WHITE HOUSE SAYS RAID WAS FULLY COORDINATED

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP72-00337R000300050004-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 9
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 25, 2000
• Sequence Number: 4
• Publication Date: December 4, 1970
• Content Type: NSPR

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White House nlaii!taincd of the raid's possibility in
Thursday that there had August or September, two
been "full coorciinat,ion or three months before it
find discussion" among all occur"red,' but. was not
iiitere=ted agencies of therc!t:ter consulted.
government on the plan At the Defense Depart-
n,in of"the ra.ict at the Son ment, ' Jerry Friccllicinl,
'r'ay prison camp in North
Vietnam Nov,. 20. deputy assistant secretary
White Ifouse :Press Sc- for public affairs, when
).et cry R o 11 a 1 c1 Ziegler asked for comment on The
Wade the statcment in Times' story-, said: "I cat.-
C:onuiientin; on an article not address the CIA's ac_ti-
in. Thursday's editions of vitics or the lack thereof
he Times, arhich report- . lao comment."
cd that I're:..ident Nixon On Wednesday, a White
i? n ci Defense ? ` ccret ry I i o u s e spokesman told
Iel'dn H. Laird had given The Time.: "I won't .=ay
the go-ahead for the raid, one way or another whe-
V,Tkh failed to liberate tiler the CIA was involved.
any U.S. prisoners. with I just can't talk about it."
out cots ultin,g the Central
Intei.iigonce Agency.
Ziegler said, 11 can teal
you ~.x'ithout getting into a
specific di,a:ux ion that
there was full coordina?
tion and di:-cus i.on All.
all perti!!etlt; ;envies in
eluding the CIA" on the
raid. Ziegler declined to
specify when or how often
the CIA was consulted on
the Son Tay mission.
The 'l'imes reported--
and Ziegler did not deny
1VA lI1NGTON -- The tier the CIA was advised.
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ILLEGIB
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 ZOS A GE ES T11, IS.
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'11mc, wash;n,!Dn 13urcau Chirt
WAFI-IIy,'u7i?0\-Pre ident Nixon
and Defcnse f'ccrctarv llclvhl R.
Laird gay e the o allcad ceder for
the raid on the fine '1'h1y POII ci;mp
in North Vietnam hlilhoiit consult-
ing the Central Intelligence \gency,
The 'T'inges has learned.
Key senators who have been con-
cerned about the possibility of an in-
telliUence. failure and who have been
quietly pr?ol.diilt; into the background.
of the mission were incredulous
when they learned, that the CIA was
not involved.
t, It's absolutely incredible," said
one influential senator familiar' with
defense and intelligence matters and
who has not been critical of tile Ad-
miliistratioll's l)ullcy in ietnalll.
"What the hell do we have a CIA
and a director of central intelligence
for'?
,Ili conccivable' Without CIA
A former senior offic?i it who had
been intimately aware of the opera-
tions of all government intelligence
agencies for years said he would
find it "inconceivable" to launch
something like the Son Tay r a i d
without bringing in the CIA.
Senate sources indicated that CIA
Director Richard Reims may have
been advised of the Son '1'ay opera-
tion in its early planning stage --per-
baps in August or September--but
that neither lie nor the CIA was
further consulted before the Nov. 20
raid at the camp, just 23 miles west
of Hanoi.
What is particularly troubling to
competent observers in Congress
and elsewhere in the gover'ilnlent is
that They have believed for 601A_e
Ea
F
h'orei;il I?elatiol.ls Conlnlit-
Ice Nov., 24.
.The, critical question in
this. regard carne up in the
following exchaiige be-
twecn en. John Sherman
'Coopert.R-Iy.) and Laird:
Cowper: "Are you able to
state the period of time in
days bet grecn the date
I.Wlien prisoners of war
were idctltified as"being at
this camp and the elate of
your 111issiQll?
years that the CIA has had agents in
North Vietnam.
What information the CIA had or
alight have been able to obtain from
agents or by other means oil wile-
ther U.S. prisoners werc at Son Tay
before the raid was ordered could not
be determined.
The CIA declined to comment on
that or on the question of whether it
had been consulted in the Son 'Pay
A Defense Dcpaitnleilt spokesman
said "we absolutely won't tali, about
"tile nature or source of the most 1?e-
cent Official intelligence available to
Laird and upon which he relied in
recollllllenciling exeCutiOn of the Soil
Tay mission..
11,'hite mouse 'Can't Talk'
A White House official said, "I
won't say one way or another wile..
ther the CIA was involved. I just
can't talk about it."
Other sources said they were cer-
tain that other than interviews with
the nine U.S. prisoners released by
North Vietnam Laird relied on in-
formation supplied by the Defense
Intelligence Agency, the intelligence
aria of the Pentagon.
