Known and Unknown_ A Memoir - Donald Rumsfeld [114]
Ford quickly convened an NSC meeting and asked me to attend. With Kissinger and Schlesinger present, Vice President Nelson Rockefeller argued for an immediate, robust military response. I thought that was premature, since we were still trying to locate the captured ship. Kissinger favored “tough talk” and a demand to free the ship.
My first concern was typical of a chief of staff; I thought it preferable to quickly develop a clear range of options for the President. I recommended acknowledging the incident but saying as little as possible so as to preserve those options until he had decided on a course.
The President decided to go with Henry’s approach.10 Ford publicly declared the capture of the Mayaguez an act of piracy. Absent the immediate release of the crew members and the vessel, the President warned, “the most serious consequences” would follow.11 There was speculation that some, if not all, of the hostages had been taken to the nearby island of Koh Tang, so the President ordered a military blockade around it. Three Cambodian gunboats that chose to defy the blockade were sunk.
As the crisis continued, Ford asked my views on his options. In a meeting on May 14, I presented the President with a memorandum outlining what I saw as the possible courses of action.12
We understood that American forces would need to take the island where we believed the Khmer Rouge held the hostages, but I suggested that we plan to get all American troops out within forty-eight hours to avoid drifting into a longer term presence there. Vice President Rockefeller suggested that B-52s bomb targets on the mainland. I suggested we not use the massive, four-engine bombers, since they were associated with damage inflicted across Vietnam and had caused negative reactions in the region and in America. I thought a better approach would be to see if we could use Navy aircraft from the USS Coral Sea, which was headed toward the area. Carrier-based aircraft could strike with precision and reduce the potential of civilian casualties.13
“The longer the delay,” I cautioned, “the weaker the U.S. looks, the greater the danger to the lives of the people, and the greater the likelihood that the critics will get into the act.”
That afternoon the President gave the order for a three-prong attack: a Marine helicopter assault on Koh Tang Island; strikes on the mainland by attack aircraft from the USS Coral Sea; and a naval interdiction operation to try to recapture the Mayaguez.14 U.S. Marines stormed the beach on Koh Tang and encountered withering fire from entrenched Khmer Rouge positions.
An hour or two into the operation, we received word from Schlesinger that the destroyer USS Holt near Koh Tang had been approached by a Thai fishing boat. The boat held men waving their clothing, in lieu of white flags. It was the crew of the Mayaguez. The Khmer Rouge, undoubtedly fearing more reprisals, had released all of the crew.
While the crew was being rescued and the Mayaguez recovered, the Marines were engaging the enemy on Koh Tang. By the end of the mission, eighteen U.S. Marines had been killed. The names of the American military who died are etched into the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, D.C. The official total of American dead in the entire Vietnam conflict stands at 58,261.
President Ford’s actions over the Mayaguez were the first steps toward rebuilding American credibility.15 When I became his secretary of defense months later, I remembered the Mayaguez crisis and its lessons. To our enemies, post-Vietnam America looked like a weakened nation, which encouraged them to act in provocative ways.
CHAPTER 15
Turning On the Lights
As I prepared to meet with the members of the Senate Armed Services Committee who would vote on my confirmation as secretary of defense, I telephoned Senator Barry Goldwater for advice. In the years since his unsuccessful bid for the presidency in 1964