March 1975 saw Hanoi make its next seriously aggressive move. In the preceding two years, North Vietnam’s army patiently moved into the South enormous quantities of Soviet artillery, surface-to-air missiles, and armored vehicles, along with 100,000 fresh troops. The Paris accords allowed more than 80,000 North Vietnamese regular troops to remain in the South, and their numbers had already increased to more than 200,000.
North Vietnamese regular and guerrilla forces now numbered some 1 million, despite the heavy losses of the previous decade. North Vietnam’s army units, created by Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap, were weapons-intensive, with few logistics or support personnel. In contrast, South Vietnam’s army was modeled on the US Army. It had about 750,000 troops, of which only about 150,000 were combat troops. They were well-equipped but poorly supported, despite the Army’s huge logistics tail.
4 March 1975: The PAVN began “Campaign 275” to capture the Central Highlands with diversionary attacks near Kon Tum and Pleiku while building up forces near Ban Me Thuot, the main objective of the campaign.
10 March 1975: The PAVN launched its attack on Ban Me Thuot, and by nightfall they held the center of the city although fighting continued in the outskirts
7 March 1975: An American Congressional Delegation left Vietnam on 7 March 1975. It sent its investigating delegation to the scene, but when the Representatives came back, the answer was still no.
10 March1975: Ban Me Thuot fell.
14 March 1975: South Vietnamese President Nguyễn Văn Thiệu met with his military commanders. and unrealistically ordered General Phú to retake Ban Me Thuot. All ARVN forces were to be withdrawn from other parts of the Central Highlands to be reassembled for the assault on Ban Me Thuot and for the defense of the coast.
President Thieu’s reserves around Saigon were much too thin. He decided to withdraw the South Vietnamese Army forces from the Central Highlands and put them into a reserve for the defense of the capital. The Major General who was to have executed an orderly withdrawal, merely packed up his staff and left the scene. He turned over his forces to a newly-promoted Brigadier General with little command experience. When all of this became known, a panic ensued. The soldiers of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam, many of whom had their families with them in the highlands, began an exodus toward the coast. The column was joined by all sorts of people. The South Vietnamese Air Force, finding itself alone and unable to defend Pleiku AB, began an aerial procession out of the place with all flyable aircraft. The trek to the coast turned out to be one of the most tragic chapters of a tragic war. The North Vietnamese Army harried the retreating column all the way to the coast, and reportedly 30,000 to 40,000 lives were lost before the 15-day agony was over.
The story of the Ban Me Thuot and Pleiku losses had some
serious implications for the immediate future. At Ban Me Thuot,
several Vietnamase Air America workers had been executed by the
North Vietnamese Army captors. News of the incident spread like
wildfire. The blood baths predicted through the years seemed to be
on the point of coming true.
The debacle at Pleiku led more or less directly to the terror at Da
Nang. The events in the Central Highlands did nothing to solve
President Thieu’s problem of insufficient effective reserves in Military
Region 111 around Saigon. His next move, whatever its desirability
for the capital district, was to have disastrous results in the North
and compound the defeat in the Highlands. The Airborne Division
was one of the best in the Da Nang area, and when the President
ordered it south to the capital, the commander of Military Region I
made every possible plea for its retention. Thieu persisted, and the
troops moved out. Reacting to the loss of his Airborne Division, the commander in Military Region I began shifting troops from the Quang Tri area back to Da Nang. Their departure served as a catalyst causing
civilians from the area to flee southward. As they went through Hue,
the trickle became a stream and then a torrent which turned Da
Nang into a madhouse of a million extra panic-stricken people, all
seeking escape to a haven further to the south. To further complicate
the matter, considerable stocks of materiel in the region were being
abandoned, although attempts were being made 60 bring some of it
out to Da Nang. To add to the confusion, the exodus was also
beginning from the southern side of Da Nang, as those defending
Chu Lai and Quang Ngai hastened to the port to try to find a means
of escape. When the last Americans left Hue on 23 March, the
situation in Da Nang was pandemonium. In addition to the civilian
refugees, tens of thousands of South Vietnamese army soldiers,
armed and without any control, were milling about the town. Not
only were the elements for serious trouble present, there was little
chance left that the evacuation could be accomplished according to
the original plan.
Meanwhile, the situation in Phnom Penh was reaching a climax almost simultaneously; unfortunately, many of the forces tasked for that evacuation (EAGLE PULL) also had roles to play in the execution of the TALON VISE-FREQUENT WIND plan.
