Interview with Dr. J. Keith Saliba

McKiernan Interviews
Interview with: J. Keith Saliba
Interviewed by: Stephen McKiernan
Transcriber: Lynn Bijou
Date of interview: 24 August 2024
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(Start of Interview)

SM: 00:00
All right, I think we are going to start. Again, I am interviewing Dr. Jay Keith Saliba, is that the correct pronunciation?

JS: 00:11
That is the correct pronunciation.

SM: 00:12
Yeah. Well, thank you very much for agreeing to be interviewed today. I would like to start off with a question about your upbringing. Where were you born? Your early experiences in high school and college, so forth in your beginning years.

JS: 00:30
Born in Alabama, did not grow up there, though. I went back to visit quite a bit, had a family and so forth, but lived most of my life in Florida. And that is where I live now. Experiences, basically, kind of run a mill, you know, school and so forth. You know, nothing really to write home about it, they say, but you know, I do not know, maybe as it pertains to your book, some of my earliest experiences were, you know, sort of seeing in the 1980s, you know, the first generation, if you will, Vietnam, you know, gotten some separation from it. You know, and so I just, for whatever reason, I think it was a documentary, it was narrated by Richard Bass Heart, and it was called, "Vietnam: The 10,000 Day War," was playing, I do not know, maybe on PBS or something. But I was always a kid who's very interested in this sort of stuff. I know, I read the papers about foreign affairs, you know, at 11 years old, or whatever. And it is something about Vietnam just really struck me as fascinating. And I, of course, at that point, I knew nothing about, you know, all of the conflict and strife that, you know, that did in January in the United States or whatever. I just thought of it as just being a very fascinating subject. And I, I sort of looked at that, that documentary is the thing that introduced me to at a very young age, and I continue to revisit it, over all these years.

SM: 02:13
Now, what year was that? Was that in the early (19)80s, that program?

JS: 02:18
I want to say, I want to say it was. I do not think that is when it was actually created. But it was probably when I saw it, it was either late (19)70s or early (19)80s.

SM: 02:28
What was, what was it about that, just seeing that war? Because obviously, you knew about World War I and World War II and Korea, what was it about Vietnam that, that really perked you up?

JS: 02:42
Well, you know, it was, it was probably the tragedy of it, you know, the, even at that young age, I kind of knew that there was something that, that was very hurtful about the whole thing. And, and, you know, I saw all these guys who have gone and done, done what they were asked, what their government asked him to do, and I thought that they were not very well treated. And in some of the news accounts, and some of the popular media, I remember a time it is sort of, it is kind of been a theme that I have seen, you do not see it nearly as much anymore, because, you know, Vietnam sort of faded in the background. But you do see it with, like Afghanistan, Iraqian war, and an Iraq war, but it is the same sort of thing. It is sort of like the crazed, dysfunctional, you know, vet who, you know, you never know what he is going to shoot up or blow up, or you always has all these different problems. But I remember, that is what I saw sort of Vietnam, as being portrayed as in the popular media, movies, you know, that sort of thing. And now, again, you do not see that so much anymore with Vietnam, because it has faded in the rear view, but you see a lot of movies and shows, that depict these really dysfunctional Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans, and you know, all of that stuff just sort of rubbed me the wrong way from even, even from an early age.

SM: 04:08
Oh yeah.

JS: 04:09
But again, we are just kind of talking about Vietnam. No, obviously, at this point. And so yeah, I, I do not know. But it was fascinating too, there is so many facets to this, the story. Some of it was, political, military, you know, protests, all of these different things really, you know, sort of tied into this very, very interesting story that, again, I continue to come back to time and time again.

SM: 04:35
What is interesting is when you saw this program, narrated by Richard Bass Heart, that is the era when the Vietnam Memorial was opened, in the early (19)80s, 1982 which was when the wall was opened and all the veterans-

JS: 04:50
Steve, Steven you are breaking up here, can you hear me?

SM: 04:54
Yes, I can hear you.

JS: 04:56
Okay, maybe sometimes, if you call me right back, it might reset because you are really breaking up badly.

SM: 05:03
Okay let me, let me call you again. And I will stop this right now. Okay, thanks. Here we go, very good. Yeah, I was just trying to say that, the, at the time you saw that documentary that was the time that the Vietnam Memorial was opened. And the timing was interesting, because that is when Vietnam veterans for the first time felt welcomed home. And, so kind of interesting that you got into it at that particular time. Before I actually start asking you questions about [inaudible], I would like to ask two things that I saw on your biography. You had done your master's thesis on Esquire's coverage of the Vietnam War. What did that, what, what did you learn from that from, from that project?

JS: 05:06
Okay. Well, the you know, Esquire, as you may know, was sort of a hotbed of what was once called, "new journalism," or literary journalism, right, where you sort of use the tools of a novelist to tell nonfiction stories. And it is a, you know, it is a genre of writing that I have not only taught, but I have tried to employ some times in my own career and something I really enjoy. And so, I just looked at this unique partnership between Harold Hayes, who was the editor of Esquire at the time, and two, sort of gifted writers, John Sack and Michael Herb. And you are probably more familiar with Michael Herb, his work with dispatches- -and his, you know, screenwriting work with-with films like, "Apocalypse Now," and, and, and "Full Metal Jacket," right. You know, but John Sack was, you know, sort of a celebrated literary journalist who covered war, pretty exclusively, he did other topics, but he was always the type of guy who was drawn back to conflict, so. And so, they had a very unique partnership, and they really, you know, sort of gave some, a unique perspective to journalistic coverage of Vietnam, and, you know, sort of Esquire and Harold Hayes and his support, allowed them to go and just kind of roam around the country and, you know, absorb different stories and different perspectives, maybe you were not seeing as much in, you know, mainstream coverage. So that was what the thesis was about, was just sort of, you know, exploring that technique. And, you know, what those guys found out, you know, the, you know, with dispatches her, you know, it was really more of, even though it was kind of a nonfiction take, right of his, his experiences there. There were also some fictional elements in it. Whereas John Sack M, right, where he followed that empty infantry company through basic training all the way through their first action, Vietnam, that was, you know, much more factually accurate. And he did not take as many sort of literary licenses as her did. Both of them had their unique approach, and they were both supported by, you know, both financially, and, and, you know, journalistically by Harold Hayes and Esquire so they, they-they gave us a, you know, a unique way of looking at the Vietnam War that maybe in that mid (19)60s area that was not really coming out yet.

SM: 06:31
Oh, yes. Yeah, you mentioned those movies. I used to bring quite a few veterans back to the universities I used to work at. And they had a lot of problems with a lot of the Vietnam movies that were made. Because they do not think, they did not think they were real. There were two that, there was the one that really bothered them the most believe it or not, was "Platoon". And I do not know, I do not know what you thought of the movie. But it was, I had three distinguished Vietnam veterans from Philadelphia and they disliked the film, they talked about it, but they thought it was Hollywood. And, and so, if there was one film and I am going to get back to what we are talking about here, what is the number one film that you have seen on the Vietnam War that you like?

JS: 09:19
What did I like?

SM: 09:21
Yeah, that is real.

JS: 09:23
I like a lot of them. And of course, I am not being there, not even really being born for most of it. I do not know what it was actually like, but certainly what I have heard from some Vietnam vets when asked that same question, they sort of say that "Full Metal Jacket," to them represented a more accurate military life but of action in Vietnam. "Platoon," what, sure, Hollywood right, Oliver Stone, it was well done from a Hollywood perspective, but you could definitely see why vets would not like it. They were not portrayed very well in that film. And, you know, everyone, anyone is perfect in the first place. I always liked "Apocalypse Now," too, I even have the four-hour version of it. I liked " We Were Soldiers." You know, I got to meet and talk to Joe Galloway on several occasions, including through my book. And that was, you know, exciting. And, and to be able to kind of, you know, meet the guy that was, that wrote that and participated in that was, was great to me. So it is hard for me, Steven, to narrow it down to just one.

SM: 10:38
Right.

JS: 10:39
Those are certainly some of the ones that I liked the best.

SM: 10:41
I know Jan Scruggs liked "Coming Home," because that was his inspiration to create the wall.

JS: 10:47
Yes, yeah, you are right, that going back a little ways to that, but that I remember that one now, too. Yeah, another great one.

SM: 10:54
And the other item before we get into the main reason I am talking to you is, you also had an experience recently talking about the psychological effects of the Tet Offensive. And I have done a lot of reading on that subject matter of 19, early 1968. But, could you just briefly describe what you were saying, when you gave that presentation in Texas?

