Operation Frequent Wind - Preparations On The Ground

Preparations On The Ground

On 1 April an Evacuation Control Center manned by U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force (USAF) and Marine Corps (USMC) personnel began operating at the Defense Attaché Office compound on 12 hour shifts, increasing to 24 hour shifts the next day. Also on 1 April Plan Alamo was implemented to utilize and defend the DAO compound and Annex as an evacuee holding area, intended to care for 1,500 evacuees for five days. By 16 April, Alamo was complete: water, C-rations and petroleum, oil and lubricants had been stockpiled, power-generating facilities had been duplicated, sanitary facilities were completed and concertina wire protected the perimeter.

On 7 April, Air America pilot Nikki A. Fillipi, with Marine Lt Robert Twigger, assigned to the DAO as the Marine Corps liaison officer, surveyed 37 buildings in Saigon as possible landing zones (LZ) selecting 13 of them as fit for use. On 9 April, workers from Pacific Architects and Engineers proceeded to visit each of the 13 LZs to remove obstructions and paint H's the exact dimensions of a Huey helicopters skids on each of the LZs. On 11 April President Gerald Ford, in an address to the American public, promised to evacuate Vietnamese civilians of various categories. On 12 April, the 9th Marine Amphibious Brigade (9th MAB), which was to supply helicopters and a security force for the evacuation, sent a delegation to consult with Ambassador Graham Martin on current plans. Ambassador Martin told them that he would not tolerate any outward signs that the United States intended to abandon South Vietnam. All planning would have to be conducted with the utmost discretion. Brigadier General Richard E. Carey, commander of the 9th MAB, flew to Saigon the next day to see Ambassador Martin; he later said that "The visit was cold, non-productive and appeared to be an irritant to the Ambassador".

On 13 April 13 Marines from the Marine Security Guard (MSG) detachment were deployed to the DAO Compound to replace the 8 Marine Guards withdrawn from the closed Danang and Nha Trang Consulates who had been providing security up to that point.

By late April Air America helicopters were flying several daily shuttles from TF76 to the DAO Compound to enable the 9th MAB to conduct evacuation preparations at the DAO without exceeding the Paris Peace Accords' limit of a maximum of 50 military personnel in South Vietnam, this at a time when the North Vietnamese army was overtly breaching the Peace Accords. In late April the MSG Marines were ordered to abandon Marshall Hall/Marine House, their billet at 204 Hong Thap Tu Street (now 204 Nguyen Thi Minh Khai Street), and move into the combined recreation area in the Embassy compound.

The two major evacuation points chosen for Operation Frequent Wind were the DAO Compound adjacent to Tan Son Nhut Airport for American civilian and Vietnamese evacuees and the US Embassy, Saigon for Embassy staff. The plan for the evacuation would see convoy buses prestaged throughout metropolitan Saigon at 28 buildings designated as pick-up points with American civilians, trained to drive those buses, standing by in town at the way stations. The buses would follow one of four planned evacuation routes from downtown Saigon to the DAO Compound, each route named after a Western Trail: Santa Fe, Oregon, Texas, etc.