Special Forces Association Chapter 78

Command the group of Caster by Ha Van Chap & team members of the group Dinh Van, Quach, Thuong, Pham Cong Thuong. They were transferred to Saigon after agreeing to volunteer for Secret mission into the North. When the Office 45 staff informed them that they be parachuted into Son-La province, they were not dissuaded by the mission from the mission. In May, the four became the group of Caster. Ha Trong Thuong. They were parachuted into Son-La where the North forces eagerly awaited them. Not long after their capture, the team's radio operator was pressed into service by the Ministry Counter espionage directorate. He reported to Saigon that their team had arrived safely. Team Caster continued on as an independent team until July 1963, when the CIA considered that it had lost contact with it. Caster had been last reported in Laos.

The Group of Dragon Operation

The group of Dragon Operation Association Area of Moncay, North Vietnam on March 10, 1962 to November 1989.

After the members of team Dragon had completed their basic airborne weapons, jungle survival and intelligence training, they had attended a special three month class before departing on their mission to North Vietnam. The purpose of the class was to bring them up to date on all of the changes that had taken place since the communists took over in 1955. This information was necessary for them to survive behind the lines. The team was driven to a refugee reception center at Sontra, on the outskirts of Danang, where all new arrivals from the north were sent for debriefing and processing before resettlement in South Vietnam.

The orientation given by a South Vietnamese army officer accompanied by a Viet Cong defector, covered North Vietnam Administrative organization from the national level down to the village, the various security forces, such as the self defense militia and the public security service border defense forces, were explained in detail. The instructors described the contemporary life in the North; how people lived, how they traveled within the urban area, and the types of documentations they needed to transact the myriad details of their daily lives. The course also covered the system of rationing, how people queued up to purchase goods, the types of coupons they were issued, and how much people were allocated for such purchases.

All of the Dragon members were natives to the North. They knew the language, customs, and geography from personal experience, although some came from provinces with distinctive accents and slight variations in their customs. The teams now learned that a whole new vocabulary; nonexistent ten years earlier, had come into being. Some words occasionally used a decade earlier were no longer common language, and other words frequently used in 1954 were seldom heard. This made it relatively easy to identify a resident who had lived there since 1955; anyone not familiar with the terms and meanings stood out.

Team Dragon:

Moc A Tai, leader

Voong A Ung

Trenh A Sam

Ciap Tu Cam

Vong Hang Quay

Tran Van Man

That same July, a six meriting Operations Association Tam of Ethnic Nung, commanded Moc A Tai, a team now known as Dragon, made its third attempt to land from NAUTILUS N1, N2 and N7 for indefinite mission into the area of Mon Cay, a stone's throw from the Chinese border. The group of Dragon members had received a general briefing at Hanoi by an American known only as "Robert" and a more detailed mission given by their officers. It was to attack an offshore North Vietnamese radar site and attempt to locate agents left in place by Colonel Vong A Sang when he withdrew his division of Ethnic Nung to South Vietnam. The briefer emphasized that the telegraphic service had been in touch with Colonel Sang. Sang had identified his stay behind agents, but insisted that he had been out of contact with the team since 1954.

While Dragon had been preparing for its mission, a small reinforcement team was scheduled to be parachuted to team Europa. It's C-123 and Taiwanese crew crashed onto a mountain in Laos before the team reached its destination. A CIA paramilitary recovery team inspected the crash site and discovered that all on board had died in the crash.

CIA preps the press, Dak Pek Special Forces Camp, Kontum province, south Vietnam. 23 December 1962. From left: Pamela "Pam" Sanders, reporter, Time/Life. Col. "Hal" McCown, Senior Advisor, 11 Corps, Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN). John "Jocko" Richardson, CIA Chief of Station, Saigon. 2nd Lieutenant Bao, Commander, RAVN Specical Forces Detatchment, Dak Pek. Capt. George "Speedy" Gaspard.

Performance as evident that it could not perform the mission. Admiral Felt went even further and urged a response in kind against North Vietnam as retaliation for attacks in South Vietnam initiated by the Viet Cong. For example, he argued that an attack against some point in the southern Vietnamese railway system be answered by destroying the rail line between Hanoi and the Chinese border. He also suggested that commando teams be inserted by submarine into North Vietnam , as indication of U.S. "technical superiority" against which North Vietnam had no “defensive capabilities.” Although such rhetoric might have helped move the transfer process forward, the navy was operating under tight budgetary constraints. It had few specialists in its rank who could be committed to a covert maritime war without the funding necessary to support their training and reassignment.

