Bear Taylor 
RIPPLE SALVO… #922… FROM THE CONGRESSIONAL RECORD, 1985: LIEUTENANT GENERAL EUGENE TIGHE, USAF (Retired), Former Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency: “During my tenure in the DIA, the MIA/POW issue was key issue for me and of high priority. I ordered a daily update every morning on my desk. I saw more information daily than any man oin the world. The evidence is clear to me that there are Americans being held against their will in Southeast Asia.”… That was more than thirty years ago and the likelihood that any of those American warriors downed in Southeast Asia in the 1960s are alive today. Scores of brave men who were Missing-in-Action then are categorized in 2018 as “BB-Killed in Action, Body Not Recovered”; “KK-Died in Captivity, Remains Not Returned”; or “XX-Presumptive Finding of Death.” … In reality? They remain Missing-in-Action. The commitment to find, recover and return them to thier families will never end.
Yesterday as Humble Host paid due respect to the nearly 3,000 human beings who perished in the “9/11” National Tragedy of 17 years ago, and a nationwide salute to the “9/11 Heroes,” my thoughts veered off to the forgotten fallen of the Vietnam war who remain MIA, and their children, now grown and continuing to cope, unnoticed and alone with the heroic burden of giving up their fathers for the cause of freedom. In tribute to that cadre of stouthearted men and women who, with their Mothers, have persevered in the absence of their fathers and husbands, this post pirates a couple of pages from the moving testimony of Barbara Mullen Keenan in her book, EVERY EFFORT: One woman’s courageous search for her missing husband, a true story. This is a good day to hear the voice of Terry Mullen, the son of Lieutenant Colonel William Francis Mullen, United States Marine Corps, XX … but first…
Good Morning… Day NINE HUNDRED TWENTY-TWO of a remembrance of a war left behind along with several hundred fallen warriors now listed as BB or KK or XX… Lest we forget…
HEAD LINES: From The New York Times on Thursday, 12 September 1968…
THE WAR: Page 1: “TAYNINH REPELS BIG ENEMY FORCE–2nd DRIVE IN MONTH ON CITY OF 200,000 IS HURLED BACK”…”Allied forces turned bck a major enemy assault on Tayninh City and nearby American installations today, but the enemy was holding on in several suburbs, trying to increase his foothold. American advisors to South Vietnamese units said that at least one heavily populated area was in enemy hands and tree militia outposts were under siege ‘But we kept them out of the central city,’ one advisor said. ‘We’re trying to keep them pinned down tonight with airplanes and artillery fire so we can sweep in on them.’ (United Press Internation reported that allied forces wrested control of the suburbs Thursday)… The attack was the second by the enemy with in a month against the city of 200,000. The city, which lies 50 miles northwest of Saigon and 10 miles south of the Cambodian border is the fourth largest in the country and the capital of Tayninh Province….By American count, at least 150 North Vietnamese and Vietcong soldiers died in the initial assault… American casualties for the day were 10 to 15 killed and 30 to 40 wounded”… Page 3: JUNGLE ATTACK REPELLED”… “American troops reported killing 95 enemy troops this morning as they turned back an attack in the jungle 40 miles northwest of Saigon. The Americans lost six dead and 22 wounded.”… Page 3: Peter Arnett report: “U.S. ADVISORS UPSET BY TAYNINH CHIEFS OUSTER”… “… bitter comments of American military and civilian advisors last weekend at Tayninh, no wonder fierce enemy attack for the second time in a month. The Americans were not talking about the enemy forces that were massing last weekend around Tayninh…Their anger was directed at President Nguyen Van Thieu’s decision to dismiss Lieutenant Colonel Ho Duc Trung, for three years the chief of Tayninh Province, a man who had the confidence of the Americans there.”…
