Then again, it was a Saturday morning and they were possibly going to market. Did you fly with him much before My Lai? After Hugh died, I was invited to Annapolis to speak one more time. There was also testimony of absolute insanity. The photos document the free, unobstructed flow of water through the easement area between the base of the dam and the drop inlets on the Spec Ops Magazine 2023 All Rights Reserved. PDF Testimony of Dr. Hugh Thompson, HTA Engineering (Expert Witness Hugh Thompson - Collierville, Tennessee, United States - LinkedIn It wasn't war.". At that point, no one had a clue beside you and Hugh? Thompson continued to fly and was hit eight times, in four of which incidents the aircraft was lost. 199 0 obj <>stream They tried to make arrangements to get him there, but couldnt find him. Mercy Thompson and the Revelation on Marriage - The Church of Jesus We came across a ditch, with probably 150 or more people in it and the wounded trying to crawl out. When the orders came down, the CO called me into his office and demanded to know what they were for. I said Im not really at liberty to say. Since Hughs death, I have become the recipient of some of the hate mail he used to get. Nearby, a squad of soldiers approached with weapons drawn. The My Lai Massacre was and still is a huge, shameful event that will be hard for several generations to get past. How do you think your story, of an event now long in the past, can make a difference? Court-martial me, and he left his weapon and walked away. After the initial shock, I think some sort of a defensive mechanism kicked in. According to Miriam-Webster.com, the word "testimony means: proof or evidence that something exists or is true, firsthand authentication of a fact, an open acknowledgment, a public profession of religious experience . "I'd received death threats over the phone," he told the CBS News program "60 Minutes" in 2004. So I was not a good guy.". We know that Americans committed a massacre 50 years ago today; and we also know that an American stopped it. I was back in Mount Vernon, outside Washington, and I got a call from my mother saying there were some people at the house who wanted to talk to me. Prepared Testimony and Statement for the Record of Hugh Thompson Chief Technology Officer Hearing on "Bolstering the Government's Cybersecurity: Lessons Learned from WannaCry" Before the United States House of Representatives Committee on Science, Space, and Technology Subcommittee on Oversight and Subcommittee on Research and Technology We didnt know what was happening. What drove you to create the Hugh Thompson Foundation? Were you glad you got it? When it was all happening, the feeling I had was, if this is how Im going to die, Im OK with it. A $300-million (minimum) gondola to Dodger Stadium? The daring act of a man in defiance of combat differences in saving unarmed civilians from being deliberately butchered by his own side while under combat orders. There were probably 10 in the squad. Return to My Lai - CBS News Then he assumed the Army initiated an investigation. But many in the Army and the public supported Calley over Thompson. The My Lai massacre of March 16, 1968, stands as one of the darkest moments in U.S. military history. And I was just devastated. Im Irish so Im to suffer. We are inundated with information but we are not very well informed. The dead were women, old men and children. Glenn and I were staring them down and watching to see how it would unfold. Youve been back a few times? At the same time, judging from Hendersons reactionhe seemed almost nonchalant, like it was just another day at the office. Anyone can read what you share. He is an amazing person made me cry just reading the research about him. Back at their base he filed a complaint about the killing of civilians that he had witnessed. But eventually the journalist Seymour Hersh found out about the massacre, and his report made it worldwide news and a turning point in the war. None. 0 So we continued our recon. Id seen civilians get in the way and unfortunately lose their lives because of that. They were shooting women and children just like anybody else.. I enjoyed that. Our purpose for being there was to protect them. Wed talk a lot and if I was stressing I could always pick up the phone and Hugh could always talk me down. The pilots were briefed, if the crew was briefed it was by the pilot in the aircraft on the way to the area. Hugh P. Thompson was the chief justice of the Georgia Supreme Court. %PDF-1.6 % If there was anything that was cleansing for me that was it. Thompsons father played a central role in his childrens education. Everybody's heard of the My Lai massacre March 16, 1968, 50 years ago today but not many know about the man who stopped it: Hugh Thompson, an Army helicopter pilot. Hugh said: These people are going to die. 30 years after the massacre, Thompson and the two other members of his crew, Glenn Andreotta and Lawrence Colburn, were awarded the Soldier's Medal (Andreott. You and Thompson must have been good mutual support. Possibly we could have stopped things earlier. Testimony of Dr. Hugh Thompson, HTA Engineering (Expert Witness) (Exhibit Allegra-10) Exhibit Allegra-10 includes Survey Notes and 12 photographs taken by HTA