Ted Braden SOG operator
There is a rumor that Ted Braden a SOG operator who went AWOL might have been DB Coopper.
"One of the most intriguing aspects of the resurgent investigation of DB Cooper in recent years is the information provided by commandos from Vietnam, now that their covert activities have been de-classified.
Plenty of troopers from the Special Operations Group of the Materials Assistance Command-Vietnam are talking to journalists and writing their own accounts of the illegal wars fought in Laos, Cambodia and North Vietnam during the larger conflict in South Vietnam from 1962-1975.
Two topics come blaring forward. First, the DB Cooper skyjacking has all the hallmarks of a SOG operation in terms of the planning, equipment and execution. Secondly, two leading commanders of SOG units, SgtM Billy Waugh and Major John Plaster say that within their ranks a rogue SOG trooper by the name of Ted Braden is widely thought to be DB Cooper.
Braden’s military career is filled with mystery and intrigue, including the assertions by some in his command that he was a professional intimate of General John Singlaub, one of the founders of the CIA and a leading figure in the Iran-Contra affair during the 1980s. Further, after Braden went AWOL in Vietnam in 1966 and was caught by the CIA trying to join the commando forces in the Congo civil war, he was incarcerated at Fort Dix, NJ. According to the officer responsible for inmates at Dix, Braden was later released by the personal intercession of the Army Chief of Staff, General Harold Johnson.
Braden’s whereabouts afterward are still hotly debated.
This picture is from Ramparts magazine, in an article they published about Sgt Braden’s exploits in Africa. Sadly, Ramparts ceased publication in 1975."
|