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The Distinguished Flying Cross
The DFC is Awarded for Valor in Combat
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The Distinguished Flying Cross, created by Congress 80 years ago, is America’s oldest military aviation award.
The cross symbolizes sacrifice, and the propeller symbolizes flight. The combination of those symbols makes clear that the DFC is an award for heroism or achievement for individuals involved in aviation. The ribbon reflects the national colors.
The first recipient of the DFC medal was Charles A. Lindbergh, then a captain in the Army Reserve on 11 June, 1927. The award recognized his 1927 transatlantic crossing in the Spirit of St. Louis.
The Distinguished Flying Cross is awarded to any person who, while serving in any capacity with the Armed Forces of the United States, distinguishes himself by heroism or extraordinary achievement while participating in aerial flight. The performance of the act of heroism must be evidenced by voluntary action above and beyond the call of duty. The extraordinary achievement must have resulted in an accomplishment so exceptional and outstanding as to clearly set the individual apart from his comrades or from other persons in similar circumstances. Awards will be made only to recognize single acts of heroism or extraordinary achievement and will not be made in recognition of sustained operational activities against an armed enemy.
District Four Congressional Candidate Charlie Brown received the DFC for actions at the tail end of the U.S. engagement in Vietnam.
Some who post here regularly have said that Brown is not a Vietnam Veteran because he does not hold the Vietnam Service Medal. The VSM was awarded to all members of the Armed Forces of the United States serving in Vietnam and contiguous waters or airspace thereover, after 3 July 1965 through 28 March 1973. The last American combat troops were withdrawn from Vietnam on March 29, 1973.
But the war was not over. The South and the North were still separate. In December 1974 the North took action. By April 27, 1975, Saigon was encircled. On April 29, the NVA shelled Tan Son Nhut air base in Saigon, killing two U.S. Marines at the compound gate. Conditions then deteriorated as South Vietnamese civilians looted the air base. President Ford ordered Operation Frequent Wind, the helicopter evacuation of 7000 Americans and South Vietnamese from Saigon, which began with the radio broadcast of the song "White Christmas" as a pre-arranged code signal.
At Tan Son Nhut, frantic civilians began swarming the helicopters. The evacuation then shifted to the walled-in American embassy, which was secured by U.S. Marines in full combat gear. But the scene there also deteriorated, as thousands of civilians attempted to get into the compound.
By April 30 it's over. Americans and many Vietnamese were evacuated by U.S. military helicopters.
Charlie Brown was one of the pilots.
His DFC was awarded for a later action though--the Mayaguez Incident, which occurred in May, 1975. Eighteen Americans were killed in this action which is considered the last battle of the Vietnam War.
The names of the men who died during the evacuations of Saigon and Phnom Penh, and during the Mayaguez Incident, are engraved on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, DC.
These men deserve to be remembered as Vietnam Veterans regardless of whether they hold the VSM or not. And so do the men and women who fought with them in those final, dark days.
Here is Charlie's DD214: http://www.charliebrownforcongress.org/files/sitepages/CharlieDD214010.gif
Thank you for your service, Charlie.
(thanks to gruntsmilitary.com, historyplace.com and the historyguy.com)
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I served with the 2nd Battalion, 9th Marines 2/9. I can testify that all Miuwtant says is correct.
Except for the casualties of the Mayaquez incident. There were 42 Military personnel (Marines, Navy and Air Force) killed. Five Air Force helicopters were blown out of the sky.
It took extreme fortitude to get our unit off Koh Tang. It was a mission gone bad as the LZ's were hot. If it were not for the bravery of the Air Force pilots, we could have lost more Marines and I am forever indebted to their resolve.
I am not aware of any of us getting a VSM. It caused problems from the day we came back to the US and left many of us trying to explain why we had medals for combat but no service medals.
I think it was 2002 before the MIA's were recovered.
The reason for the lack of a VSM is because we were not considered 'in country' even though were indeed 'in country'.
It was the Veterans for Surrender in 1972 that were demanding that we walk away from Vietnam.
Chunga,
Thank you for your post.
I wasn't there; I was still in high school. Welcome back, and thank you for your service.
The source I used said sixteen Marines, two Navy Corpsmen and two USAF airmen were lost in the Mayaguez Incident. I went back and looked and there are different casualty figures in different accounts online. I found one account that said forty-two, another that said forty-one and a third said fifteen plus twenty-three more in a helicopter crash. So I think there were combat and non-combat casualties that have been accounted for differently by different historians.
I don't understand why they didn't change the VSM to encompass the actual end of the war. They just needed to extend the date window because the eligibility criteria already includes anyone who was in direct combat for any amount of time so you, Brown and anybody else who participated in those actions in 1975 would have qualified.
One thing is clear. As the Vietnam War progressed the public progressively became more and more disillusioned. In an August 1968 poll, Gallup found for the first time that a majority of Americans, 53%, said it was a mistake to send troops to Vietnam. This was three and a half years into the war and over six months after the Tet Offensive. By 1972 the number was 60%. That means there were something like 100 million Americans who opposed the war in 1972.
Bob
There are alot of things that can be said about the Viet Nam war, the past is past and probably some day the travesty of the VSM will be rectified. Suffice to say that once the war started being run by Washington Politicians the path was downhill all the way.
loomisresident - When I landed in the RVN in '65 we Marines conducted highly successful counter-guerrilla operations by helping the villagers harvest their rice, repair their roofs, dig their wells and care for their injuries and illnesses. They began to see us as friendlies, so they fingered the VC for us. Then Westmoreland arrived. He decided we should be fighting traditional tactical battles rather than building a peasant consistency. I guess he never read Che or Mao. The rest, as they say, is history.
"Suffice to say..." Please explain how we could've "won" the Vietnam war.
I actually believe that if we had not put in the years we did the result would have been similar to what Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge did in Cambodia. I don't think the North Vietnamese cared much for the agrarian communist Viet Minh or the Viet Cong. They didn't trust them and threw them at us like cannon fodder during the TET offensives. They weren't really a functional fighting force after that. Speculation, yes.
The Vietnamese aren't quite capitalist but Cambodia is becoming more so. Koh Tang is supposedly now a major draw for a snorkeling getaway.
Skeptic, welcome home.
Semper Fi