Engineering on January 12, 2010. "Dead animals on your porch, mutilated animals on your porch some mornings when you get up. In an interview first broadcast in 2004, Hardtalk's Tim Sebastian spoke to Mr. The alternative was to be in an infantry unit, and I was told it would be a good idea to attach to an aviation company, better odds there. That one person will go on to tell 10 other people. Nobody would be held responsible. Then he assumed the Army initiated an investigation. Hugh Thompson and the My Lai Massacre - Truth or Fiction? Calley was paroled just three years later, in 1974, after Richard Nixon commuted his sentence. Every time Ive been back there, the survivors ask me, Why dont the men who committed the atrocities come back and ask for forgiveness so that we might forgive them. Theyre Buddhists you know, they can forgive, put it behind them and carry on. Ive mulled this over for years. Hell, I didnt want to believe it, either, but I had no choice because I saw it. Kyle Hockenberry: For Those I love I will sacrifice, Adam Brown: The life and legacy of fearless Navy SEAL, Gary Gordon and Randy Shughart: The real heroes of the Battle of Mogadishu, Ivica Jerak: The Croat who died as American hero. Unfortunately, Lt. Calley and the rest of Company C never paid the price for the atrocities they committed. Everybodys heard of the My Lai massacre March 16, 1968, 50 years ago today but not many know about the man who stopped it: Hugh Thompson, an Army helicopter pilot. That is what other people say. While the massacre took place, helicopter pilot Hugh Thompson and his crew flew over the jungle, offering air support. The Forgotten Hero of My Lai: The Hugh Thompson Story (First Edition Thats what keeps me going. Hugh Thompsonsdefiance and courage with that of his crew had given a new lease of life to others that they saved and will be remembered by all in the face of Humanity and History. At first, they only wanted to give it to Hugh at a private ceremony. He has had an impact on many young minds in the military. Before the story broke, did you or Hugh consider going public with the story? Hugh Thompson Profiles | Facebook He remembered how Glenn would put him down and pick him back up as he checked on other victims in the ditch. As we found out from the farce of justice being served via trials of the monsters responsible, politicians and their cronies cant be trusted either. Yes. Upon returning from the mission, Thompson reported what he had seen and experienced to his. Had you ever seen anything even approaching this before? I want you to come down here and shuttle these people out of here. And thats what happened, but at that he had to make two trips. Sorry thats not what we did and I dont care what they think of me. Furious, Hugh Thompson landed again, this time in front of a bunker where civilians were hiding. That was the only enemy combatant we saw that day. I read the citation and thought what? At that point, Hugh realizes hes got an aircraft that wont accommodate them. It went on like that for another year and half until finally they agreed to award medals to all of us. I dont know, at the time I thought about creating a diversion, discharging my weapon in another direction. Mr. Thompson landed twice in an effort to determine what was happening, finally coming to the realization that a massacre was taking place. Hugh and I were skeptical in 01, so we asked him a lot of questions and he told us things only he could have known. HUGH THOMPSON'S TESTIMONY: I'm Hugh Thompson. Like most 18-year-old males I was nave, had no idea what risks were. Id never seen nor heard of anything like that before, except in World War II. And the Army company only stopped because Thompson literally put himself between the soldiers and the civilians and threatened to shoot them if they didnt end the killings. Thompson left the Army in 1983 and became a private helicopter pilot in the South. Meet Hugh Thompson, The Hero Who Stopped The M Lai Massacre And Was Branded A Traitor For It. Even though the military has admitted to the massacre, many people are not capable of acknowledging and processing that information. When you testified in Washington for the Army investigation led by General William Peers, did you feel they were after the real story? He didnt want to appear to be frantic; he wanted to be taken seriously by Henderson. He is still tiny, but he remembers everything. Hugh Thompson reported the massacre to his commanding officer. Calley was the only person found guilty out of the 14 charged. Hugh Clowers Thompson, Jr. (April 15, 1943 - January 6, 2006) was a United States Army helicopter pilot during the Vietnam War. That aspect of it made me feel real good.. Hugh Thompson Jr., The Army Major Who Stopped The My Lai Massacre I now know why he wanted me to come with him to events. Jon Wiener is professor emeritus of history at UC Irvine, and working, with Mike Davis, on a book on Los Angeles in the 1960s. Among those numbers were 17 pregnant women and 56 infants. We surveyed around the bunker and saw that squad approaching. We started thinking what might have happened, but you didnt want to accept that thought, Thompson said in a 2000 interview, because if you accepted it, that means your own fellow Americans, people