Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 
Dr. Christopher J. Lamb 

fellow in the Center for 

Institute for National St

Defense University. H

national security strateg

reform, defense strategy

programs, and special o

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defense for resources an

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the Ivory Coast, and Ben

the Pentagon. He is the 

monographs, and article

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and defense reform. He 

international relations fr

after successfully defend

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished re

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at N

Defense University. He conducts resea

national security strategy and policy, organiz

reform, defense strategy, requirements, pla

programs, and special operations forces. Hi

ous positions include deputy assistant secre

defense for resources and plans in the Offic

Secretary of Defense; study director for the 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, F

a New Shield; deputy director for military de

ment on the State Department’s Interagenc

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balka

director of policy planning in the Office of th

tant Secretary of Defense for Special Operatio

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered g

ment as a foreign service officer with stints i

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assig

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous 

monographs, and articles on national secur

he has testified to Congress on interagency c

ation, special operations forces, acquisition 

and defense reform. He received his docto

international relations from Georgetown Un

after successfully defending his dissertation 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished researc

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at th

Institute for National Strategic Studies at Nationa

Defense University. He conducts research o

national security strategy and policy, organizationa

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans an

programs, and special operations forces. His prev

ous positions include deputy assistant secretary o

defense for resources and plans in the Office of th

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Projec

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forgin

a New Shield; deputy director for military develop

ment on the State Department’s Interagency Tas

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; an

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assis

tant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations an

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered govern

ment as a foreign service officer with stints in Hait

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned t

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous book

monographs, and articles on national security, an

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooper

ation, special operations forces, acquisition reform

and defense reform. He received his doctorate i

international relations from Georgetown Universit

after successfully defending his dissertation on th

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished researc

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at th

Institute for National Strategic Studies at Nationa

Defense University. He conducts research o

national security strategy and policy, organizationa

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans an

programs, and special operations forces. His prev

ous positions include deputy assistant secretary o

defense for resources and plans in the Office of th

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Projec

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forgin

a New Shield; deputy director for military develop

ment on the State Department’s Interagency Tas

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; an

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assis

tant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations an

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered govern

ment as a foreign service officer with stints in Hait

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned t

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous book

monographs, and articles on national security, an

he has testified to Congress on interagency coope

ation, special operations forces, acquisition reform

and defense reform. He received his doctorate i

international relations from Georgetown Universit

after successfully defending his dissertation on th

Mayaguez crisis. 
The Mayaguez Crisis,

Mission Command, and 

Civil-Military Relations

The Mayaguez Crisis,

Mission Command, and 

Civil-Military Relations

CHRISTOPHER J. LAMB

Joint History Office

Office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

Washington, DC ♦ 2018
This book was reviewed by the appropriate US government departments and agencies 

and cleared for public release. It is a publication of the Office of the Chairman of the 

Joint Chiefs of Staff, but its contents are the sole responsibility of the author and do not 

represent the official position of the chairman or the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Department of Defense, or the US government.

First edition 2018

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Lamb, Christopher J. (Christopher Jon), 1955- author.

Title: The Mayaguez Crisis, mission command, and civil-military relations / 

 Christopher J. Lamb.

Description: First edition. | Washington, DC : Office of the Chairman of the 

 Joint Chiefs of Staff, 2018. | Includes bibliographical references and 

 index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2018020162 | ISBN 9780160945038 (hardcover)

Subjects: LCSH: Mayaguez Incident, 1975. | United States--Foreign 

 relations--1974-1977--Decision making. | Crisis management in 

 government--United States--Case studies. | Civil-military 

 relations--United States--Case studies. | United States--Foreign 

 relations--Cambodia. | Cambodia--Foreign relations--United States.

Classification: LCC E865 .L366 2018 | DDC 327.730596/09047--dc23 

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018020162

F as ro el t yb eh S epu ir tn e edn tn fo D co mu e tn G .S.U ,s evo r emn tn P eciff O

I tn re en :t tskoob ro e enohP vog.opg. : lot l f eer ( ;0081-215 )668 D C a er ( a 0081-215 )202

aF :x ( aM 4012-215 )202 :li I potS CCD W , ihsa notgn D , C 1000-20402 

ublishing

ISBN 978-0-16-094503-8

8

8

90000
To the members of the US armed forces who served 

during the Mayaguez crisis, and to those who similarly have been 

called upon in the past, or who will be in the future.

What I fear is not the enemy’s strategy, 

but our own mistakes.

—Thucydides, 

The History of the Peloponnesian War

ix

List of Illustrations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . x

Foreword. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi

Preface. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii

Key Figures in the Mayaguez Crisis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xix

Abbreviations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxiii

Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Part I: Crisis Behaviors

1. Day One: Monday, May 12. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

2. Day Two: Tuesday, May 13. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

3. Day Three: Wednesday, May 14. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

4. Day Four: Thursday, May 15. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

Part II: Crisis Explanations

5. Critical Crisis Decisions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .69

6. Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105

7. Refining the Explanation: Rationality, Bureaucracy, and Beliefs. . . . . . . . . . . . 137

8. Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165

Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213

Notes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219

Map Credits. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273

Index. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 275

Contents
x

Maps

Mainland Southeast Asia. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Local Area Map. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Locations of US Air Bases in Thailand. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Command and Control Communications, May 14–15, 1975. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Planned Tang Island and Mayaguez Actions, 0600, May 15, 1975. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

Tang Island: Khmer Rouge Defensive Positions, 6:20 a.m.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

Tang Island: Situation 7:00 a.m.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

Marine Forces on Tang Island after First Wave. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Tang Island: Situation 4:00 p.m.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

Operations against SS Mayaguez and Koh Tang. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

Figures

1. Key Events and Decisions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75

2. Military Chain of Command in 1975. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199

Photographs follow page 136.

Illustrations
xi

Foreword

On May 12, 1975—only two weeks after the fall of Saigon and the collapse of 

South Vietnam—Cambodian Khmer Rouge forces boarded and seized the 

US merchant vessel SS Mayaguez in international waters and took its crew 

hostage. This unprovoked challenge to American power was a major test of Gerald R. 

Ford’s presidency and an international crisis with significant consequences for the 

United States and its allies.

Ford himself considered the Mayaguez crisis the “tensest moments” of his entire 

presidency. From Monday, May 12, through Thursday, May 15, the president and his 

advisors deliberated on the best course of action and struggled to manage the rapidly 

evolving crisis. During this time, the National Security Council convened four times 

for over five hours of meetings; this is the only time a president ever directly managed 

a crisis through the National Security Council. The episode was also the first test of the 

1973 War Powers Act, which requires the president to notify Congress within forty-eight 

hours of committing US forces to military action. 

Although the crew of Mayaguez was returned safely, forty-one servicemen lost 

their lives during the rescue mission, and over fifty were wounded. The decisions made 

during the crisis have often been misconstrued—the story behind the decision making and the operations is confusing and sometimes conflicting. Even though multiple 

books and studies have been written about the crisis, and a plethora of unclassified and 

declassified sources are available on the subject, to date none of them have adequately 

explained what US leaders hoped to accomplish and why the crisis unfolded the way 

it did.

Christopher J. Lamb sets out to remedy this in The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations. Dr. Lamb is a distinguished research fellow in the 

Center for Strategic Research at the Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. His earlier book on the incident, Belief Systems and Decision Making in the Mayaguez Crisis, was published by the University of Florida Press in 1989. 
xii

Foreword

He has published widely on international relations, the US national security system, 

and defense policy and strategy. He holds a doctorate in international relations from 

Georgetown University; his dissertation was on the Mayaguez crisis. 

This publication has been reviewed and approved for publication by the Department of Defense. It is an official publication of the Joint History Office, but the views 

expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those the Joint Chiefs 

of Staff or the Department of Defense.

—David B. Crist, PhD

Executive Director

Joint History and Research Office
xiii

Even though the Mayaguez crisis took place almost forty-five years ago, it remains 

an item of interest to many, including Department of Defense leaders. Not long 

ago, former secretary of defense Robert M. Gates cited the Mayaguez incident as 

an example of our inability to anticipate the nature and location of our future military 

engagements.1 More recently, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Marine General 

Joseph F. Dunford Jr., told a graduating class of the United States Air Force Academy 

that the Mayaguez crisis illustrated the enduring truth that “the primary difference 

between success and failure on and off the battlefield has historically been about the 

human, not the hardware.”2 He related the example of Richard C. Brims, a 1971 Air Force 

Academy graduate, who risked everything to extract Marines from a heavily defended 

island during the Mayaguez operations. With eleven of fourteen available helicopters 

already put out of action by enemy fire, Brims persisted in trying to land and finally 

succeeded, holding his position under fire until twenty-seven Marines were loaded so 

that he could carry them to safety.

Although the Mayaguez is an example of the courage and fortitude of American 

servicemen,3 for most it also remains—as Senator John S. McCain III once observed 

in his own speech to Air Force Academy graduates4—an enduring symbol of what can 

go wrong in the planning and execution of military operations, and even a metaphor 

for military tragedy and the Vietnam War as a whole.5

 Other conclusions and lessons 

continue to be extracted from the Mayaguez crisis by scholars and pundits, including 

the belief that it terminated a nascent effort to learn the true lessons of Vietnam,6 and 

worse, that it effectively ended the Vietnam War with a lie, which many believe is how 

the war began.7 Some of the variance in opinions about the Mayaguez is explained by 

the commentators’ differing beliefs, values, and priorities, but widespread confusion 

about what happened and why it happened also plays a role. 

This point was brought home to me in January 2015 when Commander Richard B. 

Hughes, USNR, paid a visit to my office at National Defense University to discuss the 

Preface
xiv

Preface

Mayaguez. He had researched the event for a war college class and wanted to compare 

his findings with my research. Thirty years ago I devoted five years of study to the 

Mayaguez crisis, writing my master’s thesis and doctoral dissertation on the topic. I 

never expected to write about it again and fully anticipated my findings would someday be eclipsed by new scholarship. Among other things, my requests for interviews 

with Henry A. Kissinger, the national security advisor and secretary of state during 

the crisis, and James R. Schlesinger, the secretary of defense at the time, had not been 

granted. I reasoned they would someday have their say on the matter and that archived 

materials about the crisis would eventually be declassified, enabling scholars to refine 

or revise conclusions. 

Over the years, these and other primary and secondary sources gradually emerged, 

producing an astonishing amount of new information about decision making during 

the crisis. In 1993 Lucien S. Vandenbroucke more fully revealed the tension between 

the White House and the Department of Defense over the sinking of Cambodian patrol 

boats during the crisis. As more information became available, other details of crisis 

behavior were illuminated. In 2008 I had a chance to familiarize myself with the burgeoning literature on the Mayaguez while researching a short case study on the topic 

for the Project on National Security Reform. However, it was not until Commander 

Hughes showed me the full range of documentation and literature on the Mayaguez 

that I came to appreciate just how much new primary information on the crisis was 

available and how many books and articles had examined that new data. The more I 

considered these new sources, the more surprised I was to discover how little the new 

data had contributed to a clear, consensus explanation for US behavior during the crisis.

This book began as an attempt to fathom how so much valuable descriptive material could confuse rather than advance a compelling explanation for US behavior. I 

wanted to see if a careful examination of all available documentation could clarify 

what happened during the crisis and, more importantly, sharpen the explanation 

for why it happened. Along the way, I uncovered some new sources, including Army 

General John A. Wickham Jr.’s notes during his service as the military assistant to 

Secretary of Defense Schlesinger. General Wickham also graciously consented to an 

interview. Others helped me find additional sources of major import, including Joseph 

E. Davis of the Veterans of Foreign Wars’ Washington office and Mokie Pratt Porter, 

the director of communications for the Vietnam Veterans of America, who helped me 

obtain a copy of the telltale Schlesinger interview in Veteran magazine. In examining 

such revealing materials, I came to believe the mysterious Mayaguez crisis still has 

important lessons to teach us about defense, foreign affairs, and national security 
Preface

xv

policy. Leaders at National Defense University agreed, and I am thankful they afforded 

me the opportunity to do this study. 

In short, that is how I ended up returning to the Mayaguez as a research topic 

thirty years later, something I never expected. A peer review by my talented colleague 

T. X. Hammes led to a recommendation to separate the academic argument about 

social science methodology from the findings on defense policy and national security 

issues. It pays to follow T. X.’s advice, as it does to follow his research more generally. 

Consequently, there is an article titled “The Mayaguez Crisis: Correcting 30 Years 

of Scholarship”8

 in the spring 2018 issue of the Academy of Political Science journal 

Political Science Quarterly. Readers interested in methodology and academic analysis 

will find the article more helpful than this book, which is aimed more narrowly at the 

defense and national security community. I must thank Marylena Mantas, the managing editor of Political Science Quarterly, for all her assistance and courtesy and the 

journal’s anonymous reviewers for their comments and insights, all of which improved 

the article I submitted for their consideration. Political Science Quarterly also granted 

permission for us to use a timeline chart submitted with the article. I also appreciated 

the helpful comments from Colonel Susan Bryant, USA (Ret.), another colleague who 

reviewed an early draft of the manuscript.

I owe a deep debt of gratitude to the many librarians and archivists who did so 

much to facilitate the research effort, beginning with National Defense University’s own reference librarian, Karen Cooper, who was unusually tenacious in helping 

track down obscure, decades-old documentation. I greatly appreciate her dedicated 

assistance, which was typical of the type of support we receive from our librarians. 

Karen’s colleague, Mary Bowser, repeatedly intervened to assist my extended use of key 

sources, trusting they would eventually be returned. Archivists at the Air Force Historical Research Agency were also uniformly helpful and diligent, particularly Samuel 

Shearin, who persisted until he could track down internal CINCPAC documents and 

oral interviews with personnel who served during the crisis. Lynn Gamma and Sylvester 

Jackson Jr. also assisted in this regard. Archivist Laurie Varenhorst was most kind in 

sharing copies of documents on the Mayaguez crisis from Clemson University’s special 

collection of Senator Strom Thurmond materials.

Obtaining graphics was a major challenge that was made much easier by the kind 

willingness of many other authors and publishers who granted us permission to use 

their photographs and illustrations. Colonel Ralph F. Wetterhahn, USAF (Ret.), kindly 

allowed us to use his insightful battle maps from his book The Last Battle: The Mayaguez 

Incident and the End of the Vietnam War. I admire Colonel Wetterhahn, who is notable 
xvi

Preface

among the authors investigating the military operations during the Mayaguez crisis for 

having traveled to Cambodia to find and interview Cambodian personnel involved in 

the fighting. W. W. Norton & Company and Osprey Publishing allowed us to use graphics 

from books they published: Roy Rowan’s The Four Days of Mayaguez and Clayton K. S. 

Chun’s The Last Boarding Party: The USMC and the SS Mayaguez 1975, respectively.

Two active-duty sailors during the Mayaguez operation shared photos they took 

during the crisis. Wayne K. Stewart served on board the USS Wilson, and Mike Chan 

served on board the USS Holt. Both took many amazing photographs during the military operations and are still producing great photography. We appreciate their quick 

assistance and permission to use their photographs. Elizabeth Druga, an archivist at the 

Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library and Museum, provided us with all the photographic 

archives from the White House during the crisis. She was extremely helpful in getting 

the high-resolution photographs from the Ford Library approved and ready for use in 

this book under tight time constraints. 

Dr. Bill Eliason, our editor at National Defense University Press, kindly reached 

out to help secure the assistance of Juliette Kelsey Chagnon, the managing editor at 

Air Force Magazine, and Mike Tsukamoto, the magazine’s photo editor. They provided 

many of the photographs used in this book. Hill Goodspeed, historian at the National 

Naval Aviation Museum, and Susan Todd Brook, the senior acquisitions editor at the 

Naval Institute Press, also helped us locate photos and granted permission for their use, 

as did Dr. Doug Lantry and Brett Stolle from the National Museum of the US Air Force. 

Technical Sergeant Shawn Nickel, USAF, went out of his way to obtain a high-resolution 

photo of Knife-22, which now resides at Hurlburt Field. Romondo Davis repeatedly 

helped us track down photos taken on the USS Coral Sea. I also want to recognize the 

exceedingly helpful cooperation of the Koh Tang/Mayaguez Veterans Organization, 

particularly Fred B. Morris and Don Raatz, for assisting our search for photographers 

and approving our use of photographs from their website.

