snowmman

Orange1 said "No cost to society? Hidden, maybe, but there. " There are lots of bad things. See, it's not reality to say, that the main issues are these 0.5% issues. You have to multiply each thing you're trying to deter against, with it's negative impact. It's all about risk management and cost/benefit. You can't fix everything. Sure you can say some incredibly complicated set of rule maintenance is the goal. But that fails. The goal should always be to simplify society, get good shared goals, minimize the overall high risk/impact things (like getting car manufacturers to build safer cars, control the spread of nukes, etc), help remove the things that cause radicalization (inequitable distribution of power and wealth), improve the flow of knowledge and education. Note I left out healthcare. Keeping more people alive longer is kind of unsustainable. But if people want it, I guess one has to go along with it. But on the other hand, all that would cut into the profits of Snowmman Industries. During the gold rush, the hardware stores made the money with shovels. Nowadays, Snowmman Industries returns the same profit potential to savvy investors.

377 mentioned patents. Google is basically built on copyright infringment. Youtube is the most obvious extension of that. They had some fights over their Google Books stuff. here's the thing: there is no god-given set of "rights". "rights" are just agreements that societies agree to enforce for the common good. Needs change over time. The strength of the US has always been its ability to change rapidly. People who want to rally against that, and argue that our strength comes from guns or "we're bigger and have nukes" or whatever other crazy idea, should get used to eating potatoes.

just got an IM that STAO's FANTOM v9.3 is available for download. Since it's incompatible with v8, everyone needs to do a full install. There are still some problems with vista...any glitches, file a helpdesk. good luck! details at: http://www.fbi.gov/page2/july09/STAO_073109.html

Did everyone get the news that the Ted B. Braden, 80, that I was looking for, died in 2007? Not sure if he's the SF Ted B. Braden. But it made me kind of sad to read. Maybe he was the Braden in Africa. If so, kind of sad to go without your old SF buddies knowing. But who knows. Maybe the SF Braden is still around somewhere. In terms of actuarial tables, though, it should remind us that Cooper is probably dead now, even if he survived the jump. (assuming Cooper in 1971 was 42-50 say)

377 said: "Not all bank robbers leave a perfect portrait on the survellance cameras." Well, it's getting better (leaving portraits) I actually have a friend who is part of revolutionizing the surveillance cam biz. I think I even saw an article where Carr was crediting his stuff with providing hi-res image of the bad guy. funny huh!

Hi Jerry. I've not read a lot. But in Plaster's book, he mentions Soviet helis, and obviously Chinese arms, and also Chinese advisors. Yeah, that's another thing that made the Vietnam war tough. You guys weren't just fighting North Vietnam. You were fighting a proxy war with China and the Soviet Union. I'm not a historian, but it seems to me that it's fake to say that WWII ended at some time. It never really ended. all these things have a timeline back to WWII, it seems to me. Care to share anything that you saw?

With http://www.google.com, there is now an autocomplete feature. so as you type in characters, google gives you a pulldown that is a guess at what you are going to type, based on google tracking what everyone else is typing. Orange1 said I should be happy about bank robbery recovery. I'd much prefer someone working on something, so when I start typing: "9x18 makarov" into google, I don't get so many choices on the pulldown. THAT scares me.

If I were a US resident i would be far happier with Carr devoting his time to stuff like this than the Cooper case. Orange1: you got to be kidding! The majority of bank robberies are just a side effect of the way banks are setup. The idea that cash is dispensed in a way that is inherently "crackable" means that it will have a failure rate. Carr is providing a service to the banking industry. They could create a more foolproof system. (only use ATMs for cash), but they won't, because of customer demand. Think of bank thefts as just the cost of doing business, kind of like credit card fraud. The banks get Larry's work for free. (well really, the taxpayers shell out for it) Are you implying bank robbery recovery has some societal good aspect to it???? Sure there's an indirect aspect, but it's pretty minor. There's lots of things that other people do that are more important, for societal good. Actually, I think having Larry resolve Cooper, would be better for the US, then putting another bank robbery guy in jail. Didn't you see the riots in California jails? We don't need more people in prison. (edit) Orange1: if you're worried about the cash amounts, you obviously know there are much bigger and broader thefts or non-societally-good-transfers-of-wealth happening left and right, everywhere! Let them eat cake! We've got bigger problems!

Larry is the lead article on 8/6/09 http://www.fbi.gov/ directly here http://www.fbi.gov/page2/august09/safecatch_080609.html Larry Carr is the only working agent in the FBI.

Kontum: Command and Control (Select Photographs of SOG Special Ops During the Vietnam War) Frank Greco (USA 2005) his 2nd book. some snaps from inside attached.