"I can assure you," the White
House official said, "that the inter'
ligencc available. to the President on
this matter was as good as it could
have been."
That is precisely the question that
has caused deep, concern in Coil-
gress, the State Department ~1nd
elsewhere since the Son Tay raiders
returned empty-handed and since
Laird's vague testimony on the in-
telligence issue before the Senate
Laird: "Well, that. Would
be very difficult. Of
course, we know that, for
a f a c t, prisoners were
there because of tfte illfor-
lllatloll frolll the very felt'
prisoners who have come
out of \ornl Vietnam. But
to gig e the dates and the
inovemcllts of PO\\'s, we
do not have that kind of
intelligence on the
ground. -
"That cap~lbilify would
he a tremendous asset.,
just as the capability of
having a camera that
would see through the
roofs and into the cells
would be a terrific asset.
Rut we do not have that in
the intelligence conlnluni-
ty at the present tillie.".
.50.50 Chance.
Cooper: "Then it was
"largely -the photographs of
the camp iiself which led
you to attempt the rescue
nlissiQll?"
Laird: "I'liRt was, the
o v e rwhelming evidei ?e
was, of course, attributed
to the very fi;ie aerial re-
connaissance which we
had of the area
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 I.,aird4e?i~,o,~~t4,l.;~lt&r '11"h"oC/ CIA-RDP72-003378000300050004-7
otlt ills .
not fault: the intelligence were Laird, Secretary of
that was supplied to us" Stale William P. Rogers,
even. though no POWs Henry A. Kissinger, Mr.
were found. Nixon's adviser for nation.."
A White House official a] security affairs, and
e m p ha.sizcd Wednesday Adm. Thomas lI o o r e r,
that the President knew chairman of the Joint.
Then lie ordered the raid Chiefs of Staff.
there was only a 50-50 "INO c li a it c e that pi-isn ieos Significance'
were still at the camp, but Asked why Helms or
that. he Believed it was some other CIA represen-?
~iortIi trying. tative was not present, a
Even within the AdiniR ?'hite House official said:
nisuation, kry officials are It doesn't m,-an a thin;.
It has.absoltitely no signi-
troubled over the itiiphca- ficance."
tions of launching an open- helm: did attend a Na-
ation as sensitive as the tional Security Council
Son ?1"ay raid without tap- meeting with the Pres-
ping the resources of the ideiit the following days
but the Son Tay miszion
government's principal in- vas not discussed.
telligenc.e arm, the CIA. ' The White lieu=_e official
,The general feeling is, at confirmed a published re-
the-very least, that it was
imprudent.
question Heillaiils
"1. can't understand it,"
said one qualified State
Department official. "It
might not have made any
difference in the end. The
decision might have been
the same. The DIA (De-
fense Intelligence Agency)
might well, have had the
best available information.
But not to seek the coun-
sel_of the agency whose
business it is to find nut
ghat is happening in oth-
er countries is certainly a
departure .fram estab-
lished and sound practice
in national security deci-
sion-making."
NVhy the CIA was not
consulted is a question
that may well be put to
t h e Administration by
either the Senate'Foreign
Relations' Committee or
t?Se Senate Armed Servi-
es Committee.
While the White House
and the Defense Dcpart-
n.ent will not acknow-
ledge that the CIA* was ex-
cluded from the Son Tay
operation, at least in its
critical stages, it is conced-
ed that the agency was not
represented at, the "deci-
sion meeting" with the
President two clays before
the raid. ?
port that the President.
slipped Laird a note on
Soli Tay during the meet-
P;irapbraziiig the Pres-
ident, the official said Mrr?.
Nixon wanted to assure
Laird that Inc believed the
planning of the mission to
be carried out the next
day-had been superb and
that there would he no se-
cond-guessing by the Pres-
ident no matter how it
turned out.
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 (.C 5 1:1;u114. i 111,] a. works for SOl11e tllll . .I )e-
n ~ ~ -sA could safely pierce North tailed target information
914 Vic nag r' fL a d r was available
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However, the view of a natural complement to sauce plane was lost over
SAIGON 0111'1.1ON- i _Nixon.- Laird. awareness tale major air strikes of North Vietnam sov. 13,
j
Y S yi1s -:iS
Iii I EOitGJ i'lCJ'TIiUR
Times Stall 1'.rilci-
SA.IGON---Soule intelligence ex-
perts in Saigon--while denying spe-
cific knowledge of the event--think
it is almost certain that leaders of
the cominanci.o raid on Son Tay
knew the camp was empty.;
It is inconceivable to some old
hands knowledgeable about clandes-
tine operations in Vietilalll that a
raid o ?fsuch importance would be
mounted on the basis of three-
week-old intelligence-as the Pentagon's
public statements seem to indicate.
