy Canyon 2 99 7. Th e First Week in Laos 109 8. Th e Second Week in Laos: Th e Attack Stalls 127 9. Collapse on the Northern Flank 141 10. Onward to Tchepone 158 11. Th e Retreat from Laos 174 12. After Lam Son 719 192 Appendix A: Th e Helicopters of Lam Son 719 213 Appendix B: Th e Butcher’s Bill 227 Notes 233 Glossary 263 Bibliography 271 Acknowledgements 277 Index 279 v Sander INVASION OF LAOS.indb v 1/3/14 12:00 PM Sander INVASION OF LAOS.indb vi 1/3/14 12:00 PM Illustrations Figures 1. O-1 Birddog 36 2. O-2 Skymaster 38 3. OV-10 Bronco 40 4. AC-130 42 5. A Cobra pilot gets some crew rest at Khe Sanh 136 6. UH-1H Iroquois “Slick” 214 7. UH-1C Charley Model gunship 215 8. AH-1G Cobra 218 9. AH-1G turret weapons 220 10. M35 20mm cannon 221 11. OH-6A with blades removed being pushed out of a hangar at 5th Transportation Battalion following repair 222 12. Th e red dust at Khe Sanh boils as a CH-47 picks up a damaged Cobra 223 13. CH-54 Tarhe 224 14. CH-53 224 Maps 1. Th e Ho Chi Minh Trail 2 2. Base Areas 604, 607, 611, and the A Shau Valley 93 3. ARVN positions at the end of 12 February 120 vii Sander INVASION OF LAOS.indb vii 1/3/14 12:00 PM illustrations 4. Concept of operations as revised on 16 February 128 5. ARVN positions at the end of 3 March 167 6. ARVN positions on the morning of 20 March 181 viii Sander INVASION OF LAOS.indb viii 1/3/14 12:00 PM preface other epic battles, the casualties were confi ned primarily to aircrews, and within this smaller subset of the military community, they took on greater emotional signifi cance. U.S. Army helicopter crews endured incomparably higher losses during this two-month operation in heavily defended airspace than during any other period of the Vietnam War. Years after the war, having retired after twenty-fi ve years of service, I mentioned Lam Son 719 to a friend who is also a Vietnam veteran. To my surprise, he had never heard of Lam Son 719. I knew that U.S. participation was limited primarily to air support, but I was mystifi ed by his reply, especially since Gen. Creighton Abrams once said Lam Son 719 may have been the only decisive battle of the war.2 Soon I began searching bookstores and libraries and collecting and reading Vietnam War histories. I found references to Lam Son 719, but few sources treated the topic with more than a brief overview, and some contained errors. Very few published accounts provide perspective on the events as they transpired on the ground in Laos. American advisors were pro- hibited from crossing the border with the South Vietnamese units they supported, and the only U.S. servicemen on the ground were aircrews that were shot down. Th e two books that do delve into Lam Son (Tom Marshall’s Th e Price of Exit and Keith Nolan’s Into Laos) are both superb. Marshal presents the relatively narrow view from the helicopter cockpit, and Nolan provides a wider perspective. Books by Lt. Gen. Phillip Davidson (Vietnam at War), Stanley Karnow (Vietnam: A History), Gen. Bruce Palmer (Th e 25-Year War), and a host of other volumes by authors such as Lewis Sorley, Henry Kissinger, and Lt. Gen. Dave R. Palmer, as well as histories compiled by the army, air force, navy, and marines include brief discussions. One clear point that all of these authors make is that the operation, the timing, and the limitation of U.S. participation were all driven by U.S. foreign policy, not military necessity. Yet at least three questions evade detailed explanation in these accounts: Why was an operation of such importance launched at a time when U.S. combat power in Vietnam was declining? Who planned the operation? And why did it fail? With the publication in late 2010 of the volume of the x Sander INVASION OF LAOS.indb x 1/3/14 12:00 PM preface U.S. State Department’s Foreign Relations of the United States that cov- ers Vietnam from July of 1970 to January of 1972, details of the political decisions that shaped Lam Son 719 began to emerge. I found many answers buried in these previously classifi ed fi les. Th is historical document series published by the State Depart- ment, Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS), became my premier source for research of U.S. foreign policy. To better under- stand the evolution U.S. policy decisions I began my research with the Kennedy administration. I examined eighteen FRUS volumes, each consisting of a thousand or more pages, and supplemented these references with the writings of prominent fi gures who participated in political decisions, such as Henry Kissinger and Alexander Haig. As my chronological examination of foreign policy approached February 1971 and the onset of Operation Lam Son 719, military documents became my primary references. Other primary sources for this history of Lam Son 719 included Lam Son 719, a monograph by South Vietnamese Maj. Gen. Nguyen Duy Hinh, published by the U.S. Army Center for Military History; a previously classifi ed U.S. Air Force document, Lam Son 719, written during and immediately after the operation; the U.S. 101st Airborne Division’s after action review of Lam Son 719; the 101st Aviation Group’s operations staff duty log; a 101st Aviation Group’s weekly narrative summary; the XXIV Corps after action review of Lam Son 719; and interviews with veterans. Although all of these sources off er valuable insights, each has limitations, and the sources do not always agree. I also consulted Merle Pribbenow’s translation of the North Vietnamese history of the war, Victory in Vietnam.