Finally, I want to acknowledge the support of David B. Crist, the director of the Joint 

History Office. This book would not have seen the light of day without his conviction 

that it made a worthy contribution to understanding an important military operation. I 

especially appreciate the many hours his sharp-eyed editor, Shawn H. Vreeland, spent 

laboring over the manuscript and working to put it in the most presentable form. He 

certainly deserves great credit for the superb craftsmanship evident in the final product. 

Collectively, David, Shawn, and I want to express our admiration for the talents of Jamie 

Harvey, who led the book design effort at the Government Publishing Office. I would 

also like to thank Rob Kocher for his expertise in redrawing and adapting the maps.
Preface

xvii

As this long list of acknowledgements suggests, the book is really a collective effort. 

Perhaps the only singular credit I should claim for the work is any errors or omissions 

the reader finds. Those, to be sure, are my responsibility. Readers inclined to share their 

observations, corrections, or clarifications can email me at lambc@ndu.edu. 

I close these prefatory remarks with an expression of appreciation for all the members of the national security community who serve overseas, especially those who serve 

in the military, and particularly those who served during the Mayaguez crisis. On a 

personal note, it is impossible to study the Mayaguez without thinking time and again 

of the servicemen sent into combat during the crisis, and especially of the three young 

Marines inadvertently left behind. Their service and sacrifices underscore the stakes 

involved when foreign powers seize American citizens and US leaders must decide 

whether to risk a small minority of citizens on behalf of the longer-term interests of the 

entire community.9

What I now appreciate, much better than thirty years ago when I first studied the 

Mayaguez crisis, is how frequently national security leaders have to decide between 

prioritizing the welfare of a small group of citizens or the broader national interests as a 

whole. This difficult choice arises not only when hostages are seized by foreign powers, 

but tacitly every time diplomats, intelligence personnel, other national security officials, 

and especially military personnel are sent beyond the bounds of our own body politic 

and its laws and authorities. These personnel constantly accept risks on behalf of the 

larger community. 

While dedicating a memorial plaque to the veterans of the Mayaguez operations 

in 1996, Senator McCain said it would “commemorate the sacrifice of Americans—

comrades and friends to some; heroes to us all—who lived, fought and died for the honor 

of a free people.”10 The senator’s tribute more accurately depicts why the United States 

used military force during the crisis than most books and articles on the topic. My hope 

is that this book will honor the sacrifice of those who participated in the Mayaguez 

operations, and the service of all those we send into danger overseas, by improving our 

understanding of decision making during the crisis and its implications for the mission 

command concept and civil-military relations.

xix

In Washington, DC

General George S. Brown, USAF Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1974–78

Philip W. Buchen White House Counsel, 1975–77 

William P. Clements Jr. Deputy Secretary of Defense, 1973–77 

William E. Colby Director of the Central Intelligence, 1973–76 

General Robert E. Cushman Jr. Commandant of the Marine Corps, 1972–75 

Gerald R. Ford President of the United States, 1974–77

Robert T. Hartmann Counselor to President Ford, 1974–77

William G. Hyland Director of the Bureau of Intelligence and 

Research, Department of State, 1974–75

Robert S. Ingersoll Deputy Secretary of State, 1974–76

General David C. Jones Acting Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 

1975

David H. Kennerly White House photographer, 1974–77

Henry A. Kissinger National Security Advisor, 1969–75/

Secretary of State, 1973–77 

Joseph Laitin Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public 

Affairs, 1975 

Major Robert C. “Bud” McFarlane, USMC Scowcroft’s assistant

Ronald H. “Ron” Nessen White House Press Secretary, 1974–77 

Key Figures in the Mayaguez Crisis
xx

Key Figures in the Mayaguez Crisis

Lieutenant General John W. Pauly, USAF Assistant to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs 

of Staff, 1974–75 

Nelson A. Rockefeller Vice President of the United States, 1974–77

Donald H. Rumsfeld White House Chief of Staff, 1974–75 

John A. Scali US ambassador to the United Nations, 

1973–75

James R. Schlesinger Secretary of Defense, 1973–75 

Lieutenant General Brent Scowcroft, USAF Deputy National Security Advisor, 1973–75

Joseph J. Sisco Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, 

1974–76 

William Lloyd Stearman National Security Council staff member, 

1971–76

Kurt J. Waldheim United Nations Secretary-General, 1972–81 

Major General John A. Wickham Jr., USA Schlesinger’s military assistant, 1973–75

In the military chain of command

Lieutenant Colonel Randall W. Battalion landing team assault commander 

Austin, USMC 

Lieutenant General John L. Burns, USAF On-scene commander/commander of 

US Support Activities Group and the 

Seventh Air Force

Second Lieutenant Michael A. 

Cicere, USMC

Rear Admiral R. P. Coogan USS Coral Sea

Admiral Noel A. M. Gayler Commander in Chief, US Pacific Command, 

1972–76

Admiral James L. Holloway III Chief of Naval Operations, 1974–78

Major General Ira A. “Jim” Hunt Lieutenant General Burns’s deputy 
xxi

Key Figures in the Mayaguez Crisis

Colonel John M. Johnson, USMC Ground force commander 

First Lieutenant James D. 

“Dick” Keith, USMC

Second Lieutenant James 

McDaniel, USMC

Vice Admiral George P. Steele Commander, Seventh Fleet, 1973–75 

Lieutenant General Ray B. Sitton, USAF Director of Operations, Joint Chiefs of Staff, 

1974–76

Brigadier General Charles E. Word, USAF Deputy Director of Operations, National 

Military Command Center, 1974–75

Other

Charles T. Miller Captain of the Mayaguez

xxiii

CIA Central Intelligence Agency 

CINCPAC commander in chief, Pacific Command

COMUSSAG/7AF commander of US Support Activities Group and Seventh Air Force

DIA Defense Intelligence Agency 

DoD Department of Defense 

FBIS Foreign Broadcast Information Service (Central Intelligence Agency)

GAO US General Accounting Office

INR Bureau of Intelligence and Research (Department of State)

IPAC Pacific Command’s intelligence center 

JCS Joint Chiefs of Staff 

NMCC National Military Command Center 

NSA National Security Agency 

NSC National Security Council

PRC People’s Republic of China

TACAIR tactical air

UN United Nations 

USSAG US Support Activities Group 

Abbreviations

1

The last battle of the Vietnam War1

 and the “tensest moments” of Gerald R. Ford’s 

presidency2

 began off the coast of Cambodia on May 12, 1975. A commercial 

US-registered ship, the SS Mayaguez, was commandeered by Cambodian forces 

while en route from Hong Kong to a port in southern Thailand. The incident sparked 

immediate concerns for National Security Advisor and Secretary of State Henry A. 

Kissinger. Throughout early 1975, Kissinger and President Ford had been doing their 

best to convince Congress to approve aid to support the tottering regimes in South 

Vietnam and Cambodia. Both men lobbied Capitol Hill hard, repeatedly warning in 

speeches that American credibility would suffer a grievous wound if the United States 

did not support its allies in Indochina. Lobbying efforts by lower-ranking officials such 

as Philip C. Habib, the assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, had 

little effect, so the president appealed to a joint session of Congress on April 10. Kissinger 

met with congressional committees the following week. 

Ford and Kissinger warned that not propping up Vietnam would signal friend and 

foe alike that the United States had weakened and was no longer reliable. Ford argued, 

“We want our friends to know that we will stand by them, and we want any potential 

adversaries to know that we will stand up to them.”3

 Kissinger insisted, “The United 

States cannot pursue a policy of selective credibility. We cannot abandon friends in 

one part of the world without jeopardizing the security of friends everywhere.” He 

also declared, “A reduction of American influence in key areas can have disastrous 

consequences. How other nations perceive us is thus a matter of major consequence.” 

Kissinger’s statements also reveal a “premonition of doom”—his conviction that the 

fall of Southeast Asia would invariably engender a time of testing for the United States.

But it was all to no avail: Congress had had enough of the Vietnam War and 

refused to provide any more assistance. Phnom Penh and Saigon fell to Communist 

forces in April, forcing the evacuation of US forces and creating hundreds of thousands of refugees. In the weeks leading up to the seizure of the Mayaguez, Kissinger, 

Introduction
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

2

Ford, and Defense Secretary James R. Schlesinger had managed these evacuations 

intensively. They also did their best to limit the geostrategic fallout from the loss of 

Indochina by signaling to international observers that US reversals in Southeast 

Asia should not be misread as weakness or lack of resolve. Ford and Kissinger were 

particularly active, making speeches, giving interviews and answering questions 

in news conferences. They consistently made three points, arguing that Americans 

had a moral obligation not to abandon their longtime friends and allies, that it was 

imperative for Congress and the executive branch to work together in forging a new 

national unity on geopolitics, and that failure to do these things would invariably 

have negative strategic consequences. 

In this context, it was probably inevitable that US leaders would attach more than 

ordinary significance to the news that Cambodian gunboats had seized the Mayaguez. 

They quickly decided to dispatch US airplanes to monitor the situation and direct other 

US forces to the area. US pilots warned and then sank Cambodian gunboats in an 

attempt to quarantine the Mayaguez from Tang Island (also known as Koh Tang; koh 

means “island” in the Khmer language) where US leaders believed some crew members 

were being held. Eventually the Cambodians decided to release the ship’s crew. Just as 

they were about to do so, US forces launched operations to retake the Mayaguez, assault 

Tang Island, and conduct airstrikes against the mainland. The island assault was nearly 

disastrous: Cambodian forces downed most of the US helicopters and inflicted numerous casualties. However, all the members of the Mayaguez crew who had been released 

just prior to the assault were recovered unharmed. 

A large majority of Americans responded to the return of the crew with relief and 

regarded the use of force with approval. An apparently successful operation was welcome 

news in the aftermath of the depressing withdrawal of US forces from Indochina. Yet questions about US motives and the way the crisis was managed quickly arose. The military 

operations cost the lives of forty-one servicemen. Fifty more were wounded in the effort 

to rescue the thirty-nine crew members of the Mayaguez.

4

 Ten of the eleven helicopters 

used in the mission were damaged or destroyed. No crew members were on the island 

that was assaulted. Instead, they had been held captive near the Cambodian mainland 

and released just prior to the Marine assault. As these and other details became available, 

Congress decided to investigate the handling of the incident. The resultant report raised 

issues about US motives, the adequacy of intelligence, and missed diplomatic opportunities but could not provide a definitive explanation for US behavior. 

Since then a number of books have contributed to a better understanding of 

what happened during the crisis, both on the scene in Cambodia and during the 
MAINLAND SOUTHEAST ASIA

Marine Corps History Division
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

4

decision-making process in Washington.5 Over the years researchers interviewed an 

increasing number of senior US leaders involved in the episode, many of whom have 

also published memoirs.6 In addition, an astonishing amount of primary information—

much of it previously classified—has been released. On the whole, and with the notable exception of the Cuban missile crisis,7

 it is doubtful there are many other major US 

foreign policy events as well documented as the Mayaguez crisis.8

For instance, researchers now know the president’s whereabouts on a minuteby-minute basis during the crisis, what was said in all the National Security Council 

(NSC) meetings where the president made his major decisions, and what was said 

during telephone calls and conversations between key leaders, including the president 

and his senior advisors. Moreover, there are numerous primary sources available, 

such as all the intelligence community communications during the crisis, all the oral 

and written Department of Defense orders, the most important diplomatic communications, the conversations held during Kissinger’s staff meeting on the first day of 

the crisis, the content of NSC staff products, and memorandums of conversation in 

the Oval Office between the central figures. There is no dearth of secondary sources 

either. The memoirs of numerous major and minor White House officials who provide 

their impressions of decision making during the crisis have been published, as have 

in-depth interviews with key leaders, including President Ford, who gave two detailed 

interviews immediately following the crisis. For an operational perspective, there are 

declassified military histories that chart the military decision-making process between 

the Pentagon and forces in the field, and numerous accounts written by military officers who commanded and conducted the military operations. In addition to the above 

materials (which represent only a portion of those available), I was also able to obtain for 

this book a declassified copy of the minute-by-minute notes from the military assistant 

to Secretary of Defense Schlesinger (Major General John A. Wickham Jr., USA), who 

recorded Schlesinger’s phone and meeting conversations.

Surprisingly, despite the copious amount of data available, scholars have not 

reached a consensus as to what happened and why. Thirty years ago I argued the US 

response to the seizure of the Mayaguez “was a hasty, risky, ill-conceived action not 

commensurate with publicly stated objectives.” Today there is a consensus on this 

point. All agree that US military operations narrowly avoided disaster,9

 but there is no 

corresponding agreement on why the United States behaved as it did. The event is still 

explained as a rescue mission, a principled defense of freedom of the seas, an exercise 

in realpolitik with the United States acting to preserve its reputation for protecting its 

interests, a political gambit by President Ford to enhance his political fortunes, and a 
Introduction

5

national spasm of violence reflecting the collective frustration felt from the debacle 

suffered in Vietnam.10

A compelling explanation for the crisis must resolve numerous inconsistencies 

that arise between asserted motives and actual behaviors. With respect to the quick 

decision by US leaders to use force, the following questions must be answered. If it was 

a principled defense of freedom of the seas, why did the Marines launch a risky invasion of Tang Island instead of just recovering the ship? If it was a rescue mission, why 

did the United States sink the gunboats leaving Tang, which ran the clear risk of killing 

those who needed to be rescued? If the United States was reinforcing its reputation for 

protecting its interests, why did it conduct hasty military operations that ran the risk of 

embarrassing failure? If Ford was trying to enhance his political fortunes, why did he 

act so precipitously, increasing the risks to operations that almost ended in disaster? If it 

was an emotional spasm of violence reflecting the frustration from the debacle suffered 

in Vietnam, why were B-52s not used as initially planned?

As for the Cambodians, most commentators seem to believe local commanders 

seized the ship and the nascent central government never managed to catch up and 

respond effectively. But if the Cambodians were just innocent bystanders, why did they 

make determined efforts to transport the crew to the mainland despite US diplomatic 

warnings and warning fire from military aircraft? On the other hand, if they were not 

innocent bystanders and had nefarious motives, why did they give up the crew so easily? 

Scholarship over the past several decades has not really answered such questions. 

The increasingly detailed information available about crisis decision making has been 

used to provide rich descriptions of the crisis that obscure, rather than illuminate, the 

most important explanatory factors. As more information became available, explanations for US behavior became more diffuse and idiosyncratic. Worse, some elements 

of what was once well understood about the crisis were lost. Thus the motives for US 

behavior remain contested and widely misunderstood, and the significance of the crisis 

is also often underestimated. This is as unnecessary as it is unfortunate and unsatisfactory. It is unnecessary because the data overwhelmingly demonstrate that one variable 

accounts for all US behavior with great consistency. It is unsatisfactory because not 

distinguishing between competing explanatory variables and their efficacy hinders 

progress toward cumulative knowledge. 

The purpose of this study is to rectify these shortfalls by correcting some key 

descriptive omissions and errors, and to provide a compelling explanation for US 

behavior based on all available evidence. There are excellent descriptive accounts of 

the crisis, but they all suffer from a few notable errors or omissions. After accurately 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

6

describing what happened during the crisis, particularly during the four days of decision 

making by leaders in Washington, it is much easier to analyze the critical decisions that 

determined the outcome of the crisis. Once decision making in the Mayaguez crisis is 

well described and explained, it is useful as a valuable case study for policy analysis. 

The incident has been dismissed as a mere “historical footnote,” but this reflects a 

poor understanding of the significant issues raised by the crisis, including what decision 

makers thought was at stake, the organizational mechanism used to manage the crisis, 

and the insights that can be generated from a close examination of the roles played by 

key leaders during the crisis. Properly understood, the Mayaguez incident can be used 

to illustrate a number of important policy issues and to impart important lessons for 

senior defense leaders and policy makers.