you were there to protect, were doing something very evil.. If you are an American who thinks all of our foreign policy and actions over the years is as pure as the driven snow, well that is just not reality. I have come to understand him more now than I did when he was here. When the American people responded as they did in defense of Calley, it was really hard, especially for Hugh. Friends I had on the division level told me they were taking volunteers for the 123rd Aviation Battalion. Were you vilified or the target of death threats the way Hugh Thompson was? Hugh Thompson - Ballotpedia An American Hero - CBS News The villagers offered no resistance as U.S. soldiers shoved them into a ditch and opened fire with machine guns. Hugh M. Thompson IV on LinkedIn: Weekly market wrap Well, I took the prescriptions, ripped them up into little pieces and walked out. The squad leader ordered Thompson and his men to get out of the way. Thompson was buried in Lafayette, Louisiana, with full military honors, including a three-volley salute and a helicopter flyover. We couldnt come up with an explanation until Hugh marked a woman we saw who had a chest wound and decided to just move back in a hover when we saw a squad coming near. This is not what Im here for. Just then Glenn spotted some people in an earthen bunker, saw faces peering out of the entry. Some were sent out into the field for 60-75 days straight, and they started getting the feeling somebody was trying to get rid of them. "I threatened never to fly again. Hugh told her he probably didnt have any family left. He started accusing me of being with CID. Testimony to the Truth We were very protective of the men on the ground. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. They approached but because the aircraft was at flight idle they tended to stay back a little. We hope to link up with other organizations and grow some legs. When you see your lieutenant or captain initiate these things, some enlisted men on the ground are more likely to do the same thing. Im sorry. At first, I just felt shock. Did you experience retaliation for what you did that day, or for talking to Henderson? So he gave me prescriptions for several psychotropic drugs. Out of the blue, our unit was called out onto the tarmac for an awards and decoration ceremony. It was a case of bloodlust. .d,H2F I waited in the hospital waiting room for about four hours to see a psychologist. At 8 years old, he made his way about 10 miles through the jungle by himself to the village. We also want to carry on Hughs passionate advocacy for all veterans, not just Vietnam vets. My Lai massacre was a bloody stain of the Vietnam War, but one man changed the course of the battle and went from traitor to hero. Billy Waugh, a fabled Special Forces Green Beret and CIA military operative, served in Vietnam and helped hunt for Osama Bin Laden and other terrorists. He was saying: Ill never fly again. He had to make sure his mother, brother and sister, killed in the ditch, were buried properly. But to see people herded up like so many animals, marched into a ditch and machine-gunned? Medina and maybe higher. Thats what they want to do. In 2001 we went back and were reunited with the boy in the ditch. Jan. 6 defendant Dustin Thompson, who blamed Trump for storming Capitol I think I may have been in shock to some extent. They killed everything. When the officers take part in it, it just escalates things. I just wish our crew that day could have helped more people than we did.". Ill have no part of this, Ill tear these wings off and never fly again!. I testified in the trials of Henderson, Medina and Calley. After My Lai, did you feel traumatized or feel like you carried a huge burden? What led you to enlist in the Army? People need to know who Hugh Thompson was, what he did and why he did it. A defendant charged in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, who testified that he believed he was "following presidential orders" from President Donald Trump when he stormed the building. I thought someone else was getting recognition for something. No. I remember wearing the same fatigues and they were pretty much covered with blood stains from carrying the boy and being in that ditch. No Id never seen nor heard of anything like that before, except in World War II. Well, it wasnt really an apology, was it? It was about six months ago that the S&P 500 dipped . When he had a heart attack he said he would slow down, but he didnt. One morning as I was prepping an aircraft for a mission, he came down and introduced himself. People should realize that when atrocities are committed like this and covered up, it degrades us all. She asked me what it was about, and I said I wasnt sure. Wed done what we could. Yes, and we were checking the perimeter as they were coming in and starting the combat assault. I know who I am, Im no hero, I was scared shitless most of the time. Today is the 50th anniversary of the My Lai Massacre, when US soldiers raped and murdered 500 Vietnamese civilians and burned their homes. Those on station knew something about it but not many saw it up close and personal except for the men on the ground and a couple of helicopter crews. I was back at Ft. I was encouraged in that there