JS: 11:18
And I sort of combined two things. It is weird, because that Texas conference is really mainly historian that I came at it from a, you know, more of a mass communication researcher perspective, right? We have framing theory and-and, and confirmation bias, were the two perspectives that I linked to sort of look at the coverage of that. And so, my contention was that, by that time in the war, the journalists who were there had pretty much decided on what it was all about. And they you know, one thing about confirmation bias is it says that we humans, and that means all of us, not just you know, not just the-the unwashed masses, but everybody, including the most learned people in the world tend to see things through a certain prism, once we have decided that we have, we have just know what is going on, right, we start to see information only that confirms what we already believe. And so my contention was, as a journalist, at that time, were sort of immediately framing and putting into certain categories, what they were seeing, and they could not see anything else. And so, one point that I made was, is that that is why the narrative quickly changed from the Vietcong are winning on the battlefield, right. And I believe they pushed that to be at the beginning, but then they sort of changed it, even though the Vietcong were being devastated, actually, and really, they never really recovered as an effective fighting force after that. Both, either politically, or militarily, they had to really be, you know, their numbers had to be stocked with people from the north-north-north Vietnam. They, they then sort of morphed into this narrative of how it was a psychological victory. It was a, the Tet Offensive, was a moral victory. You know, because they, you know, just simply because they could do it, and all the rest of it. And so the journalist would push back on that, they would say, Well, this was in reaction to all the rosy proclamations that the, you know, the five o'clock follies, and all the rest of them would put forth, you know, every day. And so, you know, that is why maybe we have swing the, in exactly the opposite direction that we went from, well, they were telling us that we were winning and then this, they were able to launch this big, you know, attack. Right, so then it became, the narrative became that it was, okay, well, we will admit that it was a military defeat, and it devastated that political infrastructure, the Vietcong infrastructure, as well. But we were going to say, we were going to let everybody know that it was a psychological victory, it was a moral victory. And in the end, that is all accounts is that they were able to pull this off. So, that was really what I was kind of contending there that, you know, we all have blind spots. And when we, when we decide how things are, we tend to only see information that supports our preconceived notions. And my, my ideas were that by that time in the war, journalistic presence in Vietnam had been well established, and they had kind of, they all kind of decided this is how things are going, this is how it is. And, and even though they were looking at really a massive defeat for the Vietcong, they just could not, I do not know, allow themselves to-to put it that way or even just to, even see it for themselves. They had to almost invent a new, you know, a new outcome and a new standard for victory. This was not winning on the battlefield, but winning psychologically.

SM: 15:06
Right? Well, I, I can tell you from all my reading and studies, I think it certainly surprised L.B.J. And, and I love that surprise of the Tet Offensive as being the beginning of many dots leading up to his surprise of withdrawing from running for president. I think there is two direct links there. I am going to get into the main portion, now of what I want to talk about, but I want to say it because of your book, I look at cities and locations as linking different eras in the (19)60s and early (19)70s. Certainly, these cities are part of that (19)60s, Dallas, Washington, D.C., Selma, Montgomery, Birmingham, Chicago, Kent, Ohio, New York City, Berkeley, Saigon, Hanoi, the [inaudible] valley, [inaudible], Miami and San Francisco. Cause, the major happenings happened during those, that era in those locations. And now, because of your book and learning more about Plei Me, I put Plei Me right in there. I just want to say that. My first question is, you know, I also read Joe's book on the [inaudible] valley, and I saw the movie. And he was very vociferous, when he always talked, I brought him to Westchester to speak, that the [inaudible] valley was the first major war of the Vietnam and during that period. And then of course, when I read the back of your book, he praised you, and what happened. I guess the question, the main, the main reason I am asking is why Plei Mei?. Because you know, you-you do so brilliantly your book, all the other locations, the small villages, this, different locations, and I know about Plei Mei's location near the Ho Chi Minh Trail. But why Plei Mei, just your thoughts?

JS: 17:06
When you say why-why did the North Vietnamese choose it, or?

SM: 17:10
Why, Why did they, they were doing things out in the highlands, they were doing a lot of things, but why Plei Mei?

JS: 17:18
Well, I mean, as you mentioned, it was, its proximity to home Chi Minh Trail complex was-was, you know, an ideal ingress point for them, right. I mean, they were able to stash a lot of supplies, a lot of men and material, across the border, but I will say that they tried to do something similar at Duco, a few months earlier. And, but they had two, they separate from two main drawbacks, from the Vietnamese, North Vietnamese perspective, and that was that, Duco, they did not have enough combat power to overcome what was, what was able, what the allies were able to bring against them. And two, and that, and this sort of correlates with that, was Duco's location was on a major highway. And even though it was right on the Cambodian border, you know, the South Vietnamese and their American allies could get supplies and things into Duco a lot easier even though it was surrounded, and Plei Mei was much more isolated. So, that is really what happened was, is they had been trying to do this sort of stuff for years. You know, this sort of, this lure and ambush where, you bring a remote outpost under, you know, siege and then not only crush the outpost, if you can, but you know, destroy the, the responding force, right, they just want to take these big chunks out of the South Vietnamese army whenever possible. And so, they tried it at Duco. But they did not have enough combat power, they did not have enough troops committed. And it was also in an auspicious location even though it was close to their base areas in Cambodia. They, it was, you know, you could get to it pretty easily you know, you could bring armor in there to Duco, pretty easily. And so, Plei Mei was much more isolated, it was a little farther away from the border. But you know, there was just that provincial route five, which linked it with highway 14, and you know, you would have to, that is a single lane dirt track, and it was a perfect spot for an ambush. So they could you know, they could secret all of these, these regular army forces around Plei Mei, and make them think that they were about to be overrun, right, make them, bring them under enough attack to where the south Saigon would have to send, or at least [inaudible] who would have to send in, you know, rescue force and then, then you could, you could isolate that rescue force on that little spin dirt track that was heavy foliage on both sides of the road, and then just destroy it. That is what they dreamed of, is destroying a large Arvin formation and then once that happened, once all those defenses were wiped out, they could pretty much roll through what you know, [inaudible] and [inaudible] because there would not really be anything else, you know, to stop them, I think [inaudible] even, they stripped down to where they really only had maybe a battalion in reserve to defend what was pretty, a pretty large town at that time. And so they had to bring in, you know, the-the first cab to, you know, that was part of the whole thing, right introducing the first cab-

SM: 20:30
Right.

JS: 20:30
-and kind of, sort of guaranteeing the provincial capital-capital safety so that Arvin could then go and rescue this besieged camp.

SM: 20:40
One of the, one of the things that is very important too, is that the, we are talking about the early stages of the Vietnam War, and the Gulf of Tonkin was in (19)64. So, everything starts going forward there, even though we are there from (19)59 on, in support and somewhat. With McNamara, and certainly with Westmoreland being the general there at the time, they were all about numbers, it was bringing in the numbers, kill, the kill ratios. And we all learned about that, I, that we were all growing up with that. I, we all experienced it as young people as members of the boomer generation that reports every day about how many were killed on T.V., and so forth. So, it was all a numbers game, in the beginning, the feeling that America could just keep killing, and killing, and killing, and the Vietnamese would finally submit. And then, then some of the critics of the war, the very early critics would say, "Well, wait a minute, you do not really know about the history of Vietnam, and what the battles, they fought for centuries were against their enemies, their most recent being the French and now the United States." Your thoughts about, the numbers game that was being played at that particular time, right, before Plei Mei, and the American strategy up to that point that it was a numbers game?

JS: 22:01
Yeah, and I think that directly stems from Westmoreland's, you know, restrictions. And the restrictions that were placed on him by, you know, the higher ups, L.B.J., number one. He did not want a wider war, he did not want American forces in Cambodia, or Laos. And, you know, when you allow an enemy to have that kind of freedom of movement and sanctuaries, just across the border of not one, but two countries, with really rugged terrain, with mountainous terrain, areas, you know, canopy jungles where you can, you can hide entire regiments without being seen from the air. And indeed, in the [inaudible] massive complex, that is exactly what they did. They had supplies, secreted in there. And they have would place it, the North Vietnamese could go and rest and recuperate and build up, you know, supplies and all of which can be completely covered from any aerial observation. So, so I guess, if I mean, looking back, in hindsight, you look at it, and you think, that does not seem like a smart way to go, it is just trying to, you know, you know, because if you are, if you are going to go by body count, you are going to go by, so this war of attrition, then it automatically incentivizes field commanders, who are, you know, looking for, at the very least some sort of success, you know, to maybe inflate what they see, or inflate what, with the counselor, right. So in hindsight, you look at it, you say, "Well, that does not seem like a very smart way to fight a war," is just, you know, trying to out kill the other, without destroying base, sanctuaries, and cutting off access, and all the rest. And there were various plans that were in the works to do that, invading Laos, and you know, completely cutting the Ho Chi Minh Trail and, leaving that whole area occupied by strong forces, you know, none of that ever came to fruition. So I, to me, it just seems like, you know, that is what Westmoreland was dealing with. You know, in the book, "The Best and the Brightest," you saw sort of the calculated mentality, of a lot of the, president's advisors, and top military men at the time, it was all statistics and all, you know, analytics, and this is how you win is by you know, x number of this versus x number of that, all the, all the rest of it. And, and I do not know that it just seems like that belies, like thousands of years of human history that, that is not really, you know, that is not really how wars fought or won, certainly.