For example, the Mayaguez crisis offers a fascinating case study in national security decision making. It was the first test of the War Powers Act,* was a major stimulus 

for defense reform, and is widely considered a metaphor for the entire US experience 

in Vietnam, especially given the way the incident was managed and its outcome. The 

incident also has attracted interest because of some unique features, reportedly being 

the only time US forces fought the Khmer Rouge and the first time Marines had made 

a ship-to-ship boarding of a hostile vessel since the Civil War.11

Of greater significance is the fact that the Mayaguez crisis was the only time in 

history when a president directly managed a crisis through the NSC,12 which met four 

times for five and a quarter hours of deliberations and decision making.13 From Monday, May 12, through Thursday, May 15, the president and his senior advisors struggled 

to control the crisis precipitated by the news that Cambodian forces had seized the 

Mayaguez. Ford announced he would personally manage the crisis, and he made 

most major decisions on how to do that in those meetings rather than during informal gatherings of key subordinates or by authorizing a subordinate group to exercise 

oversight on an ongoing basis. There was near unanimity on objectives, but not on how 

to achieve them. The extent to which cabinet officials used their positions to control 

implementation of presidential decisions to obtain preferred outcomes has not been 

fully appreciated. In the end, Ford fired Schlesinger for insubordination but without 

clearly understanding where Schlesinger was actually guilty of insubordination or 

*The War Powers Act is a law passed in 1973 that requires the president to notify Congress within forty-eight 

hours of committing US armed forces to military action. It prohibits the use of armed forces for more than 

sixty days (and allows another thirty days for purposes of withdrawing the forces) without congressional 

authorization or a declaration of war. Of the many reports submitted by presidents in accordance with 

reporting requirements in the War Powers Act, the Mayaguez crisis is the only case where the president 

cited Section 4(a)(1), which triggers a sixty-day withdrawal requirement.
Introduction

7

how Schlesinger’s decisions benefited him. In contrast, Ford either was unaware of, 

or overlooked, Kissinger’s decision to withhold information from the NSC in order to 

make military operations more likely. 

For these and other reasons the Mayaguez crisis had a negative impact on civilmilitary relations that deserves more scrutiny than it has received. It is also possible 

to extract useful lessons about command and control of US forces more generally by 

examining the incident. These and other leadership and policy issues are discussed in 

the concluding section of this book. 

PART I

Crisis Behaviors

11

News of the Mayaguez seizure reached Washington about two hours after the 

fact. The US embassy in Jakarta alerted the National Military Command 

Center (NMCC) at the Pentagon and other addresses around 5:12 a.m., and 

Deputy National Security Advisor Brent Scowcroft heard about the incident fifteen 

minutes later.* Noting the reports were of uncertain validity, he waited until his 7 a.m. 

intelligence briefing to inform President Ford.1

 Cabinet officials learned of the event in 

their morning briefings or staff meetings. 

The Department of State’s intelligence organization (the Bureau of Intelligence and 

Research, or INR) was the only element of the intelligence community to include the 

seizure in its morning summary, and National Security Advisor and Secretary of State 

Henry Kissinger was the only senior leader who immediately reacted to the news with 

great alarm. He demanded to know why the president had not been notified and why 

nothing had been done in response. He ordered an immediate investigation of those 

issues. William G. Hyland, who headed INR, asked what could be done given that the 

Cambodians already had the crew in custody. Kissinger responded angrily, saying he 

was not the chief of naval operations and was not sure what the military options were. 

But he added, “I know you damned well cannot let Cambodia capture a ship a hundred 

miles at sea and do nothing.”2

 Given Kissinger’s angst, Hyland made a point of keeping 

Secretary Kissinger and other key State Department leaders well informed over the 

next several days.3 

When Kissinger and Scowcroft met with President Ford at 9:15 a.m. for their morning 

meeting, they discussed the Mayaguez. Kissinger impressed upon the president the gravity of the situation, and it was agreed that Ford should convene an NSC meeting around 

noon to examine options. Ford told Scowcroft to inform the NSC attendees that he would 

personally take charge of the crisis, which he said “is what the American people expect.”4

*Local Cambodian time was eleven hours ahead of Washington, DC, but befitting the discussion of US 

decisions, all times mentioned in this book are eastern standard time unless otherwise noted. 

CHAPTER 1

Day One | Monday, May 12
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

12

Not long after this meeting, Ford told his press secretary, Ronald H. “Ron” Nessen, about 

the seizure. He surprised Nessen by asking him whether he would “go in there and bomb 

the Cambodian boat and take a chance of the Americans being killed? Would you send 

helicopters in there? Would you mine every harbor in Cambodia?”5

 Ford’s questions 

suggest he was already mulling over the risks of using military force. 

At the midday NSC meeting the likely motive for Cambodian behavior was immediately raised by William E. Colby, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). 

He noted the islands near the site of the Mayaguez seizure were coveted and contested 

by Vietnam and Cambodia because of underlying oil fields. Secretary of Defense James 

Schlesinger speculated Cambodian behavior might be a “bureaucratic misjudgment” or 

might reflect their determination to underscore their sovereignty over the islands and 

Anchored overnight

Mayaguez towed to 

this point by USS Holt

REAM NAVAL BASE

KOMPONG SOM 

(OIL DEPOT)

MILES

0 100

US helicopters from 

Utapao with US Marines 

heading to Koh Tang

C A M B O D I A

Mayaguez under own power

USS Coral Sea

RONG SAM LEM

Crew intercepted by 

USS Wilson and 

ferried to Mayaguez 

being towed

Mayaguez at anchor

TANG ISLAND

Captive crew on fishing boat 

under attack by US planes

Mayaguez captive

POULO WAI US reconnaissance planes from Subic Bay, Philippines

Mayaguez intercepted and 

boarded by Cambodian gunboats

PHU QUOC ISLAND 

(SOUTH VIETNAM)

AIRSTRIKES (US)

LEGEND

LOCAL AREA MAP

W.W. Norton
Day One | Monday, May 12

13

protect them from the Vietnamese, which would explain why they had already seized 

Panamanian and Philippine ships. Later in the conversation, after the NSC members 

had been discussing military options, Deputy Secretary of Defense William P. Clements 

Jr. again reminded everyone that it was important to remember the seizure was likely 

“an in-house spat” over control of up to one or one and a half million barrels of oil.6 The 

president responded, “That is interesting, but it does not solve our problem,” and opined 

that strong public and private communications and turning around the aircraft carrier 

USS Coral Sea were in order.

The fact that the United States did not have a lot of military assets near the scene 

and would not for a day or two constrained any immediate decisions to use force. One 

misconception also influenced the discussion of military options. It was assumed that 

the Cambodians had probably succeeded in taking the ship and crew to the mainland 

port of Kompong Som (also called Sihanoukville).7

 Thus, when Schlesinger initially 

outlined a range of possible military options for the president, they were reactive and 

punitive, ranging from seizing Cambodian assets, assembling forces, taking an island 

hostage, or mounting a blockade. Kissinger also raised the idea of seizing Cambodian 

shipping or mining their harbors, and later Schlesinger offered the possibility of sinking 

the Cambodian navy.

In the NSC meeting Kissinger noted that pursuing multiple American objectives—

for example, recovering the ship and demonstrating American strength—could militate 

against one another. He was particularly leery of getting into negotiations with the 

Cambodians for fear of appearing weak. Multiple sources assert Kissinger strongly 

argued in this first NSC meeting that international perceptions of American power and 

will were at stake.8

 However, the meeting minutes indicate it was Vice President Nelson 

A. Rockefeller who, after politely asking the president’s permission to speak, insisted 

that “this will be seen as a test case” and “judged in South Korea.” He mentioned the 

USS Pueblo, the US spy ship and its crew that were seized by the North Koreans in 1968 

and held for a humiliating eleven months before the crew was released (see sidebar). 

He stated bluntly: 

I think a violent response is in order. The world should know that we will act 

and that we will act quickly. We should have an immediate response in terms 

of action. I do not know if we have any targets that we can strike, but we should 

certainly consider this. If they get any hostages, this can go on forever.9 

Schlesinger responded by noting the Cambodians already had hostages: the thirtynine crew members. Rockefeller, not dissuaded, said action was required. Ford said 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

14

he was inclined to agree, observing they needed to get the Coral Sea on the way to 

the scene and have mines ready. He promised, “We will take action.” Rockefeller later 

opined that turning the carrier around was not “action” and that “unless the Cambodians are hurt, this pattern [i.e., of wanton provocation] will not be broken.” He 

advocated bombing with planes based in Thailand. Kissinger agreed with Rockefeller 

and wanted to “give the impression that we are not to be trifled with.” He mentioned 

the possibility of using B-52 bombers from Guam or aircraft from the carrier, which 

would not require approval from Thailand or the Philippines. But he also said more 

than once that it “should not look as though we want to pop somebody” and that “we 

should know what we are doing.” He wanted to know what military assets would be 

required to seize an island, retake the ship and crew, and take or mine Kompong Som. 

The meeting ended after general agreement on the need for strong public and private 

statements demanding the release of the ship and crew and more information about 

military options from the Pentagon.

After the meeting, Kissinger called Schlesinger at the Pentagon. He told Schlesinger 

that Ford had not yet decided on the specifics of how to respond and that he wanted 

to share his thinking with Schlesinger. “I’m not in favor of bombing,” Kissinger said. 

“Once done it is over.” He was thinking more along the lines of entering Kompong Som 

The Pueblo Incident

In January 1968, the United States endured a humiliating experience when North 

Korea seized the USS Pueblo—a ship equipped for electronic surveillance—in international waters. The Pueblo’s captain, Commander Lloyd M. Bucher, maneuvered 

for two hours to prevent the North Koreans from boarding while frantically calling for 

assistance that never arrived. After the North Koreans opened fire, killing one member of the Pueblo’s eighty-three-man crew and wounding several others, Bucher gave 

up the ship and its highly classified materials. The crew was imprisoned for almost a 

year, enduring frequent beatings, torture, and a subsistence diet. The North Koreans 

flaunted their confessions as spies. 

One account of the Pueblo incident claims that the American response turned 

on the argument of then–Secretary of Defense Clark M. Clifford, who suggested that 

his colleagues stop asking, “What have we got to hit them with?” Clifford said if they 

decided their prime objective was to reassert the principle of freedom of the seas, or 

teach the North Koreans a lesson, well, so be it. But he believed the prime objective 

should be the safe return of the crew, and a military response was inappropriate for 

that objective.10 

Gerald Ford, a congressman at the time, called US options “very, very limited.” 

A Gallup poll taken at the time of the Pueblo’s capture indicated that a majority of 

Americans not only preferred the use of force to secure the return of the Pueblo and 

its crew, but they expected it to lead to war.11
Day One | Monday, May 12

15

harbor and seizing the ship, and perhaps the island at the same time. But, he said, “My 

experience in Indochina is to do more rather than enough.” Schlesinger noted that 

seizing the mainland port would require congressional support and that there would 

be casualties and domestic political fallout. Kissinger concluded by saying he “didn’t 

think we should take any small actions” and should at least plan for seizing the harbor, 

ship, or an island. He wanted to “plan it well and get prepared rather than [taking] some 

piddling measures.”12

Kissinger also ordered a complete clampdown on State Department briefings of 

newsmen. He said he wanted “to let diplomacy run its course.” In reality, Kissinger 

was cooperating with the president’s political advisors who wanted it known that Ford 

personally had taken command of the crisis. Accordingly, Kissinger kept his previously 

scheduled event in Kansas City and flew off to Missouri that afternoon. While his plane 

was in the air, the White House announced the seizure of the ship. The president called 

it an “act of piracy” and demanded its immediate release, promising the most serious 

consequences if the Cambodians did otherwise. Several hours after this public threat, 

Deputy Secretary of State Robert S. Ingersoll tried to pass the same dire warning to a 

representative of the liaison office of the People’s Republic of China who was asked to 

deliver the message to Cambodian authorities. The Chinese representative refused to 

even hear the content of the message.13 Similarly, in Beijing the Chinese foreign ministry said the relevant official was not available to accept the message but that it could be 

dropped off in the ministry’s mail room. That happened, but later the ministry returned 

the document saying it was not in a position to pass the message to Cambodian authorities. In contrast, an officer at the Cambodian embassy in Beijing accepted the message 

for his country and said he would transmit it. However, the Cambodians also returned 

the message to the US liaison office without any note of explanation other than having 

stamped the original envelope with “return to sender.” The timing of the Cambodian 

return of the US message inclined the US representatives in Beijing to speculate that 

China and Cambodia had coordinated their responses.14 

Meanwhile, Pentagon leaders ordered the Coral Sea and her escorts, which were 

about to transit Indonesia’s Lombok Strait on the way to Australia, to turn back and head 

for Cambodia. Pentagon senior leaders also settled in to develop the range of military 

options requested by the president. Schlesinger supervised a debate between the Navy 

and the acting chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General David C. Jones, 

on options.15 Schlesinger preferred using carrier aircraft rather than Air Force B-52s 

because they would be more accurate and involve less collateral and political damage—presumably the Navy’s sentiment as well. Thereafter, Admiral Noel A. M. Gayler, 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

16

commander in chief of US Pacific Command (CINCPAC), who happened to then be in 

Washington rather than at his headquarters in Honolulu, worked out a basic plan at the 

Pentagon with a few of his staff and others from the Joint Chiefs’ staff.16 Gayler’s plans 

were reviewed by Jones, who then discussed them with Schlesinger before reviewing 

them with the NSC.17

It was during this initial planning that the first of many misunderstandings between 

the Pentagon and the White House arose. About halfway through the first NSC meeting, 

Jones suggested “that we get our contingency plans together as soon as possible and 

start assembling a task force,” and Ford closed the meeting saying he looked forward to 

seeing the Pentagon’s options. Somehow Scowcroft and the NSC staff had the impression 

that the plans would be produced quickly and reviewed in another NSC meeting later 

that same day. The Pentagon thought the situation was too fluid for that. No US forces 

were in the vicinity, given Kissinger’s prohibition against using Thai-based military 

assets. He insisted on this in the first NSC meeting after Jones mentioned launching 

helicopters to take a Cambodian island. Schlesinger reminded him that their ongoing 

reconnaissance flights originated in Thailand. Kissinger thought reconnaissance was 

acceptable but not other military operations.18 With no assets on hand and the location 

of the Mayaguez uncertain, Jones was reluctant to offer premature options based on 

inadequate information. Thus, no options paper was provided to the White House on 

Monday afternoon, which disappointed the NSC staff.19 In the next NSC meeting after 

nascent options were reviewed orally, the president made a point of asking for “next 

steps written in sequence as to when they can take place.”

General Jones’s concern about the fluidity of the situation proved prescient. 

That evening, shortly after 9:30 p.m., the Pentagon called Scowcroft with some good 

news. With daylight emerging in the Gulf of Thailand, a US reconnaissance plane had 

located the Mayaguez and two accompanying Cambodian patrol boats not far from 

where the seizure had taken place near Poulo Wai island. Contrary to assumptions, 

the Mayaguez had not been taken to the mainland port of Kompong Som. It was still 

possible, perhaps, to isolate the ship from the mainland. Scowcroft discussed this 

briefly with President Ford.20 Then, with the situation apparently stabilized, he left for 

home. Less than an hour later (10:15 p.m.) Scowcroft’s assistant, Marine Major Robert 

C. “Bud” McFarlane, called Scowcroft with more news. The Mayaguez was moving 

again in the direction of Kompong Som, its assumed destination, and could be there 

within six hours. Scowcroft immediately returned to the White House, where he 

contacted Major General John Wickham, Schlesinger’s assistant. Alarmed about the 

potential for another Pueblo, Scowcroft asked if there was still time for US aircraft to 
Day One | Monday, May 12

17

prevent the Mayaguez from reaching the mainland. Wickham said he would find out 

and call back. Scowcroft and McFarlane settled in to wait for Wickham’s news. It was 

the beginning of what would prove to be a long night for both men. 

19

Wickham called Scowcroft back around 1:00 a.m. and told him Thai-based 

F-4 fighters could reach the ship in time and were being loaded for that 

mission. Scowcroft told Wickham to launch the aircraft while he sought 

presidential permission for the interdiction. Scowcroft made this decision despite 

Kissinger’s earlier injunction against operating out of Thailand. He then called Ford, 

who approved his action. It turned out US decision makers had more time than they 

knew. Captain Charles T. Miller of the Mayaguez had convinced the Cambodians that 

Kompong Som harbor was not deep enough to take his ship.1

 Not long thereafter US 

intelligence intercepted a Cambodian communication indicating local Cambodian 

authorities had been told that “the American prisoners were to be moved to Tang 

Island,”2 a narrow three-mile-long island about thirty miles southeast of Kompong Som. 

