Posted on 01/06/2006 2:03:22 PM PST by robowombat
My Lai Massacre Hero Thompson Dead
Friday, January 06, 2006
NEW ORLEANS — Hugh Thompson Jr., a former U.S. Army helicopter pilot honored for rescuing Vietnamese civilians from his fellow GIs during the My Lai massacre, died early Friday. He was 62.
Thompson, whose role in the 1968 massacre did not become widely known until decades later, died at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Alexandria, hospital spokesman Jay DeWorth said.
Trent Angers, Thompson's biographer and family friend, said Thompson died of cancer.
"These people were looking at me for help and there was no way I could turn my back on them," Thompson recalled in a 1998 Associated Press interview.
Early in the morning of March 16, 1968, Thompson, door-gunner Lawrence Colburn and crew chief Glenn Andreotta came upon U.S. ground troops killing Vietnamese civilians in and around the village of My Lai.
They landed the helicopter in the line of fire between American troops and fleeing Vietnamese civilians and pointed their own guns at the U.S. soldiers to prevent more killings.
Colburn and Andreotta had provided cover for Thompson as he went forward to confront the leader of the U.S. forces. Thompson later coaxed civilians out of a bunker so they could be evacuated, and then landed his helicopter again to pick up a wounded child they transported to a hospital. Their efforts led to the cease-fire order at My Lai.
In 1998, the Army honored the three men with the prestigious Soldier's Medal, the highest award for bravery not involving conflict with an enemy. It was a posthumous award for Andreotta, who had been killed in battle three weeks after My Lai.
"It was the ability to do the right thing even at the risk of their personal safety that guided these soldiers to do what they did," Army Maj. Gen. Michael Ackerman said at the 1998 ceremony. The three "set the standard for all soldiers to follow."
Lt. William L. Calley, a platoon leader, was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment for his role in the killings, but served just three years under house arrest when then-President Nixon reduced his sentence.
Author Seymour Hersh won the 1970 Pulitzer Prize for his expose of the massacre in 1969 while working as a freelance journalist. The massacre became one of the pivotal events as opposition to the war was growing in the United States.
Thompson's role in ending My Lai didn't come to light until the late 1980s, when David Egan, a professor emeritus at Clemson University, saw an interview with Thompson in a documentary on the massacre. He launched a letter-writing campaign that eventually led to the awarding of the medals in 1998.
"I proudly and humbly accept it not only for myself but for the men who served their country with honor on the battlefield in Southeast Asia," Thompson said at the time of the award.
What a shame. He was an excellent and courageous soldier who did the right thing at great cost to himself. I will miss him.
On a more personal note.....
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1553205/posts
I remember JF Kerry speaking so authoritatively and remorsefully about his own culpablity.....
(If you know about something wrong and don't report it, as an officer you share responsiblity!)
....
The good ones are dying while the LIAR is a Senator.
True hero. I will never forgive Nixon for letting Lt. Calley off the hook for that atrocity.
God Bless Hugh Thompson. Calley and the others who perpetrated this blight on the honor of the US military should rot in hell!
I agree with you 100%. May Thompson rest in peace. He was a man of courage and a great representative of the American people. The Calleys of this world will get what they deserve in the next.
It takes a lot of courage to take a stand like this guy did - and then he didn't make a big deal about it.
Democrats like Kerry could learn from this example.
But I know they won't.
Of course not. It just doesn't fit the MSM agenda does it?
Ok, now you have my curiosity.
William Laws Calley, Jr was a war criminal. My Lai was a screw up. There isn't much more to add. Add away we are listening, my tin-foil hat is on and ready.
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