SM: 24:40
You brilliantly talk about some of the leaders of South Vietnam, DM and, and his, his lack of leadership, I believe, because he has enemies himself. But, you talk also about the importance of morale. And what, and-and Plei Mei was really about morale as well. Because if it went down, that would look terrible to the people in South Vietnam who, and certainly the United States who were supporting the Vietnamese. And we lost this very important thing, because we knew that morale was also important to the North Vietnamese, because that is why they trying to do these surprise attacks, which ended up being the main goal of Plei Mei, by killing as many people as possible. Your thoughts on, the both sides trying to win this morale battle, so that whoever wins this or that, that will get rid of the government of South Vietnam or make the leaders of the North Vietnamese look bad?

JS: 25:45
Yeah that and that was, that is part of the other aspect of it is, you know, Plei Mei was not just sort of this isolated thing, right. The real goal was to destroy large Arvin formations whenever possible-

SM: 26:00
Right.

JS: 26:00
-but what was [inaudible], you know, so a secretary of North Vietnam, what his, his ultimate goal was, was not to inspire an uprising among the South Vietnamese, right. And so, they figured that if they could make the quote, puppet, in Saigon look bad enough, that they could destroy enough of this forces, and winning up victories on the battlefield, it would make the people say, "Look, this is, you know, at the very least, this is inevitable, we need to rise up and get with on the winning side," at the very least, right, and you are right, that is about crushing the morale and inspiring this general uprising, he had hoped for the general uprising all the way through the 72 Easter offensive again, and it did not materialize again. Even though the North Vietnamese through, you know, upwards of 200,000 troops in a holy conventional invasion of the south in (19)72, it still did not inspire, it inspired a lot of panic, it inspired a lot of people fleeing, but it did not inspire this, this sort of general uprising that he, long hoped for, right. So that is, that side of things. And yeah, I mean, even though there were only a handful of Americans at Plei Mei you know, your-your prestige, becomes-

SM: 26:00
Right.

JS: 27:17
-entwined with holding on, that maybe even though these camps were, you know, part of the CG program, and offensively under the South Vietnamese special forces, it was really the Americans who were running it. And, you know, to lose something like that, and to have these guys overrun, and more importantly, to lose a very important, you know, government outpost like that would be, would be terrible. And I think that is why, you know, one reason anyway, right, why the first cab was introduced to kind of come in-

SM: 27:55
Right.

JS: 27:56
-and, and, and help save the day. But it was also this idea that, you know, we need to get the Americans in there, we need to test this new air mobile division, and we need to show what we can do. We need to, you know, it is time for us to take over, and it is time for us to actually win this war, because the South Vietnamese are not capable of doing it, you know.

SM: 28:15
Right.

JS: 28:16
And I think that was, there was a lot of, that was part of it too, this eagerness to get the first cab in there.

SM: 28:24
Yeah, I think, at the very beginning of your book, you talk about President Kennedy and the fact that he liked Special Forces and, and he was he liked it because they were more flexible than, during Eisenhower's reign as president, where he still used the nuclear deterrent as a, as a force, a threat, to prevent conflict. And then, of course, we lost President Kennedy, he was assassinated. And of course, it is interesting, that within three weeks, Diem, and [inaudible] both, were both assassinated or killed in a coup. So, a lot was changing there. And also all these other leaders that came in, in the South before [inaudible] and [inaudible]. They, I do not, were there any decent ones that, that the people supported, before [inaudible] and [inaudible]?

JS: 29:19
You know, it was, it was, it was a rough time, was not it? I mean, that is what coups do is that is they, they-they destabilize. And you know, Diem was, you know, even though, yeah, he was, he had his corruption problems, that is for sure. And he, you know, was not well loved and he cracked down on the Buddhist. I mean, they had their problems as well. I mean, these armed factions, some of them infiltrated by communist agents. I mean, there is all of these different facets, right, that is going on. So, I mean, he was dealing with a, a rough situation, and he was also paranoid, but he was also an ardent nationalist, and he was an ardent anti-communist.

SM: 29:59
Right.

JS: 30:00
So you know, and he, there was a certain level of stability with him in power, and, regardless, right, and so with his loss, then you were ushering in, you know, almost like, you can go back to Roman history, like this time at the barracks emperors, where there is just-

SM: 30:16
Right, yeah.

JS: 30:16
-one after an uprising, you know, and then being, you know, as either assassinated or, you know, at least put out of power. And then you finally get to, as you say, to event two, and, you know, things stabilized there, but also probably because the war had stabilized a lot more by the time, you know, [inaudible]'s presidency sort of matured. But, you know, good ones. I mean, I do not know [laughs]. You are right, yes. I mean, it is, it is just, you know, it, you are just wondering, you think back what, all the intrigue that was going on, and the different factions and, you know, not knowing who was who, and who you could trust and, and, and Diem was, was, you know, often vilified for, you know, putting people in power that he could trust rather than who were necessarily the most effective.

SM: 31:11
Yeah.

JS: 31:12
But then when you, you know, this is also the guy who gets overthrown in a coup and executed. So, I mean, there was probably some reason, right, some good reason for that paranoia.

SM: 31:23
Yeah, he was also paranoid about the people that were helping the Special Forces, the Hmong, and the mana guards. I would like you to talk about, first off the twelve-man units. I, I learned a lot in your book, I learned an awful lot. And I have got to underline all of it, because I have learned so much. And could you talk about, when you talk about the special forces, these twelve-man units, what were they, and who were, what were the characteristics and qualities that was necessary, they were Americans now, but to be successful?

JS: 32:00
Yeah. So as you rightly point out, President Kennedy saw a lot of value in so called coin, you know, counterinsurgency, and he thought it well, I do not know how much thought he gave it, but certainly some in, in the echelons of the military and political establishment thought that, you know, some of the lessons of the counterinsurgency, lessons from World War II had been lost, had been forgotten. And it was time, if you were going to take this flexible response approach, it was time to sort of reinvigorate them again, and Special Forces was, was a vehicle through which that could happen, at least from the Kennedy perspective. Where they, they were twelve-man alpha detachment, and they usually had two officers, a captain and a first lieutenant, First Lieutenant serving as executive officer. And then ten, ten enlisted, and enlisted usually were, you know, senior enlisted, at least, to the level of sergeants, and so forth. But you know, you would sometimes you would have other specialists in there as well, but, you know, especially some of these early guys, and some of the offshoots like, Delta, the Delta project, which I have mentioned in the book as well, I go over the book, you know, these are some grizzled characters. These are some hard-nosed fighters from Korea, and World War II paratroopers, and this is what you know, the type of guy that was drawn to Special Forces, who were the independent minded. They, they, they were very well trained, trained in weapons, and communications and demolition, and, and medical, you know, medical treatments and so forth, right. And they were often cross trained. So that you get, if one guy goes down with that specialty, someone else has training that can step up. But, there is a whole idea of really between, about these, alpha detachments was that they needed to be able to operate alone, they needed to be back in the back country, working with indigenous forces to organize them to, you know, talk [inaudible], whatever enemy they were fighting against. And again, this was not just in south, southeast Asia, but we were talking about even in Europe, they had units like this in place to try to, in case the Soviets actually did invade, then you would be able to operate behind enemy lines and organize you know, European citizens to put up a guerrilla resistance, and all this right. This is all tracking back to those old-World War II units. And so, the reviving this kind of stuff. And so what was the average Special Forces Trooper like he was, you know, he was not really young, he almost surely had conventional military experience. And, it was an air airborne billets. So, you know, they all had their jump wings. And they, but they were also sort of Mavericks, you know, kind of independent.

SM: 35:09
Yep.

JS: 35:10
And, you know, the conventional army looked askance at them, they thought, you know, you know, what are these guys doing, they were off on their own and these camps, so they were kind of running their own show, and, you know, they grow their beards, and they got their hairs- -into [inaudible], and, you know, all the rest.

SM: 35:23
[laughs].

JS: 35:26
Uniforms and rags, and all the rest and, and, and, you know, but when it came down to it, and you are in the middle of nowhere, and you are in this little bunker, and all you got, besides you as a few other Americans and some [inaudible], who probably do not speak very much of their language. And then the beast out there in the darkness waiting beyond the wire, you know, these are the type of guys you want out there, and do not need nearly as much support and can think on the own, and can act on the own. And, you know, so, I guess in a way, that is what it is what it was, he was talking about Special Forces and these-these teams, you know, they were, they were unique and, and I again, a lot of them told me that this some of them were assigned there, they did not volunteer, some of them were assigned to it to fill out the ranks. And they said, it was not exactly career enhancing in those days, we, we sort of think of Special Forces now is like the greatest thing, you know, the average person thinks of him as like, you know, on a pedestal. But in those days, the regular army despised them, and, and even the guys who were, who were put into Special Forces, they knew, I mean, in a big, Cold War environment, the best way to advancement in the military was commanding of infantry battalion, or commanding an armored squadron or something like that, or even our artillery battery, you know, those were the names because they were expecting the big, the big set piece battles of the Cold War. And to be in Special Forces, some of them as one of my sources call them you know, "Those weirdos over on Smoke Bomb Hill," you know, they were always out there, eating snakes or whatever.