It took time for this intercept to be translated and evaluated.3 Meanwhile the prevailing 

assumption was that the Cambodians would try to get the Mayaguez to a mainland port.

Knowing none of this, and having been led to believe the Mayaguez was as little as 

fifteen minutes from Kompong Som,4 Scowcroft called Ford again at 2:23 a.m. He was 

upset that slow communications might have precluded the opportunity to successfully 

interdict the ship and prevent a repeat of the Pueblo debacle. Dispirited, he told Ford 

he didn’t think there was time for an intercept but felt they needed to try. The president 

agreed to aerial interdiction but emphatically cautioned Scowcroft that the plane should 

not sink the Mayaguez, which Scowcroft agreed would be disastrous. Just a few minutes 

later, Scowcroft received news that the Mayaguez was actually anchored off of Tang 

Island and relayed this news to the president.5 Later, US P-3 reconnaissance aircraft 

reported that at least some of the crew apparently had been transferred to Tang Island 

on small boats.6

Shortly before 6 a.m. Ford called Schlesinger. The two men had a long conversation.7

Ford reinforced the concern Scowcroft had shared with Wickham: preventing a repeat 

of the Pueblo ordeal. He ordered Schlesinger to quarantine the Mayaguez and in effect, 

CHAPTER 2

Day Two | Tuesday, May 13
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

20

its crew, by making sure that no Cambodian vessels moved between Tang Island and 

the mainland. Schlesinger passed the president’s orders through the chain of command to Air Force Lieutenant General John J. Burns. General Burns was the on-scene 

commander for directing and coordinating the operations. He commanded the several 

thousand airmen and Marines still in Thailand as part of US Support Activities Group 

(USSAG) and the Seventh Air Force. He and his staff operated from his headquarters at 

a US Air Force base in Nakhon Phanom, located in the northeast corner of the country 

near Thailand’s border with Laos. 

LOCATIONS OF US AIR BASES IN THAILAND

Map by author
Day Two | Tuesday, May 13

21

The exact wording of the orders passed to Burns was noteworthy: 

It is desired that we isolate island of Kas Tang [sic] by turning boats away that 

are approaching the island or by turning back any boats that attempt to leave 

and give evidence of heading for the mainland. Gunfire across the bow is one 

method that can be used. In view of the direct communications contact with 

the on-scene commander, immediate report on any movements should be 

available to Washington. Therefore, the decision to fire on or sink any boats 

resides in Washington. It is particularly important to get maximum information on any outgoing boat to determine if there are Americans aboard and to 

report such when requesting authority to sink. Although this will be difficult to 

accomplish, deck loading will probably be required on the small boats as they 

did in taking personnel, believed to be Americans, from the ship to the island.8

These unusually specific instructions from Schlesinger demonstrated great concern 

with a carefully modulated use of force.9 Conversing with General Wickham early that 

morning, Schlesinger also made the point that it was important to sequence actions so 

that punitive strikes followed the release of the crew and seizure of the ship. “When it 

is all through,” he said, “we should sink the PT boats” and “pulverize the KC [Khmer 

Communists].” He also noted that if the crew had been taken to the island, it would have 

to be seized as well.10 

Just before 7 a.m. Ford called Schlesinger again. He was disturbed by the inaccuracy 

of the reports on the ship’s location. Schlesinger explained it had stopped at a second 

island about twenty-five miles from the mainland. He also explained the Pentagon 

wanted to use riot control agents to discourage the ship from moving. “By all means,” 

Ford replied. Ford emphasized he wanted to be kept “fully informed” and invited 

Schlesinger to let him know if another NSC meeting would be helpful. Schlesinger said 

the location of the ship was the critical issue. Knowing it was not in Kompong Som, the 

Pentagon needed to revise its options paper. The one thing he asked Ford’s help on was 

operating out of Thailand. In the previous NSC meeting, Kissinger had said that was 

out of bounds, but Schlesinger believed that unless US forces had that latitude they 

would “lose the ship.” Despite having already approved Scowcroft’s action to launch 

F-4s from Thailand, Ford seemed unsure of how to respond. He noted Kissinger had 

said the cost of flying out of Thailand would be a forced withdrawal of American forces 

from the country within thirty days. He told Schlesinger to “proceed as you are unless 

I call back.” Not long thereafter Scowcroft called back on behalf of Ford and said the 

Pentagon was free to mobilize and make available all the troops it could and move them 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

22

to Thailand.11 Clearly it had been decided that Thai sensitivities would not be allowed 

to impinge upon military operations.

Scowcroft met that morning with Ford, but without Kissinger, who was in Missouri. 

The two men agreed that with the Mayaguez resting off Tang Island, thirty-four miles 

from the mainland, it should be possible to prevent the Cambodians from moving the 

ship and crew. They also agreed another NSC meeting should be convened. Scowcroft 

called Wickham to tell him about the meeting and inform him that the president wanted 

an update and a discussion on military options.

In preparation for the next NSC meeting, Schlesinger met with the operations deputies from all the service branches (they are the flag officers who execute the decisions 

the service chiefs make). Schlesinger communicated the urgency felt by senior leaders 

and told acting Chairman Jones and the other senior military staff he was “inclined to 

use Marines at first light.”12 He had the Pentagon staff prepare a memorandum to the 

president outlining military options.13 It argued that as long as the Mayaguez could 

be stopped from entering the mainland harbors, the primary US objective should be 

to recover the ship and crew “by eliminating unfriendly escorts” and boarding the 

Mayaguez once US naval assets arrived in the area. The memo noted there were indications the crew had been moved to Tang Island, in which case a helicopter assault of 

Marines on the island could be made. In the event the ship reached a mainland harbor, 

much more force would be needed to mine or seize a port, or blockade the Cambodian 

coast. The Pentagon options paper also discussed seizing or sinking Cambodian naval 

and merchant craft in retaliation or even seizing the island of Poulo Wai, which it was 

believed the Cambodians valued for potential oil production. 

The memo’s assessment of the pros and cons of alternative courses of action suggested 

initial Department of Defense preferences. “Minimum use of force” was considered a 

“pro” and “unfavorable reaction from Congress and US public” a “con.” The memo also 

recommended quick consultations with Congress in light of the War Powers Act, adding 

“any unilateral action which generates too much congressional and public antipathy 

could create the notion that we as a government are unable to act forcefully to protect our 

interests.” Schlesinger insisted on this key point throughout the crisis, to the point that he 

was misunderstood and mischaracterized as not favoring the use of punitive force. This 

depiction of military options from the Pentagon illustrates that Schlesinger, like Kissinger, 

had arrived at some conclusions early on concerning how he wanted to manage the crisis. 

Also that morning there were some indications that Cambodia might be interested 

in a diplomatic resolution to the crisis. The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) requested 

information from the State Department’s INR on a news broadcast reporting that the 
Day Two | Tuesday, May 13

23

Mayaguez would be released after Cambodia received “US apologies and the return of 

Khmer aircraft that were flown to Thailand.” Thinking ahead about communicating with 

the Cambodians, DIA shot a query to the National Security Agency (NSA) about its ability 

to enter the Khmer communications net to transmit messages to Khmer leadership.14

At 10:22 the president convened the second NSC meeting. Colby updated the group 

on the situation and the belief that some of the crew had been transferred to Tang Island. 

He noted the Cambodians had fired on US surveillance aircraft and also remarked on 

their recent ruthless execution of seven Vietnamese crewmen they had captured. Vice 

President Rockefeller played an active role in the discussion again, criticizing the faulty 

intelligence about the ship’s location for having misled decision makers about the possibility of preventing the ship from being taken into the harbor. President Ford echoed 

the vice president, registering his concern about delayed and inaccurate information. 

He said he was “very concerned” and emphasized that “we must have the information 

immediately. There must be the quickest possible communication to me.”15

General Jones tried to reassure the group that the Pentagon now had firm orders to 

quarantine the ship and crew from the mainland, but he said they had to be careful about 

how the ship would be dissuaded or ultimately disabled if it tried to move. “We cannot 

guarantee that we could stop it, but we think that there is a good chance that we could 

keep it from going into the harbor without sinking it.” With respect to rescuing the crew 

on the island, Schlesinger noted the inherent risk, but he thought a dominant force along 

with Khmer language speakers who could communicate an ultimatum might do the trick: 

The danger for the Americans on the island is that we do not know what the 

Cambodians would do. I think there is less danger if we have the dominant 

force. We will have Cambodians on the choppers who will be able to say that 

we can take the island unless they give us the Americans or the foreigners. 

This message would be bull-horned from the choppers at a time when we are 

ready to act.16 

Rockefeller again took up his and Kissinger’s theme that perceptions of American credibility were the paramount concern.17 However, he was leery of an island assault and 

instead echoed Schlesinger’s preference for sinking Cambodian naval assets:

I do not think the freighter is the issue. The issue is how we respond. Many 

are watching us, in Korea and elsewhere. The big question is whether or not 

we look silly. I think we need to respond quickly. The longer we wait, the more 

time they have to get ready. Why not sink their boats until they move? Once 

they have got hostages, they can twist our tails for months to come, and if you 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

24

go ashore, we may lose more Marines trying to land than the Americans who 

were on the boat originally. Why not just sink their ships until they respond?18

Schlesinger agreed but thought the sequence of military actions was important. 

He proposed first retaking the ship and crew and then “attacking and sinking the 

Cambodian Navy . . . in order to maximize the punishment.” Schlesinger pointed out 

that sinking their ships as a matter of priority “might precipitate sinking of the freighter 

and jeopardize getting the Americans out.” Rockefeller had more faith in the ability of a 

resolute response to intimidate the Cambodians, reiterating his earlier observation that 

the Communists would press on until they hit a “steel” resolve. Listening to the debate, 

Ford asked Scowcroft what he thought. Scowcroft agreed with Schlesinger that it made 

sense to get the ship first before assaulting the island. Rockefeller again insisted that 

“the longer we take, the worse it gets,” arguing for a strong and fast response. 

Ford ordered aircraft to quarantine the island, both incoming and outgoing traffic. 

With respect to timing, he asked Pentagon leaders when US forces would arrive and 

could be committed to action. The meeting ended with general agreement on the need 

for better information about the possible timing of military operations to retake the ship 

and storm the island. The most notable decision in the meeting was Ford’s repetition of 

his early morning orders that the Mayaguez and crew be isolated from the mainland. 

He told the Pentagon to do it with minimum force, not necessarily sinking the boats but 

dissuading them from moving. Because Schlesinger had told the forces in the field to 

be ready for precisely that, and to be on the lookout for crewmembers huddled on deck, 

the NSC meeting essentially served to reinforce existing orders. 

Immediately following the NSC meeting, Ford met with some congressmen on 

other issues, during which he said to Representative Joseph D. “Joe” Waggoner (D-LA) 

that “I’ve got a tough decision to make on the ship.” The comment suggested Ford was 

mulling over the inherent difficulty of preventing boat movement without endangering 

the ship and crew, a concern he acknowledged in his memoirs.19 

A little later, during a meeting on domestic policy issues, the president stepped 

away to make a call to Kissinger in Missouri. Perhaps the president had heard that Senator Robert C. Byrd (D-WV) had suggested giving the Cambodians a forty-eight-hour 

deadline, or perhaps he had been thinking more about Schlesinger’s comment that US 

forces would broadcast an ultimatum message in the Khmer language via bullhorns 

when assaulting Tang Island.20 In any case, Ford wanted Kissinger’s thoughts about 

setting a deadline for the Cambodians to release the Mayaguez—a position favored by 

some of Ford’s advisors. An ultimatum had already been drafted by the DIA and sent 

out by the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) to field commands with the caveat that the message 
Day Two | Tuesday, May 13

25

might be changed and that if it were approved, an “execute” message would follow. 

The ultimatum was to be read over international distress frequencies and channels 

the Cambodians were known to be monitoring. The key line in the ultimatum read, “If 

the Cambodian authorities do not announce by 10:00 this morning their intention to 

release all crew members unconditionally and immediately, the Cambodian authorities 

will be fully responsible for the further consequences.” Kissinger told Ford he did not 

support the ultimatum. 

During his trip Kissinger was kept informed by Scowcroft and received situation 

reports from his Department of State staff. One report related the anger expressed by 

Thailand’s prime minister, Kukrit Pramoj, over the use of his country as a staging area 

for operations related to the Mayaguez. The US charge d’affaires advised Kissinger 

that the United States should “play by the rules” or otherwise lose a great deal of Thai 

cooperation. Kissinger was not concerned about the Thais and in general was upbeat. 

He told newsmen he had participated in one NSC meeting and received a full report on 

another, and he had “the impression that the government is fully united on the course 

that needs to be taken.” To the newsmen, he seemed in high spirits:

Kissinger, who had seemed morose since the ignominious US evacuations of 

Phnom Penh and Saigon, appeared to have regained his old ebullience. In Kansas City he pounded the podium with booming enthusiasm and proclaimed: 

“The United States will not accept harassment of its ships in international sea 

lanes.” In private, too, he seemed remarkably buoyant. Asked by Time correspondent Strobe Talbott when he foresaw the incident ending, he smiled and 

said: “I know your magazine’s deadline. I think we can meet it.”21

Back in Washington, Ford spoke with Schlesinger about an hour after his conversation with Kissinger about the ultimatum. Ford said there would be another NSC meeting 

at 10 p.m., and he wanted to see the various military options in writing.22 He reiterated 

his instructions on the quarantine of the island and also specified how the ship was to 

be prevented from moving with carefully escalated force if the Cambodians attempted 

to take it to the mainland. He wanted the military options “in black and white.” The 

president was surprised to learn the 1,000 Marines had not yet moved from Okinawa, 

saying he thought they were going to Utapao, Thailand. Seemingly confused as to 

whether he was missing something, he promised to call Schlesinger back on that issue.

Ford then met with Scowcroft for clarification, and Scowcroft quickly passed 

Ford’s instructions to Wickham at 2 p.m. Scowcroft emphasized that if the ship moved 

it should be “interdicted with as little force as possible” and that the president would 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

26

make the decisions on each escalation of force, “step by step.”23 These instructions 

were fully consistent with what the Pentagon had already told the on-scene commander, but the White House did not seem reassured about the matter. Scowcroft 

said the president wanted a coordinated assault on the island and the ship and that 

he had approved moving Marines from Okinawa to Thailand. Scowcroft also told 

Wickham that the vice president had talked Ford into bombing the Kompong Som and 

Phnom Penh airports as part of the island assault24 and that this should be added to 

the military options being prepared for the next NSC meeting. Scowcroft closed with 

an odd request, saying White House lawyers needed a copy of the execute orders on 

interdicting the Cambodian boats. 

The official orders for the Marines to deploy went out about an hour later. More 

guidance on the discriminate, escalating use of force against the Mayaguez if it began 

moving went out in a “flash” message (i.e., one conveying extreme urgency) two hours 

after that. Consistent with Schlesinger’s earlier guidance, this message was again 

extremely detailed, specifying the amount and type of force to be used should the ship 

be towed without the crew or if operating “under her own steam” with the crew. The 

types of force ranged from warning shots across the bow and riot control agents; to 

selective disabling fires; to, as a final resort, gunfire directed at the bridge of the ship. 

The message underscored extremely tight control of lethal options against any Cambodian naval craft or mainland targets:

The international implications of this operation make restraint imperative. 

Complete command and control must be maintained by COMUSSAG/7AF 

[commander of USSAG and Seventh Air Force (i.e., Burns)], who will 

be acting upon direction from the National Military Command Center. . . . Expenditure of ordnance will be in strict accordance with the ROE 

[rules of engagement] included in this SSI [standing signal instruction]. 