Running Recon: A Photo Journey with SOG Special Ops Along the Ho Chi Minh Trail Frank Greco Paradin Press 2004 Attached some snaps from internal pages of the book, showing some photos, just for people who are interested in these kind of books

Ok, I worked thru the numbers to see how much of FBI resources are on the case. as of 8/25/04 There are 28,576 FBI employees. 12,156 of these are special agents. 16,420 are support people, including 1300 analysts and more than 1000 information technology experts. 200 are overseas There are 48 chemists 3 geologists 3 mathematicians and just 1 metallurgist. Out of all that, there is 1 person working the case. And then there's the contract with Snowmman Industries, which doesn't disclose employees by division or project, but accounts for 37% of the FBI outsourcing budget. (edit) Example: We recently received okay to buy up all "Dan Cooper" comics that exist worldwide, thinking that getting contact with all collectors would help lead to DB Cooper. The FBI okayed the budget, and we get 10% collection fees on all comics purchased. Win, win. Local and state taxes apply, so everyone gets a taste. (edit) I'm closing in on twice the number of posts Jo has. Life is good.

http://rlv.zcache.com/soledad_welcome_sign_tshirt-p235786517046874846q08p_400.jpg

Jo and Sluggo sitting in a tree K-I-S-S-I-N-G First comes love Then comes marriage then comes ...I don't know what! (edit) Badges? The original quotation comes from the 1948 film The Treasure of the Sierra Madre with Humphrey Bogart. In one of the scenes in the movie a Mexican bandit leader (Gold Hat played by Alfonso Bedoya) is trying to convince Fred C Dobbs (played by Bogart) and company that they are the Federales. Dobbs: 'If you're the police where are your badges?' Gold Hat: 'Badges? We ain't got no badges. We don't need no badges! I don't have to show you any stinkin' badges!' This in turn was adapted from B Traven's 1927 novel upon which the movie was based: "All right," Curtin shouted back. "If you are the police, where are your badges? Let's see them." "Badges, to god-damned hell with badges! We have no badges. In fact, we don't need badges. I don't have to show you any stinking badges, you god-damned cabrón and ching' tu madre! Come out from that shit-hole of yours. I have to speak to you." From "The Sierra Madre" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqomZQMZQCQ From "Blazing Saddles" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lj056ao6GE

interesting Frank Greco ran the photo lab for CCC. (I had quoted from his "Running Recon" book before. Kontum: Command and Control 27 February 2006 Vietnam special forces veteran Frank Greco recently published Kontum: Command & Control as a follow up to his highly acclaimed first book Running Recon. Greco enlisted in the Army after dropping out of college and after completing his basic infantry and parachute training joined Special Forces. Whilst assigned as a typist to the 7th SF group at Fort Bragg in late 1968 he a submitted request to serve in Vietnam. Two weeks after that request he received his orders and departed for his mission in early April 1969. For the first 8 months of his tour he was a member of SOG (Studies and Observation Group) Recon Team Colorado running missions across the boarder in Laos, whilst stationed at CCC (Command and Control Central) in Kontum. Greco assumed control of the CCC photo lab for the remainder of his time In-Country, processing and developing top-secret reconnaissance photographs as well as taking part in numerous low-level recon flights across the border. Greco's original work, Running Recon, was an account of his and other veteran's experiences in SOG and featured more than 700 photographs that were taken and developed during his time at CCC. Kontum: Command and Control uses the same successful format as Running Recon and contains around a 100 photographs within its 80 pages. Some of the photos are full color versions of the black and white images in Running Recon, whilst others are never before seen SOG photographs. The book has a number of good aerial images of the Ho Chi Minh trail, as well as plenty showing Recon teams just prior to mission departure. In addition to the photographs a few SOG veterans have contributed some of their personal accounts, which make for interesting reading. Whilst Kontum: Command and Control is less comprehensive and features fewer original photographs than Running Recon, it is nonetheless a valuable supplement to the original book and a worthwhile addition to any SOG library.

Sergeant Major Walter J. Shumate was a living legend in the Special Forces. A veteran who had entered the army during the Korean War, he had seen and done it all. Now closing in on thirty years of service, at forty-four he was the oldest man ever to make it through Delta Force Selection. And he was invaluable to the formation of the unit. Sumate added an element of humanity that could very well have eluded the organization in those critical early years. Without his special touch and unique influence, the outfit could easily have taken itself way too seriously. But with Shumate around, no matter how special we thought we were, he could always convince us that were were just human beings. He was serious about soldiering but he was the opposite of a robot. (this was in the 1978, after Shumate had served in MACV-SOG in Vietnam, after he got into Delta)

background: I am by no means experienced in using online search materials for people. Stuff like that used by genealogy folks. I've been getting myself up to speed. Ancestry.com has stuff I wasn't aware of. With respect to our quest for info about a Ted. B. Braden, age 80, it's depressing information. I suspect Cousin Brucie will be able to dig up some more stuff, so I'll defer to him for a while. (edit) Hey in honor of Mad Dog, and to see if you read the full post on him, I've attached a Marlin Model 444-S (.444 Marlin). There's another post I could make about how Plaster in "SOG" noted the jokeplaying around "Walter Shumate". Walter Shumate stayed in, and somehow joined Delta Force in the late 70's under Beckwith. (the joke was to always give your name as "Walter Shumate" whenever you got into fights, or kicked some Marine ass, or signed into hotels etc...so the stories started filtering back about Walter Shumate doing all these crazy things everywhere, simultaneously)

georger correctly pointed out "(that was a rumor the Snowmman started). " Isn't the Cooper thing all about rumors? I've said many times. "There are no facts". Sluggo concurred, with his issue about Fact vs Fiction categories for books published.

