View Full Version : SOG Abn/HALO Ops.
A few weeks ago someone had asked about SOG Abn insertions. My reply was that they may have been attempted but were not IMHO practical because of the necessity of recon teams to stay together. Below is a declassified document from that period. Note that one HALO and four static line operations were conducted. Even though the staff in the "Puzzle Palace" determined these to be viable means of insertion, all five operations were aborted since the personnel became separated upon insertion.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/tailwind/twc.htm
BMT (RIP)
04-13-2004, 05:30
CCS had about 5 or 6 SL inserts the year I was there. Drop off Ban Don SCU was hurt on jump and extracted the next morning. Team cotinued the mission.
BMT
CommoGeek
04-13-2004, 06:25
Plaster's first book on SOG had a chapter devoted to HALO jumps by RT's. I can dig it up tonight and post a synopsis if y'all want.
If I remember correctly, it says that only a handful were performed; that they overcame several difficulties; but were rarely successful because of the limitations of MFF over the Indochinese terrain. As a direct result of these MFF missions, one SOG soldier lost his life.
Please treat this as a filler until a proper synopsis is posted, it is all off the top of my head.
Solid
The report I cited gives a synopsis of abn ops conducted by SOG during 1970. This is contained on the last page. Get it from the horsy's mouth.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/tailwind/twc.htm
I served with one man who made a HALO drop with SOG -- Sammy Hernandez. About all you could pry out of him was: "Yep. We did!".
My take is that the operations were conducted but the actual recon missions failed. I jump qualified my team in Special Projects -- TM Cutlass. We were prepared to jump and if you read into some pictures on my web site you will see some selected drop zones. The following is my doctrine and not that of the Military. Abn insertion for recon activity can only be effective at night, (I'm refering to the jungle terrain of SEA) if you are going in daylight you may as well make a nap of the earth insertion. Assembly is difficult in daylight. On one insertion my second ship set down on the wrong LZ about 500 M away from us. The reassembly of my two elements was, to say the least, harrowing. Imagine assembling at night. You will notice that on the one HALO insertion cited the team was separated and picked up on four separate LZs.
From personal experience, I have to ask if the operations were the best way to go or if certain people were in the business of "Ticket punching". I have heard of "Combat Jumps" made just for the purpose of getting a star on one's wings.[SIZE=1][SIZE=1]
cough-oneseventythirdiniraq-cough!
The Reaper
04-13-2004, 22:33
Originally posted by Razor
cough-oneseventythirdiniraq-cough!
Didn't they secure the airfield that the SF and Kurds had been on for a while?
TR
What's the definition of a Combat Jump?
Thank you,
Solid
Originally posted by Solid
What's the definition of a Combat Jump?
Thank you,
Solid
In all seriousness I was trying to find an answer to your question but couldn't find one immediately through GOOGLE. I am sure there is someone here who knows the "DA Approved" definition. I would say that the first pre-requisite is that it be a combat operation. I believe that DA places a size parameter in there which eliminates SOF operations from being "Official" Combat Jumps.
I wasn't thinking of the 173d in the Middle East but they also conducted a Combat Jump in "War Zone C"
I found an interesting site. If you have any "Airborne Blood" in your veins it will perk you right up:
http://www.geocities.com/Pentagon/7963/paratrooper.htm
It is a history of most airborne combat operations from the first by the Italians in WWI to the latest in the Middle East. You will have to scroll about half way down to get to the present. Almost all airborne troops are documented with the obvious absence of Russian and Soviet operaations. With all of the links, this is a huge site and equivalent to reading a book.
The piece on the 5th SFGA/Mike Force operation in RVN has a link to photos taken by Scott Whiting who was my room mate in Germany.
Makes me want to holler "AIRBORNE"!!!
:lifter
LOL I think we over-loaded the site :)
Originally posted by The Reaper
Didn't they secure the airfield that the SF and Kurds had been on for a while?
TR
So I've been told, by guys that were sitting in lawn chairs and watching the jump not far from the DZ. :rolleyes:
Maybe they did it as a show for the guys in the lawn chairs? Sort of like fireworks.
Solid
Originally posted by Razor
So I've been told, by guys that were sitting in lawn chairs and watching the jump not far from the DZ. :rolleyes:
That's like the B-Team sitting on the deck overlooking Qui Nhon Bay, sipping cool ones and watching the Marines conduct an "amphibious assult" on Viet Nam.