Ordnance expenditures will be restricted to forward firing ordnance 

(i.e. 7.62mm, 20mm, 40mm, 2.75[-inch] forward firing aircraft rockets) 

employed to impede attempts to move the boarded ship and its escorts to 

an unfriendly port (fire only alongside the boat or across the bows). Fire 

will not be directed toward the vessels or against shore targets unless specifically authorized by COMUSSAG/7AF.25

COMUSSAG/7AF was General Burns, the on-scene commander, and consistent with 

previous guidance, he had to have authorization from the NMCC before planes could 

expend any ordnance.26
Day Two | Tuesday, May 13

27

Just after 6 p.m. Schlesinger called Ford with news that one of the small boats had 

left the island, and Ford reiterated any boats leaving should be sunk.27 Schlesinger 

also gave the president the tragic news that twenty-three US personnel had died in a 

helicopter crash. Air Force troops from the 56th Security Police Squadron28 were being 

positioned as an emergency assault force at Utapao in case Marines could not arrive 

quickly enough.29 One of the helicopters crashed, killing all eighteen security police 

and its five-man crew, a tragic reminder to all concerned of the inherent risk involved 

in any military operations.30 

Meanwhile, some minor political and diplomatic signaling took place on the evening 

of the thirteenth. The under secretary of state for political affairs, Joseph J. Sisco, learned 

that Deng Xiaoping burst into laughter in Paris when asked about Beijing’s reaction if the 

United States intervened to recover the Mayaguez. “If the United States intervenes, there 

is nothing we can do,” he said.31 He also told reporters he was not aware of China’s alleged 

role as intermediary in diplomatic negotiations between the United States and Cambodia. 

Shortly after that report a discreet inquiry was sent out from the CIA notifying personnel 

in Thailand that it would be “most helpful” to have prompt reporting on the host country 

reaction to US Marines taking “limited military action against Koh Tang Island.”32 Also 

that evening, White House staff began notifying selected members of Congress about the 

military measures being used to quarantine the Mayaguez and her crew from the Cambodian mainland and to keep Cambodian reinforcements from reaching Tang Island. 

Then began several hours of rapid decision making that would determine the 

outcome of the crisis. For three hours, orders from the president would be sidestepped, 

questioned, delayed, and eventually thwarted in an act of insubordination that greatly 

angered the White House but saved the lives of the crew and arguably the president’s 

reputation. The sequence began with the chairman of the JCS’s assistant, Lieutenant 

General John Pauly, USAF, discussing with General Wickham the fact that several 

boats had departed Tang Island and were apparently headed toward the mainland. 

US planes had used riot control agents and two of the boats had turned back, but a 

third was continuing. Wickham immediately called Scowcroft with this information 

at 8:11 p.m., adding that one of the three boats had sunk. Scowcroft and Ford discussed 

the situation while Wickham and Schlesinger did the same (at 8:12 p.m.). Schlesinger 

told Wickham to “destroy it,” before leaving to get ready for his late night NSC meeting 

at the White House.33 Ford and Scowcroft reached the same conclusion. “If they can’t 

stop it any other way, we have no choice but to destroy it,” Scowcroft said. Ford agreed:

Ford: I think we have no choice.

Scowcroft: It is obvious they know what we want.
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

28

Ford: No, I think you should. If we don’t do it, it is an indication of some considerable weakness.

Scowcroft: No question about it.

Ford: I think we should just give it to them.

Scowcroft: To show them we mean business.

Ford: I am glad they got the first two. I think we ought to take the action on the 

third one.

Scowcroft: Thank you, Sir.34

Scowcroft called Wickham back at 8:14 p.m. and told him the president said the boat 

had to be stopped: “If they can’t do it any other way, it has to be destroyed.” Alarmed, 

Wickham responded, “We may lose the thing here in the next few minutes.”35 

According to Wickham, despite the order to sink the boat, he deferred.36 Wickham 

discussed the issue with General Pauly. They were both listening in on pilot commentary from cockpits. A P-3 reconnaissance aircraft first reported the “fishing boat 

with possible Caucasians huddled in the bow.”37 A large group of about forty people 

on deck was unusual. The gunboats had no personnel visible on deck. Other aircraft 

were asked to take a close look and determine if the people were, in fact, the Mayaguez’s crew. A pilot took a pass and said “the ten to twelve up on the fo’c’sle appear to 

be Caucasian.”38 Wickham and Pauly agreed the pilot should take another look and 

wanted to know if the others on deck were “Caucasian” as well. But that pilot had to 

peel off because of fuel depletion, and so another pilot went in to try to confirm all 

forty or so people on deck—a group similar to the Mayaguez crew in number—were 

Caucasian. Apparently those on the back of the boat were harder to see, so it was not 

clear whether they were Caucasians or not. In any case, the two generals conferred 

and said, “Do not shoot.”39 

An A-7 trying to deter the vessels had set fire to a Cambodian patrol boat, which 

eventually sank. Pauly confirmed the sinking of the patrol boat with Wickham at 8:31 

after several calls discussing its status. The pilot’s observation that the fishing boat 

might hold Caucasians arrived at the Pentagon at 8:45.40 However, trying to determine how many of the people on deck were Caucasians took time, and it was not until 

9:48 p.m. that Wickham called Scowcroft back to seek presidential approval for attempting to disable the boat:

Wickham: We have got one of these little boats five miles off Kampong Som. 

No aircraft around with RCA [riot control agents]. They have expended [them]. 

Pilot reports a group of what looks like Caucasians huddled on the bow. He 
Day Two | Tuesday, May 13

29

made several passes. The pilot thinks he could probably disable it by hitting it 

in the rear. Can we get Presidential approval?

Scowcroft: Do you need it? He’s already . . .

Wickham: Well, now we have a question as to the identity of the people on the 

bow. Do we want to stop them and possibly sink the boat? Why don’t you run it 

by the President? I have an open line to them and you can get right back to me.41

Scowcroft called the president at 9:50 to get approval for firing on the boat that might 

contain the Mayaguez’s crew members. The pilot’s confidence gave Scowcroft and Ford 

an option other than just sinking the boat or letting it escape to the mainland: 

S [Scowcroft]: We have just had a report that on one of the boats which is five miles 

off Kompong Som there may be some Caucasians held in the front. The pilot thinks he 

can stop it without sinking it.

P [Ford]: Right. As I understand it, one fled and got to another island and then 

we sank the one and the third one is the one you are discussing.

S: Yeah.

P: Well, I don’t think we have any choice.

S: If they get the Americans to the mainland they have hostages and . . . 

P: We have to predicate all these actions on the possibility of losing Americans.

S: I will have them ask the pilot to do his best to stop it without sinking it.

P: I think that is right. I will be over there in about 15 minutes.42

Scowcroft called Wickham back at 9:54 and said, “Go ahead, John. Have the pilot 

to disable it, and not to sink it.”43 Schlesinger returned to see Wickham, most likely to 

get an update before heading to the White House for the third NSC meeting.44 Wickham 

told him the boat was five miles from the mainland with uncertain passengers aboard, 

but the pilot was saying he thought he could disable the boat without injuring them. 

Schlesinger told Wickham to pass the news to Scowcroft, requesting the president’s 

approval for such a risky endeavor, which he did at 9:56 p.m. Schlesinger then left for 

the White House.

Schlesinger had called Scowcroft earlier to tell him his thinking on the timing of 

military operations. During that call he had suggested that since Kissinger was coming back to Washington late, it might be better to have the NSC meeting the following 

morning. Apparently Schlesinger was not anxious to have another NSC meeting. 

However, Scowcroft and Ford, believing the Pentagon was chary of using force to 

sink the Cambodian patrol boats, wanted the meeting. They decided to hold the NSC 

meeting late enough to accommodate Kissinger’s arrival,45 a point they had agreed 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

30

upon in their 9:50 telephone conversation. During that same conversation Scowcroft 

told Ford the Pentagon’s option paper would be available by then. 

At 10:00 p.m. Scowcroft took another call from Wickham. This time Wickham was 

asking for the president’s permission to have the pilot disable the boat that possibly contained the Mayaguez crew. Scowcroft told him to go ahead. But when Wickham called 

Pauly to pass this authorization along, Pauly had news for Wickham. The pilot was now 

reporting that the forty-foot boat could have as many as thirty to forty people on board, 

with eight or so in the bow. Either the pilot, Pauly, Wickham, or all three concluded it 

was too risky to try to disable the boat by shooting off its rudder. Too much was at stake, 

and there was no available search and rescue capability for survivors if the boat was 

inadvertently sunk. Pauly also reported two high-speed boats were coming from Kompong Som toward the fishing boat. After speaking with Ford at 10:30, Scowcroft called 

Wickham back. Hearing the news about the two high-speed boats, he told Wickham to 

have them sunk. Wickham agreed to do so but asked Scowcroft to inform Schlesinger 

when he got to the White House that this action had been ordered.

Meanwhile the NSC members took their seats, and the third NSC meeting began at 

10:40 p.m. The president bypassed the usual update from Colby and instead asked Scowcroft to summarize the current situation with the fishing vessel. Ford then observed 

that if the boat got to the mainland, “and we have done the other things we are contemplating, there will not be much opportunity for them anyway.” The president seemed to 

anticipate that the Khmer regime would retaliate for US military action by killing the 

crew. Kissinger interjected with another, perhaps worse, possibility: that the Cambodians would “hold them for bargaining” purposes. Schlesinger’s rejoinder was, “I would 

think that avoiding bargaining chips is less of an objective than not being in a position 

where the Cambodians can say that the F-4’s killed our own men.” This was the crux of 

the issue, and the president asked what his advisers recommended. 

Schlesinger was for sinking the Cambodian patrol boats but for only using riot 

control agents on the vessel with the possible Mayaguez crew members. Kissinger 

dithered and then reluctantly agreed with Schlesinger, saying, “We will take a beating 

if we kill the Americans.” But, he told Ford, “At the same time, we must understand that 

we cannot negotiate for them once they are on the mainland. If you are willing to take 

that position, then I think we can let them go.” The important thing, Kissinger said, was 

that the crew not “become bargaining chips.” 

Scowcroft observed that they already had sunk a boat, implying the decision to run 

the risk of harming the crew had already been made. Schlesinger responded that the 

boat “did not have Caucasians on it,” which prompted Kissinger to observe that could 
Day Two | Tuesday, May 13

31

not be known with certainty. The exchange opened the floodgates of White House frustration about the Pentagon not having sunk boats automatically as ordered. Tactfully, 

no one from the Department of Defense observed the repeated White House orders for 

a carefully modulated use of force or that, when the Pentagon presented options for 

degrees of force applied to the boat with Caucasians, the White House had decided in 

favor of dissuasion rather than just sinking it. 

In any case, after discussing whether the Pentagon was implementing presidential orders with alacrity, Ford decided to “reluctantly agree with Jim [Schlesinger] and 

Henry [Kissinger]” and try further dissuasion rather than sinking the boat that might 

contain the Mayaguez’s crew. He ordered that riot control agents, but not lethal force, 

be used in an attempt to turn the boat around. Scowcroft left the meeting to pass those 

orders to the Pentagon, which relayed them down the chain of command to forces in 

the field. Later, testimony from the captain and crew of the Mayaguez revealed how 

harrowing it was to be on the receiving end of the dissuasion. A circling AC-130 Spectre 

gunship, temporarily directing the other air elements, had F-111s drop 2,000-pound 

bombs a mile in front of the boats, and when that failed to stop their progress, drop the 

same ordnance again, only a half mile off their bows, “which is just about the edge of 

a 2,000-pounder’s blast range.” This caused some gunboats to turn back, but not the 

fishing boat and its escort. Then,

even after Spectre raked the water ahead with a dazzling display of firepower, 

the boats kept going. Finally, Spectre had had enough. He had been taking 

40-mm fire regularly from the patrol craft so, with JCS authorization, Spectre 

directed a flight of A-7s . . . to attack. The patrol craft sank so fast the RF-4s in 

the area missed getting pictures of it. . . . 

Later, Captain Miller would describe what happened next: “We were bombed 

a hundred times by our jets. Ten foot forward of our bow light. Rockets and 

machine gun fire. You have to give our pilots credit. They can thread the eye 

of needle from a mile away. They did everything that was possible without 

blowing us out of the water to try to get this boat to turn around and take us 

back to the ship.” 

The crew—Thai fishermen who were also captives—tried several times to turn 

away from the onslaught. The Cambodians forced them to press on. “When 

they [the aircraft] saw it wasn’t going to work,” said Miller, “two jets overflew 

the boat from bow to stern about seven feet above us and tear-gassed us.”46
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

32

As it turned out, the Cambodians were not dissuaded by the gas either, and the boat 

continued on to the mainland along with what decision makers would later learn was 

the entire crew of the Mayaguez. Once it entered the territorial waters of Cambodia and 

began to mix with coastal traffic, US planes, which were not authorized to overfly the 

mainland, abandoned their attempts to track the vessel. 

Having decided the fate of the fishing boat, the NSC members then agreed to go 

ahead and sink the Cambodian patrol boats, even though it was acknowledged they 

could be carrying Americans. Confused, Counselor to the President John O. Marsh Jr. 

asked about the possibility of the other boats containing Americans. Kissinger clarified, 

“The pilot should sink them. He should destroy the boats and not send situation reports.” 

As Kissinger later explained, 

We were sliding into a position in which much of the President’s time and the 

NSC’s was taken up with decisions about the movement of individual small 

boats eight thousand miles away. To avoid this, Ford ordered the destruction 

of all the boats near Koh Tang, squelching attempts to return to a case-bycase consideration.47

The president agreed with Kissinger, stating near the end of the meeting, “I think we 

should sink any boats that can be used to try to move the Americans.” Around midnight 

Scowcroft again left the meeting to call Wickham with the orders to sink four Cambodian patrol boats near the island. Accounts differ, but most agree that three Cambodian 

gunboats were immediately sunk and another four damaged. 

Back in the NSC meeting, the risk involved in seizing Tang Island was being discussed. It was clear to the NSC members that taking Tang before all possible US forces 

were assembled carried higher risks. The group weighed the risks of alternative scenarios, assessing the arrival of various assets and their impact on risk. Schlesinger framed 

the issue by saying 270 Marines “in all probability” could take the island given the 

estimate of 100 Cambodian defenders, but said the Pentagon “would prefer to land with 

1,000.” For some reason Schlesinger was using the estimate of Cambodian defenders on 

Tang Island from Pacific Command’s intelligence center (IPAC) rather than DIA’s larger 

estimate of 150 to 200 heavily armed troops. When Colby asked if the 270 Marines could 

not “protect themselves” while waiting for the next wave, General Jones reminded him, 

“We have nothing to confirm the exact force on that island.” Colby’s concern was that 

the Cambodians might execute crew members. While noting “this is not my business,” 

he nonetheless weighed in repeatedly in favor of moving faster, worrying “if they take 

reprisals, it would be very difficult for us.” 
Day Two | Tuesday, May 13

33

Kissinger agreed there were advantages to speed. However, with the risk of humiliating hostage negotiations negated by the decision to sink boat traffic, he emphasized 

the risks of using insufficient force. He wanted a “more reliable force.” Ford at one point 

summarized the debate, saying, “In other words, the time you gain in this cycle is not 

worth the gamble.” Schlesinger, Kissinger, and Jones all agreed on that point, so the 

president abandoned the idea of early operations on the fourteenth. The issue then 

became whether a one- or two-day delay was the better course of action. More than 

once Kissinger noted he was not competent to assess the military risks of seizing Tang 

with a smaller Marine force, essentially inviting an intervention from General Jones that 

never came. After some discussion on the military and political pros and cons of waiting 

one as opposed to two days, the president ruled forces should be prepared to go within 

twenty-four hours but reserved the final decision on that issue for the next NSC meeting.

The group also considered the advantages and disadvantages of using B-52 strikes 

against the mainland versus aircraft from the Coral Sea. Schlesinger argued, “B-52’s are 

a red flag on the Hill [Capitol Hill]. Moreover, they bomb a very large box and they are 

not so accurate. They might generate a lot of casualties outside the exact areas that we 

would want to hit.” Kissinger worried that waiting for the Coral Sea entailed another 

daylong delay, but then White House Chief of Staff and former Navy pilot Donald H. 

