Saigon’s last day
The desperate people clamoring at the gates of the American Embassy.
The Marine guards standing on top of the Embassy compound walls, pushing desperate climbers back down into the surging crowds below.
Today, the recollection of CIA agents at the scene on this day in 1975 — April 30th — the last day of America’s involvement in South Vietnam.
The final gasp had begun three days before, on April 27th, as the North Vietnamese army began its attack on Saigon and the South Vietnamese government crumbled.
Two days before, on April 28th, a group of South Vietnamese air force pilots had defected to the North and then bombed the Tan Son Nhut Air Base, the primary US evacuation site, rendering it unusable.
By April 29-30, only the Embassy in downtown Saigon remained as an evacuation point for Americans still in the country and the South Vietnamese interpreters, agents and others who had assisted the American effort and needed to escape.
CIA employee:
“The plan had been for [CIA-owned] helicopters to go to the apartment buildings [in Saigon] where the Americans were because they could land on the roof and they would evacuate them to the [Tan Son Nhut] airport, where they would get on airplanes or big helicopters or whatever.
“But that was no longer an option.
“Most of the helicopters had been blown up on the airport [runway].
“The helicopters started coming [from ships offshore], and they picked up the [remaining] people at the airport and then they started coming to the embassy.
“As soon as the helicopters started coming to the embassy, the embassy was surrounded [by] Vietnamese.
“I mean, you’ve seen some of the pictures.
“They were trying to crawl over the wall.
“They had not yet delivered the first batch of combat Marines to the embassy to protect us.”
Polgar:
“It was late in the evening of the 29th when we had the howling mobs outside the fence.
“We had a dangerous situation because we, as Americans, were up on the fence.
“Anybody could have taken a potshot or overrun us for that matter.
“I spotted a [US] colonel outside the fence. . . . I said, [let’s] organize a little shock troop, a little human wedge that could bring people up to the fence, . . . then we’ll lift you across.”
Broussard:
“The Marines stood on the walls throwing Vietnam civilians back on the deck.
“It started to look like the Alamo…
“Incredible things happened around the embassy walls that day.
“A Vietnamese mother threw her baby over our 8 foot wall, perhaps thinking someone would pick the baby up and it would get to America.”
LaGueux:
“In a couple of cases. . . some of the expatriates were coming forward on the very last day with their hoard of dependents, saying to the embassy, ‘Here I am, Joe Brown, and here is my Vietnamese family of 25 people; we want to leave now.’’”
CIA Employee:
“And so, all the [CIA] people were on the wall, pushing people down and pulling our people in . . .
“[T]o get close enough to get in, they would drive their cars through the crowd and push up to the gate and climb on the roof to get pulled over into the embassy.
“And that was sort of on three sides of the embassy.”
On April 29th, about ten thousand people stood outside the Embassy gates seeking entrance through the locked doors.
Another 2,500 were inside the Embassy or on its grounds.
The crowds inside the Embassy broke into the Embassy’s liquor supply while Embassy staff incinerated confidential documents and five million dollars in cash.
LaGueux:
“Finance people were still counting money and trying to arrange for the evacuation of monetary assets.
“It had distressed me that we had let that go to the very end. . . .
“[W]e still had millions, gold—all kinds of things—until the very last day.”
By 2:15 a.m. on April 30th, helicopters were landing on the Embassy roof every ten minutes.
LaGueux:
“We’re talking about big helicopters. . that can hold . . . I don’t know . . . a hundred people, and we’re operating them every few minutes.
“I mean, there was one right after the other.”
Someone drove a vehicle through the Embassy gates and the Embassy’s grounds and lower floors were overrun with desperate people.
Marine guards retreated, closing themselves off in the Embassy’s interior staircase and locking gates behind them, and went to the roof to await helicopter pick-up.
At the time, 850 non-American evacuees and 225 Americans remained in the building.
At 03:27 a.m. on April 30th, President Ford ordered that no more than 19 additional helicopter airlifts would be allowed and then followed with an order that airlifts be limited to US personnel.
Polgar:
“More could have been gotten out if the president hadn’t arbitrarily terminated the evacuation process around 4:00 a.m.
“We had thousands of people in the embassy compound at that time that could not be evacuated.”
LaGueux:
“On the 30th . . . [at] 4:00 [in the morning] or thereabouts, a helicopter comes in, and this time it’s got a passenger . . . a Navy officer . . . a lieutenant . . . and we finally get him into the ambassador’s office on the third floor. . . .
“[He said] ‘I have a message for Ambassador Martin from the president.’
Polgar:
“[The message] said, ‘Mr. Ambassador, I’m instructed to put you on the next helicopter, and if you are not going to go willingly, I have to put you on by force.’”
LaGueux:
“It was soon thereafter that we left, although I’m not sure that it [was] on that [next] helicopter.”
At 07:53 a.m. on April 30, the last helicopter, bearing ten Marine security guards and their commander, took off from the Embassy roof.
A total of 978 Americans and 1,120 Vietnamese and third-country nationals had been airlifted by helicopter from the Embassy.
Hundreds of third-party nationals were left behind in the Embassy and thousands of Vietnamese were left outside the gates.
Two hours later, the acting South Vietnamese president ordered all South Vietnamese forces to cease fighting.
His unconditional surrender came a bit later, in a radio address.
And at noon on April 30th, a North Vietnamese army tank crashed through the gates of South Vietnam’s presidential palace.
For America, the Vietnam War was finally over.
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I’ll see you tomorrow.
— Brenda
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