from http://www.americantowns.com/ca/sacramento/news/a-day-to-remember-in-sacramento-100257 May 20, 2008 Operation Enduring Freedom Kinser, Adam G. Palmer, Christopher L. Operation Desert Storm Dale L. Paulson Leroy E., Jr. Hein Vietnam War Gary Eugene Newby Richard Lee Laws Karl Robert Berbert David Levant Felt Kenneth Richard Endsley Gene Howard Jr Ellis David Lewis Harty Michael Anthony Gilson John Michael Henson Gerald C Hunsbarger III Gary Nolan Bass Jerome Garcia James Richard Brink Edward Wayne Butler Michael Jean Dugas Charles Wesley Haskell David Robert Goodine George Henry Brewer Grant Hamly Highsmith John Calvin Smith Jeffry Ray Tharaldson Erskine Jay Oliver Francisco Mario Jr Tamayo Dennis Ray Langrock Michael Ransom Page Robert Warren Major Edmund Lawrence Palczewski Robert Wayne Toreson Lionel Jr Parra Tamadge Cecil Jr Stevens Phillip Anthony Lotta Peter Lenhart Siller David Earl Schwartz Ronald Royce Ryan Ervin Lee Rush Gary Lee Mc Cloud Kenneth Earl Mc Farland Larry Dee Mc Kinnon John Glenn Melchor Terry Leroy Joslin Samuel Walter Yates James Raymond Kelly III Robert Edward Wright James Allen Belveal Philip Mark Bennett Boyd Edwin Squire Donald Keith Bakkie John Michael Acosta Leonard Paul Hudson Ronnie Herbert Beals Kenneth Eugene Aznoe Donald Paul Abbie Kenneth Jacob Arent Thomas James Daniels Hugo Araux Gaytan Blair Edward Dennis Fredrick Jean Hoffman Johnny Manuel Cruz James Shelton Hollis James R Godwin James Gregory Brady Robert Charles Hein Robert Owen Cole Herbert Ernest Frenzell Manuel Louis Gines Ralph Guarienti Larry B Buzzard John Gilbert Broadbeck Roy Wayne Graham James Oliver Ellsworth Thomas James Carter David Leroy Butler John Henry Gruber Edward Carrola Terry Lewis Conley Thomas James Huckaba Albert Clifton Jr Files Thomas Joseph Jr Fox Robert Ernest Gaftunik Michael Milton Cox Robert Jay Hess Houston Clifford Jr Box Craig Louis Hagen Jerry Lee Houser Robert Lee Foster Steven John Gaftunik Jackie Don Weatherly David Thomas Shields Vincent Gene Lew Jack Harlan Kamrath Robert Gene Smoot Robert Royce Sloppye Ronald Dean Layton Michael Arnold Joseph Bobby Gene Lawrence Paul Robert Jordan Ernest Murral Weathersbee Martin John Kerby Gary Philip Rader Douglas Edward Lohmeyer Jerry Michael Shriver Jerry Lee Simmonds Raymond Jr Villalpando Daniel Ray Twitty Tony Trombetta Michael Kenneth Klein Wilson Couch Koehler Lawrence Lee Keister Bobby Clyde Snyder Ronald Allan Vilardo David George Williams Kenneth Eugene Kotyluk Ralph Warren Kuchcinski Steven Charles Vinter Melvin Charles Lapp Dennis Ray Stewart Stephen Joseph Stemac Stanley Frank Wilton Roy Edward May Timothy Xavier Murphy John Frederick Morris John Edward Nelson Terrance William Nelson Charles Sargent Moore Kenneth Vern Jensen George Wesley Montgomery Gary Teofilio Padilla Richard Griffith Philbin James Paul Mc Laughlin Theodore Jr Mazon James J Jr Shaughnessy Ronald James Revis Robert William Jr Johnson Joseph Santos Lupe Paul Lopez David Jackson Sharp Guy Gene Jr Shannon Richard J Johnston Stuart Arthur Werner Wallace Bruce Werner Irving Albert Self Raul Losoya Salvadore Iniguez Ruiz James Goodwin Whaley Loy Neal Whaley Kenneth Edward Ross Korean War Barbieri Henry Jasper Hagan Malcom C Mc Pherson Patrick Joe C Polenske Kenneth Otto Walsh David Charles Wright Jack M

