Written By Bernie Weisz Vietnam War Historian Contact: BernWei1@aol.com Title of Review: "Invaluable Insight Of The Last Few Years of American Involvement in Vietnam"
This is truly one of the most insightful books I have ever read on the very end of the line for the U.S. in their "pull-out" in Vietnam, circa 1970-71. Tom Marshall, formerly of the Phoenix, C Company, 158th Aviation Battalion, 101st Airborne vividly describes how more than 30% of his 130 helicopter-school classmates, i.e. pilots, crew chiefs and gunners paid the heavy "price of exit" with their blood. In addition, Marshall puts the reader in the helicopter cocpit for all the action that occurred while flying along the NVA infested DMZ during the "Vietnamization Period" where the U.S. turned over the entire war to our ally-the South Vietnamese Government and it's army to fend for itself as President Richard M.Nixon acquiesed to a war weary public's harsh cry to end the war. Marshall skillfully describes combat assaults and "string extractions" (pulling soldiers out of hot combat zones from helicopters via rope and long ladders attached to S.O.G. Units (Special Operations Group SEAL Teams). Usually these were teams that were inserted behind enemy lines deep in enemy territory that would have been wiped out and overrun without immediate helicopter extraction. The reader of "The Price of Exit can actually hear the AK-47 fire and can feel the exploding mortar shells shot by the communists at U.S. helicopters. Marshall details exactly what happened during Operation "Lam Son 719" between February 8th and March 25, 1971. This was an offensive campaign (similar to the 1970 Cambodian Insursion where it was shielded from the American public by the Nixon Administration) which was conducted in the S.E. portion of Laos by the South Vietnamese Army. Marshall carefully describes how the U.S. and in particular, the Phoenix, C Company, 101st airborne provided logistical, aerial and artillary support to the operation while it's ground forces were prohibited from entering Laotian territory. Marshall also chronicles North Vietnamese Army atrocities, their tactics and ruthlessness, and most stridently how no American wanted to be the last to die in a war America had long given up on and abandoned. Tom Marshall also touches on little discussed subjects such as how the U.S. military initiated "smart bombs" in Vietnam, drug use in the military, racial tension between black and white G.I.'s as well as the general feeling throughout the military of futility, shattered beliefs and abandonment of American virtue. Marshall also covers the little known fact that the U.S. military dropped "electronic sensors" via air designed to report troop movement of vehicles and people along the North's major infiltration route into the South, i.e. the infamous "Ho Chi Minh Trail" This is a classic history lession of the last few years of America's Vietnam debacle in the form of a memoir. Indespensible reading!
This is truly one of the most insightful books I have ever read on the very end of the line for the U.S. in their "pull-out" in Vietnam, circa 1970-71. Tom Marshall, formerly of the Phoenix, C Company, 158th Aviation Battalion, 101st Airborne vividly describes how more than 30% of his 130 helicopter-school classmates, i.e. pilots, crew chiefs and gunners paid the heavy "price of exit" with their blood. In addition, Marshall puts the reader in the helicopter cocpit for all the action that occurred while flying along the NVA infested DMZ during the "Vietnamization Period" where the U.S. turned over the entire war to our ally-the South Vietnamese Government and it's army to fend for itself as President Richard M.Nixon acquiesed to a war weary public's harsh cry to end the war. Marshall skillfully describes combat assaults and "string extractions" (pulling soldiers out of hot combat zones from helicopters via rope and long ladders attached to S.O.G. Units (Special Operations Group SEAL Teams). Usually these were teams that were inserted behind enemy lines deep in enemy territory that would have been wiped out and overrun without immediate helicopter extraction. The reader of "The Price of Exit can actually hear the AK-47 fire and can feel the exploding mortar shells shot by the communists at U.S. helicopters. Marshall details exactly what happened during Operation "Lam Son 719" between February 8th and March 25, 1971. This was an offensive campaign (similar to the 1970 Cambodian Insursion where it was shielded from the American public by the Nixon Administration) which was conducted in the S.E. portion of Laos by the South Vietnamese Army. Marshall carefully describes how the U.S. and in particular, the Phoenix, C Company, 101st airborne provided logistical, aerial and artillary support to the operation while it's ground forces were prohibited from entering Laotian territory. Marshall also chronicles North Vietnamese Army atrocities, their tactics and ruthlessness, and most stridently how no American wanted to be the last to die in a war America had long given up on and abandoned. Tom Marshall also touches on little discussed subjects such as how the U.S. military initiated "smart bombs" in Vietnam, drug use in the military, racial tension between black and white G.I.'s as well as the general feeling throughout the military of futility, shattered beliefs and abandonment of American virtue. Marshall also covers the little known fact that the U.S. military dropped "electronic sensors" via air designed to report troop movement of vehicles and people along the North's major infiltration route into the South, i.e. the infamous "Ho Chi Minh Trail" This is a classic history lession of the last few years of America's Vietnam debacle in the form of a memoir. Indespensible reading!