SM: 35:26
Yep. [chuckles].

JS: 36:25
But now, I mean, we look at him as like, you know, we are, we do it, we think, the highest the highest about Special Forces operators these days.

SM: 37:20
Well, I tell you, when the when the reinforcements had to come in to save, Plei Mei, getting Charlie Beckwith was very important. And I think, could you talk about, this is just one man we are talking about here. I think you had also said that he had, had not been in combat or something like that. You gave him a really great description of his whole background before he was given the, in charge of Delta Force. But, how he picked his men and what they had to possess to be, to pass by him so that he would be okay, you know, fighting by their, by his side, just talk about Charlie Beckwith, who he was and how he picked them, and what kind of men he wanted by his side?

38:10
He was, he was an irascible fellow, from all accounts, I mean, he had died before this book came out, so I was never able to talk to him. But just from talking to people that knew him, looking at, archival documents and so forth. He just was a, he was a character. And he, and, you know, he had his-his way of that he, he wanted things done, he wanted sort of an American version of the SAS the British, the Special Air Service of the British, right? He wanted those independent, tough operators who could do all kinds of things behind enemy lines. And, and, you know, he finally ended up getting the chance to do that when he was given Project Delta, which eventually, as you noted earlier, morphed into the current incarnation of what we call Delta Force.

JS: 39:02
Right as operational, Operation Detachment Delta. So, we colloquially call it Delta Force. And so you know, that is what he wanted. He, one of my sources the late, great Yule White, who was at Plei Mei and recently passed. He passed maybe, within the last year. He said that Beckwith had, had an idea about the two types of men, there were two types of men in the world to Beckwith, they were either piss cutters, or dipshits.

SM: 39:02
Right. [chuckles]

JS: 39:35
And you really did not want to be in the latter category with Beckwith, right?

SM: 39:38
Right.

JS: 39:39
If he liked you, you were a piss cutter. And that meant, you know, you were a hard charger, you were someone who could get the job done. You were someone who, you could, someone you could depend on, especially in a fight. And if you were a dipshit, you better just stay away from them, you know, and get out of the unit if you can, and get away from them. And so, Yule White was, Beckwith referred to him as a piss cutter. But even then, years later, White told me I do not think I put this in the book. He told me, he said, he met Beckwith later on, and Beck tried to get him involved in some other thing, years later that he was doing and, and, Yule wanted to no part of it, he said he had [laughter] enough of that in Southeast Asia in those crazy times in Plei Mei, of course, he was wounded pretty grievously.

SM: 40:26
I think, I think Beckwith, he wanted these people to be volunteers in Vietnam for six months, they must have earned a Combat Infantry Badge, and, and it be at least a sergeant. Now, I think there is one person that he ended up wanting, who did not qualify for hardly any of those. [chuckles] Because he considered him the first category.

JS: 40:57
Yeah, that was Yule White.

SM: 40:59
That was Yule White. [chuckles]

JS: 41:00
Yeah, he had airborne and all the rest of it, but and he told me and again, he corroborated this, where I found elsewhere. But, you know, Beck would sent out these flyers, as soon as he took over Project Delta. And he said, "I can promise you a metal, a body bag, or both." And he stuffed them in every outgoing mail bag that was going to go out to Special Forces, eight camps around Vietnam, and he dumped a bunch of those fliers in there. And he says, the response was overwhelming. There was a bunch of guys who wanted to go, they were already out there on the fringes, already out there. You know, in these, in these camps, pretty much doing whatever they wanted, there was very little oversight, you know, so they were just they were on their own. And, they wanted even more they wanted to, they wanted to take it up another notch, and do some Long-Range Reconnaissance and all the rest of, is what, you know, Beck would get started with Project Delta.

SM: 42:00
Did not he-he- he promised them they either get a medical badge, or body bag or both?

JS: 42:10
Yeah, well. Medal [inaudible]

SM: 42:12
[chuckles] Yeah.

JS: 42:15
That is, that is a heck of a sales pitch, whatever group that worked. And so you know, and as I said, when he got to, you know, he had been clamoring for such a command for years, and nobody wanted to be part of Beckwith right in the upper but he had a few friends. And they finally said, Look, we were giving you this project, Delta, you know, go to go to Vietnam. Mm-hmm. And he showed up in in, I believe, was NhaTrang. And tried to, you know, see what his guys were up to, they were all nowhere to be found. They were all party and downtown, and you know, with the bar girls and all the rest. And he just, you know, he went ballistic and fired nearly all of them. And that is when he put that call out. He says, if these guys do not want to do what I want them to do, then they were going to go- and then I am going to find my kind of guys. And that is that is how we did it by reaching out with those flyers and saying, look, I can promise you a metal of body bag or both. And you got to be these certain things and come on, but he liked [inaudible] even though he was not he did not have the CIB. At that point. He liked White. And he thought he was a peace guard. And he was older, you know, 31 I mean, that is, that is what Beckles was looking for, you know, they one of the sources said, These guys made you feel good, because they were older. You know, they had they had their brizzle they that white and their beards and-and you know, they had been through some shit and Korea and World War Two, and you just felt safer and better when those guys arrived on the scene?

SM: 43:03
Yep. Yeah, when I visit the Vietnam Memorial on Memorial Day, Veterans Day, I always see people who are a few of the Montagnard who are there. And they make reference to it sometimes in some of the guest speakers, but I do not think there has been enough written about them and-and their importance in the Vietnam War, especially being our fighting side by side with Americans. Because in reality, I believe you state pretty emphatically that they did not like the Vietnamese that well, because they were treated as less than human almost by them. And could you talk a little bit about the role that the Hmong and the Montagnard have played in the Vietnam War? Now you describe it in the very early part of the war and in 1965, and 64. But they were they were there throughout the war. So who are they? Where did they live? And-and how important were they in the war for America?

JS: 44:54
Well, um, the and I will hasten to say this, I do not know about the Hmongs but I do know about the mind yards that not all of them were on our side. There were minors who sympathize with the Vietcong. And were, you know, be a con agents. So there was always that danger, right. And several special forces camps were sort of attacked from within. Because the Montagnards that were in there were actually Vietcong agents, even though they were ethnically Montagnards. You know, so I think that sort of disdain, you know, went, you know, kind of both ways, right, I oftentimes think of the way the Montagnards were looked upon by the Vietnamese is the way that like the Americans of the Old West looked upon the Indians, right? The Native American tribes, it has been there a long time, but they just did not, they did not like them. And they did not treat them well. And they were different. And they were primitive by their standards, and all the rest of this sort of, and of course, that empathy was returned heartily by, you know, tribes to the Apache and Comanche and so forth. Right. Same thing with the-the Montagnards. So they were not uniformly on the American side, but they were there, enough of them were, especially when they could be with Americans. And they could see sort of, like the broader advantages of being with Westerners, right, with new technology and education and improved agriculture, and things like that, they can kind of see their own their own self-interest. And plus the, you know, largely the Americans that they dealt with did not, you know, they were not, they were not conscripting them, like the Vietcong were and so forth, it was more of a, a little bit more of a partnership rather than kind of conscripting you into the service of the infrastructure. So they were they were very valuable. And, you know, the, the civilian regular Defense Group. CG, right was something that was valuable early on, because it helped secure, otherwise endangered villages from being taken over by the Vietcong in the back country. It sort of taught though, in law, these were mountain art villages, right. And so it taught them to defend themselves. And, and it is sort of spread, if not total allegiance to Saigon at least resistance to being taken over by the Vietcong. Right, so this is something they were happy with. But when one the program began to morph into an offensive instrument, rather than self-defense, but actually organizing the Montagnards and into strike forces, and saying them out and putting them on ambushes, and, and really even more so uprooting them from their, you know, their ancestral lands and moving them into these heavily fortified camps, it is sort of, you know, you got some manpower, and at least for the most part, this manpower was not being used against you. But it was not quite that organic, you know, self-defense, vibe that was going on early on the program. And a lot of the reason for that is, you know, because it was the control that was devolved from CIA and Special-Special Forces to, you know, MACV. And so they wanted, they wanted to, they had all these guys on their arms, they want to put them out there and do interdiction and, and, you know, ambush and offensive operations against the Vietcong. But they were they, you know, it just like we were seeing, you know, just like you see all the PTSD that people in Iraq, who helped us, you see the people in Afghanistan, who helped us the interpreters and all the other people who put their faith in the United States, you know, in the end, they get abandoned. And that is what happened with the Montagnards.

SM: 49:03
Yep.

JS: 49:05
And they have got, you know, and you know, some of them really had some pretty terrible experiences, and so-called reeducation camps and all the rest after the war, and, you know, horrific injuries, and, you know, all the promises that were made for pensions and, and health care, and all of these things that, you know, they were promised earlier on in the war, obviously, they cannot be fulfilled, that there is no longer a South Vietnamese government in the United States long gone. And so they were left just left out to dry and, you know, it is just, it is tragic. And it is, it is, it is infuriating. And, and I guess it is just, you know, the way we do things, you know, because you see it repeated in places like Iraq and Afghanistan to this day.