This article from http://www.ultimatesniper.com/Docs/30.PDF is a good close match to what Plaster wrote about Mad Dog Shriver in "SOG" Mad Dog's story is worth trying to understand. Apparently from Sacramento, CA. Our little forum here means nothing. But Mad Dog deserves a post. Fuck the length. Picture attached. Details about his eyes, his dog, about how he wanted to leave but couldn't figure how to, grab at me. RIP Mad Dog. THE UNTOLD TRUE STORY OF MAD DOG SHRIVER: Mad Dog led dozens of covert missions into Laos & Cambodia until his luck ran out. There undoubtedly was not a single recon man in SOG more accomplished or renowned than Mad Dog Shriver. Mad Dog! In the late 1960s, no Special Forces trooper at Ft. Bragg even breathed those top secret letters, "S-O-G," but everyone had heard of the legendary Studies and Observations Group Green Beret recon team leader, Sergeant First Class Jerry Shriver, dubbed a "mad dog" by Radio Hanoi. It was Jerry Shriver who'd spoken the most famous rejoinder in SOG history, radioing his superiors not to worry that NVA forces had encircled his tiny team. "No, no," he explained, "I've got 'em right where I want 'em -- surrounded from the inside." Fully decked out, Mad Dog was a walking arsenal with an imposing array of sawed-off shotgun or suppressed submachine gun, pistols, knives and grenades. "He looked like Rambo," First Sergeant Billy Greenwood thought. Blond, tall and thin, Shriver's face bore chiseled features around piercing blue eyes. "There was no soul in the eyes, no emotion," thought SOG Captain Bill O'Rourke. "They were just eyes." By early 1969, Shriver was well into his third continuous year in SOG, leading top secret intelligence gathering teams deep into the enemy's clandestine Cambodian sanctuaries where he'd teased death scores of times. Unknown to him, however, forces beyond his control at the highest levels of government in Hanoi and Washington were steering his fate. The Strategic Picture Every few weeks of early 1969, the docks at Cambodia's seaport of Sihanoukville bustled with East European ships offloading to long lines of Hak Ly Trucking Company lorries. Though ostensibly owned by a Chinese businessman, the Hak Ly Company's true operator was North Vietnam's Trinh Sat intelligence service. The trucks' clandestine cargo of rockets, smallarms ammunition and mortar rounds rolled overnight to the heavily jungled frontier of Kampong Cham Province just three miles from the border with South Vietnam, a place the Americans had nicknamed the Fishhook, where vast stockpiles sustained three full enemy divisions, plus communist units across the border inside South Vietnam -- some 200,000 foes. Cambodian Prince Sihanouk was well aware of these neutrality violations; indeed, his fifth wife, Monique, her mother and half-brother were secretly peddling land rights and political protection to the NVA; other middlemen were selling rice to the NVA by the thousands of tons. Hoping to woo Sihanouk away from the communists, the Johnson Administration had watched passively while thousands of GIs were killed by communist forces operating from Cambodia, and not only did nothing about it, but said nothing, even denied it was happening. And now, each week of February and March 1969, more Americans were dying than lost in the Persian Gulf War, killed by NVA forces that struck quickly then fled back to "neutral" Cambodia. Combined with other data, SOG's Cambodian intelligence appeared on a top secret map which National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger studied aboard Air Force One at Brussels airport the morning of 24 February 1969. Sitting with Kissinger was Colonel Alexander Haig, his military assistant, while representing the president was White House Chief of Staff H.R. "Bob" Haldeman. During the new administration's transition, President Nixon had asked Kissinger to determine how to deal with the Cambodian buildup and counter Hanoi's "fight and talk" strategy. While President Nixon addressed NATO's North Atlantic Council, those aboard Air Force One worked out details for a clandestine U.S. response: The secret bombing of Cambodia's most remote sanctuaries, which would go unacknowledged unless Prince Sihanouk protested. When Air Force One departed Brussels, Kissinger briefed President Nixon, who approved the plan but postponed implementing it. Over the coming three weeks, Nixon twice warned Hanoi, "we will not tolerate attacks which result in heavier casualties to our men at a time that we are honestly trying to seek peace at the conference table in Paris." The day after Nixon's second warning, the NVA bombarded Saigon with 122mm rockets obviously smuggled through Cambodia. Three days later, Nixon turned loose the B-52s on the Fishhook, the first secret Cambodian raid, which set off 73 secondary explosions. A Special SOG Mission Not one peep eminated from Phnom Penh or Hanoi and here was a fitting irony: For four years the North Vietnamese had denied their presence in Cambodia, and now, with U.S. bombs falling upon them, they could say nothing. Nixon suspended further B-52 strikes in hopes Hanoi's negotiators might begin productive discussions in Paris, but the talks droned on pointlessly. To demonstrate that America, too, could "talk and fight," President Nixon approved a second secret B-52 strike, this time against a target proposed by General Creighton Abrams with Ambassador Bunker's endorsement: COSVN, the Central Office for South Vietnam, the almost mythical Viet Cong headquarters which claimed to run the whole war. An NVA deserter had pinpointed the COSVN complex 14 miles southeast of Memot, Cambodia, in the Fishhook, just a mile beyond the South Vietnamese border. The COSVN raid was laid on for 24 April. Apprised of the upcoming B-52 strike, Brigadier General Philip Davidson, the MACV J-2, thought that instead of just bombing COSVN, a top secret SOG raiding force should hit the enemy headquarters as soon as the bombs stopped falling. He phoned Colonel Steve Cavanaugh, Chief SOG, who agreed and ordered the Ban Me Thuot-based Command and Control South, CCS, to prepare a Green Beret-led company of Montagnard mercenaries for the special mission. At CCS, the historic COSVN raid fell upon its most accomplished man, that living recon legend, Mad Dog Shriver, and Captain Bill O'Rourke. Though O'Rourke would command the company-size raiding force, Shriver equally would influence the operation, continuing an eight-month collaboration they'd begun when they ran recon together. Mad Dog - the Man and the Myth There was no one at CCS quite like Mad Dog Shriver. Medal of Honor recipient Jim Fleming, who flew USAF Hueys for SOG, found Shriver, "the quintessential warrior-loner, anti-social, possessed by what he was doing, the best team, always training, constantly training." Shriver rarely spoke and walked around camp for days wearing the same clothes. In his sleep he cradled a loaded rifle, and in the club he'd buy a case of beer, open every can, then go alone to a corner and drink them all. Though he'd been awarded a Silver Star, five Bronze Stars and the Soldiers Medal, the 28-year-old Green