It is equally inconceivable that up-
to-date aerial photos were not avai-
lable to Prig. Gen. LeRoy J. i`,Ianor,
who masterminded the swoop on the
prisoner of war camp 23 miles west
of Hanoi.
Detailed Pictures Obtained
that the prisoners had
been moved was indirectly
supported by the raid's
leader, Col. Arthur D.,Si-
nlons, in his press confer-
ence. statements in Wash-
in-ton after the raid.
Asked if he blamed the ab-
sence of prisoners on an
intelligence failure, he re-
plied:
"I am not sure what you
mean by* an intelligence
failure."
He was then asked if
earlier remarks that the
prisoners had been gone
for three weeks indicated
a lack of daily aerial re-
connaissance of the camp.
Ile replied:
"I cannot comment on
the question."
Laird added: "We were
reasonably confident that
t h i s particular location
had been used."
Men associated with ef-
forts in South tirletilalll to
rescue prisoners point 'olit
that being reasonably con-
fident a site had been used
in the past would not meet
the absolute intelligence
Even though the \c-eather was bad requirements one would
in the region prior'to the raid, it was normally expect for such a
not that bad all the tinge.. Further- ill is si.on.
more, a.er'ial reconnaissance would Official spokesmen at
not have disclosed American inteli- the headquarters of U.S.
tions. U.S. planes have, been photo- G e n. 'Creighton W.
graphing, or trying to find, prisoner Abrams have consistently
camps for four years. Startlingly cle- refused. all comment on
tailed pictures can be obtained from the Son Tay raid, Similar-
planes flying, miles overhead. ly, the headquarters of Air
If this scenario is true and reaso- Force commander Gen.
nably recent photos were available, Lucius Clay is under or-
it follows that Manor as well as Se- ders to say absolutely
cretary of Defense Melvin R. Laird nothin'
a''
and PI'esidtalt Nixon were well
aware that American prisoners at Privately, however, offi-
Son Tay had been lno%,cd. cers in both headquarters
a t bite House have been engaging in
official firmly denied, as did Defense some occasionally far-out
Department spokesmen, speculation speculation. It may be
that the President and Laird knew more than speculation, but
no prisoners would be found at Soil no one will admit to any
Tay but orc':crcd the raid for other' hard knowledge of the Son
reasons, Tay raid and it is likely
("The President reali ed there that such information is
would be other benefits from the restricted to only a hand-'
mission," the ,}'elite Iiollse official fled of very, top-ranking
said, "but the primary purpose was people.
to free. our prisotisrs even though This speculation holds bast, such photo recon-
there was the clear possibility all that the Son Tay raid was naissance information was
along that no one would be at the a carefully prepared e;_er- almost routinely released
camp,") CISC to demonstrate to ;, dal""Olt
Itl a n o n d.1' Intelt1E'\\?:,
with the men showed that
the preparations had been
met.iclllous, The chances
Haigc,i that U.S. force., Sources in Sai ,on sa of getting in and getting
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~.7Clb ~
raids had bColl in the 7{cellcnt, and this
was certainly a major fac-
tor.
i-f
Nnv. 21-2,, which were That incident provided
largely mounted for the justification for the raids
same purpose. and was sewed upon im-
The intent was to show mediately by those offi-
YIanoi that despite con- cers at 7th Air Force who
tinuing troop withdrawals already had been advocat-
from South Vietnam, the illy a strike.
Nixoti Administration was '
capable of powerful retail No one in Saigon is
align and was willing to spealking' officially on the
risk considerable world spbject of just when the
wide displeasure in using Soil Tay raid ineca'rne part
it. of the picture. Prepara-
Some sources_ c?onsicler? Lions for that also had
that Laird's original con- been underway for several
ten Lion drat the raids were months, according to the
centered on missile and Pentagon. It Wild been eon-
antiaircraft positions was ceived as far back as Au-
a smokescreen, The real g'ust' -
target was the supply litre The decision to stage the
running pow n the coast two raids simultaneously
which was oulgin, with was natural, military offi-
East bloc trucks and other ccrs say, once it. was decid-
supplica being stockpiled ed to retaliate for the loss
for movement over the Mu of t h e reconnaissance-
Gia Pass onto the IIo Chi plane.
Minh Trail. The planners in Wash-
It is known that the Air ington, however, had to be
Force had been itching to aware that.the raid on Son
-get at these supplies for lay probably would have
s e v e r a'l weeks Mort more widespread reper-
North Vietnam shot clown essions in hanoi than file
a reconnaissance p 1 a n e air raids below the 19th
Nov. 1+i - the incident parallel.
w h i c h olii.wardly trig- Retaliatory air r a i a s
gereci the aerial spectacu- have been staged f re'
lar.ol Nov. 21-22, quentty anti the people of
the north are accustom-r.
