The Other Evacuation

(CBS)  When South Vietnam fell in 1975, the world’s attention focused on the evacuation from Saigon.

But at the same time hundreds of miles away a smaller, but no less heroic, escape was made.

In addition to the embassy in the capital the U.S had a consulate in the southern city of Can Tho, a provincial capital on the Mekong River Delta. Staffed by a consul general, several foreign service, USAID and CIA officers, the Can Tho consulate had a tiny, six man Marine contingent on hand when the order came to pull out.

The Marine commander in Can Tho was Staff Sgt. Steven Hasty, in his third tour of duty in Vietnam. He recalls that planning for an evacuation began in late March or early April.

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The Consul General, Francis Terry McNamara, “had a deep desire to get out as many loyal South Vietnamese that had worked for the consul as possible,” Hasty said. So the evacuation plan called for using four Air America helicopters assigned to Can Tho and a couple of old landing craft.

But on the morning of April 29, the plans changed. Two Marines had been killed in Saigon. Everyone was pulling out right away. And the Saigon embassy needed the four Air America choppers for its own rescue effort.

The ack-up landing craft became the consulate’s only hope. Later that day the Marines, the consulate staff and 300 Vietnamese loaded onto the craft and shoved off down the river.

The boats were ambushed once, but the attack was repelled. As they made their way down the river, Hasty feared taking heavy casualties in an attack at the Mekong’s mouth, the narrowest portion of the river.

"Out of nowhere, the skies clouded over and it poured down rain for about 45 minutes so thick you could not see the bow. The sound of the rain striking the river muffled the sound of our engines," remembered Hasty.

But the evacuees' troubles weren’t over. When they reached the mouth of the river at dusk, the landing craft were supposed to be met by another, larger vessel. None showed up.

So, said Hasty, "we had a full load of fuel and a hand held compass and we decided to head for the Philippines." It wasn’t the best plan, but the only other option was turning back—and that wasn’t an option.

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Finally, at about 2 a.m., the evacuees saw the lights of the cargo ship Pioneer Contender, which had assisted in the evacuation of Da Nang earlier.

The remnants of the Can Tho consulate stayed on the Contender until a Japanese tugboat could bring them to a Korean vessel, where helicopters eventually arrived to transport them, at long last, to the U.S.S. Blue Ridge.

As the dramatic escape unfolded, Hasty said he was aware that history was being made. He felt disappointment. He felt the U.S. had broken its promise to the Vietnamese and wasted lives in a half-hearted effort.

That the consulate at Can Tho kept its word to the Vietnamese it employed is some comfort to Hasty, now a Marine colonel.

"We salvaged something out of it," said Hasty. "We didn’t leave anybody behind."