Beret didn't care about decorations. But he did care about the Montagnard hill tribesmen, and spent all his money on them, even collected food, clothes, whatever people would give, to distribute in Yard villages. He was the only American at CCS who lived in the Montagnard barracks. "He was almost revered by the Montagnards," O'Rourke says. Shriver's closest companion was a German shepherd he'd brought back from Taiwan which he named Klaus. One night Klaus got sick on beer some recon men fed him and crapped on the NCO club floor; they rubbed his nose in it and threw him out. Shriver arrived, drank a beer, removed his blue velvet smoking jacket and derby hat, put a .38 revolver on a table, then dropped his pants and defecated on the floor. "If you want to rub my nose in this," he dared, "come on over." Everyone pretended not to hear him; one man who'd fed Klaus beer urged the Recon Company commander to intervene. The captain laughed in his face. "He had this way of looking at you with his eyes half-open," recon man Frank Burkhart remembers. "If he looked at me like that, I'd just about freeze." Shriver always had been different. In the early 1960s, when Rich Ryan served with him in the 7th Army's Long Range Patrol Company in Germany, Shriver's buddies called him "Digger" since they thought he looked like an undertaker. As a joke his LRRP comrades concocted their own religion, "The Mahoganites," which worshipped a mahogany statue. "So we would carry Shriver around on an empty bunk with a sheet over him and candles on the corners," recalled Ryan, "and chant, 'Maaa-haa-ga-ney, Maaa-haa-ga-ney.' Scared the hell out of new guys." Medal of Honor recipient Fleming says Shriver "convinced me that for the rest of my life I would not go into a bar and cross someone I didn't know." But no recon man was better in the woods. "He was like having a dog you could talk to," O'Rourke explained. "He could hear and sense things; he was more alive in the woods than any other human being I've ever met." During a company operation on the Cambodian border Shriver and an old Yard compatriot were sitting against a tree, O'Rourke recalled. "Suddenly he sat bolt upright, they looked at each other, shook their heads and leaned back against the tree. I'm watching this and wondering, what the hell's going on? And all of a sudden these birds flew by, then a nano-second later, way off in the distance, 'Boom-boom!' -- shotguns. They'd heard that, ascertained what it was and relaxed before I even knew the birds were flying." Shriver once went up to SOG's Command and Control North for a mission into the DMZ where Captain Jim Storter encountered him just before insert. "He had pistols stuck everywhere on him, I mean, he had five or six .38 caliber revolvers." Storter asked him, "Sergeant Shriver, would you like a CAR-15 or M-16 or something? You know the DMZ is not a real mellow area to go into." But Mad Dog replied, "No, them long guns'll get you in trouble and besides, if I need more than these I got troubles anyhow." Rather than stand down after an operation, Shriver would go out with another team. "He lived for the game; that's all he lived for," Dale Libby, a fellow CCS man said. Shriver once promised everyone he was going on R&R but instead sneaked up to Plei Djerang Special Forces camp to go to the field with Rich Ryan's A Team. During a short leave stateside in 1968, fellow Green Beret Larry White hung out with Shriver, whose only real interest was finding a lever action .444 Marlin rifle. Purchasing one of the powerful Marlins, Shriver shipped it back to SOG so he could carry it into Cambodia, "to bust bunkers," probably the only levergun used in the war. And the Real Jerry Shriver Unless you were one of Mad Dog's close friends, the image was perfect prowess -- but the truth was, Shriver confided to fellow SOG Green Beret Sammy Hernadez, he feared death and didn't think he'd live much longer. He'd beat bad odds too many times, and could feel a terrible payback looming. "He wanted to quit," Medal of Honor winner Fred Zabitosky could see. "He really wanted to quit, Jerry did. I said, 'Why don't you just tell them I want off, I don't want to run any more?' He said he would but he never did; just kept running." The 5th Special Forces Group executive officer, Lieutenant Colonel Charlie Norton, had been watching SOG recon casualties skyrocket and grew concerned about men like Mad Dog whose lives had become a continuous flirtation with death. Norton went to the 5th Group commander and urged, "Don't approve the goddamn extensions these guys are asking for. You approve it again, your chances of killing that guy are very, very good." But the group commander explained SOG needed experienced men for its high priority missions. "Bullshit," Norton snapped, "you're signing that guy's death warrant." Eventually 5th Group turned down a few extensions but only a very few; the most experienced recon men never had extensions denied. Never. "Mad Dog was wanting to get out of recon and didn't know how," said recon team leader Sonny Franks, though the half-measure came when Shriver left recon to join his teammate O'Rourke's raider company. And now the COSVN raid would make a fitting final operation; Shriver could face his fear head-on, charge right into COSVN's mysterious mouth and afterward at last call it quits. Into COSVN's Mouth The morning of 24 April 1969, while high-flying B-52s winged their way from distant Guam, the SOG raider company lined up beside the airfield at Quan Loi, South Vietnam, only 20 miles southeast of COSVN's secret lair. But just five Hueys were flyable that morning, enough to lift only two platoons; the big bombers could not be delayed, which meant Lieutenant Bob Killebrew's 3rd Platoon would have to stand by at Quan Loi while the 1st Platoon under First Lieutenant Walter Marcantel, and 2nd Platoon under First Lieutenant Greg Harrigan, raided COSVN. Capt. O'Rourke and Mad Dog didn't like it, but they could do nothing.* Nor could they do anything about their minimal fire support. Although whole waves of B-52s were about to dump thousands of bombs into COSVN, the highly classified Cambodian Rules of Engagement forbad tactical air strikes; it was better to lose an American-led SOG team, the State Department rules suggested, then leave documentable evidence that U.S. F4 Phantoms had bombed this "neutral" territory. It was a curious logic so concerned about telltale napalm streaks or cluster bomb fins, but unconcerned about B-52 bomb craters from horizon to horizon. Chief SOG Cavanaugh found the contradiction "ridiculous," but he could not change the rules. The B-52 contrails were not yet visible when the raiding force Hueys began cranking and the raiders boarded; Capt. O'Rourke would be aboard the first bird and Shriver on the last so they'd be at each end of the landing Hueys. As they lifted off for the ten-minute flight, the B-52s were making final alignments for the run-in. Minutes later the lead chopper had to turn back because of mechanical problems; O'Rourke could only wish the others Godspeed. Command passed to an operations officer in the second bird who'd come along