Rumsfeld observed that the aircraft could launch from the aircraft carrier while it was 

still a good distance away. The debate over overwhelming force (B-52s) versus more 

discriminate punitive attacks (carrier aircraft) was confused at times by interventions 

from lesser participants who assumed the purpose of the military operations was to 

rescue the crew. For example, Deputy Secretary of Defense Clements said:

I hate to have us lose sight of our objectives in this case. Those objectives are 

to get the Americans and the ship. If we want to punish people, that’s another 

thing. I think that dropping a lot of bombs on the mainland will not help us 

with the release of the Americans.48 

The president cut off this line of reasoning: “I think we have to assume that the Americans were taken from the island and that some were killed. This is tragic, but I think 

that we have to assume that it happened.” He then asked, “Does anybody disagree?” 

and no one did. 

With the punitive nature of the operations agreed upon, the question arose as to the 

amount of punishment. Whereas some like Schlesinger and White House Counsel Philip 

W. Buchen were concerned about reactions from Congress, Kissinger and Rockefeller 

preferred disproportionate force. Kissinger argued that if only a degree of force commen-
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

34

surate with the provocation was used, there would be no disadvantage to challenging the 

United States at every opportunity. He considered it helpful to prove that the president was 

willing to ignore congressional concerns. “In fact,” he said, “some domestic cost is to our 

advantage in demonstrating the seriousness with which we view this kind of challenge.” 

Kissinger emphasized they needed to “impress the Koreans and the Chinese.” His points 

led to a discussion of worthwhile targets and how to justify attacking the mainland, which 

is how the meeting ended.
35

Not long after those attending the third NSC meeting dispersed around 12:30 

a.m., an intercepted Cambodian communication indicated a possible desire 

on the part of Cambodian authorities to seek a political solution. INR alerted 

the director of the Mayaguez working group to this development at 1:20 a.m. as well 

as Secretary Kissinger’s personal assistant and the White House Situation Room. An 

hour later Defense Secretary Schlesinger requested copies of all Cambodian intercepts. 

Apparently he was just as interested in what the Cambodians were up to as INR was. 

INR renewed its request to NSA for verification of the report later that morning (shortly 

after 8 a.m.). NSA promised a quick response, but it took another eight hours before the 

agency responded that it was “unable to clarify the information.”1

Just before 5 a.m. an unusual message arrived in the Department of State from the 

US embassy in Tehran. The subject line was “Chinese Embassy Tehran Believes Mayaguez to be Freed Soon.”2

 The Pakistani first secretary had told an American diplomat 

that a senior Chinese embassy official in Tehran said China was “embarrassed” by the 

Cambodian seizure of the Mayaguez and expected it to be released soon. The report was 

credible insofar as the Chinese source knew and shared the fact that the US liaison office 

in Beijing had called on the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs about the Mayaguez. The 

Chinese source commented that China was using its influence with the Khmer Rouge to 

seek the early release of the ship.3 State Department officials also learned that morning 

that China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs had returned the US message for Cambodia, 

saying the Cambodians had refused to accept it.

Scowcroft met with Ford early on the morning of the fourteenth as was their usual 

practice, but there was not much news other than that the headwinds delaying the Coral 

Sea had abated. After Scowcroft and the CIA briefer provided their morning updates to 

the president, Rumsfeld slipped into the Oval Office to share his views privately on the 

Mayaguez crisis. He had prepared a memo on the best options, which he gave to the 

president. The main point he made was that Ford should not use B-52s “since they were 

CHAPTER 3

Day Three | Wednesday, May 14
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

36

associated with damage inflicted across Vietnam and had caused negative reactions in 

the region and in America.” Instead, the former aircraft-carrier pilot thought it made 

more sense to use aircraft from the Coral Sea because they could strike with greater 

precision and reduce potential civilian casualties.4

Rumsfeld was followed by Scowcroft and Kissinger, who met with Ford several 

times that morning. During one such meeting Kissinger took a phone call from Under 

Secretary Joseph Sisco just before 10 a.m. that demonstrated Kissinger’s subordinates 

understood he was not looking for a diplomatic solution to the crisis. Sisco advised 

Kissinger to contact the United Nations (UN) for help in securing the release of the 

Mayaguez but emphasized the outreach would just be for appearances’ sake: 

For public relations reasons only, why don’t we go through the cosmetic motions 

by writing a letter to the UN and send it to the Security Council protesting the 

seizure on the high seas. It will help us with the Congress when we get to military action. Why don’t we also try to get the Secretary General? I know nothing 

will come from this.5

Reassurances notwithstanding, Kissinger was leery, responding that they already 

had communicated through the Chinese. But Sisco persisted, saying, “We can’t lose 

a thing by it.” Kissinger gave Sisco permission to prepare a communication for his 

review. Meanwhile, Scowcroft called General Wickham at 10:30 to ensure Schlesinger 

would have the required mainland bombing options ready for the final NSC meeting later that day, including the pros and cons of using B-52s as opposed to carrier 

aircraft. His call was followed by one from McFarlane, who told Wickham the White 

House needed regular situation reports directly from the NMCC. The White House 

was not going to allow the Pentagon to control information flow. Wickham complied 

and arranged for the reports.6 

After the call from Scowcroft, General Jones and Schlesinger discussed the military options. They reached agreement on two critically important points: the use of 

airpower and the risks the Marines were running. It was agreed that the Coral Sea’s 

forty-eight tactical aircraft were not really good for destroying runways. However, 

Schlesinger voiced strong opposition to use of B-52s because they were indiscriminate 

and ill-suited for their targets, arguing “any use would have to be on political grounds.” 

He wanted any attacks on the mainland to be “surgical.” The two Pentagon leaders 

agreed the Coral Sea aircraft should avoid the two ships in the harbor of unknown 

registry. Instead they would be given an “armed recce mission” to find other, more 

relevant water and shore targets.7
Day Three | Wednesday, May 14

37

As for the Marine assault, it appears from Wickham’s notes on the meeting that 

both men expected some “preparation” of the landing zone by tactical aircraft and 

continuous air cover for the Marines thereafter. Schlesinger cautioned that care should 

be taken to avoid collateral damage when preparing the landing zone. The point was 

made that the commandant of the Marine Corps, General Robert E. Cushman Jr., “had 

no concern about securing the assault area,” but he noted it would take time to do the 

clearing operation.8

 They would wait for the insertion of the second wave of Marines 

before moving out for the clearing operation. When there were 600 Marines ashore 

they would have a commanding force that could be withdrawn safely the following 

day. Broadcasting directly into the Khmer radio network to issue an ultimatum or other 

demands was also discussed.

Later that morning Ford, Kissinger, and Scowcroft met with the visiting prime minister of the Netherlands, Johannes den Uyl. Afterwards, Kissinger and Scowcroft stayed 

on to further discuss their preoccupation: the Mayaguez. Kissinger hedged on whether 

to use the B-52s, but he wanted to reinforce presidential resolve in favor of a forceful 

response. He encouraged the president to favor a larger military operation, telling him 

he “should take out the port” and that he would “take as much heat for a big strike as for 

a small strike.”9 Kissinger then left the Oval Office briefly to make a call to Sisco. He had 

been thinking about Sisco’s recommended outreach to the UN. “Joe,” he asked, “can 

we just send that letter to the Secretary General and not to the President of the Security 

Council?” Sisco agreed, saying he would make it public so that it “looks like a serious 

attempt.”10 Kissinger directed him to go ahead. Sisco moved quickly. Within the hour 

the US ambassador to the UN, John A. Scali, delivered a request for assistance to UN 

Secretary-General Kurt J. Waldheim that noted the United States reserved the right to 

act in self-defense in accordance with Article 51 of the UN Charter. 

While Ford, Kissinger, and Scowcroft were meeting in the White House to discuss 

how they could get the results they wanted from the Pentagon, military leaders were 

meeting in the Pentagon to decide how they would rule on the all-important question 

of military risk in the next NSC meeting. The Joint Chiefs agreed that another day to 

coordinate the disparate forces arriving on the scene would be useful and provide a 

higher assurance of success. However, given countervailing risks associated with delay, 

the Chiefs decided not to insist on more time. 

About the same time, the news media were also showing a marked interest in 

risk assessment. Reporters grilled Nessen at his noon press briefing. Before Nessen 

could make his first announcement, reporters pounced on him, demanding to know 

if he could confirm the Associated Press report that US warplanes had attacked three 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

38

Cambodian vessels. In the middle of the news conference, Nessen was handed a statement by Pentagon spokesman Joseph Laitin that said “the Cambodians appeared to be 

attempting to move US captive crewmen from the ship to the mainland” and that after 

firing warning shots to dissuade them, “three Cambodian patrol craft were destroyed 

and about four others were damaged and immobilized. One boat succeeded in reaching Kompong Som.” Reporters wanted to know whether any American crewmen were 

on the Cambodian patrol craft being attacked. Nessen dodged the questions as best 

he could, saying he had no further information.11 That afternoon the Senate Foreign 

Relations Committee joined the fray, unanimously adopting a resolution supporting 

the president’s attempt to resolve the crisis with diplomacy and calling upon Cambodia 

to release the crew. 

General Burns finalized his plan for the military operations at 1:30 p.m. on the 

fourteenth. Burns and his staff, operating from his headquarters in Nakhon Phanom 

near Thailand’s northeast border with Laos, created the plan with input from the Navy 

and Marine Corps. The Air Force helicopters and Marines assembling to retake the 

Mayaguez and its crew were 800 miles to the southwest of Burns’s headquarters at the US 

Air Force base in Utapao, Thailand, located on the coast not far from Bangkok (see map 

on page 20). An orbiting EC-130 aircraft outfitted for airborne command and control 

would link the communications of the dispersed commanders and forces.

WHITE HOUSE

FREQUENCY LEGEND

HF—High Frequency

UHF—Ultra High Frequency

VHF/FM—Very High Frequency/Frequency Modulated

LEGEND

7AF—Seventh Air Force

NMCC—National Military Command Center

CINCPAC—Command in Chief, Pacific Command

ABCCC—Airborne Command Control Communication

BLT—Battalion Landing Team (US Marines)

JCS—Joint Chiefs of Staff

NMCC Washington, DC

JCS Voice Alert Net

Wideband Security Voice Teletype

CINCPAC 

Hawaii Satellite Communication System

Teletype

Security Voice Landline

BLT 2/9 

Utapao

Ships

UHF Voice 

Teletype

Tang Island 

BLT 2/9

UHF Voice

VHF/FM 

Voice

Fighters

U-2

ABCCC EC-130 Secure Voice

Courtesy of Ralph Wetterhahn

COMMAND AND CONTROL COMMUNICATIONS, MAY 14–15, 1975
Day Three | Wednesday, May 14

39

General Burns authorized close air support of the Marines assaulting Tang Island 

and tactical aircraft and naval gunfire strikes to destroy all Cambodian small naval 

craft within twenty-five nautical miles of Tang Island, Paulo Wai, Kompong Som, and 

Ream (excluding Vietnamese territory). He emphasized that

all forces must be aware of the fact that the primary purpose for conducting 

ground operations is to secure the safe release of US/third-country national 

prisoners [several of the crewmen were not US citizens]. Actions which will 

unduly jeopardize this objective are to be avoided.12

Somewhat incongruously, Burns also authorized the use of the largest conventional 

bomb in the US inventory (the 15,000-pound BLU-82) to clear a landing zone on the 

island. His plan would be reviewed in detail during the fourth NSC meeting, which 

began just before 4 p.m. that afternoon and went on for almost two hours.13

The final NSC meeting began with Colby telling the participants that the Cambodians had apparently transported at least some of the crew from Tang Island to the 

mainland, putting them ashore at Kompong Som port around 11 p.m. the previous 

night (Washington time). He thought the determined attempt to get some crew to the 

mainland indicated the Cambodians appreciated their value “as bargaining chips.”14 

After Colby reported on crew location, Cambodian strength, and disposition of Cambodian patrol craft not yet sunk by US planes, Kissinger suddenly changed the direction 

of the conversation. “Why are we not sinking the boats?” he asked, apparently referring 

to those remaining. This set off a discussion of the missions that US forces had been 

assigned. Kissinger clarified through questioning that the US warships on the scene—

the USS Henry B. Wilson (a guided-missile destroyer) and the USS Harold E. Holt (a 

destroyer escort)—were not blockading the island and interdicting boat traffic. The 

president fumed that he had the impression the Holt would station itself between the 

island and mainland to prevent Cambodian naval traffic between the two, saying, “I 

am amazed at this.” General Jones explained the ships were over the horizon to avoid 

tipping the Cambodians to the possibility of pending military operations, but the 

president’s skepticism about Pentagon compliance with his expectations was evident.15 

After further discussion on Cambodian and US forces, the president asked the 

Department of Defense for its recommendations. At Schlesinger’s invitation, Jones briefed 

the group on the seizure of the ship and the island. He began by saying he did not recommend using B-52s, which the Joint Chiefs considered “overkill,” and also notably left out 

aircraft strikes against the mainland. Instead, tactical aircraft would suppress enemy fires. 

When he finished, the president immediately asked about the Coral Sea and B-52s. The 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

40

general then identified three target sets on the mainland—the airfield at Kompong Som, 

the naval port, and the regular port—saying there was not much to hit at the airfield or 

the naval port. There were targets at the regular port, however, including eight fast patrol 

craft and some buildings and other facilities. The president asked whether the breakwater 

could be destroyed by B-52s, and Jones said it would be difficult. He also asked about the 

comparative impact of B-52s and the carrier aircraft, and Jones said the former would 

generate more damage to the runway and port but also result in collateral damage. 

Having heard General Jones’s recommendation, timing was discussed and Jones 

noted the need “to get the order out as soon as possible.” The president agreed on the 

need to launch both operations as quickly as possible, and Admiral James L. Holloway,16 

the chief of naval operations, said it would be “at first light.” Jones agreed but said that 

“may be a moot question.” When the president asked about the departure of the Marines 

in helicopters, Jones said it should be “within an hour.” The president noted they already 

were forty minutes behind schedule, but instead of seizing the opportunity to argue for 

another day’s delay, Jones responded: “They should still make it.” Holloway then left the 

meeting at 4:45 to pass along instructions for the military operations. 

The NSC meeting then turned to the issue of strikes on the mainland. General Jones 

raised the idea of issuing an ultimatum to the Cambodians before striking mainland 

targets with either B-52s or carrier aircraft.17 The president ultimately decided in favor 

of carrier strikes, noting later in the meeting they would be more responsive in terms of 

timing and would produce less collateral damage and less possible harm to Americans. 

He specified that once the cyclic operations from the Coral Sea began “they should not 

stop until we tell them.” He would let the Pentagon know when he thought the Cambodians had been sufficiently punished.

Concerning the ultimatum, Rumsfeld offered his views on the right way to communicate the ultimatum: privately, with specificity, and via a diplomatic effort. Kissinger 

then told the group about his initiative to contact the UN secretary-general but said 

he thought it would be too complicated to try to issue ultimatums to the Cambodians by way of Beijing. Schlesinger asked about a local ultimatum (presumably from 

the Marines to the Cambodians on the island who might be holding crew members). 

Kissinger said he would not object to that, but the ultimatum should not delay mainland 

strikes, which they had agreed they would say were necessary to protect the Marines. 

He wanted to “move massively and firmly.” He mentioned taking out the one hundred 

aircraft at Phnom Penh but said, “I do not want to upset people too much.” 

Buchen was in favor of an ultimatum, saying it “may be the only way to get the Americans out”; later he added, “With an ultimatum, [neutral ships in the harbor] have a chance 
Day Three | Wednesday, May 14

41

to get out.” He also worried that hitting mainland facilities might risk harm to crew members being held on the mainland. Kissinger responded to Buchen by objecting again to the 

idea of an ultimatum. Later he would say using bullhorns on the island to relay demands 

for the release of the crew was okay, but he insisted they should just state the demand 

and not negotiate. Kissinger countered the proposal for an ultimatum to the Cambodian 

government by saying they should consider advancing the timetable for airstrikes. 