SM: 49:53
When you look at the-the early part of the war in 64 and 65. I looked at the leaders that were leading at the time in South Vietnam and in America, and all of them were under a lot of pressure, they felt that- Johnson did not have it in the beginning because he had a lot of support for the war and everything. But the one person that stands out as a leader is Ho Chi Minh. I remember reading a book that said the in before he died, that he was Vietnam. There was no question even the people in the north and the south, he was admired by a lot of people because of who he was and experience and he had one- is the one that wanted to support the Geneva Accords. And-and of course, the United States and South Vietnam would not have anything to do with it. But that because they probably knew that, you know, he would be the one that they would be elected or whatever. But that just I do not know if you have ever thought of that. But they-they revered him. So people have been off for the on their side revered Ho Chi Minh.

JS: 51:07
Yeah, one thing that I would- that I learned over the course of all this is that by the time all these figures died in 69, and so by the time a lot of this stuff was transpiring, even the early part of the war, he had already become something of a figurehead.

SM: 51:21
Right.

JS: 51:21
And, but he was still a symbol, right?

SM: 51:24
Mm-hmm. Yes.

JS: 51:26
-Calling many shots anymore, even-even into the even into the early and mid (19)60s. He just getting old, you know, but

SM: 51:33
Right.

JS: 51:33
-he had been around a long time. And he had to gather gravitons. He has had the chops. And you know, and I think to do from a strictly real politic perspective, he was willing to do or say whatever it took to get, you know, what he wanted? And that was the independence of Vietnam under whatever government.

SM: 51:51
Mm-hmm.

JS: 51:53
You know, so, but you are out and you are right. I think the average person in Vietnam would look at him and say, you know, that is, you know, that is Uncle Ho, that is the leader.

SM: 52:03
Yeah.

JS: 52:03
That is the That is the guy. Right? Who's, who's been at this for decades?

SM: 52:09
Yes, yes.

JS: 52:11
Yeah. And that another reason why Giáp was so revered too, because he had, you know- -not only was he effective military commander, but he-he paid his dues. He been in there for so long. And of course, you know, all when you start getting into political machinations of what was going on in Hanoi, you know, Lai [inaudible]. And, you know, he had usurped you know, they were on two opposite sides of things.

SM: 52:17
Yep.

JS: 52:19
Mm-hmm. -And, and, and he had you serve both-both Ho Chi Minh and Giáp and, you know, marginalize them, but still recognizing that, you know, they, they had their people who revered them. So, it is interesting to see the different, you know, leadership qualities, but they were always [inaudible] Giáp and his, his, his supporters were always going for the big, dramatic win, and Ho and Giáp we are all about, you know, let us take it slow. What is going -on mental it is going to happen, you know, let us not you know, and, and believe me, the Vietnamese are South Vietnamese, South Vietnamese communists, were, you know, quite skeptical of Lai's wild strategy, because they knew they were going to be the ones who took the [inaudible]. And they did in (19)68, when they rose up in Tet, they took horrific beating. And they destroyed all these carefully built, you know, cadre and infrastructure over the years and not to mention, you know, just plain old main force units just wiped out. And they took a huge hit for My Lai’s desire, this dramatic victory in this this win-win now mentality. Right. Right. Right.

SM: 53:49
Early on, when he early on in your book, you talk about the first group that was taken care of Plei Me and then the tragedy were four, four were killed in a helicopter crash. And I think it is important that people read your book, because not only do you describe this important whole event itself, and it is linkage to early part of the history of the Vietnam War. But the fact is, it shows that Americans are dying little by little by little by little. If you look between (19)59 and (19)65, how many really died, you go to the Vietnam War and you see that there is, you know, how it gets bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger. We are, we are, we do not talk about the Americans who are dying now in (19)64 and (19)65 advisors. And so you really do a great job of that, you know, itis sad to hear about number six died here for died here, but those add up

JS: 54:54
Mm-Hmm.

SM: 54:54
-and they are Americans. And I almost cried when you when you talked about the helicopter that crashed and the four young men, the four men who died their age, whether they were married, you know where they came from. And you-you did a great job. And in some in sections of the book about their backgrounds where they came from how they ended up in Vietnam, I mean, a tremendous job, just but could you talk about those four their pictures or in the book two of those four that were in that helicopter?

JS: 55:30
Yeah, that was, that was the-the helicopter gunship that was trying to get- they had been running. They have been running close air support all through the night, up until that point, and because, you know, the Air Force could not get there soon enough. So they were really the kind of the first responders if you will, and they, you know, they had run story after story. They had gone back. refueled rearm that on how many times and then they were tasked with putting in Captain Lanny Hunter who was the-the C two surgeon, and they felt like if they could get him into the ground on Plei Me , then they would- he would be able to do things not only you know, care for the wound and everything but also it was something that he called the physicians mystique, it would make the-the guys who were there kind of look and say, you know, the doctors here the real doc, not a medic, but a real surgeon, a real who knew a lot of the guys who was well respected. And they said it can it can it not only it can, he can do things and help save lives that an average medic could not do but he could also inspire he could also be you know, a real morale boost. And so he agreed to do that he talked it over with his-his commanding officer and they said what you are doing at first light and this was the very first morning of the of the Plei Me siege. And so but the you cannot just fly a medivac chopper in by itself, you got to have some kind of gunship support. And so these two crocodiles, which is what the-the 119th called, they were, they were gunships. They were, they were alligators and crocodiles, right the alligators with slicks, they were the ones who killed the troops and, and supplies and so forth. And the gunships were the ones who were just the bristling helicopters with weapons. And so they say you got to fly in. And that is what happened is they flew in, and they were going to, they needed to get Lanny Hunter into the camp. But they also needed to get some wounded out, they needed to drop off some supplies. So you tried to get make the most out of every helicopter run into this into the teeth of all this anti-aircraft fire. And, you know, what happened was they- you know, they went in the metabank, that love Lanny Hunter was on came in, and sort of when he went into his flare, he came in too fast, maybe and caused them to be a little too high. And so he was a sitting duck. And so what happens is the gunships have to go and draw fire away from them. And they did that. But they unfortunately went right into the teeth on the southern portion of the camp of where most of the North Vietnamese anti-aircraft fire was concentrated. Got shot down. And you know, and the real tragedy for the whole unit 119 was they-they could not go get those guys, the area was just too hot. And they just, you know, they died like that in there. They crashed

SM: 58:47
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 58:47
-molting bolt in flames, and they all burned. And they were just young, you know, young guys,

SM: 58:53
Right.

JS: 58:53
-wives and kids on the way and everything like that. But they could not go get them until the siege was over, because it was just too much fire too much, too much any enemy activity. So they just stayed out there for days and days and days. And finally, you know, as you know, for the book, I was able to talk to one of the guys who went on the mission to get them. And it was just a really, really horrific event and heartbreaking to say the least.

SM: 59:18
And you lost another one there and Mr. Bailey.

JS: 59:22
Yes. Joe Bailey. Yep. Yep. And he was he was on the ground, right, one of the one of the Special Forces troopers occupying or, you know, garrisoning the camp

SM: 59:36
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 59:36
and then to go out and try to rescue these guys who had been shot down and the way they were man, the way they described it was this, you know, because I asked them all the same question. I said, "Why would you risk yourself to go and get someone you did not know" or "Why would you risk yourself to help some guy on the ground that you did not know?" And they all said the same thing "It was because they do it for us, you know." So it is like reciprocal agreement, that even though we may not know each other, we were all we were on the same team, and we were going to try our best to save you under any circumstances. So the guys that were in that helicopter that got shot down, we were trying to help the guys on the ground, and they had been helping them all night running gun runs, you know, to try to suppress the NBA attacks. And, and on the flip side of that, the guys on the ground saw that helicopter go down, and they said, We got to go get them.

SM: 1:00:36
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:00:37
It does not look good. But we got to go try. And they went out onto the wire, and they got ambushed, and they got, you know, Joe Bailey lost his life that day trying to help guys who he did not even know, but who would have to help him.

SM: 1:00:52
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:00:52
And that is that free to call that thing that is in the military that that so many of them say they miss that you just you cannot you know, just some average civilian or something who did not know who you can trust. You know, meanwhile, this guy, they do not know each other, but they were, it is just part of the ethos. They tried to help me so I am going to go try to help them and I made and lose my life in the process.

SM: 1:01:13
We need that in America today.

JS: 1:01:17
Well, the [inaudible] right-

SM: 1:01:18
-[inaudible] about everybody.

JS: 1:01:22
That is what a lot of these guys coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan have said in the past is like, you know, how do you know who to trust? -You do not have that camaraderie. You do not have that, that that brotherhood, that sisterhood that you had, while you were downrange. And, you know, Sebastian, younger, I do not know how what you know about him. But you know, if you are interested in such things, he has written, you know, very, very passionately and persuasively about, you know, young men in combat and what they miss, about being in combat-

SM: 1:01:55
Hmm.