Damage Unreported to then]. 'Hanoi's prcaia-
Since the air raids on ganda machine also Ira-
Nov. 21-22, the Air Force mentioned c o in m a n d o
has released no assess- raicls in the past, but these
in e n t of the d a in a g e were, by inference, coas-
caused. Nor has there tal probes designed to
been any indication as to botage",roads and bridge:.
hoer many planes struck The 1 a a din of unl-
SLlpiliy dumps and how formed American soldier
many went after missiles in. helicopters a bare
and antiaircraft sites. miles from Hanoi is anot.h-
Sources in Saigon say, er matter. It was a clear
however, that the total demonstration that instal-
number of sorties flown lations almost anywhere
over North Vietnam was in. the north are about 400. It is likely that le to similar attacks. This
a majority of these strikes point was hot dependent
went against supply ontherescue ofanypriso-
clumps after the first wave ners at all
.
of planes struck antiair- T 'h a t -is why in a n y
craft defenses, knowledgeable people in
Spokesmen at 7th sir Saigon believe the raid
Force headquarters in Sai- went on rearclles.s of the
goo say that; any bomb ca- presence of r prisoners.
rage assessment, known
in Air Force jargon as Son T-a y had be(n
I7DA will have to come cased' since last Aug ;1st
and later Pentagon infni-
from \?lashin?ton In the
 DEC 1970
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7 the North Vletndine e, 'a5
y t~\ 7t ( ~1n r r: / 1 ` t said several 1"; e( 1C5. I1'0
1" ~:~ el .. ?:i Fi ~~ E
[; ~. / ~ r i - t L H \i 'Y
bably as Iol-g as three a result of the raid, would
r ; ? months. But again this is a. be even more strict in
1 ?ianor S no s Shit of C;~ptins at About
Saimme, Tiille Raiders Went Into Trail-iincj
B3.'. STUART 11. LQOItY
:EGLIN AIR F O R C E
BASE, Fla. -- American
.prisoners of war "probab-
ly" were being removed
from the Son Tay camp in
North V i e t n a in, about
three months ago, just
about the time a group of
coinmandos started train-
,in- for a rescue mission,
according to Big. Gen.
Leroy J. Manor.
The general, who coni-
lnlanded the daring mis-
sion, made the rct-elatlon
at a press conference here
.Wednesday in which he
also disclosed for the first
time that fhe courtyard
inside the supposed prison
had been converted into a
'.garden Blot" but that this
Iiad not. been detected by-
Anmer?ican intelligence.
In fact, he 'indicated,
photographs which
showed the topographical
changes inside the com=
pound were misinterpret-
ed.
"I would not say that the
intelligence on the camp
was not good," Manor said
in replying to a question,
"in that it had been identi-
fied some time ago as a
prisoner of war facility.
Unfortunately we were
not able to tell exactly
landed inside the camp,
they found that what.they
thought from photographs
was a prison courtyard
had been turned into a?
garden plot, according to
the general.
"T h e r e was evidence
that the inside of the com-
pound had been tilled and
a garden plot had been
planted inside the corn-
pound," .Manor said. .
Later when asked if ae-
rial reconnaissance photo-
9 raphs had indicated the
agricultural use to which
the area had been put,
Manor ann.''crcd that the
'photos :hawed us there
was activity in the corn-
pound. This would lead
one to believe that that ac-
tivity' was caused by pri-
sioners of war if you as-
smile that this was a priso-
ner of war facility."
His words here, once
again, were confirmation
that the raid was planned
on an "assumption that
the prisoners were in the
compound but no hard
esidence. '
Manor would not say, as
other officials have re-
fused to in the past, what
the last date was that the
United States had definite.
information that prisoners
were being kept at Son
Tay.
when they moved, the pri- Prison Layout
s o n e r s of w a r. That's Asked what evidence the
mighty difficult to tell." commandos had founds af-
The general saws no in-
ter they had landed that
telligence breakdown indi- the commpound. which mea-
cated in the fact that the stared 1S5 feet, by 132 feet,
prisoners cnulcl have been had been turned into a
moved as much as three P0-A%1 facility, -anor an-
months before his men sw?ered:
swooped clown on the tiny "The only ?c v i d e n c e
compound only 23 miles found that it was in fact a
west of Hanoi on Nov. 21 prisoner of war facility
in the hope of liberatidg as was the type of construc-
many as 100 Americans. . tion, the size Of the cells
GAjpprM .d For R' I $; , nr o /a `
t
fi
t
h
th
l
,
enmen
ts e
en
e
s it was evacuated, this is
rather indefinite answer their security around pri-
because the type of con- son camps.
struction that is used in The general said,
that part of the world trill however, that he -knew of
.deteriorate rather rapidly no plans for future raids.