PEACE TALKS: Page 2: “VICTORIES ON BATTLEFIELD CLAIMED BY BOTH SIDES AT TALKS IN PARIS”… “Americans and North Vietnamese negotiators exchanged claims today of smashing victories on the battlefield. W. Averell Harriman, for the United States, said more than 12,000 Vietcong and North Vietnamese soldier had been killed since August 18. He said a new series of enemy attacks had met with ‘crushing defeats. Yet your government seems prepared to go on expending its most precious national treasure–its youth–in a senseless and callous manner.’ Xuan Thuy, chief of Hanoi’s delegation said 62,000 allied troops had been killed during August. More and more American soldiers, he said, are rebelling against the war and have refused to obey their officers’ orders. NO VISIBLE PROGRESS MADE… Unless the United States begins ‘seriously moving toward peace,’ Mr. Thuy said, ‘many more U.S. troops will have to find a useless death instead of being allowed to promptly return to their homes.’ This exchange of military claims symbolized the posture of the talks at this point as, once again today, no visible progress was made toward discussion of the political issues in Vietnam. President Johnson’s demand that North Vietnam promise some reciprocal military gesture before American bombing stops, a position he reiterated in New Orleans yesterday, was dismisses by Mr. Thuy as absurd.”…
Page 1: “MANY TANKS LEAVE PRAGUE AMID SIGNS TENSION IS EASING–Withdrawal Is Linked To Moscow and Kuznetsov Talks”... Page 1: “NIXON BACKS NUCLEAR PACT BUT ASKS DELAY BY SENATE–Urges Holding Up Until Soviets Intentions Become Clear–G.O.P. Members Block Vote On Committee–New Meeting is Set”… Page 1: “HUMPHREY TERMS NIXON A WIGGLER ON CRUCIAL ISSUES–He Wants To Question On Law and Order, Fortas and Nuclear Treaty”... Page 1: “PANEL SETS DATE FOR FORTAS VOTE–Nomination Issue Likely To Reach Senate Floor After Key Test Next Tuesday”… Page 1: “JOHNSON PREPARES TRANSFER OF POWER” … Page 2: “PUEBLO TALKS TERMED DELICATE–U.S. OFFICIALS BELIEVE THEY’RE AT MOST CRITICAL POINT”… “American sources said today that the United States believed that negotiations for the release of the 82 Pueblo crewmen had reached the most critical point since they began seven and a half months ago. The officials hope to receive a reply from North Korea this week to a United States proposal that could mark a breakthrough. Pending such a reply they declined to discuss the substance of the potential compromise–indeed, they stressed the need for secrecy at this juncture.”... Page 42: “NAVY F-111 CRASHES INTO OCEAN WITH 2″…
12 SEPTEMBER 1968… OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER…New York Times/AP: No coverage of air operations over the North.
VIETNAM: AIR LOSSES (Chris Hobson) There were four fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 12 September 1968…
(1) An F-105D of the 469th TFS and 388th TFW out of Korat was diverted to Takhli due to bad weather at Korat. The aircraft ran out of fuel and the pilot was forced to eject due to fuel exhaustion. The pilot survived… (a very bad oops)…
(2) A C-123K of the 19th SOS and 315th SOW out of Phan Rang with 3 crewmen aboard suffered a prop reverse malfunction sending the aircraft off the runway. The Provider was damaged beyond repair…
(3) CAPTAIN RONALD R. FOGLEMAN was flying a Super Sabre with a division of F-100D’s of the 510th TFS and the 3rd TFW out of Bien Hoa on a close air support mission on the coast at the southern tip of South Vietnam when downed by automatic weapon fire. After delivering his bombs on the enemy position he commenced a strafing run and in the pullout was hit in the fuselage and was forced to eject in close proximity to the enemy troops. CAPTAIN FOGELMAN was rescued by an Army AH-1G Cobra. The brazen Army aviator set the Cobra down and CAPTAIN FOGELMAN jumped aboard the skid and grabbed an open gun panel for the liftoff and flight to safety. (Just like in training)… CAPTAIN FOGLEMAN would transfer to the Commando Fast FACs and complete his Southeast Asia tour with 80 Misty FAC missions among his 315 combat missions. He would complete his distinguished Air Force career as a four-star and Chief-of-Staff of the Air Force… a bio of the General is at..
https://www.af.mil/About-Us/Biographies/Display/Article/104988/general-ronald-r-fogleman/
Humble Host also suggests a video clip…Search for “Misty Fast Fac Pilots Panel Part 4; General Ron Fogelman”
(4) MAJOR SAMUEL CHAPMAN MAXWELL, flying an F-105D of the 357th TFS and 355th TFW out of Takhli on an armed recce mission into the “Talley-Ho” area of North Vietnam south of Cape Mui Ron with a flight of Thunderchiefs, was downed by ground fire while strafing enemy water craft. Read the Task Force Omega report of record on the loss of MAJOR MAXWELL.
AMONG THE many remembrances left for COLONEL SAMUEL CHAPMAN MAXWELL at the VVMF “The Wall of Faces” is this post dated 11/7/15 from Christina Maxwell: “My Dad… Sam Maxwell II was my father. I never knew him, but always loved him. I was three when he left on the train in Germany for Tahkli, Thailand to begin his final flight missions over North Vietnam. He didn’t come back for 21 years–1989–at which time we had a military funeral for him… Life doesn’t make sense. I look forward to seeing him and knowing him in heaven when I get there. RIP Dad.”