JS: 1:01:56
-and about being military and so forth.

SM: 1:01:58
Hmm.

JS: 1:01:58
And, you know, he is a guy, you know, he is one of those, those long form journalists, as literary journalist who goes and does the thing. You know, he is with the guys. Right. And that is one thing that is, that is always impressed me is the, you know, he spent [inaudible] spent months in the Korengal Valley in Afghanistan with his group, and he did a 3-3-3 documentary films and-

SM: 1:02:23
Wow.

JS: 1:02:24
-at least one book on it. So I do not know, Steve, if you are interested in things like that. I just throw his name out there.

SM: 1:02:29
Well, I am very interested in and of course, I knew Wallace Terry, who wrote Bloods. And he was with the African American soldiers by their side during the war.

JS: 1:02:39
Yeah.

SM: 1:02:39
-yeah. So that is something and of course, Joe Galloway. Oh, can say about Joe, my goodness, one of a kind. Could you give us- for people who are studying this down the road? Plei Me, you know, it had been there a while but as you start your book with that first group, and then you have got the back with group coming in and three reinforcements with Delta Force, and then the [inaudible] comes in, right to the very end of your book, you talk about the reason why Plei Me, the soldiers and Plei Me survive. Could you talk about the thanks that you gave to the groups that came in that dropped the food that dropped bombs around the sort of camp? Could you talk about those people who risked their lives to say these to save Plei Me.

JS: 1:03:33
Yeah, I mean, I heard it described by many sources that it was just a wall of anti-aircraft fire every time you would approach that camp like you would like, like if you were out in the woods, and you have got a stick and you actually hit a hornet's nest and they will just come buzzing out I mean, every time that they would fly their helicopter or fixed wing aircraft near that camp, this round would just light up with an aircraft fire just trying to just shoot down as many aircraft as possible kill as many people as possible

SM: 1:04:03
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:04:04
and of course you know all that ratchets up the pressure right on we got to get this relief force there and of course their ideas they want to ambush the release force too. Yeah, I mean, think about that for a second. I mean, all of those guys and those helicopters and in those-those a One Sky Raiders which was like a, an old-World War Two prop plane that they use for close air support and Vietnam. And you know, coming in and laying down Napalm and you know, cluster munitions and 20-millimeter cannon fire, all of this to constantly try to beat back the NBA assaults on the wire to try to, you know, to bomb them at least enough to keep them far enough away from the camp even so that they could not just constantly rain down fire

SM: 1:04:56
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:04:57
benders and you know, and then you get the resupply, right, coming in, on-on-on-on these big transports for both the Air Force and the Army. And, you know, these are lumbering aircraft compared to, you know, a Canberra, you know fighter bomber or

SM: 1:05:21
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:05:21
even a helicopter and maneuver around these things are pretty much flying in a straight line, and they would make up these pallets of supplies. So that they would, they would drop even faster because the area that they could drop the supplies in was very, very limited Plei Me was not that big to begin with. And then they had this sort of inactive defense that went far out away from the act of the active line of defense where there were man gun trenches and all that they had sort of like a no man's land that was outside of the camp with barbed wire and claymore mines and things like that. But if supplies landed in there you would be you take you take your life in your own hands trying to even get to it because it was constantly under fire,

SM: 1:05:38
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:06:07
-And so the just the skill of the pilot, and the Air Force, or I am sorry, these special forces, riggers, right the ones who rigged the pallets up in the first place, specifically, so that they would drop quickly. And so the planes would come over, they only have a second or two to release the load. And they wanted it to drop right into the camp. So they not only the guys who get it, but so that the NBA could not get it

SM: 1:06:07
Right.

JS: 1:06:32
-It is the level of skill. And meanwhile, you have got the board air controller, sort of like I would like it him as like the conductor of an orchestra. And he was up there in a little O-1 bird dog observation plane. It is like a Cessna. And you know, he was marking things down with a grease pencil on his plexiglass of his of his of his of his plane, you know, all the different flights that he has got stacked up and he was in ease and again, he was orchestrating all of this and calling in okay, you know, flight 2 you can go now

SM: 1:06:32
Mm-Hmm. Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:07:06
-going to run, okay, we have got a supply run coming in, imagine the pressure,

SM: 1:07:11
Yeah.

JS: 1:07:11
-of that skill that is involved in that, all of that to keep these guys on the ground alive.

SM: 1:07:18
Yep.

JS: 1:07:19
-And, again, not knowing any of them. Really, I mean, you might, you might have met a guy here, there. But for the most part, there is guys on the ground that need help. And in to do all that and to bring in all of that heavy-duty ordinance so close to the base, but not kill anybody. was amazing. They wanted some, including the camp commander Harold Moore took some shrapnel from close air support, they came in too close. And a couple of Montagnards were crushed to death when a supply pallet came right down on top of their gun trench.

SM: 1:07:54
Wow.

JS: 1:07:54
So it was not it was not without hazard.

SM: 1:07:57
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:07:57
But most part in a hot complex situation. These guys really, the skill and determination they exhibited over that week was just amazing.

SM: 1:08:09
Could you give um if someone wants to know more about Plei Me, what would be the date, the date the month and the days in 65.

JS: 1:08:20
Mm-Hmm. So that is going to be October 19th through October 25th is the official length of the siege 1965 There are things that happened before it there was leading up to it and there were some things that happen after it.

SM: 1:08:37
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:08:38
Both are talked about in the book, but that siege itself ran from October 19 to which was a Tuesday I believe all the way through the 25th is when the seed was officially lifted when that South Vietnamese armored Task Force finally arrived.

SM: 1:08:55
Yeah, and-and then the La Drang Valley was only about three days later.

JS: 1:09:01
Well, well-

SM: 1:09:02
-that means remember, like,

JS: 1:09:05
The pursuit started almost immediately. But you are right. When you think about the, you know, Colonel Hal Moore -and most of the seventh and what we think of as the beginning of the La Drang on November 14.

SM: 1:09:13
Yep. Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:09:19
That would be that was after a really frantic pursuit of the forces that had to besiege Plei [inaudible] and Plei Me that was always the big complaint from American commanders at that time. Was that the Viet Cong and again, they thought these were the Viet Cong up until maybe halfway through the siege and they started to realize oh, this is actually the PAVN right People's Army of Vietnam as the NBA. And so that one complaint they always made was that they were always allowed to attack and then just drift away and to pick and choose their time. They were going to attack and the first cab was like, we were not going to do that we were not going to allow them just to attack and run away and regroup, we were going to pursue that. We were going to we were going to kill them however we possibly can. And so it was a frenetic frantic pursuit over those weeks until how more landed has the first of his battalion in at the, at the base of the Tupac massive in on November 14. And it was marked by some success. But mainly, it was, it was, it was pretty frustrating for

SM: 1:10:32
Right.

JS: 1:10:32
first [inaudible].

SM: 1:10:33
Yep.

JS: 1:10:34
You know, they-they could pin him down sometimes, but the you know, they-they burned a lot of fuel. And they had a lot of mechanical problems because they kept running the helicopters so hard. You know, they get an A for effort. They were trying to make it happen. But they got a quick introduction to how difficult it was to deal with that terrain and with an enemy that can, you know, can hide and disperse. And but they both sides finally got their battle on November 14th. And we know what happened after that.

SM: 1:11:06
Yep. Joe Galloway was lucky to get that, or unlucky. But I think he would say lucky to get that helicopter ride into the area.

1:11:16
And he came into Plei Me to you know, he sort of BS his way on and had a buddy and all the rest of it. That got him into to Plei Me and he told me that story for the book. So he kind of got that first. You got his debit there and then left with the first [inaudible] and then ended up, you know, of course, going in a couple of weeks later. On that first.

SM: 1:11:41
You-you talk about also toward the end of your book, The you break down the losses from Plei Me how many Americans died? And how many of the enemy you think died? Could you break that down a little bit more?

1:11:56
Yeah, well, we had seven Americans who were killed. 11 if you count the four guys that were on the recon, that really re-catch up, it was a gun, gunship escort for when Beckwith was looking for a proper LZ for his insertion. So those that have a mechanical player, but they still died and they died in service to their country. And when the rotor came away from their helicopter, technically, you could say that they also perished in the siege because they were directly participating. Then you had you know, scores of South Vietnamese and Montagnard were killed. And the NVA regiments that were there were they fared pretty poorly. The counts on the 33rd regiment, which was the one that actually laid siege to Plei Me are much more accurate. Whereas the 32nd, the one that was tasked with ambush in the relief column, they- body counts are not nearly as reliable. But the 33rd definitely took a horrific beating. And one of the reasons was and ironically, it may have been because their seeds went on so long, that they just were they were subjected to relentless and brutal air bombardment

SM: 1:13:23
Yes Right.