In July 1962, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara convened a meeting of State, Defense, and CIA officials to discuss transferring control of the Department of Defense in a one-year program dubbed Operation Switchback. Col. George C. Morton, chief of MCV (Military Assistance Command Vietnam) J-3 Special Warfare Branch, argued for more U.S. Special Forces involvement. Colonel Morton's background included stay-behind operations in Greece during the early 1950s, and he was viewed as an “expert” on Special Warfare. That September, the National Security Council Special Group (5412) went on record as supporting Admiral Felt's earlier thinking by formally suggesting the use of motor torpedo boats and SEALs for covert operations against the North. There was no immediate effort, however, to secure either the boats or the SEALs.

These events, in the context of the ever-widening covert operations against Hanoi, were based on National Security council authority for the conduct of cover paramilitary operations, which was assigned to the CIA under NSCID 5312/2. This directive contained a philosophy that such operations would develop behind-the-lines agent teams that would constitute a viable paramilitary force to employ the enemy's rear in time of open war and in support of the pentagon's general war plans. This thinking embodied a notion that was a throwback to the European experiences of World War 2 OSS operatives who were now in the State Department, Pentagon and CIA.

As to the fact that the teams going into the North would soon be landing along Hanoi 's rail lines, Colby said, “That could be an extra dividend. Plus the idea of eventually sabotaging them.”

As the CIA station chief, Colby also had to contend with Diem Government officials who were necessary to implementation of the cover operation, but were increasingly becoming the targets of domestic and hostility over Diem's unwillingness to share power. Colby's support of Nhu and Dr. Tuyen was clearly tiring, and he joined the U.S. Embassy Saigon staff in urging their removal. Diem ignored their entreaties.

Agent Ares went into the North by boat in February 1961 and landed safely in northeastern Quang Ninh. He soon reported his safe arrival to to Saigon . As Colby's new concept of paramilitary team activity was being implemented, another event took place half a world away that would have a long-range impact on the CIA's cover program if not the Vietnam war itself. This was the abortive Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba 17-19 April 1961.

The impact on Vietnam came on 20 April, when President John F. Kennedy convened a special study group headed by Gen. Maxwell Taylor. Its task was to examine the Bay of Pigs disaster and make recommendations on how to strengthen similar future U.S. operations in an environment short of open combat.

President Kennedy posited that “communism” was engaged in a nibbling operation. He also conveyed a clear interest in paramil.

Reunion of the planners William Colby, Chief Far East Division, plans Direcotrate, CIA Headquarters and Col. Tran Khac Kinh, former Deputy Commander. 1st Observation Group, Army of the Republic of Vietnam at Phuc Hai, South Vietnam, 1965. (Courtesy Gilbert Layton).

Team Eros after completing parachute training jump at Cu Chi, South Vietnam. February 20, 1962. Top row from left: Ha Trong Thuoung (commander, died in prison), Ha Cong Quan (radio operator), Pham Cong Tieu. Bottom row from left: Pham Cong Thuong (radio operator), Thai, Phong Cong Dung (deputy commander). (Courtesy Pham Cong Thuong and Pham Cong Ha).

Team Atlas after its formation in Saigon, circa 1961. From left: Nguyen Huu Hong, Tu Duc Khai (killed in action). We also had two line U.S. Navy petty officers working for us at Da Nang who dealt primarily with Nguyen Huu Quang (commander). Tran Viet Nghia (Courtesy Hong and Diep).

The Group of Swan Operation Association Area of
Cao Bang, North Vietnam
September 3, 1963

Team Swan parachuted in on 4 September, Team Bull went in to Ha Tinh on 7 October, and Team Ruby was captured following its landing in Ha Tinh at the end of December. Ruby tried to evade the South, but was captured in nearby Quang Binh province. They capture of most of the teams was announced by Hanoi and dutifully recorded by the CIA Foreign Broadcast Information Service.

Throughout the fall, plan 34 experienced delays in implementation. At CIA headquarters, Colby would later describe the delay as the result of the negotiations between the CIA and the Pentagon over the final transfer of the paramilitary effort and the follow-on plan of 34. Colby was also embroiled in Washington's inability to decide whether or not the United States should continue to support President Diem. The die was cast when Washington refused to intervene with Saigon plotters, who launched their coup to topple Diem on 1 November.

By 3 November, both Diem and his, Ngo Dinh Nhu, were both dead as were Le Quang Tung and his brother Le Quang Trieu. Within little more than two weeks of President Diem's assassination, Gen. Paul Harkins, the MACV commander, cabled Admiral Felt that, in his judgment, the climate is right for the military's cover operation to go into effect.