Thus, the conversation segued to a discussion of how to manage the mainland 

airstrikes. During that discussion, some critical points were made that were later forgotten, contributing to major misunderstandings and presidential ire. In accordance 

with the earlier agreement with Schlesinger, Jones noted that carrier aircraft would 

be armed with precision-guided munitions and that the first wave would be “armed 

reconnaissance.” Admiral Holloway elaborated, saying the first wave “will hit targets 

connected with the operation” (i.e., Cambodian assets that theoretically could interfere 

with Marine operations). “Later waves,” Holloway said, “will hit other targets, including 

the . . . airfield and the ports.” He then added that after “the first operation (i.e. wave) 

the fighters will come back and report.” Kissinger then specified that strikes on the 

mainland should not occur before the Holt could retake the Mayaguez, presumably to 

minimize the chance that the Cambodians might sink it in retaliation. 

Holloway again left the meeting to pass along the instructions for the airstrikes, 

which went out at 5:10 p.m. Consistent with what he had explained, the first wave of 

aircraft were assigned the mission of “armed reconnaissance,” that is, “locating and 

attacking targets of opportunity”—in this case those that might be able to reinforce 

Cambodian forces on Tang Island. What the execute message that went to forces in the 

field said in that regard was that “principal targets” for the first wave of armed reconnaissance were “aircraft and military watercraft.”18

Schlesinger asked if there were any changes to the estimate of Cambodians forces 

on Tang, and Colby said no. The group also discussed possible casualties.19 General 

Jones said it was very hard to estimate, and Schlesinger opined it might be twenty or 

thirty killed in action. Deputy Secretary Clements noted sooner or later the public would 

also hear about the twenty-three Air Force personnel killed in the earlier helicopter 

crash. After Kissinger had to explain again to Buchen why he did not favor an ultimatum 

before hitting mainland targets, the group discussed whether any Americans were on 

the island and if so, how many. Kissinger pointed out there was no way to know and 

that “taking the island if they are not there is easier to explain than failing to take it if 

they are.” Schlesinger agreed that “we have an obligation to get the Americans or to see 

if they are there.” 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

42

The meeting ended with a discussion about how to manage “consultation” with 

Congress and when to notify the public and allies that operations were underway. The 

possibility of congressmen and senators objecting to the operations was raised, and 

Kissinger responded that the president “would have to go ahead anyway.” The decision 

was made to brief selected representatives and senators as quickly as possible.

The NSC meeting ended with many participants rushing to prepare for the outreach 

effort. Just after 6 o’clock, Kissinger and Rumsfeld both popped into the Oval Office for 

short discussions with Ford on how to manage the discussion with the congressmen 

and senators, who were arriving around 6:30 p.m. Back in his office, Kissinger received 

a telephone call from Sisco at 6:16. Sisco told Kissinger he had the deputy secretary with 

him and all the regional assistant secretaries. They were working out details for notifying US allies, and they wanted Kissinger’s approval to send cables to key US posts instead 

of rounding up foreign ambassadors in Washington. Given concerns about timing, they 

agreed to do both cables and telephonic notifications, but Kissinger again demonstrated 

his concern with making a strong impression on other nations: 

Kissinger: I want a strong—I don’t want a weeping State Department—just say 

we’re trying to rescue the ship and the crew and we are doing military operations on the Island [Tang] and trying to seize the ship and there may be a few 

associated operations. 

Sisco: Yeah, that’s all you would say.

Kissinger: Yeah.

Sisco: Sure. And you might add one other point: namely, that we undertook 

certain diplomatic steps beforehand . . .

Kissinger: Yes, but I do not want to give the impression of super reasonableness.

Sisco: No. All right, that’s fine. I’ll pass that along.20

Ten minutes later the meeting with members of Congress started. Sisco interrupted it 

to get further guidance. He had a secretary slip in and hand Scowcroft a short message 

asking for immediate “yes/no” decisions on two issues. Sisco wanted to be sure the military operation had commenced before any diplomatic notifications took place, which 

Scowcroft could not confirm. Second, he wanted approval to include the Russians and 

Chinese on the list of countries informed, which Scowcroft confirmed was correct.

The discussion with the congressmen and senators began with President Ford 

briefing them on the military operations. He covered the basics and justified the strikes 

against the mainland as necessary to protect the Marines. Kissinger’s explanation 

that all diplomatic means had been exhausted fell flat. The reaction was, as Kissinger 
Day Three | Wednesday, May 14

43

later described it, “unenthusiastic” (so much so that he later told Ford he thought the 

exchange with congressional leaders inclined Schlesinger to scale back the use of 

force).21 The very first question posed to the president by House Speaker Carl B. Albert 

(D-OK) was about endangering the lives of crew. He asked, “Could Americans be on 

the boats that will be destroyed?” The president said candidly, “There is no way of 

knowing.” Other questions followed about whether we were “just going into Koh Tang 

shooting,” why we could not wait longer before using force, why Cambodia was not 

given a deadline for compliance, and why the mainland was being bombed. Many also 

wondered, what next? As House Majority Leader Thomas P. “Tip” O’Neill Jr. (D-MA) later 

said, “There was a tremendous feeling of uneasiness of where do we go from here if we 

don’t find the crew.”22 There were also concerns expressed about compliance with the 

War Powers Act. Other questions and comments were more supportive, but overall the 

reception suggested the likely political reaction to the president’s management of the 

crisis depended on the outcome. Ford ended the meeting by asking the senators and 

congressmen to join him in a prayer for “the very best” results possible.23

* * *

On the other side of the world, US forces hastily prepared for combat and departed 

Utapao, Thailand. They left shortly after 4 a.m. (local Cambodian time).24 The Marines 

were transported by CH-53 Sea Stallion helicopters from the 21st Special Operations 

Squadron, code-named Knives, and heavily armored HH-53 helicopters (nicknamed 

“Super Jolly Green Giants”) from the 40th Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Squadron, 

code-named Jollies.25 Five CH-53s and three HH-53s carried 177 Marines from the 2nd 

Battalion of the 9th Marine Regiment and three Army linguists to assault Tang Island. 

Another three HH-53s carried 59 Marines from D Company of the 1st Battalion of the 

4th Marine Regiment, along with an Army intelligence officer fluent in Cambodian, 

an explosive ordnance disposal team, two Navy corpsmen, and Navy and civilian personnel to get the Mayaguez under way. Cambodian gunboats observed and fired on the 

assault force during its 200-plus-mile flight from Utapao over the Gulf of Thailand to 

Tang Island and the SS Mayaguez, located about 33 miles southwest of the Cambodian 

port of Kompong Som. No damage was done, but it was clear the Cambodians were 

alert to their presence. 

The Cambodians who seized the Mayaguez were well armed, so taking the ship was 

expected to be difficult. The Marines were prepared for a stout defense, booby traps, and 

even the possibility that the Cambodians might try to scuttle the ship. It was assumed 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

44

the Marines would pay a high price for retaking the ship.26 That was not the case. The 

Marines were deposited on the USS Holt, which then was brought alongside the Mayaguez. Six armed Cambodians had been observed through binoculars forty minutes 

earlier, so the Mayaguez had been doused with riot control gas to suppress resistance 

just prior to the Holt’s arrival. However, the Marine boarding party, wearing gas masks, 

Knife-21,

Knife-22

WEST BEACH

EAST BEACH

HILL 440

USS HOLT

SS MAYAGUEZ

TANG ISLAND

Knife-31,

Knife-23

Jolly-31,

Knife-32

Jolly-43,

Jolly-42

Jolly-11, Jolly-12

Jolly-13

KHMER ROUGE POSITIONS

Heavy Machine Gun

Light Machine Gun

Mortar 

Defense Positions 

Ammunition Storage

Headquarters

Radio

PLANNED TANG ISLAND AND MAYAGUEZ ACTIONS

0600HRS, MAY 15, 1975

© Osprey Publishing
Day Three | Wednesday, May 14

45

was surprised to discover the Cambodians had left the ship unattended. After Marines 

raised the American flag, sailors prepared the ship for towing. The Holt then towed the 

Mayaguez away from the combat zone.

Conversely, US forces were shocked by the Cambodians’ ferocious defense of Tang. 

The Marines were expecting only token resistance from a few irregular Cambodian 

forces. The assault commander, Lieutenant Colonel Randall W. Austin, and three other 

officers had scrambled to obtain intelligence about Tang Island, which they found hard 

to obtain. They managed to get an Army U-21 Ute to inspect the island from the air, but 

the airplane was restricted by Air Force leaders to an altitude of 6,000 feet, which made 

it difficult to observe much. However, they were able to see that the island was heavily 

foliated except for a cleared strip that cut across a small peninsula on the northern tip 

of the island connecting what appeared to be two harbors. It seemed obvious to Austin 

and his colleagues that these harbors were the center of any activity on the island.27 

They could also see the Mayaguez anchored a mile north of Tang. 

Despite the paucity of information collected during his reconnaissance, Austin 

was assured before departing Utapao that pre-assault strikes to neutralize known 

antiaircraft sites would be conducted. That did not happen.28 Austin and his Marines 

approached Tang Island at dawn in eight helicopters, four from the west and four from 

3-Man Fighting Positions

Mortar

Heavy Machine Gun

Light Machine Gun

Ammunition Storage

Trench Line

Village

LEGEND

Knife-21

Knife-22

Knife-31

Radio

Knife-23

Partially Sunken Patrol Boat

Jungle Trail

Khmer Rouge Headquarters

Courtesy of Ralph Wetterhahn

TANG ISLAND | KHMER ROUGE DEFENSIVE POSITIONS

6:20 A.M. | MAY 15, 1975
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

46

the east. A ninth helicopter, one of the three that had carried Marines to the USS Holt, 

also joined the first assault wave. Instead of a “walk-ashore” operation, the Marines 

flew into the teeth of a defense prepared by numerically superior, better-armed, wellentrenched, and well-disciplined Khmer Rouge soldiers who had recently improved 

their defenses and were expecting the attack.29

Knife-21 and Knife-22 were the first helicopters on the western beach with their 

loads of Marines, many of whom were fresh out of boot camp and had never seen 

combat. Shortly after 6 a.m., Knife-21 reached the beach, swung around, and lowered 

its ramp facing the tree line. As Marines poured onto the beach, the Cambodians 

unleashed a devastating barrage of direct and indirect fires. Knife-22 aborted its 

approach and concentrated on providing cover fire for Knife-21, which had been badly 

damaged and was limping away from the beach. About a mile out to sea, it collapsed 

in the water. Knife-22 was also badly damaged and struggled back toward Thailand, 

barely reaching the coast before its pilots made an emergency landing. 

Knife-23 and Knife-31 approached the eastern beach. Again the Cambodian 

defenders waited until the Marines were unloading before firing. Knife-23 was severely 

hit. It lost an engine and its tail section, falling stricken to the beach. Marines emerged 

from the wreckage and made it to the tree line, followed by the surviving Air Force crew 

members. Knife-31 fared even worse. The cockpit took a direct hit from a rocket, and 

the helicopter burst into flames. It settled in the surf just offshore, taking with it all the 

Marine radios intended for coordinating close air support. Some of the survivors from 

Knife-31 attempted to make it ashore and were lost to enemy fire; others, including 

some badly wounded, used the helicopter to shield their movement as they swam out 

to sea. A Marine braved enemy fire and was badly burned trying to recover the body 

of the copilot, Second Lieutenant Richard Vandegeer. Another Marine, the forward air 

controller, used an Air Force survival radio to call in airstrikes on enemy positions that 

were trying to kill Knife-31’s survivors. 

About 8:30 a.m. Jolly-13 made an effort to retrieve the small group from Knife-23 

isolated on the eastern beach. By then, an AC-130, code-named Spectre-61, had been 

sent to support the Marines, and it delivered its first tentative fires in support of Jolly 

13: ten 40-mm rounds directed at enemy troops. Jolly-13 landed, taking numerous hits 

while waiting for the Marines to board, but the Marines were pinned down. Eventually, 

a fuel tank on Jolly-13 caught fire, and it was forced to depart. The helicopter struggled 

back to Thailand, where it was declared out of action. 

After the devastating results on the eastern beach, all the remaining helicopters 

were directed toward the western beach where repeated attempts were made to rein-
Day Three | Wednesday, May 14

47

force the Marines already on the ground. Jolly-41, Jolly-42, and Jolly-43 made runs at 

the beach but had to abort after being damaged by ground fires. Knife-32 finally made 

it in, discharging thirteen Marines but suffering great damage in the process. A rocket 

tore a hole in its side and exploded in the passenger compartment as the Marines 

exited. The helicopter made it back to Utapao but was so badly damaged it would not 

return to the fight. Jolly-42 made another attempt at insertion and managed to unload 

twenty-seven Marines, including First Lieutenant James D. “Dick” Keith, who would 

assume command of the largest group of Marines on the western beach from Second 

Lieutenant James McDaniel. Although Jolly-42 succeeded in delivering its Marines, it 

too was so badly damaged it was rendered inoperable after returning to base.

Jolly-43 fared better, finding an undefended portion of the beach south of the main 

Marine force. It offloaded twenty-nine Marines, including Lieutenant Colonel Austin 

and his staff who were armed mostly with .45-caliber automatic pistols. Austin tried to 

coordinate supporting airstrikes before starting to move a mile north and join up with 

the other Marines. Jolly-41 made five separate insertion attempts, each time forced 

away by enemy fire. Finally, at about 10 a.m., the helicopter succeeded in unloading 

twenty-two of its twenty-seven personnel before mortar fire forced it to lift off again. It 

hovered, prepared to touch down once more, suffered damage from a near miss by a 

mortar round, and then pulled away as another mortar round exploded where it had 

Radio

Jungle Trail

Khmer Rouge Headquarters

WEST BEACH

EAST BEACH

Knife-23

Knife-31

Knife-21

2nd Lt McDaniel’s Platoon

2nd Lt Cicere’s Platoon

Lt Col Austin’s 

HQ Element

Khmer Rouge Patrol Boat

Khmer Rouge Positions

Jungle Trail

US Positions

Downed Helicopters

Khmer Rouge 

Ammunition Storage

LEGEND

TANG ISLAND

SITUATION 7:00 A.M. | MAY 15, 1975

Courtesy of Ralph Wetterhahn
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

48

just been hovering. Jolly-41’s successful insertion of Marines had been facilitated by fire 

support from Spectre-61, the “AC-130 gunship that provided the first effective air support to the assault force.”30 Nevertheless, the damage Jolly-41 sustained in the process 

also required its removal from action after it managed to return to Thailand.

The net result of such concentrated enemy fire was that at the end of the invasion’s 

first hour there were only fifty-four Americans on Tang and fourteen of them were dead. 

At the end of the first planned assault wave, the number of Americans on the island 

had climbed to more than one hundred and thirty, but eight out of the nine helicopters 

that participated in the assault had been shot down or otherwise damaged so badly by 

enemy fire they could no longer be used. Meanwhile, the Marines on Tang were divided 

into three isolated detachments. Second Lieutenant Michael A. Cicere and twenty 

Marines were pinned down along with the five crew members of Knife 23 on the east 

beach. Lieutenant Keith with eighty-two Marines were dug in on the west beach, and 

the command element under Lieutenant Colonel Austin with a total of twenty-nine 

Marines was still about a mile further south. The Marines from Knife-31 treading water 

off the coast of Tang were eventually discovered by the destroyer, USS Wilson, which 

launched a motorboat to retrieve them. The Wilson’s sailors suppressed fire from the 

Cambodians on Tang Island who tried to pick off sailors and Marines during the process.

* * *

While the Marines were for fighting on Tang, feverish diplomatic activity was underway 

back in the United States. In New York, Secretary-General Waldheim had moved with 

alacrity. As soon as he received the appeal from Ambassador Scali, he broke off his 

meeting (which, coincidentally, he was having with UN representatives forced by the 

Khmer Rouge to leave Cambodia) to contact both the Chinese and the Cambodians. 