JS: 1:13:23
-and attacks from the camp itself for seven days, you know, nearly you know, and, and doing the-the South Vietnamese relief force was so slow in getting there, it just, it just drove the siege out day after day after day. And these guys just were pummeled. So I do not remember the exact figures off the top of my head, but I know that several, several, several companies pretty much cease to exist. In the 33rd I know that several battalions they lost all I think all of their battalion commanders was killed, or maybe two or three, they lost a lot of a lot of their equipment, which at that time was in really short supply for the North Vietnamese, you know, there was any aircraft guns and, and, and recoilless rifles and all that stuff was-was gold to them, especially in those early days and they lost a lot of that, but also lost a lot of manpower. -32nd even though it had taken a beating out there on Route five, again, body counts are not as reliable. Most sources seem to think conservatively they lost a couple of 100 guys, which is still a chunk, you know, that is a lot that is a that is a lot of people to lose, and but they were able to escape and make their way out and I do not think that they saw any more action for quite some time but the 33rd was harassed and chased the whole way from Plei Me by the first cab until they actually got to the base areas in the Ia Drang. And I think if memory serves now we are getting into Joe Galloway's territory here. But I think that the 33rd did participate somewhat in the Ia Drang battles, it was mainly the 66 NBA regiment, but I think the 33rd did in that course they lost more guys.

SM: 1:15:18
Right.

JS: 1:15:19
So, by the time it was all said and done, they and they abandoned South Vietnam and started across the border to Cambodia,

SM: 1:15:28
Right.

JS: 1:15:29
Both of those regiments, the 33rd. And the 32nd that besieged Plei Me were pretty badly mauled. But they could then take-take refuge in Cambodia, and get replacements and rest and recuperate and get more supplies. And then when they were ready, they could go back into the fight, which is what those sanctuaries allow them to do.

SM: 1:15:54
I have a couple of questions now that are just general questions on Vietnam, and I just like your thoughts. A lot of the books and a lot of historians have stated that America was not prepared for this war. They did not understand the culture of Vietnam, they did not, they were not prepared for a guerrilla war. I think Special Forces though, were pretty good at countering them. But they did not understand the language. They should bet-bet-better understood the history. And when Robert McNamara wrote his book, In retrospect, several years ago, he admitted that he, he knew we were not going to win the war. But he still left in 1967. And the war was still going on. And I know Senator McCarthy never forgave him for that. Because I interviewed Senator McCarthy and said that, In retrospect, was a bunch of garbage in his view, because he should have done that way before 67. Your thought about America? What has America prepared for this war?

JS: 1:16:54
Prepared? That is right. What are we talking about? Are we talking culturally, politically, militarily? All of the above-

SM: 1:17:01
-all of the above? Because, you know, because did they understand guerrilla warfare? Do they understand the history of Vietnam? You know, all you had to do was listen to Ho Chi Minh, he could have told you everything. So just your thoughts?

JS: 1:17:17
Yeah, I mean, I think right, culturally, I think that, that they did not, they did not even a lot of Americans did not even know where it was right. And they did not, they did not really see public fans are the nuances of, you know, Cold War geopolitics, it was pretty much like, where our president says, we need to be there. Those are the commies we need to do. And that is probably the deepest it was ever thought of by, you know, just on the average American, those who are even aware of it. Then you get the guys who are charged with prosecuting the war. You are right. I mean, ever since 1945, in the end of World War Two, America had been preparing for a large set piece, geopolitical struggle against the Soviet Union, and to a somewhat lesser degree, China, right.

SM: 1:18:22
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:18:22
And so the emphasis was on, you know, big weapons, big units, air power, all the rest to defeat a foe that could pose an existential threat to your country. And-and, of course, you know, Vietnam was not that, you know, it was. So I agree, I think today, they were taking somewhat by surprise, I think that they thought that kind of like the incremental. The incremental approach gradiated pressure that McNamara approach with LBJ is at least acquiescence, right?

SM: 1:19:01
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:19:03
To keep the pressure up, and, you know, keep trying to get concessions and keep trying to get them to come to the bargaining table. I mean, they did not I do not think they knew what they were dealing with. And you would think that you could look and just see from the-the perspective of the French. But again, I think that the Americans thought at the time, and they were justified in thinking that we had more capabilities than the French

SM: 1:19:29
Right.

JS: 1:19:29
-we had, we had better weapons, and we had better tactics. And we were- the French had just gotten beaten in World War Two and works for some of the reasons we supported them in Vietnam was to try to get them back on their feet because we saw it as a way to do as an anticommunist block to have a strong France again. Probably a lot of Americans leadership did not they did not want to see colonies anymore. They did not want to see they knew the third world was changing. You are right. I think a lot of these things it took them by surprise and-and just like inch by inch, step by step, they got deeper into something. And I think by the time they realized and adjusted strategy, and then we are talking getting into (19)72, which kind of comes to my, my second book that will be coming out here in a few months, is that, you know, by that time, all of the goodwill and all of the political capital, everything had been expended.

SM: 1:19:47
Mm-Hmm. Mm.-Hmm.

JS: 1:20:12
And that by that time, Congress wanted no more part of it, and neither did the American people. And so, you know, that is the Nixon felt, felt a heavy pressure, he had to get out, and he had to get out. And, you know, the election of 72 was-was the-the new Congress coming in the new was going to be sworn in, in early 73, 93rd Congress, and he knew it was going to be hostile to Vietnam, especially it had been growing more so. And so I think that by the time they figured it out, they figured out how to fight the war, what the priorities should be, and all the rest of it. That coupled with the defeat of the Viet Cong in 68 Tet all of those things came too late. And I think that by the time they figured out what they should do, and then Watergate happened in Nixon lost all of whatever little capital he had, and then finally resigned. And at that point, we just pretty much washed our hands of the whole thing and, and left South Vietnam on its own. In the process-

SM: 1:21:44
Yep. Arthur Schlesinger, the historian who was a special assistant to President Kennedy, said, said that Kennedy picked the best and the brightest for his administration. And of course, administration stayed on with LBJ, a lot of them after Kennedy was assassinated, set for Bobby who took off within a year. Look at what they did under Kennedy and Johnson. And when we are talking best and brightest, he is referring, I think, and mostly to Robert McNamara, and McGeorge Bundy.

JS: 1:22:23
Mm-Hmm.

SM: 1:22:23
And can you throw Dean Rusk in there as well? I get that. Yeah, they might. is bright, always smart. That is the question I want to ask. And, and I do not think they were very smart. If they could not see what was happening, and particularly and I have different views. I have interviewed Robert McNamara's son. He has got a new book out too, on his father. And I have a little more and even Bobby Mueller grew to like Robert McNamara in overtime because he debated him. However, what Eugene McCarthy told me after In Retrospect came out is that his book was a bunch of garbage is what a lot of people felt because it was a little too late.

JS: 1:23:11
Mm-Hmm.

SM: 1:23:12
If he knew this before, he should have been in the office with LBJ and said stop. I- you know, so, you know, just when you say you know, the best and the brightest, it always goes to Arthur Schlesinger because he was in that group from Harvard, but maybe they were not the best in the brightest, after all. Any thoughts on that? Oh Yeah- yeah, Halberstam wrote that. But you know, Fletcher's always saying it [inaudible]

JS: 1:23:33
Yeah, I mean, that is the that is the book right? It is, we-we look at that and and-and we see it was Halberstam right? Who wrote the book- -Yeah, yeah. And it is true. I just I think that, you know, there is this adage that you fight, you are always trying to fight the last war. And I do not know, I think that they were trying to blame a-a-a-a- the American way of war. I think you are trying to bring it and make the war fit the way we wanted to fight it rather than the realities of what was going on. And again, slash injure or Eugene McCarthy's take on McNamara, you know, it was a little too late. And I would add to that, I would say that, you know, in a different sort of little too late, it was like, they finally figured it out. And we were having real success, but it was too late because they had already they had already burned all the bridges and

SM: 1:23:50
Yep.

JS: 1:23:53
bended all the little and no one believed him anymore and, and then, at that point, they just the people just wanted out in Congress, you know, was going to make that happen one way or another and I just I would look at it, Stephen, I just look at it. It is such a such a tragedy, right?

SM: 1:25:04
I agree. Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:25:05
But if you get if you do it, right, if you do it, then the very least you can do is to is to be successful and to be and to win the thing. And this is what we come back to our beginning of our conversation, the thing that struck me as a young kid starting to watch this stuff starting to study, it is like, it just seems like such a waste. -and one of these guys lost, and then countless others who were named and, and who do you know, even though I said, I did not like the caricature of the Vietnam vets, it is in popular media, I mean, a lot of them did have a lot of problems. And a lot of them came overcame those problems, a lot of them went on to live a very happy and successful lives and still do. In fact, the great majority of them do. But the thing is, is you make that if you make that commitment, and you tell these young men to go do something, at least have the decency to be successful, and make their sacrifice worth something. And to me, that is, that is the tragedy too. And the tragedy is the is the millions of Vietnamese who were who lost their lives. And we were-

SM: 1:26:15
Yes.