for the raid, Captain Paul Cahill. Momentarily the raiders could see dirt geysers bounding skyward amid collapsing trees. Then as the dust settled a violin-shaped clearing took form and the Hueys descended in-trail, hovered for men to leap off, then climbed away. Then fire exploded from all directions, horrible fire that skimmed the ground and mowed down anyone who didn't dive into a bomb crater or roll behind a fallen treetrunk. From the back of the LZ, Mad Dog radioed that a machinegun bunker to his left-front had his *(Greg Harrigan and I had been boyhood friends in northeast Minneapolis.) men pinned and asked if anyone could fire at it to relieve the pressure. Holed up in a bomb crater beneath murderous fire, Capt. Cahill, 1st Lt. Marcantel and a medic, Sergeant Ernest Jamison, radioed that they were pinned, too. Then Jamison dashed out to retrieve a wounded man; heavy fire cut him down, killing him on the spot. No one else could engage the machinegun that trapped Shriver's men -- it was up to Mad Dog. Skittish Yards looked to Shriver and his half-grin restored a sense of confidence. Then they were on their feet, charging -- Shriver was his old self, running to the sound of guns, a True Believer Yard on either side, all of them dashing through the flying bullets, into the treeline, into the very guts of Mad Dog's great nemesis, COSVN. And Mad Dog Shriver was never seen again. The Fight Continues At the other end of the LZ, Jamison's body lay just a few yards from the crater where Capt. Cahill heard bullets cracking and RPGs rocking the ground. When Cahill lifted his head, an AK round hit him in the mouth, deflected up and destroyed an eye. Badly wounded, he collapsed. In a nearby crater, young Lt. Greg Harrigan directed helicopter gunships whose rockets and mini-guns were the only thing holding off the aggressive NVA. Already, Harrigan reported, more than half his platoon were killed or wounded. For 45 minutes the Green Beret lieutenant kept the enemy at bay, then Harrigan, too, was hit. He died minutes later. Bill O'Rourke tried to land on another helicopter but his bird couldn't penetrate the NVA veil of lead. Lieutenant Colonel Earl Trabue, their CCS Commander, arrived and flew overhead with O'Rourke but they could do little. Hours dragged by. Wounded men laid untreated, exposed in the sun. Several times the Hueys attempted to retrieve them and each time heavy fire drove them off. One door gunner was badly wounded. Finally a passing Australian twin-jet Canberra bomber from No. 2 Squadron at Phan Rang heard their predicament on the emergency radio frequency, ignored the fact it was Cambodia, and dropped a bombload which, O'Rourke reports, "broke the stranglehold those guys were in, and it allowed us to go in." Only 1st Lt. Marcantel was still directing air, and finally he had to bring ordnance so close it wounded himself and his surviving nine Montagnards. One medic ran to Harrigan's hole and attempted to lift his body out but couldn't. "They were pretty well drained physically and emotionally," O'Rourke said. Finally, three Hueys raced in and picked up 15 wounded men. Lieutenant Dan Hall carried out a radio operator, then managed to drag Lt. Harrigan's body to an aircraft. Thus ended the COSVN raid. A Time for Reflection Afterward Chief SOG Cavanaugh talked to survivors and learned, "The fire was so heavy and so intense that even the guys trying to [evade] and move out of the area were being cut down." It seemed almost an ambush. "That really shook them up at MACV, to realize anybody survived that [B-52] strike," Col. Cavanaugh said. The heavy losses especially affected Brig. Gen. Davidson, the MACV J-2, who blamed himself for the catastrophe. "General," Chief SOG Cavanaugh assured him, "if I'd have felt we were going to lose people like that, I wouldn't have put them in there." It's that ambush-like reception despite a B-52 strike that opens the disturbing possibility of treachery and, it turns out, it was more than a mere possibility. One year after the COSVN raid, the NSA twice intercepted enemy messages warning of imminent SOG operations which could only have come from a mole or moles in SOG headquarters. It would only be long after the war that it became clear Hanoi's Trinh Sat had penetrated SOG, inserting at least one high ranking South Vietnamese officer in SOG whose treachery killed untold Americans, including, most likely, the COSVN raiders. Of those raiders, Lt. Walter Marcantel survived his wounds only to die six months later in a parachuting accident at Ft. Devens, Mass., while Capt. Paul Cahill was medically retired. Eventually, Green Beret medic Ernest Jamison's body was recovered. But those lost in the COSVN raid have not been forgotten. Under a beautiful spring sky on Memorial Day, 1993, with American flags waving and an Army Reserve Huey strewing flower petals as it passed low-level, members of Special Forces Association Chapter XX assembled at Lt. Greg Harrigan's grave in Minneapolis, Minn. Before the young lieutenant's family, a Special Forces honor guard placed a green beret at his grave, at last conferring some recognition to the fallen SOG man, a gesture the COSVN raid's high classification had made impossible a quarter-century earlier. Until now, neither Harrigan's family nor the families of the other lost men knew the full story of the top secret COSVN raid. But the story remains incomplete. As in the case of SOG's other MIAs, Hanoi continues to deny any knowledge of Jerry Shriver. Capt. O'Rourke concluded Mad Dog died that day. "I felt very privileged to have been his friend," O'Rourke says, "and when he died I grieved as much as for my younger brother when he was killed. Twenty some-odd years later, it still sticks in my craw that I wasn't there. I wish I had been there." There remains a popular myth among SOG veterans, that any day now Mad Dog Shriver will emerge from the Cambodian jungle as if only ten minutes have gone by, look right and left and holler, "Hey! Where'd everybody go?" Indeed, to those who knew him and fought beside him, Mad Dog will live forever. (This article is derived from Maj. Plaster's book, SOG: The Secret Wars of America's Commandos in Vietnam, published by Simon & Schuster.) Also see this for an account of the final action that led to his MIA http://taskforceomegainc.org/s139.html (edit) Notes from the Virtual Wall: According to the Task Force Omega site, a Radio Hanoi broadcast indicated that Shriver had been killed in the fighting. However, he was carried as MIA until 10 June 1974, when the Secretary of the Army approved a Presumptive Finding of Death. During this time he was promoted from E-7 to E-8. As of 04 June 2004 his remains have not been repatriated. There is a marker for Master Sergeant Jerry M. Shriver in the Fort Lawton Federal Cemetery in Seattle, Washington (Plot 4-235, placed 08/22/1974). Unofficial information indicates that Master Sergeant Shriver was on his third tour of duty in Vietnam and received two Silver Stars, the Soldier's Medal, seven Bronze Stars, the Purple Heart, the Air Medal, and three Army Commendation Medals for valor - a total of 15 decorations.