when it is not being used." President Nixon, Laird
If the prisoners had in- and Ambassador David K.
decd been taken out three E. Bruce, head of the
months before the raid, A m e r i c a. n negotiating
that would I:ace been ex- team in Paris, have all left
actly the time training for open the possibility of fu-
`t-he mission began in the tore raids to liberate uris.o-
scrub lands of this; vast Hers.
base--tile largest single fa- When a reporter asked
citify in the Air force, ;Manor why it would not
covering; 144 square miles be feasible to land "a divi-
.along the Gulf of Mexico lion" or an "Army size
in Florida's Panhandle. unit" in North Vietnam to
Secretary of Defense rescue prisoners, the ge=
Melvin R. Laird has testi- fled a replied:
Pied that he gave the go. "I would hope that it
ahead for training for the would be feasible," con-
mission Aug. 11 and that tinning:
actual training b e g a n "Speaking from a per-so-
Aug. 20, three months to real point of view, yes, I de-
the day that President finitely would recommend
Nixon gate the final au- more" such. raids.
thorization for the raid.
'1?hrrs, if Manor's esti-?
mate is correct, the whole
operation, which stretched
halfway around the world
in scope and involved all
t Ii r e.e military services,
was doomed from the be-
g 11111ing.
While the newly' in-
stalled garden plot was
growing at Son Tay, the
commandos and their Air
Force transport t e a in s
were practicing for the
raid. Tuley constructed a
rough dummy of the com-
pound and made, accord-
ing to Laird, some 130
practice assaults at night-
time.
Precise Training
The training, Manor re
sealed, was so precise that
experts here even deve-
loped a way to simulate
the light of a quarter
moon as it would shine on
Son Tay the night of the
mission.
't'hen, before the detach-
ment left for Southeast
Asia, the whole facility
was dismantled to 'main
tarn security. - .
Despite all the problems
with locating the prisoners,
Manor said he would not
only be willing to do it all
over again but that'it was
his lersanal belief that fu-
C1AeRDP714e0Q337R000300050004-7
should be attempted. He
 v
Ili S "" ~i'? d DAILY NEWS
Approved For Release 2000/00/'RIDP72-003378000300050004-7
GIs CHARGE U.S. I-VA111 CRIMES
. 11-1111 1 L_
By JE3tttY OPPENHEIME'?R
A night in a room with pythons, bamboo
.shoots' placed under the fingernails, dunkings
in human excrement, water torture and "the
Bell Telephone hour" are methods used b;'
Army interrogators to force* information from
suspected enemy soldiers, according to a
group of anti-oar Vietnam veterans.
The allegations were made yesterday at the
second session of the National Veterans' "In-
quiry into U.S. War Crimes," being held thru
today at t e Dupont Plaza Hotel.
The forum is aimed at arousing public opi-
nion to the groan's contention that the alleged
My Lai massacre was just one incident in de
facto policy of war crimes committed by U.S.
troops in Vietnam.
Members of the group c,,,-,tend that Lt. Will-1i iam Calley, accused of killing 102 u.en, wom-
en and children in the village of `rlv Lai, is a
scapegoat for high logel commanders.
Steven Noetzel, of Floral Park, N.Y., a for-
mer Special Forces intelligence specialist, tes-
tified that in November, 1963, he was with a
group of soldiers 'transporting 16 suspected
Viet Cong soldiers by helicopter to an interro-
gation point.
He said that when they arrived at Tan Son
Nhut Airport only four of the suspects re-
mained. "They pushed the other 12 out over
the Mekong Delta. A colonel asked what, hap-
pened to the other prisoners and he was told
they tried to escape."
Mr. Noetzel, father of three and an employe
of the Bell Telephone Co., said he didn't wit-
ness the incident, "but I saw flesh on the door
jamb and blood on the floor" of the helicopter.
He said the door gunner told him that the men
had been pushed out.
White working with a psychological warfare
team, Mr. Noetzel said lie had the opportunity
to witness the day-to-day operations of the
Special Forces in the IV Corps area. He
claimed that he saw suspected Viet Cong
placed in barbed wire cages with their hands
tied behind their backs and covered wth mos-
quito-attracting liquid, and detainees thrown
.blindfolded into rice paddies filled with human
waste when they refused to answer questions.
. 'At one camp, Mr. Noetzel said, two or three
prisoners were placed overnight in a room
containing a python snake. "We could heat'
KENNETH B. OSBORNE
them screaming all night." He said he saw
two such snakes ranging in length from 8 to 16
feet.
Kenneth B. Osborne, not studying at the
International Service School at American Uni-
versity;, said he served in Vietnam from Sep-
tember, .1967, to December, 11168, as an intelli-
gence specialist working in an undercover ca-
pacity. He, sid he lived in Da Nang "under a
cover name" recruiting and training South
Vietnamese agents, in cooperation with the
CIA.