By the end of 1963, planners at the National Security Council Special group, those on the staff of the Special Assistant for Counter-Insurgency and Special Activities (SACSA) in the Office of the Secretary of Defense (90SD) at the Pentagon, and those at the CIA would have been well aware that the Vietnamese team concept was as singularly unproductive as General Lansdale's paramilitary teams were in Cuba during the summer of 1962. And still the Vietnamese teams went in, much to the delight of Hanoi perspective, the key remaining questions were timing and the conditions that would nudge Washington to launch bolder attacks against the North. For Washington, would be found in plan 34A, the bombing scenarios strongly urged by the pacific Command in phase II of plan 34A, and the sustained bombing scenarios supporting plan 37, soon to be studied intently by Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, McGeorge Bundy.

Matching Wits
January 22, 1963

Military Special Operations taking over. Dak Pek special forces camp. Kontum province, South Vietnam, 22 January 1963.

In photo:
1) Capt. Hoang - Commander 2nd Battalion 40th Regiment, 22nd Division
2) Capt. George "Speedy" Gaspard, Commander, Detachment A13
3) Lt. Col. Walter "The Shark Junior" Little, Commander, Detachment B210
4) Maj. Gen. William B. Rosson, Special Assistant for Counter-Insurgency and Special Activities (SACSA), Officer of the Secretary of Defense
5) Lt. Pete Skamser, Executive Officer, Detachment A13 (hidden behind Gen. Rosson)
6) Col. Gilbert "Gib" Strickler, CIA paramilitary officer, Combined Studies Division
7) Col. George S. Blanchard, Deputy Director, Special warfare directorate, SACSA (hidden behind Col. Strickler)
8) Col. George Morton, U.S. Army Special Forces Vietnam (provisional)
9) Lt. Col. "Butch" Kendrick, operations staff, Military Assistance Command Vietnam (MACV)
10) Lt. Col. Eisler, Deputy Chief of Staff for Logistics, MACV.

In July, singleton agent Nguyen Chau Thanh was brought in by boat to land in Ha Tinh province. He was supposed to be taken in by Nautilus 3, but at the last moment, was taken north by another crew. He too was captured not long after landing. Four members of Team Eras landed in Thanh Hoa on 20 May and were soon surrounded by border security forces, which seemed to be waiting for them. Their radio operator was recruited into the expanding net of co-opted radio operators now covering the length of most North Vietnam's border with Laos.

As Remus was landing in North Vietnam, the U.S. Navy's pacific commander, Adm. Harry D. Felt was describing the CIA's poor maritime.

Watching Switchback in progress. Dak Pek Special Forces Camp, Kontum province, South Vietnam, 22 January 1963. From left: Col. James "Jim Herbert", Military Assistance and Advisoray Group Vietnam (MAAG Vietnam). Capt. George Gaspard. Col. Robert "Bob" Sweet, Senior Advisor 22nd Infantry Division, Army of the Republic of Vietnam. Maj. Gen. Charles Timmes, Commanding General, MAAG Vietnam.

The establishment of the Long Thanh Training Center in April 1963 was another step in the CIA's preparation to transfer its northern paramilitary programs to the Pentagon. Other evidence of the transfer included internal reorganization within the agent teams and the use of team names that had a more military sound. The former chief of demolitions training at Long Thanh, Nguyen Hung, recalls the buildup:

"Larry Jackson was my principal CIA point of contact for the demolitions training and he stayed with me until the U.S. military took over everything in the spring of 1964. During the summer of 1963, Army Special Forces arrived at Long Thanh."

American Advisors with Dinh The Chan (bending forward). Team Horse after completing a practice parachute jump (courtesy of a former commando).

Team Horse had been recruited in 1962 and shared the history of their organization with the newer trainees. During the fall of 1965, nine agents in Team Dog and three in Team Easy. On 7 November, eight agents in Team Verse were dropped into Son-La to Reinforce Tourbillion. All were met by the People's Armed Public Forces.

That same month, Team Romeo was ready for launching. The team's eleven members knew that other commando trainees had preceded them into the prelaunch restricted area during 1965, as replacements for teams they were led to believe were already operating deep inside North Vietnam. No one had ever returned from the North, but this was explained by the training staff as meaning that the agents were still doing their job up North. Morale was high and the team members wanted to be off. Their Vietnam and American Special Forces Training Staff was enthusiastic. There was no hint that anything was wrong.

