MEDIA DIGEST
AMERICA'S "LAST BATTLE" OF THE WAR WAS A FIASCO
The humiliating April 29, 1975, image of U.S. helicopters evacuating Americans and Vietnamese from Saigon rooftops as North Vietnamese troops overran South Vietnam to win the Vietnam War was a political-military disaster damaging America’s global prestige. Two weeks later, the U.S. endured another humiliation in Southeast Asia. On May 12, the genocidal communist Khmer Rouge, who had conquered Cambodia on April 17 (and renamed it “Kampuchea”) seized the SS Mayaguez, an American container ship. They had attacked in small “swift boats” and were armed only with AK-47 rifles and rocket-propelled grenades.
The attackers captured Mayaguez Capt. Charles T. Miller and 38 crewmen. Over the next three days, President Gerald R. Ford and his senior advisers wrestled with America’s response. U.S. forces ultimately recaptured the Mayaguez, and concurrently Cambodian officials released all the crewmen unharmed. However, during that operation the U.S. military lost 41 lives, including 23 Air Force support personnel accidentally killed in a helicopter crash—a