Sinister
04-14-2004, 19:29
If I remember correctly, lots of the old-timers were in on those jumps. John "Spider" Trantanella was the NCOIC of the school in Okinawa, and I think Frank Norbury Sr. was the static jumpmaster on a couple of the insertions. SSG Madison Stroheim (sp) was the NCO that was captured killed and body never recovered.
The Reaper
04-14-2004, 20:24
Originally posted by Sinister
If I remember correctly, lots of the old-timers were in on those jumps. John "Spider" Trantanella was the NCOIC of the school in Okinawa, and I think Frank Norbury Sr. was the static jumpmaster on a couple of the insertions. SSG Madison Stroheim (sp) was the NCO that was captured killed and body never recovered.
Roger.
Sergeant Major Billy Waugh, Staff Sergeant James "JD" Bath and Sergeant Jesse Campbell were on the jump with Sergeant Madison Strohlein.
TR
Ambush Master
04-14-2004, 21:49
Cliff Newman and Sammy Hernandez were on the "First" Insertion with 4 Indig.
The second was Larry Manes, Noel Gast, Robert Castillo and John (Spider) Trantanella.
Third was Billy Waugh, JD Bath, Jesse Campbell and Madison Strohlein.
Later
Martin
kriegsmodell
11-02-2008, 18:34
I know this is an old thread but I am a new member (smile). Thought this article (link attached) might be of some interest.
http://www.skydivewithjohn.com/documents/HistoryofHALOOperations.pdf
To add to the discussion--
In early '70, David Babysan Davidson and three others did a static line jump into Cambodia. A few months later RJ Graham and three more did the same thing but in a different area. These were the first parachute insertions of US led SOG teams into any operational AO.
These jumps were also--in the opinions of the CCS Recon Co personnel--the reason Billy Waugh came to CCS as SGM of Recon Co for a few months before going to CCN. Billy Waugh was at CCS from around April to July '70--give or take a few weeks on either end of those dates--and the thoughts were that he wanted to take some "lessons learned" to CCN...along with RT Plane's four best Montagnards. RT Plane's 1-0 and 1-1 were on leave and returned to find their best men--something that did not sit well with RT Plane's leaders :mad:--and a newly assigned 1-2 (Appleton) sent to Okinawa for HALO training.
Appleton did not go on any ops with RT Plane and committed suicide on Okie when he found out his wife back at Fort Bragg was cheating on him.
Two of the four Yards (Tiak and Noe) made it through the training and went on HALO jumps at CCN with RT Florida. Noe was KIA in the spring '75 invasion and Tiak lives in NC.
There was little publicity for the CCS parachute jumps...possibly because no HALO jumps were conducted by CCS teams.
The consensus of opinion of those there was that the static-line jumps worked better than HALO because the teams landed together. The down-side to the static-line jumps was that because US aircraft rarely flew low over the AOs at night, for some time prior to any jumps they had to run deception flights over those general AOs to get the enemy used to the noise of low-flying aircraft.
CCS used UH-1s at around 1000 AGL for their jumps, and that A/C makes a racket at that low altitude.
HALO didn't have the "noisy aircraft" problem, but only one team, Jim Storter's from CCC, landed together successfully. All of the other HALO insertions were a fiasco and, in the opinions of those manning the teams, they caused more problems than they solved. But CCN and SOG could then say to the higer-ups that they did have people "on the ground"--never mind that in virtually all cases their situation called for an immediate extraction due to injuries or they were ineffective due to being in contact.
Realistically, the CCS AO was much more suitable to static-line ops due to its generally flat to rolling terrain versus the high mountainous terrain up north. It was thought that night static-line jumps would be too dangerous in the mountains since they would be jumping in areas that were mostly below the mountain peaks in the AO.
Only a few parachute jumps of either type were across the "fence" since the Cambodia AO was off limits to SOG ground teams starting July'70 and Laos was off limits starting March '71. This meant that in a little over a year after the CCS static-line jumps by Babysan and Graham, both Cambodia and Laos were no longer open to ground ops.
Richard's $.02 :munchin
lonewolf726
11-06-2008, 07:13
I know this is an old thread but I am a new member (smile). Thought this article (link attached) might be of some interest.
http://www.skydivewithjohn.com/documents/HistoryofHALOOperations.pdf
Intresting article. Some of those guys are still around, and still jumping. They hold an Annual Combat HALO Reunion Jump every year ( this last yr was their 9th, I believe). I knew Charles Wesley well, he was a hell of a soldier. Melvin (Sleepy) Hill is still around and jumping, I'll ask him to drop by here and add to the discussion.