The SS Mayaguez was stopped in international waters by the P-128, a Cambodian gunboat manned by Khmer Rouge forces. The boat was taken, and its crewmembers made captives.
The Khmer Rouge crew of the P-128 had acted without informing their superiors.
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A celebration organized by anti war figure and songwriter Phil Ochs marked the end of the Vietnam War, which of course by necessary implication marked the South Vietnamese defeat. The event in Central park included performances by Bob Dylan, Pete Seeger, Joan Baez, and Paul Simon.
The ironies are thick, as the poster above portrays. Rather than smiling Vietnamese women, there were thousands of South Vietnamese going into an uncertain future that included "reeducation", although this time the Communists in Vietnam did not commit mass murders. The Khmer Rouge and Pathet Lao, however, were about to.
A partial solar eclipse was visible in Greenland, Europe, north Africa and north Asia.
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The Khmer Rouge captured the Thổ Chu Islands, where they evacuated and later executed 500 Vietnamese civilians.
The PAVN (NVA) launched a counterattack from Phú Quốc and Thổ Chu and attacked Cambodia's Poulo Wai island.
Peace certainly had not come to the region.
The Federal Government announced it would not cover $1.5B in New York expenditures which had been asked for by the city. I can recall this really being a topic of conversation.
Sony introduced the Betamax home videotaping system. It costs $2,488 in 1975 dollars, which would be well over $10,000 now.
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Kaho Xane Pathet Lao, the official newspaper of the Lao People's Party, (the Communist Party) announced: that the nation's Hmong people "must be exterminated down to the root of the tribe" because their soldiers had assisted the United States in fighting the Communists.
Two days later the genocide would begin.
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550 occupants of the French Embassy in Phnom Penh crossed into Thailand. They included 300 Khmer Muslims.
The People's Republic of China and the European Community agreed to establish trade and diplomatic relations.
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The US government declared the Vietnam War era at an end for purposes of veterans benefits.
9,087,000 military personnel served on active duty during the official Vietnam Era, but of course not all of them went to Vietnam. 3.4 million U.S. servicemen were deployed to Southeast Asia. Approximately 2.7 million served in the Republic of Vietnam. Most US servicemen in Vietnam were not combat troops, although because of the nature of the war, any of them could be exposed to combat.
There has never been a U.S. President who served in Vietnam, although one Vice President, Al Gore, did. George W. Bush was in the Texas Air National Guard as a fighter pilot during the war. Bill Clinton had a student deferment. Joe Biden had a deferment for asthma. Trump had one for shin splints.
None of my immediate family (parents, aunts, uncles, cousins) served in Vietnam or would qualify as a Vietnam Era veteran, even though a lot of them had been in the service. The husband of one of my cousins had served in Vietnam as an officer in the Navy, and a Canadian cousin of my mother's who was living in Florida was drafted and served in Vietnam, so there is some family connection. In the neighborhood, the son of the man who lived across the street was a paratrooper in the war.
In junior high, one of the more colorful social studies teachers had been in the Marine Recon, a unit much like the Rangers, during the war, and occasionally wore a green beret, which was never officially adopted by the Marines, to school. In high school, a legendary swimming teacher from the South Pacific had been a Navy SEAL and bore the scars of having been shot in the war and also from having been straffed as a child by a Japanese airplane. The ROTC teacher also had been, but I didn't take ROTC.
In university, a geology professor who also held a job with the State of Wyoming had served in Vietnam, and according to those who knew him well, suffered pretty markedly from PTSD. I never noticed that myself, and he was a good professor.
When I joined the National Guard right after high school I found it packed with Vietnam Veterans. One of my good friends in the Guard was the mechanics section chief but had the Combat Infantryman's Badge awarded for two tours in the country. Another friend of mine also had the CIB from the 1st Cavalry Division, with his uniquely being stitched in dark blue for the subdued patch. A fellow I was friendly with had been a Ranger in Vietnam and when he first joined and was still relying on service period uniforms he'd wear a black beret, another unofficial item. A good friend of mine who was his brother in law was in the Wyoming Air National Guard and had flown medical missions to the country, a deployment you rarely hear about. One of our members had been a Navy pilot. What with the CIBs, combat patches, pilot's wings, etc., we must have been an odd looking bunch to the young soldiers in the Regular Army.
There were a lot of them.
Cartoonist George Baker, the creator of the World War Two era Sad Sack cartoon, died at age 59.
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The Social Security Administration announced for the very first time that it's retirement and disability program was in debt; and that its $46 billion reserve would be drained by 1983. Notably, President Nixon had extended Medicare, which originally did not apply to everyone, to everyone 62 years of age or older during his Administration.
Television broadcasting began in South Africa.
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Royal Lao General Vang Pao, a Hmong highlander, was ordered by the Prime Minister of Laos to cease resistance to the Pathet Lao.
He resigned instead.
It's almost like the Domino Theory was correct.
Before serving in in the Royal Lao Army, he has served with the French starting during World War Two. He immigrated to the United States where he died in 2011.
101 former RVNAF aircraft at U-Tapao Royal Thai Navy Airfield were loaded aboard the USS Midway which evacuated 27 A-37s, 3 CH-47s, 25 F-5Es and 45 UH-1Hs.
