On 16th March, 1968 Warrant Officer Hugh Thompson Jnr was flying helicopter reconnaissance for an attack on an alleged North Vietnamese-controlled village at My Lai.
As the ground attack developed below, Thompson realised he was in fact witnessing something something else:
A massacre.
He decided to act. /1 🧵 #history #histodons
At first Thompson and his crew, Lawrence Colburn and Glen Andreotta thought the wounded Vietnamese they saw below them were the result of artillery fire.
They dropped a green flare near a wounded civilian, expecting the infantry to help. Instead, Captain Medina of Charlie Company walked over and shot her in the head. /2
Horrified, Thompson spotted similar scenes unfolding at an irrigation ditch nearby. He immediately landed his helicopter, attempting to stop the murder.
“These are human beings!" He yelled at the Lieutenant there, leading the killing. "Unarmed civilians sir!”
The Lieutenant told Thompson he was stepping outside his authority and ordered him back into his helicopter. /4
From this point on, it was clear to Thompson and his crew that nobody was going to restrain the ground forces.
Thompson had no direct radio to those on the ground, nor to their commanders back at base, so began demanding the other aerial forces present - who did have radio communications with them - intervene.
They stayed silent. /5
While Thompson continued to demand intervention, his crew spotted 2nd Platoon Charlie Company, under Lieutenant Brooks closing on a group of fleeing women, children and old men to the north.
Thompson immediately threw his scout helicopter round and towards them. He grounded it between the advancing soldiers and the terrified civilians. /6
Jumping out of the helicopter with only his side arm, he turned to Colburn, who was on the helicopter's fixed machine gun, and issued him an order Colburn later said he would never forget.
Thompson told him that if Charlie Company fired on Thompson OR the civilians...
“Open up on ‘em. Blow ‘em away.”
With Thompson and the helicopter now blocking Brooks' path to the civilians, Brooks demanded Thompson and his crew move.
He refused. /7
The horror of this situation is beyond understanding. I would like to say, as an American born well after this event, that Thompson and his aircrew are heroes for standing up to the out of control ground forces. I thank them for that. And, with the heat of a thousand white hot suns, I also feel that Medina and every last one of his marauding ground force should still be serving life sentences for their crimes. In my humble opinion.
John Bull
Robert Denby