"Gentlemen, start your engines." The laconic command, copied from the Indianapolis 500 auto race, echoed from the public-address system of the U.S.S. Hancock. Moments later, the commander of Heavy Helicopter Squadron 463, Lieut. Colonel Herbert Fix, lifted his CH-53 Sea Stallion off the deck of the aging carrier. When the other seven choppers in his squadron had left the deck, they fluttered off in a tight formation through blustery winds and dark, ominous rain clouds that hovered over the South China Sea. Operation "Frequent Wind," the emergency evacuation of the last Americans in Saigon, was under way.
The rescue operation had been delayed as long as possible—too long, in the view of many Pentagon officials. In recent weeks 44 U.S. naval vessels, 6,000 Marines, 120 Air Force combat and tanker planes and 150 Navy planes had been moved into the area. But Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and the U.S. ambassador in Saigon, Graham Martin, argued that the final withdrawal of the American community would probably set off a wave of panic in Saigon and hasten the fall of the South Vietnamese government.
During the preceding eight days, U.S. planes had evacuated almost 40,000 American and South Vietnamese refugees from Tan Son Nhut airbase near Saigon. But by last week, the airlift was growing increasingly dangerous. Artillery shells and rockets closed Tan Son Nhut airport Monday morning. Next day a U.S. C-130 transport was hit by a rocket on the runway and burst into flames as the crew escaped. A short tune later, two U.S. Marine corporals guarding the U.S. defense attache's compound at Tan Son Nhut were killed by Communist artillery.
News of the destruction of the C-130 and the Marines' deaths reached President Ford during a meeting with his energy and economic advisers. He scribbled a note to the deputy director of the National Security Council, Lieut. General Brent Scowcroft: "We'd better have an N.S.C. meeting at 7."
Plainly, evacuation by commercial flights, by military airplanes or by sea was no longer feasible. The security advisers discussed whether conditions might permit a resumption of the military airlift. If not, they would have to go to a fourth option, the riskiest of all: evacuation in Marine helicopters. Scarcely two hours after the meeting ended with no decision, Ford learned that two C-130s attempting to land at Tan Son Nhut had been waved off; the airport was blocked by thousands of panicky South Vietnamese. By then all of Ford's advisers, including Martin, agreed that it had to be "Option Four." At 10:45 p.m., the President ordered Operation Frequent Wind to begin.
Kissinger telephoned Ford to report that a fleet of 81 helicopters was about to embark on its mission, then, at 1:08 a.m. Tuesday, he called again with the news that the evacuation had begun. In Saigon, the center of activity for much of the day was the landing zone at Tan Son Nhut airport, a tennis court near the defense attache's compound. Landing two at a time, the helicopters unloaded their squads of Marines—860 in all, who reinforced 125 Marines already on the scene—and quickly picked up evacuees (see box following page).