JS: 1:26:16
-we were just split. And-and so, you know, what was all that for, you know, to-to, again, I hate this keep coming back when we spent 20 years in Afghanistan, and yet the scales of the enormity of what went on were not, were paled in comparison to-to Vietnam. Still, what was it all for? I mean, what was all those guys who were killed and lost legs? And what was it all for? If you are just going to wash your hands and-and bug out in an embarrassing display at the-the Kabul airport or in Saigon in 75? You know-

SM: 1:26:29
Yes, It is like, it is like in your book use you talk about when all the bombardment is happening around the outskirts of pre-May in how parts of bodies around the wires? I mean, you know, after the all the bombing and taking place, these are these are human beings to from North Vietnam or the Viet Cong. I mean, they were they were babies, ones that have parents that love them and had families and they end up on body parts on a on a, you know, on a wire around a camp it is tragic. And I think the one thing you said at the very end of your book, because that person who saw that soldier, and it was actually thought that the soldier was just in the one I am talking about with a maggots.

JS: 1:27:46
Yes, yeah.

SM: 1:27:47
Could you talk about that, too? Because this is what the tra- this is what tragedy war is all about?

JS: 1:27:53
Yeah. No, it was I think I called it one of wars, little atrocities. I mean, it was just, you know, somehow this, this North Vietnamese soldier had escaped the bulldozers that would have pushed all the bodies into the trenches that they dug themselves and then covered him over and he was propped up against them some foliage. And he would have he had died and compound fracture of his leg probably bled out at that moment, but he had the maggots had gone to work on his face instead of the leg wound. And, you know, the guy I told you about the helicopter pilot, who was walking around kind of looking to see, what he could see was just guessed. You know, he could not he could not believe his eyes. And it is you put it so well, I mean, he hears these guys, and they will they suffered, they suffered on their way down the Ho Chi Minh Trail, they starved and they were sick. And you know, these are things that, you know, we do not really think about, but just the hardship of just that, of just war itself, not even being shot or anything else, just the physical toil that it takes on your body, even as the young man and then at the end of that whole long, arduous, starving sick trip and they get to their their reward is to storm into this camp, and get bombarded by Napalm and become body parts in the wire. And a tragic thing that I found out in my research was is that the the NBA commanders knew that those that they were sending these guys into this mall have-have heard horrific fire. But they had no intention of taking the camp at that point. They just wanted to make the defenders think they were about to be overrun.

SM: 1:29:40
Unbelievable.

JS: 1:29:41
And in these guys against the wire and getting them slaughtered, knowing that really the whole point was is to first destroy that ambush or ambush that relief column and then overrun and destroy the camp. That was all part of the plan. And they knew it. I do not know if the I do not know if the company commanders knew it, but certainly the regimental commanders must have known it. That that was part of the plan.

SM: 1:30:07
Yeah. -wars, not only hell, it is insanity. And then that you just proved it there. And Jan Scruggs wrote a book called Heal a Nation. I do not know if you saw that book. And it was about the importance of the wall and healing America, and certainly healing the families and the loved ones of the Vietnam soldiers who lost their lives in the war. Did that, as Jan said, heal a nation, does a wall heal the nation.

JS: 1:30:07
So but-

1:30:39
I think that it certainly had a powerful effect. And I you know, I have been to it several times. And I have, I have, I seen the reverence with which the people approach it. And not all the guys are, you know, 70s, you know, in Vietnam age, you know, I mean, a lot of young people too, and, and people from different walks of life, and mean, something. And, you know, another thing I think, that helped heal the nation was-was Operation Homecoming, which was, as you know, once the Paris Peace Accords, were finally signed, there was the agreement to get the Viet W's out. And, and the reception that those guys got, everywhere they went, and the POW bracelets and the people the way they were treated, and the way that the-the citizens came up around the country to greet the planes and all of that. I mean, it was really inspiring. And that is what I asked again, that is, that is part of the second book that I am publishing this this winter, is I asked him, what was that? Was that a healing effect on the nation? And I really think that it was I think, law and things like that. helped me get a little better in the end.

SM: 1:32:09
Did you talk to Jan Scruggs at all? If not, he is a good man to talk to.

JS: 1:32:17
Steven I, I will, if I had the chance, I will reach out. But I do have to say this, but I have to go because I got to take my son to eye, to his eye appointment.

SM: 1:32:28
Very good.

JS: 1:32:29
So- is there any kind of last thing you wanted to ask me or?

SM: 1:32:33
Yeah- I was going to say if there is one word that stands out in the 60s and 70s, what is that one word?

JS: 1:32:44
60s and 70s. alike, all the way to the end of the 70s.

SM: 1:32:47
What is there is one word that comes to mind when you think of the (19)60s and the (19)70s? What is that word?

JS: 1:32:56
Chaotic.

SM: 1:32:58
Yeah. All right. Well, yeah, my mind was Vietnam. Yeah. And the last thing I want to ask is, and this is just-just your thoughts? Why did we lose the Vietnam War? And who was the most responsible for this loss?

1:33:14
Why we lost it, I think the strategy, my view was ultimately the strategy. I think that the American- whenever would have lost the American people if we were if we were actively winning, rather than just holding off rather than trying to hold territory or rather than just trying to accumulate body count. But then that opens up an entire other hand, does not it? What how would the Chinese have reacted? If we invaded Laos? I was a Chinese or how would the Soviets have acted if we invaded Cambodia, or at least, you know, create a buffer zones-

SM: 1:33:58
Right.

JS: 1:33:59
-that help prevent those supplies? And, you know, that is the that is the thing is that it is- we do not know. I mean, you got hindsight, we can both look back, and we see the mistakes now. And maybe we do not even see it, maybe we still do not see it. But it is just at the time, you know, Korea loom large and that experience and having all those Chinese forces come in. And I know that America's leadership did not want to do it. They also wanted to, in some ways for NSA, we were not even fighting a war. And if you are going to do it, you got to, you got to go to the American people and say, here is what we have got.

SM: 1:34:43
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:34:44
What we need to do, can you support us and lay it on the line and say, this is what we really think is happening. '

SM: 1:34:53
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:34:53
This is what we need to do. And I do not think that the leadership did that. And I think that the Because of that, it constrain the strategy to one of attrition and holding, you know, trying to hold on to South Vietnam territory, and really fighting it sort of a defensive that.

SM: 1:35:15
My last question is this real fascinating go. I have been asking the last 25 people I have interviewed, what word of advice would you give to the people who are listening to this interview? Who are not even born yet? These tapes are going to be at our center, and people that are born 50 years from now are going to be probably looking at your book listening to this tape. What words of advice would you give to them?

JS: 1:35:46
I would say this, sometimes nation states have to go to war. Just make sure that you get your government to fully explain why you are going to war and-and why it is necessary and what they intend to do to win it.

SM: 1:36:06
Mm-Hmm.

JS: 1:36:09
If they cannot answer those questions satisfactorily, then you have got to not support what is going to happen. And, again, war are sometimes necessary for any sovereign nation, but you do not do it. You do not engage in it. Unless you fully believe and intend to win, and the secure objectives. And if you cannot do that, and your government cannot explain that to you, as a citizen, then you need to be mighty skeptical of it.

SM: 1:36:41
Well, thank you very much, Dr. Saliba. I am going to turn this off now. And I just want to thank you for doing for doing the interview with me and I wish you the best on your new book. Are you still they still-still there?

JS: 1:37:00
[inaudible]. When the book comes out [inaudible]-

SM: 1:37:07
Oh, I would be looking forward to it-

JS: 1:37:17
[inaudible]

SM: 1:37:22
-well, all that-all the people in Binghamton they are-are going to know so that is all you know, we got Dr. Nieman Dr. Nieman in the History department. So you know, you are going to be known that this book, I just want to say that this book that you just written is so important. So important. And I learned an awful lot that I did not know. And I thank you for this and the people anybody connected with Plei Me. I mean, they are American heroes. They are American heroes. That is all I have to say. And what will happen is we will be sending you a copy of this tape digital copy to your email address from Binghamton and then you can listen to it and if you if everything's fine and Okay, so we can place an onsite loan with your picture and a brief biography.

JS: 1:38:15
[inaudible]

SM: 1:38:15
And I tell it to your university that you work at is very lucky to have you that is all I had to say.

JS: 1:38:20
[inaudible] I like that-

SM: 1:38:26
[chuckles] Yes, you are lucky you are You take care. You be safe now. Bye now.

24 August 2022

Stephen McKiernan

Dr. J. Keith Saliba

Dr. J. Keith Saliba is an associate professor of journalism at Jacksonville (Florida) University, where he teaches narrative nonfiction and mass communication theory. He has been writing about the Vietnam War and military affairs, first as a reporter and columnist, and later as an academic. He is the author of "Death in the Highlands: The Siege of Special Forces Camp Plei Me," a Military Writers Society of America 2021 gold medal winner in history. Dr. Saliba has a Ph.D. in Mass Communication and International Relations from the University of Florida.

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Vietnam; War; Veterans; Book; Special forces; South Vietnamese; Camp; Americans; Helicopter; Supplies; Vietnam War