LEAVE A REMEMBRANCE…VVMF, THE WALL OF FACES…
SUMMARY OF ROLLING THUNDER LOSSES (KIA/MIA/POW) FOR THE FOUR 12 SEPTEMBER DATES FOR THE FOUR YEARS OF THE OPERATION OVER NORTH VIETNAM…
1965… LTJG GERALD GREEN, USN… (KIA)…
1966… CAPTAIN ROBERT FROST WAGGONER, USAF… (POW)… and… MAJOR STANLEY GEORGE SPRAGUE, USAF… (KIA)… and… LCDR WILLIAM FRANCIS COAKLEY, USN…(KIA)…
1967… NONE…
1968… MAJOR SAMUEL CHAPMAN MAXWELL II, USAF… (KIA)…
RIPPLE SALVO… #922… ON 29 APRIL 1966, BARBARA MULLEN and her two boys Sean and Terry began living a life based on hope. Captain “Moon” Mullen, USMC, was missing in action in Southeast Asia. Her heroic years of searching for her husband is a story brilliantly told in EVERY EFFORT… Here is the voice of one of her sons speaking for the tens of thousands of the children of the Vietnam war who didn’t come home, especially those MIA, BB, KK, or XX.. I quote pages 349-351…
“Early the next morning I am sitting at a table in a Veterans of Foreign Wars hall in Hyannis, Massachusetts. Two or three hundred people have come to a breakfast meeting organized by Cape Cod Vietnam Veteran to help POW/MIAs in Southeast Asia. The Vietnam Veterans are wearing odd pieces of old uniforms–a camouflage jacket, khaki pants. One has a medal pinned to a blue windbreaker jacket. I am touched that after all these years they refuse to forget their comrades who are still missing.
“At the front table Terry is seated between members of two MIA families. A mother and father in their sixties tell how their young son, a Marine enlisted man, became missing during a search-and-destroy mission into Laos in 1969. Their identical sweat shirt jackets are covered with pins and patches, which plead Help the MIAs, Remember The POW/MIAs. A sister of an aviator shot down over Laos has just asked that letters be sent to President Reagan an Congress on behalf of the MIAs.
“I am nervous, wondering what Terry will say. He arrived late last night, and we haven’t had time to talk. He walks to the center of the table, where his nearly six-foot-five frame towers above a small podium. He is wearing a white shirt open at the neck; his beige sports coat nearly matches the color of his hair, which is curly now like Sean’s.
‘My father, Lieutenant Colonel William Mullen, a Marine Corps pilot, was sent to Vietnam in 1965,’ he begins. ‘One year later, two weeks before he was supposed to come home, his plane was shot down on a bombing mission over Laos.
‘In 1973 almost six hundred POWs came back from North Vietnam. President Nixon and Dr. Kissinger, however, had signed no agreement for release of the prisoners in Laos. There are five hundred sixty-six servicemen still missing in action in Laos. None of the men shot down there was ever released. After 1973 Dr. Kissinger tried to buy the prisoners in Laos from the North Vietnamese for $3,500,000,000 in aid, but Congress refused to vote for the money. President Nixon became involved in Watergate and the missing men were forgotten in the years that followed.
‘I don’t understand how our country can allow ment to be captured in a war then desert them. Some of these men would have been held for fifteen to twenty years by now. The United States should tell the world about this tragedy. President Reagan should send the Secretary of State to Laos to talk with the Communist government there. We should ask ourselves what the life of a serviceman is worth. And, if necessary, our country should pay amount to get those men released.
‘Our government continues to receive information from refugees, satellite photo, and U.S. intelligence sources that report that live American prisoners have been sighted in Southeast Asia. No one knows how many men could have survived, but even if one is still alive, we owe it to him to bring him home. I hope people who care will make others believe that this terrible thing has happened and demand that our government get them released somehow. We found a way to bring the hostages home from Iran, and these men have been held twenty times as long.
‘I want to say something personal now. I was only two and a half years old when my father left for Vietnam. I never really knew my father. But I do know some things about him. He was a fine pilot. He laughed a lot and had a lot of friends. He was a good baseball pitcher, and he played the piano. He loved to sing; his favorite song was ‘Danny Boy.’ I know a lot more things about my father. But I never knew my father. If my father is dead, I want him brought back and buried at Arlington with the rest of the dead heroes. Because no matter what anyone thinks of the futile and tragic war in Vietnam, the men who fought there were heroes.
‘If my father is alive after all these years, he must think we’ve forgotten him. I want him to know that we haven’t. There is still time to bring him home. If others are alive, we must bring them all home. My wish is simple. If my father is alive, I want to know him, not things about him. If he is dead, I want to be able to put a flower on his grave.'”… End quote
Lest we forget… Bear…
