Reginald Hathorn - Here There Are Tigers: The Secret Air War in Laos and North Vietnam, 1968-69

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Here There Are Tigers

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Reginald Hathorn

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Copyright 2008 by Reginald Hathorn

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FIRST EDITION

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Hathorn, Reginald.

Here there are tigers : the secret air war in Laos, 196869 / Reginald Hathorn. 1st ed.

p. cm. (Stackpole Military history series)

Includes index.

ISBN-13: 978-0-8117-3469-1

ISBN-10: 0-8117-3469-2

1. Vietnam War, 19611975Aerial operations, American. 2. Vietnam War, 19611975Personal narratives, American. 3. Vietnam War, 19611975CampaignsLaos. 4. Hathorn, Reginald. I. Title.

DS558.8.H386 2008

959.704'348dc22

2007037711

eBook ISBN: 978-0-8117-4148-4

In memory of the unknown trooper who wrote these words on a scrap of paper at a premission briefing before his LRRP teams insertion into Laos, from which he never returned:

I see as the eagle, clear and all

I listen as the deer, alert, head cocked

I think as the snake, unblinking, silent

I walk as the panther, soft and sinuous

I crouch as the lion, ready and muscled

I kill as the mongoose, swift and sure

I die like a man

I am Mike Force

NKP/CCN

5th SPF

This book is humbly dedicated to all FACs who flew the skies of Southeast Asia during the war in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodiaespecially to those of the 23rd TASS stationed at Nakon Phanom Royal Thai Air Base, Thailand, and to our groundcrews who kept us in the air.

It is also dedicated to the pilots and groundcrews of the Nimrods, Sandys, Candlesticks, Hobos, Knives, and Jollys, who, under the most difficult of conditions, assisted me in our mutual service to our country.

Last, but not least, it is dedicated to those who will remain in Southeast Asia forever. May God always look after these heroes souls who did not come home.

I give thanks to the guardian angel who rode with me through the terror, chaos, and hell of Southeast Asia on The Trail.

W ebsters International Dictionary, 2nd edition, defines the word narration as an act of telling or relating the particulars of an occurrence, or course of events. That which is related: a story.

This is my story, a story of becoming an Air Force forward air controller (FAC). The events I recount are but a few of the combat missions I flew in the skies over Laos, North Vietnam, and South Vietnam in support of U.S. and allied military forces against the North Vietnamese, the Viet Cong, and the Pathet Lao during 1968 and 1969. I flew 229 sorties: 42 in South Vietnam, 21 in North Vietnam, and 166 in Laos. The missions in North Vietnam were flown in support of the 5th Special Forces, MACV-SOG. They, as well as all the missions in Laos, were top secret.

Laos was a land of inhospitable factions, political turmoil, armed insurrection, and invasion by another country. It was an extremely dangerous place to be. Like the tigers that walked its green jungles and misty karst mountains, it would consume the careless and unwary without so much as a hiccup. I unwittingly threw myself into this arena of mystery, secrecy, and danger when I volunteered to become a SCAR FAC. If I were young again, Id do it all over.

I freely admit that I found myself as I flew the skies of Southeast Asia. I found my limitations, my abilities, my weaknesses, my strengths, and I found a belief in God I had never had before. As missions and events unfolded, I became strongly convinced that a guardian angel had attached herself to me to guide and protect mefrom myself perhapsto whisper to me as I flew, to keep me right-side-up.

I also freely admit that, flying my O-2 under the call sign of Nail 31, I came to believe I had a hunting license for an unlimited bag limit. I grew hard, and harder, as I witnessed what the enemy did to our people and their own people. I eventually reached the point where I relished the arrival of fighter-bombers who expended their munitions on the enemy at my call. I grew cold as stone and saw what I did the same way a guy back home might view catching the bus and going to work. Many of us had business cards printed up. At first it was a joke, but after three of my buddiesFAC Captains Bob Rex and Don Luna and my Special Forces covey rider, Sgt. Timothy Walterswere killed, I passed my cards out freely.

Having trouble with hostile neighbors? Need a change?

Call Nail 31, 23rd TASS.

Killing is my Business. Business is good.

Have O-2. Will travel.

Business had been goodtoo goodand each day saw me and the enemys AAA guns in a pissing contest with each other. I won each match, but I came to realize that, like in the Old West, sooner or later a faster gun comes along. My guardian angel began to whisper to me more and more, and one day, as I headed out on a MACV-SOG mission, I stopped in the little chapel set up there in the intelligence building. I knelt in my tiger stripes, laid my Swedish K submachine gun down beside me, and spoke to my angel. I promised that if I came back from this one, Id quit the insanity.