was an investigation going on and they were going after some people in a big way. Our main job was to fly close to the deck, entice fire to get the enemy to give up their position, mark it, suppress fire and get out of the gunships way. I looked at them and the first thing I saw was, Reason: to conduct necessary military business. So thats all I would tell the CO. Two young infantrymen in Iraq came upon a situation where a number of civilians were questionable and the men werent sure whether to engage or not. Somehow they trusted him and they came out. 1895), in United States testimony 1892, typescript, 247, Church History Library, Salt Lake City. In mid-March 2022, posts about a warrant officer named Hugh Thompson and his role in the My Lai massacre circulated on social media, including a tweet describing that time period as the 50-year anniversary of that incident:. The eyewitness testimony of Thompson and his surviving crew member helped convict Calley at a court-martial. Some peoplepublicly stated that they felt Thompson was the only soldier at My Lai who should be punished (for turning his weapons on fellow American troops) and wanted to see him court-martialed for his actions at My Lai. HistoryNet.com contains daily features, photo galleries and over 25,000 articles originally published in our nine magazines. Did you have a sense that what you had seen at My Lai was and isolated incident or did you suspect similar atrocities were happening elsewhere? All of the investigations led to nothing, Hugh and I felt like all three trials were just window dressing. It took several weeks of time, and several volumes of testimony to satisfy the United States pen<rion bureau that "Old Reliable" was the identical soldier who had enlisted in Company H, Fifteenth Ohio volunteer Infantry, in 1862, and who was last reported "wounded and missing In battle of . Hugh was running scenarios through his head to figure it out. In the middle of a firefight I was an E4, what was I to do? There was no time to get an ethics opinion or consult authorities. Hugh Thompson Jr. - Wikiwand . Trent Angers, Thompsons biographer and friend, analyzed the list and found about 50 there who were 3 years old or younger. In unison, all three of us shouted, You son of a bitch! That was Captain Ernest Medina. As he told The Associated Press in 2004: "Don't do the right thing looking for a reward, because it might not come. Would I have? William Calley, the officer who ordered the slaughter at M Lai. The lieutenant told him to mind his own business and get out of the way. Billy Waugh, Famed Special Forces Warrior and CIA Legend, Dies At 93. When we would come back to those we marked, wed find they were now dead. As murderous bloodlust unfolded on the ground below, Thompson and crew confronted fellow GIs to save numerous civilians from the fate of some 500 others that morning. And it turned out it was a good thing that they did. It was time to stop it, and I figured, at that point, that was the only way the madness, or whatever you want to call it, could be stopped.. I flew with him dozens of times and saw sporadic action. Yet in the midst of the chaos and bloodshed, one U.S. soldier followed his convictions. Thats unlikely to improve anyones mental health, Letters to the Editor: Yes, we need to talk about Bidens age. ), At Willie Nelson 90, country, rock and rap stars pay tribute, but Willie and Trigger steal the show, Concertgoer lets out a loud full body orgasm while L.A. Phil plays Tchaikovskys 5th, Opinion: Why my Taiwanese American identity has become more complicated. In 1964 an Ohio woman took up the challenge that had led to Amelia Earharts disappearance. Upon coming home, he got death threats and the like. At the age of 62, after extensive cancer treatment, Thompson was removed from life support and died on January 6, 2006, at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Pineville, Louisiana. What about those who didnt stand up to evil in their midst? He kept the aircraft and himself in between these people and the squad. Hugh Thompson is a genuine, bone-fide hero of the Vietnam war, protecting hundreds from being massacred by US troops at My Lai. We never thought we were heroes. He made some notes on a legal pad and excused me and I left. I was on the backup team that day and we went out to try to retrieve the bodies. For a while we were going out on snatch missions, where wed basically kidnap draft-age males and take them in for interrogations. He said: They are coming this way. You found later that that wasnt true? They also reported the massacre to higher officers, who ordered the troops on the ground to stop. Ill never fly again, he vowed. That morning, Hugh said, This is supposed to be a VC stronghold, but you know G2. Usually, when intelligence said an area was hot, it wasnt, and visa versa. When Hugh gave his order, I distinctly remember pointing my weapon directly down at the ground, so there was no question. When Hugh realized it was our people doing this killing, he knew he had to take drastic measures. You still didnt understand what was actually happening? They landed their helicopter between the American forces and the civilians, and they trained their guns on the advancing Americans.
hugh thompson testimony
