Aerial evacuation was largest ever

  • Published
  • By Dr. John Treiber
  • 60th Air Mobility Wing
TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. --  2015 marks the 40th anniversary of Operation Baby Lift during which more than 2,700 Vietnamese orphans - many of whom were of half-American descent -- were brought to the US via military and contracted airlift. Among those 2,700 children 758 entered the United States via Travis Air Force Base before being joined with their new families, making this a national and local historical event. The Baby Lift anniversary was especially poignant for the 60th Air Mobility Wing since one of its C-5s crashed soon after takeoff while carrying the first load of orphans. No matter how one looks at it Baby Lift is a heartrending story, but by focusing solely on that event it leaves out a larger piece of recent history significant to Travis, 60th AMW, AMC, and even America as a whole. Operation Baby Lift, you see, was really just a small part of an enormous air mobility movement of South Vietnamese escaping their homeland in what the Air Force History Program has assessed to be the largest aerial evacuation in history.

Operation Baby Lift began in early April 1975 when the South Vietnamese government was reeling but still intact. By mid-month however, North Vietnam had started a full-blown mechanized invasion of the country that made it abundantly clear to both South Vietnam and the United States that the end was in sight. The impending fall of Saigon led directly to Operation Frequent Wind on 29 and 30 April -- shown in great detail in the smashing PBS documentary Last Days in Vietnam -- the famous helicopter evacuation of thousands of Vietnamese nationals from the US embassy. While the Marines and Navy played an outsized role in that amazing rescue operation, the Air Force also flew some of the helicopter sorties that saved many lives.

Meanwhile the Air Force, notably the 374th and 314th Tactical Airlift Wings flying C-130s, along with Military Airlift Command C-140s from the 60th Military Airlift Wing and other units flew non-stop evacuation missions out of Saigon throughout much of April in order to bring friendly Vietnamese to safe havens in the Philippines, and later directly to Guam. This was a key moral decision since our allies would otherwise have faced harsh retribution at the hands of the communist invaders. That mission came to be known as Operation New Life, and the majority of the refugees, combined with those Vietnamese evacuated during Operation Frequent Wind along with the famous boat people, were processed through Guam which became a kind of Ellis Island for the original Vietnamese-American diaspora -- over 110,000 souls in all. Wake Island was used in a similar manner, though on a smaller scale. Without the Air Force's airlift capability, honed as it was during the Vietnam War, it is difficult to imagine Operation New Life having occurred on such a scale, if at all.

As per a presidential directive the mainland United States was the final destination for the refugees. After enduring a week of processing at Andersen AFB and naval facilities on Guam, the Vietnamese boarded contracted commercial airliners and MAC transport aircraft and soon found themselves flying across the Pacific along with Americans who had also escaped the North Vietnamese invasion. This phase of the airlift evacuation was called Operation New Arrivals and its scope was just as astounding as New Life. The Air Force alone flew in excess of 50,000 people using C-141s, C-5s, and C-130s during 251 flights to airfields in the US in order to distribute these soon-to-be Americans evenly throughout the country. Naturally 60th MAW aircraft and personnel took part in Operation New Arrivals as well.

Travis AFB, too, was heavily involved in the overall Vietnamese airlift operation. As noted above the base was first tasked to receive the orphans during Operation Baby Lift, but around the same time became a key aerial port for workers and materials departing to the Philippines, Guam and Wake in support of Operation New Life. Finally during Operation New Arrivals the base received over 2,600 Vietnamese refugees and 2,300 Americans who had escaped the collapse of South Vietnam. California was slated to absorb nearly 5,000 of the refugees, prompting Governor Jerry Brown to visit Travis and observe operations while the planes were arriving. The first flight, a contracted World Airways DC-8 arrived on 20 April carrying 209 passengers, soon followed by a MAC C-141 with more refugees. After that the planes just kept coming and Travis handled them with characteristic skill and determination. This was a national event of great magnitude, so of course the planes were greeted by numerous reporters who thoroughly covered the new arrivals' story. In the end the 60th MAW's overall role in the Vietnamese evacuation, both in the air and on the ground at Travis, led to an Outstanding Unit Award for 1974-75.

There has been a good deal of deserved focus on Operation Baby Lift this spring, but overlooked has been that event's connection with the infinitely larger evacuation of refugees following the collapse of South Vietnam. It is not a stretch to say that we were trying to make up for our failures in Southeast Asia, yet out of that the United States succeeded greatly by conducting the largest aerial evacuation in history. Moreover, this mass movement of people also planted the seeds of the vibrant Vietnamese community that is now firmly part of the American fabric. In the final assessment forty years ago this April and May Travis AFB, the 60th MAW, and MAC were at the heart of a historical juncture that transformed the nation and the lives of so many.