A further 41 aircraft were flown to the U.S. 54 aircraft were transferred to the Thai Government, these comprised: 1 A-37, 17 C-47s, 1 F-5B, 12 O-1s, 14 U-17s and 9 UH-1Hs.
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The one millionth run in Major League Baseball history was scored by Bob Watson of the Houston Astros.
The Khmer Rouge seized control of South Vietnam's Phú Quốc Island.
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Chinese Communist Party, Chairman Mao Zedong spoke out against the Cultural Revolution and the Gang of Four in his last speech to the Politburo.
All former South Vietnamese military personnel and government officials were ordered to register with the new government. This was the first step to sending them to reeducation camps.
The city of Jerusalem was hit by missiles for the first time, after two Czechoslovakian made Katyusha rockets struck 500 meters from the Knesset parliament building. They were fired by Arab guerillas.
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The ARVN surrendered in the Battle of Long Xuyên, An Giang, the last South Vietnamese soldiers to do so.
Heavily criticized throughout the American period of involvement in the war, the ARVN had been engaged in fighting prior to largescale US involvement and while its conscript troops often did lack motivation, it's best units were good. The final fighting in 1972 demonstrated both qualities, with the ARVN coming apart in the northernmost section of South Vietnam, but putting up a stout fight outside of and in Saigon. Frankly, the American Army had enormously declined in quality during the war and by the time the US withdrew in 1972 it was largely an ineffective fighting force.
Henry Kissinger wrote a memo:
25 year old Smokey the Bear, a black bear at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., was retired from service as a living symbol of fire prevention.
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ARVN troops in Cần Thơ surrendered to the VC following the suicide of Gen. Nguyễn Khoa Nam, age 48, Major General of IV Corps in Cần Thơ. This effectively brought organized resistance to the VC and NVA almost to an end after twenty years of combat. The country remains, of course, under the regime that won the war.
Quân VNCH ở Cần Thơ đầu hàng VC sau cái chết của Tướng Nguyễn Khoa Nam, 48 tuổi, Thiếu tướng Quân đoàn IV ở Cần Thơ. Điều này đã khiến cho sự kháng cự có tổ chức chống lại VC và Bắc Việt gần như chấm dứt một cách hiệu quả sau hai mươi năm chiến đấu. Tất nhiên, đất nước vẫn nằm dưới chế độ đã thắng trong chiến tranh.
Les troupes de l'ARVN à Cần Thơ se sont rendues au VC suite au suicide du général Nguyễn Khoa Nam, 48 ans, major général du IVe Corps à Cần Thơ. Cela a effectivement mis fin à la résistance organisée au VC et à la NVA après vingt ans de combat. Le pays reste bien entendu sous le régime qui a gagné la guerre.
By this point, I'd quit tracking the war on my National Geographic map of Vietnam. There came to be no point.
Khmer Rouge forces landed on Phú Quốc which was claimed by Cambodia but controlled by South Vietnam. It was also the location of a large South Vietnamese POW camp.
Hank Aaron broke the career record for RBIs.
The New York Stock Exchange dropped the requirement of a fixed commission for stock transactions following pressure to do so from the SEC.
Footnotes:
*Google Translate text. I don't speak Vietnamese.
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Saigon fell to the NVA.
Gen. Dũng received orders from the Politburo to attack and take Saigon, which was surrounded except on approaches from the sea. Early in the morning NVA sappers tried to take the Newport Bridge but were repulsed by ARVN Airborne. An armored battle ensued, holding the bridge.
NVA armor then attacked Tan Son Nhut, which was defended by ARVN Rangers. An armored battle ensued there as well. A pitch battle broke out, but the NVA overcame the ARVN.
At 10:24 South Vietnamese President Minh surrendered unconditionally, although the ARVN continued to fight at the Newport Bridge, unaware of the surrender. They stopped fighting upon learning of the surrender.
The surrender was announced to the nation at 2:30.
I, General Duong Van Minh, president of the Saigon administration, appeal to the armed forces of the Republic of Vietnam to laydown their arms and surrender unconditionally to the forces of the Liberation Army of South Vietnam. Furthermore, I declare that the Saigon government is completely dissolved at all levels. From the Central government to the local governments must be handed over to the Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Vietnam.
Duong Van Minh on the transcript written by Bùi Văn Tùng
This was followed by:
We, the representatives for the forces of the Liberation Army of South Vietnam, solemnly declare that the City of Saigon was completely liberated. We accepted the unconditional surrender of General Dương Văn Minh, the president of the Saigon administration.
Bùi Văn Tùng.
In the Mekong Delta, the ARVN actually fought on for a day thereafter. Upon learning of the unconditional surrendered, they abandoned the ARVN or surrendered to VC forces that they outnumbered.
ARVN generals Le Van Hung, 42, Tran Van Hai, 50, Le Nguyen Vy, 42, and Pham Van Phu, 46, committed suicide.
Brig Gen. Pham Duy Tat, the ARVN officer known for his hopelessly naive cheerful attitude in Ken Burn's documentary on the Vietnam War, survived but would serve 17 years in a Communist reeducation camp. Upon being released, he relocated to the United States, passing away in 2019.
ARVN generals, Le Van Hung, Tran Van Hai, Le Nguyen Vy, and Pham Van Phu, committed suicide.
Operation Frequent Wind concluded.