Team Romeo was issued a mission order to launch into the North, reach its regrouping point and wait further orders.

On the morning of 19 November, Team Romeo took off form Long Thanh in an American transport aircraft with an American crew and flew to the forward launch base at Khe Sanh. That afternoon, the commandos boarded two helicopters for the lift into their operating area. A third helicopter carried the American and Vietnamese operations officers who had accompanied the commandos from Long Thanh and would see to their safe insertion into the planned landing zone.

The three helicopters took off together and flew at low altitude through Lao airspace. Between four and five o'clock, they landed not far from the Ho Chi Minh Trail in an area known as Vitulu, close to the Lao border, in Le Thuy District, Quang Binh province. The team quickly disembarked, offloaded its supplies and moved away from the landing zone.

Team Romeo established radio contact with its headquarters to conform its safe insertion and movement toward the planned regrouping point. As the team moved forward, however, a ten kilometer jaunt turned into a five-day trek. The terrain on the ground was not the same as depicted on the map.

The team members concluded they had followed the proper instructions to reach their regrouping, and their failure to be at that location was not due to their inability to use a compass and a map. It became evident that they had been dropped in the wrong location! They had based all their movements on similarities between the train where they had landed and those depicted on the map, much of which looked the same. They were lost, totally and completely with no idea where they were or where they had landed.

A quick radio message to their headquarters brought the reply confirming that they had indeed been dropped on the wrong landing zone. The solution, passed by their headquarters, was for their headquarters to attempt to locate the team and then direct it to the correct regrouping point.

The days stretched by as food rations began to run out. Then, after six weeks of tramping through unfamiliar jungle, with only the strategic Technical Directorate completely aware of where they were and where they were headed, disaster struck. It occurred when, at long last, their headquarters reported locating them and told them to be prepared for aerial resupply.

The team members cleared a landing zone and spread a T-shaped panel on the ground to mark the location for the drop from an aircraft that they could clearly see approaching in the distance. They then watched in horror as the aircraft dropped their supplies four or five kilometers away, a forced march of several days under the best conditions.

While they pondered the idiots in the sky, they heard sounds of strange voices, laughter and splashing water from a nearby stream. A careful search revealed the presence of five North Vietnamese soldiers. They watched as the troops frolicked, set up their kitchen, ate their evening meal and finally strung hammocks as they prepared to settle in for the evening, unaware they were under close and continuous observation by a well-armed commando team.

Team Romeo went into a huddle and discussed its options. It was too early for the next scheduled radio transmission, so the team members could not contact their headquarters or request an airstrike. Also, the loss of their supplies meant an immediate need for resupply but an airdrop would alert the enemy patrol. Reaching a consensus, they quickly surrounded the now resting enemy patrol and captured it with little effort.

The five men were members of the Quang Binh province border defense forces. From them, Romeo learned that the border defense force had been scouring the area for the team, supposedly after receiving reports from mountain top animal herders that a flight of helicopters was carrying commandos in the area.

As the captives spoke, it was evident that they were not bragging when they said they had the border under total surveillance and that nothing went across it without their highly effective border security network picking up some indication. Every village and hamlet was obviously tied into this reporting system, which rant to the provincial border defense headquarters.

Team Romeo was no in a quandary. The training doctrine received at Long Thanh demanded that the five captives be killed immediately. That was the only way the commandos could ensure that the North Vietnamese forces would not learn their precise location. However, it was obvious the North Vietnamese already knew they were in the area and were searching for them.

Doctrine notwithstanding, it went against the very nature of the men just to shoot the five captives. The school solution was one thing, but face to face with the enemy, they now hesitated. After three days of agonizing, the team commander ordered the prisoners released. The team moved out in an attempt to evade capture, without advising the Directorate by radio of what had happened.

One week later, on 14 January 1966, Team Romeo found itself surrounded and taken under five in a carefully prepared ambush by a combined forces of the People's Army, border defense forces and militia. The team members learned that their five prisoners had returned to their unit immediately after release and reported their capture by the team.

Following capture, the team members were tied up with telephone wire and searched. Their supplies were carefully inventoried. A brief questioning provided their captors with the identity of the team's two radio operators. Both had been captured with their radio equipment and signal operating the two were separated from other members of the team and taken away from the mountains for the better part of a week, until they arrived just west of the coastal provincial capital of Dong Hoi City. They were thrust into the confines of the provincial temporary prison, a collection of thatched huts replacing the permanent prison in Dong Hoi City that was now threatened by American air strikes. This was to be their home for the next six weeks.