Episode 147: The Mayaguez Incident - The Last American Casualties in Vietnam, Part VII

In the years following the Mayaguez Incident, several memorials have popped up. As is was considered the final combat action of the Vietnam War (despite taking place after the officially recognized end of the war and in Cambodia, not Vietnam) those killed in action were engraved in the final panel of the Vietnam Memorial Wall in Washington, DC.

In 1996, Arizona Senator and former Vietnam POW John McCain helped dedicate a memorial to those killed on Koh Tang on the grounds of the US embassy in Phenom Penh, Cambodia.

In 2013, a memorial marker for those killed in the Knife-31 crash off Koh Tang's east beach. It is in Section 60, Site 10360.

Two Marines killed in action during the Mayaguez Incident, who were originally listed as missing in action and whose statues was officially changed in 1976 to killed in action (body not recovered) were eventually located, recovered, repatriated, and ultimately interred at Arlington National Cemetery. Second Lieutenant Richard Van de Geer is interred in Section 66, Grave 6027 - he was 27 years old.

Private First Class Walter Boyd, Jr. is buried in Section 66, Grave 5686 - he was 19 years old.

 

Episode 146: The Mayaguez Incident - The Last American Casualties of Vietnam, Part VI

 

The crew of the SS Mayaguez is released by the Khmer Rouge, but it is too late to stop the US rescue attempt. Now President Ford wants to pull out the troops, but since information flowed a lot slower in 1975 than it does in 2025, the second wave of US Marines was already on site. Will they follow presidential orders or will they disregard their commander-in-chief and extricate their comrades under siege in enemy territory?

While those decisions were being made, the destroyer USS Henry B. Wilson came across the survivors of the Knife-31 crash that happened in the opening minutes of the attempted invasion of Koh Tang and was able to rescue them after they had survived more than two hours treading water in the ocean 

Yet Another Podcast Announcement

I am having no luck with these end of the year holidays. I was back in the ER on New Year's Day thanks to a complication from my appendectomy. This is why there was no new episode this week. Sheesh, after these last two weeks, my New Year's resolution is to stay out the hospital in 2025!