http://www.amazon.com/review/R3JCJAPMVCF89H A Great Book about a Great Story, December 29, 2003 By Matthew S. Beyeler I am now reading this book for the second time, having just recently discovered it. I cannot recommend this book enough. In October 1970, as a young wet-behind-the-ears 1LT, I arrived at CCC, Kontum. Within two months I was serving under CPT Bob Howard as the XO of his Recon Company. When Bob left to go to DC to recieve his Medal of Honor, I then served under CPT Jim Storter. [Ed. interestingly Storter was Commander when he led the 4th HALO jump. Talk about leading by example!!] As XO, I had the opportunity to join an RT from time to time on a mission as a "straphanger," or extra US. I identify most strongly with RT Montana, whose One-Zero was SSG Mike Sheppard, One-One was SGT Mike Bently, and One-Two was MSG Charles Behler. What an amazing group of soldiers I served with. I remember John Plaster, Fred Krupa, David Mixter, Walter Shumate, and many more. There is no exageration in this book, these soldiers performed extremely hairy recon missions in the face of unbelievable odds, again and again. What really astounded me was reading stories about guys I had served with that I did not know, they themselves did not brag about their exploits at all. Neither McCarley (of Operation Tailwind fame), nor Miller, nor Howard, nor Plaster ever bragged about one mission. They were the consumate professional soldiers who "marched to the sound of the guns." Some were new to Special Forces, like Miller, and some were ex-SF NCO "old hands" with years of SF tours under their belts, like Howard, McCarley and Storter. John Plaster has done an excellent job of giving both the "big picture" along with so many individual stories. I had no idea how comprehensive and effective (and costly in soldiers lives) the SOG mission was overall. I am recommending this book to everyone I know. Regarding the "mole" in Saigon, I have always suspected treachery in the deaths of SSG Mixter and Dai-uy (CPT) Krupa. The NVA were waiting in force when Mixter's RT and Krupa's Hatchet Force company were inserted. The NVA knew exactly when and where to expect them! Shame on the higher-ups at SOG for not withholding the teams/companies exact map grid coordinates from our ARVN "allies." This book is a literate, exciting and highly informative account of one of the most incredible groups of solders, ever. Well done, John!