25 March 1975: On the 25th of March, the Consul General of Military Region I, Mr. A1 Francis, ordered the evacuation of the Americans, some
Third Country Nationals, and a few, selected Vietnamese who could
be accommodated. On March the 25th, things went well enough, but
the next day the panic began to take hold.
Several civilian airlines were contracted by the embassy to ferry civilians from Danang to Saigon. One, World Airways, added its three Boeing 727s to the fleet.
26 March 1975
On the evening of the 26th, for example, a World Airways Boeing 727 landed at Da Nang
to bring out more people. As the manifested passengers attempted
to board the aircraft, the plane was surrounded by a crowd. Vehicles
were driven onto the ramp and parked all a’bout the 727. All sorts of
illegal persons crowded on board, making it impossible to stay within
either the legal limits for emigration or those for aircraft loading.
The event portended serious problems for the morrow. One of the
elements that made the situation at Da Nang so dangerous was the
thousands of armed South Vietnamese troops who were out of
control, roaming through the city.
27 March 1975: On the 27th, people of Da Nang used aircraft, helicopters, and ships in an attempt to flee. Some of the ships in the harbor had to
move further out to sea to avoid being overcome by the hordes of
small craft that were attempting to put their human cargoes aboard.
Several of the Air America and World Airways pilots who flew into
Da Nang on the 27th of March complained that their aircraft had
almost been swamped by the sea of humans-that was the last big
day of the airlift. Most of the people taken out by air were deposited
in Saigon. The remnants of the Consul General’s Staff were removed
by sea on the next day. The Pioneer Contender left Da Nang with
them late on the 28th, and arrived at Cam Ranh Bay midday on the
29th.
28 March 1975
Since tens of thousands had been left behind, Mr. Ed Daily, President of World Airways, decided to make one more attempt on the 29th to fly one of his 727s into the Da Nang airport to take refugees out.
In the riot that ensued, his aircraft almost did not get off the ground. His crew was forced to take off on a taxiway, through the masses of refugees. It succeeded in getting back to Saigon in spite of severe damage, flying with gear down and partially split flaps* and carrying about 290 refugees. Most of these were South Vietnamese Army soldiers who forced their way into the plane. Some actually shot family members who resisted or stood in the way. At least seven refugees hung in the wheel wells of the 727, and were saved only by the fact that the landing gear retraction mechanism was jammed by the body of a soldier entangled during the 727’s takeoff run.
In the North, once Da Nang had fallen, the enemy continued down the east coast, the major cities falling like dominoes. Nha
Trang was overrun virtually without a shot being fired. There were
very few lessons to be learned from the Da Nang experience that
had not already been learned from the other incidents. In all
instances it was found that crowd control is essential during an
evacuation. Such control might be facilitated in some instances by
using roof-top helicopter landing zones. In general, events had
shown that the timing of an evacuation is crucial. If the decision
comes too early, it may well precipitate the defeat and panic one is
trying to avoid; if it comes too late, more personnel than necessary
may be lost because of the inability to control crowds.
The Communist forces entered Da Nang on March 29. Qui Nhon fell on March 31,1975.
31 March 1975: 374 TAW is reassigned from PACAF to MAC as part of the realignment of all tactical and strategic resources directed by the Secretary of Defense. The 374 TAW had been under the operational control of 13th Air Force and Pacific Air Force (PACAF) until then. The 374 TAW transferred the seven C-130E ABCCC of the 7th Airborne Command and Control Squadron (ACCS) to the Clark AB host wing, 3 TFW as a result of the MAC takeover of the 374 TAW. However, the 374 TAW continued to provide maintenance for the ABCCC aircraft.
By the end of March 1975, things looked very black indeed in
Saigon. The Central Highlands had fallen and so had the great
airport and sea terminal at Da Nang. The US Congress had made it
clear that there would be no additional emergency appropriations.
The crisis in neighboring Cambodia was at its peak and competing
with Saigon for American resources and attention
The TALON VISE plan, as it stood in the winter of 1974-75, was
logical enough, but quite complex. The officer in charge of its
execution was to be the United States Ambassador to the Republic of
Vietnam. He had four options:
OPTION 1-Evacuation by commercial airlift from Tan Son Nhut
(and other Vietnamese airports as required-withou’t any Department
of Defense participation).
OPTION 2-Evacuation by military airlift from Tan Son Nhut or
whatever other airports were required.
OPTION 3-Evacuation by sealift from the port serving Saigon.
OPTION 4-Evacuation by helicopter to ships of the US Navy
standing by offshore.