Mr. Osborne testified that he witnessed de-
taincees thrown out of helicopters twice during
April, 1968, near Da Nang. He claimed the
acts were committed "by Marine enlisted men
on orders from their lieutenant. I was there to
observe. During my 15 months in Vietnam I
was responsible for deaths."
Several times, Mr. Osborne said, the CIA
asked him "to terminate agents with preju:
dice," which he described as CIA jargon for
killing an agent. After receiving one such or-
der, Mr. Osborne said he told the man to leave
the area because he did not want to kill -him.
Another time he wa told "to terminate with
prejudice" a .Chinese woman who was acting
STEVEN -NOETZEL
as his contact with other agents. "They felt
she was too cross-exposed to our activities,"
he said.
He said he also witnessed bamboo shoots
stuck under the fingernails of suspects and, in
one instance, a sharpened ?ocden dn,Al forced
into the car of a man who. later died. The
so-called "Bell Telephone hour," according to
Mr. 'Osbornee, was the placement of live wires
from a field telephone to the feet, hands, ears
of prisoners,
Gordon S. Livington, of Baltimore, identified
himself as' a 1SS0 graduate of West Point and a
physician who steed during 1968 with the 82d
Airborne as a regimental surgeon. The outfit
was commanded by Co.. George S. Patton, 3d,
who is now a brigadier general serving in Ger-
many. Mr. Livingston, now' a resident in psy.
chiatry at Johns Hopkins, said that the slogan
of thee outfit was "to find the bastards and
pile on."
He said that in February of 1969 he wit
nessed a chaplain in the unit "praying for ,
big body count at the nightly briefings." Mr
Livingston recited the prayer which he al
legedly heard: "Help us, oh Lord, to fulfill the
standing order of this regiment. Give us t i
wisdom to find the bastards and pile on.
Approved For Release 2000/09/14: CIA-RDP72-00337R000300050004-7
 xl~ ;j
1970
Approved For Release 2000/09/14: CIA-RDP72-00337R000300050004-7
`.how P.O.W., Camp Raid, Was Flawed
By WILLIAM 13EECHER with about 10 large' helicop?
Spea;ar to TN' New York Tlmes ters from a base in Thailand.
WASHINGTON, Nov. 25- Several of the helicopters
The planners'of the comman- were empty; they were to
do raid on a North Vietnam- have been used to bring out
Tese prison camp last weekend the 70 to 100 prisoners who
had to take into account the were thought to have been
!position of the moon and So- there.
viet satellites and to gather The sources pointedly re
men from all over the world. fused to say whether, any
Details of the raid on the North Vienacese guards had
;prisoner-of-war compound at been captured and brought
Sontay, which is about 23 out for questioning.
miles west of Hanoi, emerged Such riven might be expect-
from interviews with knowl- ed to provide information on
edgeable officials. when the Americans had been
Both the rescue attempt andrrioved from Sontag, the kind
the air strikes some hoursof treatment they had received
later in the southern prov- there, and procedures normally
inces of North Vietnam were
executed in nearly flawless followed in moving prisoners
from one camp to another.
fashion, the planners said. Men had been taken from
But both operations fell short assignments all over the world
of militar, et ~c t
n
been lnvolvea in sending small
American and South Viet-
namese intelligence teams into
the north.
SOG stands for Studies and
Operations Group. Its assign-)
ment throughout the war has;
been to move into Laos, Cam-;
bodia and North Vietnam to
gather military intelligence on
eluded about 80 men, sources'
say, including administrative
personnel.
Sontay was one of a half.
dozen or so prison camps con
sidered for the mission. It was
selected, sources say, largely
because it had. sufficient flat
space around it to permit the
landing of enough large heli-
such things as location of thought to be housed inside.
enemy troops, supply dumps I One major concern was-that
and concentration of air de- the lumbering helicopters,]
fences. h i ? (skimming the treetops on a'
s
v .
Colonel Simons, w '
years old, has had a long
career of difficult special as-
signments. In 1961, he was in.
charge of Operation White
Star, a combined Central In-
telligence Agency - Special,
Forces effort to organize Meo
tribesmen In Laos to harass
and spy on Pathet Lao and
North Vietnamese activies.
Because of his special ex-
perience, Colonel Simons was
the man quickly chosen to lead
the raid when the attempt was
first seriously discussed early
land, might be detected and,
attacked by North Vietnamese
MIG fighters, or that the task
force might be attacked as St
left.
For that reason, a number
of diversionary flights were
flown by Navy aircraft, drop-
ping flares, jamming North
Vietnamese radar and other-
wise causing the North Viet-
namese to direct much of their
air force and attention out to
sea during the Sontay raid.
