Guest Writer – Jim McLefresh; How I Ended Up in Laos

                                  Introduction

Jim McLefresh retired as an E-8 from the U. S. Air Force after twenty years with AA, AS, BS, MS & MA degrees. After retiring from the Air Force, he taught Intro to Physics at a High School. Later he taught AutoCAD and Graphic Design at a local University. He completed beta testing for Drone manufactures, software/equipment developers, cell phone manufactures, Autodesk and Corel.

From the University, Jim moved to the local County to run their material testing lab. From the Lab he moved into the Land Survey Department and later became the County’s GPS Surveyor. He retired from the county and now does contract work with other Civil Engineering/survey companies. He also wrote for several survey publications.

Jim has shared the story on how he ended up in Laos, please enjoy it.

                      How I Ended Up In Laos

                               Jim McLefresh

My first trip to Vietnam was in February 1968. I traveled on a chartered Flying Tigers 707. Because of the flight distance, the trip required three refueling stops. The first one was Hawaii, then Wake Island, and the last one was in the Philippines. The sad part was I had to make the trip twice. While I was in Vietnam, my father died, and I went home for his funeral. It was extremely difficult for me to board the aircraft, back to Vietnam for the second time, knowing what was there waiting for me. Each trip required me to go through the gauntlet of spitting and yelling at the San Francisco airport several more times.

During my first flight to Vietnam, the most interesting refueling stop was Wake Island. The pilot circled the island before we started our descent, allowing everyone to see the small piece of ground where we were going to land. After everyone got a good look, he started his descent. We continued down in a long, slow spiral until it looked like we were almost touching the water. Then the landing gear came down, yet there was still nothing but water out my window. Just as I got a glimpse of land, the wheels hit the runway, and to us it seemed that all hell broke loose as they deployed the reverse thrusters to slow the aircraft down. We stopped at the other end of the runway, which was on the other side of the island. The crew turned the plane around, taxied to the terminal, and everyone got off. We walked around until the aircraft was refueled, and off we went again.

We were scheduled to arrive at Bien Hoa AB, Vietnam at about 1900 hours. When the chartered flight entered Bien Hoa’s airspace, there was a small problem. We could not get clearance to land. Our pilot informed us that the base had been overrun by the North Vietnamese Army, and that base security was still trying to clear the base of insurgents. The aircraft was instructed to maintain a circle pattern over the base. The civil engineers also needed to check the runway for damage. By the time we were allowed to land, two long hours had slowly gone by. I did not know it then, but the next morning I found out that this was the beginning of the 1968 Tet offense.

Before landing, we were instructed to lower the shades and turn off the cabin lights. The crew was instructed to turn off their navigation lights and only use their landing lights just before the aircraft touched down. Once on the ground, the pilot turned off all the aircraft lights as we were guided to the port. The crew made sure that everyone got off the plane as fast as we could, and all the luggage and cargo was quickly unloaded. The Flying Tiger crew elected to depart without refueling or loading any of the outbound troops.

Only a few guys on emergency leave were allowed to board. An announcement was made informing the rest of the troops that they were not flying out that night. No doubt they were extremely upset about being left behind. Another aircraft arrived the next morning and picked up those troops left behind.

I was assigned to the 3^rd Field Maintenance Squadron, Aerospace Ground Power (AGE) Equipment Shop. When you are first assigned to the AGE Shop, you are normally put on 3^rd shift. I had just started working days when an airman from my squadron commander’s office came looking for me. When he found me, he told me I was to stop what I was doing, lock up my toolbox, and report to my squadron commander “NOW.” As I walked across the flight line toward his office, I tried to remember anything that I did that may have caused a visit to the “Old Man”.

I walked directly into his office and reported as ordered. He stood up and handed me $100 cash and told me to go to the BX and buy some civvies (civilian clothing) and a small suitcase. “Why”, I asked. He said I will need them for my trip today. He instructed me to go directly to my barracks after going to the BX and pack the suitcase. I was to pack only civilian clothes, but first I was to remove all labels. Also, I was not to take any form of ID, dog tags, or photos of any kind with me.

I was not given any formal written orders for this trip. I was traveling only with verbal instructions. Here I was, a lowly 19-year-old E-3, going TDY (temporary duty assignment) with no written orders and no idea where I was going. There is still no record that I made this trip.

Before leaving my commander’s office, I asked the usual dumb questions, “Where am I going?” To which he replied, “You’ll find out when you get there.” Then I asked one more dumb question: “Why am I the one going?” Again, his answer was no real surprise: “Because you volunteered, didn’t you?” To which I replied, “I did, when?” He looked directly at me and replied, “You’re dismissed, Airman.”

The “secret war” in Laos was conducted by the CIA and U.S. Air Force

In just a few hours, I was sitting in a truck at the end of the runway watching a small, silver, single-engine aircraft land. There were no markings on the side or tail of the aircraft. The pilot taxied over to the truck and opened the door. He directed me to sit in the back and keep quiet. Several hours later, we landed on a short, dirt runway between two mountains. Parked along the runway were a few small aircraft, like the one I was in, and one helicopter. And just like the aircraft I arrived in, none of those aircraft had any markings on them.

My pilot pointed to a small metal building and said, “That is where you will be working. I will also try to get back in a few weeks to pick you up.” Then he said, “By the way, welcome to Northern Laos.” He taxied the plane back onto the dirt strip and was gone in a few minutes. It was two months before he returned to take me back to Bien Hoa.

When I walked into the building which the pilot had shown me, I saw why I was sent there. At that time, I was skilled at repairing aircraft hydraulic testing equipment. In one corner of the building was a hydraulic unit with all its tubing on the wall and a workbench next to it. The airman who previously maintained the unit’s support equipment had to return to the states and would not be returning. I needed to get that hydraulic unit up and running.

Soon after arriving, a Laotian airman walked into the building. We exchanged greetings, but he did not tell me his name. He pointed to a room in the back of the building where there was a place to sleep. He also told me someone would bring me my meals. Furthermore, he then advised me, for my own safety, not to leave the building. I suspected it was less for my safety and more, so I wouldn’t see what was going on.

Do you remember a statement that you saw countless times in the military; “Or other duties as assigned”? I soon learned that, at times, I would be required to perform some additional duties. None of which I enjoyed.

No matter what your primary duties were, you did what you were told

One day, a helicopter taxied down the dirt runway and stopped by my shop. One of the crew members came in and told me they needed another gunner that day. I informed him I had no experience being a gunner. His reply to that was, “Don’t worry, you’ll learn quickly.” He showed me what to do, and that is what I did. It’s surprising how fast you learn what to do when someone else starts shooting at you.

Before I returned to Vietnam, I was able to repair the broken hydraulic unit. During those same two months, I experienced an event that thoroughly changed my life. Those same events still provide me with an occasional nightmare today. About two weeks before my return a good friend of mine arrived at the same site. We were assigned to same Tech school, sent to the same base for our first assignment, and again to Vietnam and Loas. He was sent there to replace the Tech that went back to the states. On his second mission he was killed, and we were never able to recover him.

Thousands of tons of bombs were dropped on Laos during the American war in Southeast Asia

Because, officially, we were “Not really in Loas” the Air Force listed him as MIA. His death, the events after, and meeting his wife when I returned to the States drove me into a deep state of depression I almost didn’t recover from. All those events are still another story and will be detailed in my next half of this story.

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