Do you remember the movie "Clerks"? It was filmed in 1994, in b/w, with a budget of only $27,000 Here's a trailer http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNd8nvnmhyM (edit) did you notice how the trailer has them giving (at 0:21) the quote about how "things would be great if it wasn't for the customers"...Funny thread back reference! That leads to a true story from last year. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Fort_Dix_attack_plot 6 men charged in plot to attack US Fort Dix 9 May 2007 FORT DIX, New Jersey - Six foreign-born Muslims were arrested and accused of plotting to attack an Army post in Fort Dix and slaughter scores of US soldiers a scheme the FBI says was foiled when the men asked a store clerk to copy a video of them firing assault weapons and screaming in Arabic about jihad, or holy war.

Found a picture of the camp that TW painted the watercolors from. Attached. It's possible Hoffa is buried there? (edit) Re: sliding over the edge...Which side of the edge is preferable, and why? Weird how skydiving is about going over the edge (doorway). (edit) SHUT UP! THE INVESTIGATION IS NOT ONGOING! The truth will be as I define it. On the 8th day I will rest.

Yeah, I had some numbers on different countries with people in Vietnam. It wasn't just US. There's another guy tracking which US military groups were in Laos. It wasn't just Air America. Basically everyone had some number of people in Laos. (when no one was supposed to have anyone) The whole fake "Laos Neutrality" thing, and the political issues there, and in Cambodia, and how the NVA exploited that, seems like one of the key reasons why the Vietnam war was (tactically at least) unwinnable. There were a lot of reasons I guess. Geez, Laos and Cambodia have their own complicated political, and sad, stories. Man, what a jumble of crap for any Vietnam vet to digest when rationalizing one's experience. It would seem the only sane thing would be to close it off and move forward with your life. Feel good when you see your old buddies.

I'm close to the end of "SOG" and have some notes on things that would be worth posting, but I'm starting to think you guys are lost in the details. -It's surprising to see the relatively low number of freefall jumps most of the team members had before the Vietnam combat halo jumps/training. Storter had 0, and led the first successful team mostly because he bragged he could do it while drinking the night before. Really. That's what happened. He said "What?" when he got called on it the next day with approval..but went ahead and did it. (after training) (and was the first real success). -Storter's team transitioned to using Paracommanders. There was one more HALO after that (if you ignore 2 ARVN-only jumps later). I guess it's reasonable to assume that the last one used Paracommanders also, then. -They had the radio location devices we discussed, although they seemed to say they worked. Except not waterproof. -Looking thru the claimed numbers of freefall jumps, it's possible that Braden was way more experienced than any of the people that jumped in the vietnam combat halo jumps. -more than one of the vietnam combat halos were in rain. -The Larry Manes, Noel Gast, Robert Castillo and John Trantanella jump was in really really stormy weather. Manes thought it would be aborted, but jumpmaster Norbury sent them out. -The toe popper that exploded in Gast's rucksack on the jump: Plaster says it went off due to the rapid change in atmospheric pressure. I had read/posted accounts that implied it was because Gast f*ed up and jumped with the top-popper activated. It appears that wasn't the case. I apologize to Gast. He was severely injured. -I'm really impressed with Plaster's effort to capture history for readers. He did a very fine job for something that must have been difficult to capture well. While some may say his method of "telling stories" isn't objective enough...the reality for any subculture where history is passed without the written word: it's all about stories. That's how humans remember. Remember that for 10-20 years, the SOG guys only had these stories in their heads. The official SOG files were burned in the early 70s. They were told to keep things secret. The fact that the SF guys did tell the stories, to pass critical operational knowledge, lessons learned, ...to remember those who had fallen. It's very touching, and very human. Plaster did good.