3 k, -
'' for the 'Sontag mission, one
'The 50 or so men, who land- even from behind a Pentagon
ed at 2 A.1n. Saturday, Hanoi; desk. The bulk of most, 110W-
time, at Sontay soon discov-'ever, came from Fort Bragg,
ered that the prisoners were N. C., where the Army Special
no longer at the camp. And Forces has its headquarters,
the bombing Florida, home of the Air Force's
so hindered by had weather special air warfare tess,.s.
that they were ended after Most of the training was con-
only about 250 strikes---in- ducted at Eglin. The planning
stead of the planned 500-- was so detailed that a full-scale
reproduction of the prison camp
had been made. .-the layout gleaned from re-
'There were so many corn- connaissance photos-was con-
plex factors that had to be co- structed and every phase of the
ordinated," one source said, operation rehearsed again and
"weather, the phase of the again.
moon, the availability of Navy Mock-Up Camp Destroyed
fighters to provide diversions Then the mock-up 1-ikon
and to be ready to bail the ,camp was destroyed for fear,
team out if it got into 1\4IG however remote, that Soviet
trouble." spy satellites might pick it up
"The factors simply weren't Sontay might be a target for
right until last Saturday," he some future American rail of
declared: some sort.
"We had to wait for just "We also didn't want to keep
the right weather window and it up any longer than necessary
window over Sonta ," In case any prying eyes at Eglin
moon y might see what they weren't
another ..source said. "The. supposed to," one source said.
weather ha+l to be open Security was so tight' that
enough to move in our chop- the planners are convinced
pers and have visibility for there was no advance leak of
our covering fighters. The the mission. Rather, they be-1
lieve, the prisoners were moved
moon had to be just right so. to another camp for prosaic.
that it gave our men enough reasons, perhaps because Hanoi;
light in which to operate, but, felt it could save some money'
very little for the enemy to by consolidating two camps
+`
'discover their approach. It
The Sontay raid was not the
was just a coincidence that first time Americans have
the rescue effort at' Sontay slipped into North Vietnam dur-
and the air. raids in the south- ing the war. In 1965, Col.
ern panhandle came during Arthur D. Simons, the man who!
the same weekend." led the raid on the camp, had
A waning half-moon was been in charge of a group
this year by senior. military jets was kept ready to speed
men of all four services. to Sontay if the raiders were
Decides on Small Team atacked by enemy fighters.
They were determined that,
since Hanoi had shown no
disposition to exchange Ameri-
can prisoners for the 8,000
,North Vietnamese and 17,000
Vietcong prisoners in South
Vietnam, an effort must be
made to free them forcibly.
A total of 378 Americans are
believed to be prisoners in
North Vietnam and 958 more
are missing, some of whom also
may be in captivity.
Some senior officers even
talked among themselves of an
amphibiQus landing by a Marine
division in North Vietnam
aimed at so unnerving Hanoi's,
leaders they might quickly sue
for peace and release all
rprisoners.
(But these and other officers,
convinced that the White
]House would never permit
such a widening of the war,
argued that,the job could be
done by small hand-picked
teams, using surprise to over-
whelm local guards and extri-
cate the prisoners by helicopter.
They laid this 'second pro-
posal before Secretary of De-
fense Melvin It. Laird in late
spring or early summer. In Au
gust, he approved assembly
and training of a special task
force, called Joint Contingency
Task Group Ivory Coast-
Brig . Gen. Leroy J. Manor,
49, commander of the Air
Force Special Operations Force
at F ,1in, was picked to com-
mand the new group. It in-
up when 1AV0'Svdl~06rre~ease~0` ': CIA-RDP72-00337R000300050004-7
 Apro~ved For Releas
From News 17iseaLches
Critics of the administration
clashed with Its supporters in
the Congress yesterday over
whether the unsuccessful
American raid on a North Vi-
e t n a in e s e prisoner-of-war
camp betrayed an intelligeace
failure and jeopardized the
lives of American prisoners.
Senate Democratic Leader
Mike Mansfield (Mont.) ques-
tioned "the reliability of our
n"T
001 9 1 ~-RDE72-00337 R000300
"It was a bold effort by corn
rageous men who would do it
again-and I hope they do,"
Dole said.
"How many men must die in
prison camps, how many
,:omen must be told they're
must be told they're father-
intelligence" in raid "'? 1
re we --1-c some 1'e
w
S
bef
r
C
S,
o
camp that had been vacated
?"o
e asked in the
l
D
spouse
o
fdr several weeks. He and Sen. Senate.
George D. Aiken of Vermont,,
ranking He said if new opportunities
Republican on the: rescue attempts should
e t
Foreign Relations Committee, for occur, the United States
expressed concern for the should take them.
safety of Americans still held "That doesn't mean any en-
prisoner by North Vietnam. "
la "That of the war," y
Sen. Charles II. Percy (R-lie
said. Dole said he had talked
IM) said he was earlier with three women
turbed our intelligence was
not whose husbands are prisoners
accurate" and termed the of war, and "I'm willing to ac-
ac-
raid adangeroas military esca- cept their statement that 'it's
lation of the war.
Senate GOP leader Hu -h to have my husband die
gh
Scott and House GOP whip in a rescue attempt than rot to
Leslie Arends attacked critics death in a prison camp'."
of the raid. "A11 the cloves cm- "We're not talking about an
mediately fluttered their effective a ay of bringing
feathers and took a nose dive American prisoners of war
at the President," said Scot. back when we disagree about
"I wonder what they would be this venture," Muskie said,
saying had several hundred "...If we're going to respond
American prisoners have been to all our frustrations about
found and released," said Ar- the war... by encouraging
ends. such military efforts as this
Sen. Edmund S. Muskie (D one, (what) were doing is em-
the senior Senate Republican was both applauded and criti-.
said in a speech. cized
Mansfield said it would have
been in the national interest
for the President to have
briefed congressional leaders
in advance of the prison camp
raid but added: "I can see rea-
sons why the commando at-
tempt had to be kept under
strict secrecy."
Scn. Edward M. Kennedy
(D-Mass.) also raised the ques-
tion of the effect of the raid
on the safety of American
prisoners. "All of us are
greatly concerned about the'
safety of the men - not just
the immediate but their long-
term safety," Kennedy said.
Sen. Birch, Bayh (D-Ind.)
accused the administration
for taking what he called a
"John Wayne approach."
But Scott said it was more
important than ever to try to
get American prisoners out of
North Vietnam because they
are being tortured, inade-
quately fed, and kept in nar-
row cells in violation of the
Geneva convention fr?? Ih-
Republican Leader Gerald
R. Ford of Michigan called the
sortie "a great effort to try to
rescue some of those -being
held." He said he hoped for
"Wetter intelligence" in any fu-
ture similar operation
Rep. Robert L. Leggett (D-
Calif.) described the raid as "a
first-magnitude blunder from,
the very beginning." Had
there been any prisoners
there, Leggett said, the North
Vietnamese guards probably
would have shot them as soon
as the raid was discovered
If the North Vietnamese re-
taliate against other prisoners,
Leggett added. "it will be a
high price to pay for some-
one's desire to be a hero."
Rep. John V. Tunney (D-
Calif.) called the raid "faulty
in conception and . . . faulty
in ? execution." Tunney, Cali-
fornia Senator-elect, claimed
it was based on bad intelli-
gence and could endanger the
lives. of other prisoners.
Maine) said a repetition or we course that can escalate the treatment of POW's.
prison can ip raid would be whole war." Scott said he suspects that
"risking an escalation of the the wives and mothers of
Muncie as,,-:Ed whether, if
war. the mission was in fact a sym- American prisoners "are on
the paSenate ssion floor for the pris- Muskle - holirc demonstration of Ameri- our side in this."
said id comp as can concern, "did we in the Sen. Henry M. Jackson (D.
gnats, and opposition opposition to the Wash.), a senior member f
o
practices of the North Viet process incur risks which run
namese, "should not blind us counter to the objective of the Armed Services Commit-
to the follies of the adminis?' bringing them home?" tee, also called the effort to
tration's latest military adven- In a Senate speech, Mans- free the prisoners "sound, pru-
ture. ' field said; "I admire the cour..deurt and sensible.
"I am troubled ... that even age of the commandos ... It "I believe the action here
was a bold stroke. But I raisewas fully warranted," he said.
a success in this instance "I believe everything
would still have been a failure questions as to the reliabilityshould
of our intelligence," be done to free our prisoners."
for hundreds of other prison Aiken urged both the Sen?Askecl whether he feared pos-
ers," he said, because it fro'- ate and the administration tosible reprisals against U.S.
that disrupts chances for a ne- exercise restraint in their dis-prisoners, Jackson said', "One.
gotiated settlement that would ? has to take a calculated risk."
free all the prisoners. consign of the new events but
he questioned Mr. Nixon's fail-' In the Rouse also, thQ raid
key Sen
) de- - ri t o members
Robert Dole (R-Kan
r o
ess
i
s
C
ti
.
.
.
ongr
po
s ac
on
on..
h
fended the raid, saying Ameri- "No President in these times
cans are dying in North Viet" can ever hope to fashion for-
namese prison camps, and the eign policy in the inner sanc-
United States cannot wait in- tum of the White House with-
definitely for negotiations to out risking grave repercus-
make some progress. signs at home and aboard,"
Approved For Release 2000/09/14: CIA-RDP72-00337R000300050004-7