He called the Chinese representative to the UN to his office, and for the Cambodians he 

used an open channel that had worked for him with an earlier intervention on behalf 

of foreign evacuees from Phnom Penh.31 At 7 p.m. the UN issued a statement that the 

secretary-general was communicating with the Cambodians and that he encouraged all 

parties to refrain from further use of force. Seven minutes later the Cambodians locally 

broadcast a message in their own language announcing the release of the ship. It was a 

long, rambling statement that ended with a reference to the Mayaguez:

Regarding the Mayaguez ship, we have no intention of detaining it permanently 

and we have no desire to stage provocations. We only wanted to know the 

reason for its coming and to warn it against violating our waters again. This is 
Day Three | Wednesday, May 14

49

why our coast guard seized this ship. Their goal was to examine it, question 

it and make a report to higher authorities who would then report to the Royal 

Government so that the Royal Government could itself decide to order it to 

withdraw from Cambodia’s territorial waters and warn it against conducting 

further espionage and provocative activities. This applies to this Mayaguez

ship and to any other vessels, like the ship flying Panamanian flags that we 

released on 9 May l975. Wishing to provoke no one or to make trouble, adhering 

to the stand of peace and neutrality, we will release this ship, but we will not 

allow the US imperialists to violate our territorial waters, provoke incidents in 

our territorial waters or force us to release their ships whenever they want, by 

applying threats.32

Clearly the Cambodians were cognizant of US threats to use military action. While 

denying the efficacy of the threats, the Cambodians nonetheless were signaling their 

willingness to let the ship go. But it took time to receive, translate, and pass along their 

message to authorities in Washington. The CIA’s Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) notified the Department of State about the broadcast just minutes before 8 

p.m., precisely when Sisco was calling Kissinger again to obtain his approval of routine 

diplomatic communications. 

Sisco told Kissinger that Deputy Ingersoll would bring a list of countries being 

notified to the 8:00 dinner in honor of Dutch Prime Minister Uyl. Kissinger interrupted 

him to again insist, “I don’t [want] some of these usual pansy briefings.” Sisco reassured 

him that State Department veterans like Philip C. Habib were handling the notifications 

and they were “not pantywaists.” Sisco then tried to get Kissinger’s quick approval for 

three diplomatic communications. He offered to read them over the phone or have 

them hand-delivered by Deputy Secretary Ingersoll, who was about to leave for the 

Uyl dinner. One was a brief cable to all diplomatic posts so that they would not be in 

the dark; another was a short telegram for Bangkok so the US ambassador there had 

“a little guidance.” The third initiative was another run at notifying the UN Security 

Council instead of just the secretary-general. Sisco said it was necessary “because we 

are using force and we are obligated to tell them we are using force under Article 51,” and 

because “we should do this from a public relations point of view.” Instead of approving 

these diplomatic efforts over the phone, Kissinger told Sisco to send them to the White 

House for his review.

Fifteen minutes later both Kissinger and Scowcroft learned of the Cambodian 

broadcast announcing the release of the Mayaguez. What transpired next can be 

pieced together from a careful reading of multiple firsthand accounts that are not 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

50

always consistent. The president says in his memoirs that he was notified about the 

broadcast by Scowcroft at 8:15 and that he “told Brent [Scowcroft] to have Schlesinger 

hold up the first strike until we had a better idea of what was happening.” Kissinger 

in his memoirs agrees that Scowcroft called the Pentagon to hold off the first strike 

but says that he asked

Scowcroft to instruct the National Military Command Center that I would be 

seeking presidential guidance and that I also intended to consult Secretary 

Schlesinger. Since there was little time left, I suggested that the planes from 

the Coral Sea proceed on course but drop no ordnance until the President had 

made his decision. (emphasis added)33

At 8:30 Scowcroft told General Wickham the aircraft from the Coral Sea were not to 

release any ordnance. Simultaneously, the JCS was informing Admiral Gayler “not to 

use Navy TACAIR [tactical air] for strikes on Kompong Som Harbor.” Several minutes 

later (at 8:32) the JCS clarified for Admiral Gayler that the assault on the island and 

boarding of the Mayaguez could continue. Two minutes after that Gayler was told to 

“use all possible communications to divert and cancel CORAL SEA TACAIR.” At 8:44 a 

flash message from the JCS went out notifying forces in the field that Coral Sea strikes 

against targets in Kompong Som complex were “rescinded repeat rescinded. Cease 

repeat cease strike operations against targets in Kompong Som complex.”

While Scowcroft was on the phone with the Pentagon at 8:30, Kissinger was on 

the phone with the president discussing the broadcast. Kissinger notes in his memoirs 

that he could see pros and cons to canceling the airstrikes on the mainland in light of 

the broadcast, but that in any case, the president was resolute.34 Ford “would not alter 

any of his directives, he said, until he was sure of the crew’s release.” In his memoirs 

Ford said that Scowcroft called back shortly after 8:30 and they “decided to go ahead 

with the bombing because we couldn’t act on the basis of a radio message that was so 

imprecise.”35 However, in an interview the president gave immediately following the 

crisis, he said that he was enjoying the first sips of his martini-on-the-rocks at 8:29 when 

Kissinger, not Scowcroft, called about the broadcast:

The secretary [Kissinger] told me that the word had come that they were 

releasing the ship. And I said to the secretary, “They don’t mention the crew,” 

and apparently in the information Henry had, he had not been told or the 

announcement didn’t include the crew. So I said to him, “Proceed as we had 

agreed, with the air strikes and the full operation.”36
Day Three | Wednesday, May 14

51

Schlesinger was on his way to the White House while Scowcroft, Kissinger, and Ford 

were discussing the broadcast. After arriving, Schlesinger received a call from the Pentagon explaining the cancellation of the first strike. He found Kissinger, who gave him a 

copy of the FBIS translation of the Radio Phnom Penh broadcast. Fearing the broadcast 

was just propaganda, Schlesinger argued mainland strikes should continue.37 Kissinger 

then called Ford out of the dinner at 8:50 p.m., and the two men informed him of their 

recommendation, at which time, Kissinger would later claim in his memoirs, “the planes 

from the Coral Sea were still en route.”38 Ford then made a firm decision, saying, “Tell 

them to go ahead, right now.” Scowcroft then called Wickham back—not two minutes 

later as he had said he would, but twenty-two minutes later, because that is how long it 

took Kissinger, Schlesinger, and Ford to discuss the issue and for the president to arrive 

at a definitive decision. 

In fact, the planes were over their targets at 8:45, and the flash JCS message 

rescinding authority for the strike had reached the planes a mere minute earlier. They 

aborted, dropped their ordnance in the sea, and returned to the carrier. Several people 

communicated Ford’s decision to resume strikes, with sources recording different 

times for doing so. Scowcroft’s assistant, Major McFarlane, could call Wickham with 

the news that the first wave could go ahead and strike. McFarlane did so at 8:47 p.m. 

The Pentagon sent a message to its forces a minute later, at 8:48 p.m.: “correction to 

previous order: First wave of TACAIR from CORAL SEA to strike mainland targets. BDA 

[bomb damage assessment] is to be made and reported to National Military Command 

Center.” Scowcroft reinforced the message McFarlane had delivered, calling Wickham 

at 8:52 to say the Coral Sea strike operations could proceed as originally planned. A 

verbal order to that effect went out to General Burns, the on-scene commander, at 

8:58. Interestingly, the order also noted that Burns had the authority to detour strikes 

against the mainland to support the Marines if necessary. 

While the back and forth occasioned by the Cambodian broadcast complicated the 

first mainland strike mission, the White House was considering how to get a message 

back to the Cambodians in response to their broadcast. One NSC staffer, William Lloyd 

Stearman, who had been in contact with DIA about the ultimatum to be broadcast to the 

Cambodians, suggested using the broadcast frequencies the Khmer Rouge was using 

and that NSA was monitoring. Stearman recalled Kissinger thinking this was a great 

idea but said NSA objected since it considered knowledge of Cambodian frequencies 

to be classified.39 If NSA objected, they did so at high levels and directly to the White 

House because at lower echelons NSA had been collaborating with DIA on preparing 

the ultimatum for broadcast into the Cambodian radio network.40
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

52

In any case, broadcasting the US response directly into the Cambodian radio network did not happen, even though Kissinger and the White House spokesman, Nessen, 

claimed it had and President Ford thought so as well. Nessen told the press the United 

States had broadcast its response on a radio frequency “we knew would be monitored” 

in Cambodia. On May 16, the secretary of state agreed, saying the United States took 

“drastic communications measures” and broadcast the US statement directly into Cambodia.41 Ford privately told the shah of Iran, who visited the White House on May 15, that 

“we put a message through their frequencies and over the AP [Associated Press] that we 

would stop when the crew was released.”42 However, a later congressional investigation 

found no evidence of a direct broadcast response to Cambodia. 

Even as the discussion about how to communicate with the Cambodians was 

underway, NSA radio intercepts indicated the Cambodians were releasing the crew. An 

unknown Cambodian source said, “Let the Americans go. We do not want to become 

prisoners ourselves.” While NSA was trying to evaluate the accuracy of the message, 

intelligence agencies began sharing the news. Admiral Gayler’s staff thought this intelligence supported the belief that at least some Americans were still on Tang Island. At 

9:15 p.m., INR received the NSA message saying an unidentified Khmer command had 

said, “Let them take their ship and leave.” It was shared with the State Department’s 

working group on the Mayaguez crisis.

Whether Kissinger was informed of the intercepts is not known. In his memoirs, he 

merely notes that “after toying with the idea of breaking into Cambodian communications, we decided that the most expeditious way would be to release a statement to the 

news services.” When Nessen failed to respond quickly enough to Kissinger’s request 

that he come to his office, Kissinger sent Scowcroft to grab Nessen, who took the message 

and put it out to the press at 9:15 p.m.:

We have heard [a] radio broadcast that you are prepared to release the S.S. 

Mayaguez. We welcome this development, if true. 

As you know, we have seized the ship. As soon as you issue a statement that 

you are prepared to release the crew members you hold unconditionally and 

immediately, we will promptly cease military operations.43

While Nessen was encouraging the press to file their reports immediately, Kissinger was 

on the phone with Sisco again. He told Sisco about delivering the message to the Cambodians via the press and keeping up the bombing in the meantime. Sisco responded 

that he was glad to hear about the outreach through the press because he anticipated 

criticism on that score:
Day Three | Wednesday, May 14

53

Sisco: I was going to recommend to you that you take the offensive and take the 

initiative because the one kind of criticism we would face here is if you guys had 

waited another hour or two, you know, and all that sort of thing. That’s what 

we will hear so I was going to recommend to you get out and get our side of the 

story that these guys have had three days to respond. But . . . 

Kissinger: That’s right.

Sisco: But now this announcement I think meets that particular concern, you see.

Kissinger: Yeah. Okay.

Sisco: All right. Look, I’m going to go out and get a bowl of chili but I’ll be back 

if there’s anything you want from Phil [Habib] and me.

Kissinger: Okay, fine. You can send that letter to the Security Council although 

l just don’t see why it can’t wait until first thing in the morning.

Sisco: No, it . . . I’ll send it now, Mr. Secretary. Take my word for it, get it out.

Kissinger: Why?

Sisco: Simply because you are fulfilling an obligation . . . 

Kissinger: Okay, go ahead; send it.

Sisco: . . . and nobody can criticize you.

Kissinger: Okay.

Sisco: Okay.44

Within ten minutes Sisco had a message out to Ambassador Scali to deliver the notification to the UN Security Council. By then the Marines had been fighting for almost 

two hours and were in increasingly desperate straits.

While White House principals waited for more news from Cambodia, they labored 

through the dinner with Uyl, which by all accounts was an awkward affair. The dinner 

had been delayed a half hour as the Cambodian broadcast was dealt with, and once 

under way Ford kept popping out of the black tie affair to receive reports in the usher’s office adjoining the state dining room. Scowcroft and Rumsfeld made only token 

appearances, and Kissinger stayed for only one course. Schlesinger arrived late but 

stayed until dessert had been served before leaving. Shortly after 10 p.m. Ford ushered 

the guests to the Red Room for coffee. 

While the dinner party had coffee, on the other side of the world the Mayaguez 

crew had been released. The Cambodians sent them toward American forces on 

the same Thai fishing boat that had carried them to the mainland. They were soon 

sighted by an American reconnaissance plane. Four minutes after the president bid 

his guests farewell at the North Portico of the White House, the USS Wilson intercepted the fishing boat and took the Mayaguez crew on board. Ford then headed for 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

54

Kissinger’s office in the West Wing for the latest information. At 10:57, while Ford was 

in Kissinger’s office, the second wave of A-6 Intruders and A-7 Corsairs from the Coral 

Sea bombed Ream airfield, destroying seventeen planes, cratering the runway, and 

flattening the hangar.

Ford returned to the Oval Office at 11 p.m. where he was joined by Kissinger, 

Scowcroft, and McFarlane, and over the next half hour, by Rumsfeld and other staff. 

McFarlane, in direct touch with the NMCC as previously arranged with Wickham, 

already had the news that the entire crew had been safely recovered. He shared this 

information with the president and his top aides. When Schlesinger called the president 

from the Pentagon at 11:08 with the news that the crew had been recovered, he said 

thirty members were on the fishing boat. Thirty was the estimate made by the American 

reconnaissance plane that first sighted the fishing boat. For some reason Schlesinger 

had not yet received the more complete report from the Wilson that the entire crew was 

safe. In his memoirs, McFarlane recalled the moment:

Ford, who already knew from me that the crew was in fact safe in US hands, 

gave no indication of this to Schlesinger, but thanked him and hung up. Then 

he let out a loud guffaw. “Schlesinger didn’t have a clue as to what was going 

on,” he said, laughing. “He didn’t even know the crew had already been recovered.” Kissinger, Scowcroft and Rumsfeld joined in his merriment [and] broke 

into loud laughter. At that moment, David Hume Kennerly, the White House 

photographer, snapped a picture. Later, press secretary, Ron Nessen, looking 

for a quote to put under the picture, asked me what the President had said 

when he heard the crew had been recovered. I told him truthfully that he had 

reacted with relief and thanked God that they were all safe. The next day, the 

photograph appeared on the front page of The New York Times, the caption 

indicating it was a shot of the President and his aides reacting to the news that 

the Mayaguez crew had been released.45

Schlesinger called Ford back a few minutes later with the update that the entire crew 

had been rescued, but the merrymaking in the Oval Office at Schlesinger’s expense 

reveals the extent to which the secretary of defense was considered an outsider by the 

White House at this juncture. Reinforcing that division, the occupants of the Oval Office 

discovered the Pentagon’s press secretary already had “scooped” the White House 

by announcing the successful recovery of the crew. Nessen and other advisors were 

furious at the Pentagon, which “from the very beginning of the operation had been 

leaking information about the Mayaguez to reporters” in advance of White House press 
Day Three | Wednesday, May 14

55

reports.46 Nessen recommended the president trump the Pentagon with a live television 

announcement of the recovery of the ship and crew. 

About two minutes after the second call from Schlesinger confirming the entire 

crew’s recovery, the third wave of aircraft from the Coral Sea launched. Two A-6s and 

six A-7s, plus support aircraft, were headed toward Kompong Som and Ream Naval 

Base. Meanwhile, the news moved up the chain of command that the captain of the 

Mayaguez had informed Navy personnel that his entire crew was accounted for, that 

they had not been mistreated, and that he had convinced the Cambodian command in 

Phnom Penh that if they released the ship and crew, US airstrikes would be stopped. In 

light of this information, Admiral Gayler asked the JCS whether the third wave should 

continue on course. 

This very issue was being debated in the White House by Kissinger and his staff. 

Stearman argued, “Henry, we got our people back, we got the ship back, why don’t we 

call off the air strikes. Suppose one of our guys gets shot down and we have another 

prisoner or worse yet somebody gets killed. So, why don’t we knock it off?” Kissinger 

retorted, “We are not going to lose any aircraft.”47 Rumsfeld had a different concern. 

Given the intention to make a national announcement on live television, he recommended that Ford call Schlesinger back for absolute confirmation that the entire 

crew had been recovered. Ford did so at 11:45, and Schlesinger assured Ford the news 

had been confirmed by three different sources. While Ford was on the phone with 

Schlesinger, Scowcroft asked whether there was any reason for the Pentagon not to 

disengage. Kissinger said, “No, but tell them to bomb the mainland. Let’s look ferocious! 

Otherwise they will attack us as the ship leaves.”48

57

With the benefit of the phone call from the White House, during which 

Kissinger encouraged the president to continue the mainland strikes, 

Schlesinger had the instructions necessary to answer Gayler’s inquiry 

as to whether the third wave of aircraft should continue. General Jones discussed the 

issue with Schlesinger, who confirmed that the third strike should be carried out. 

Accordingly, five minutes later at 11:50 p.m., the third group of aircraft struck an oil 

refinery; several buildings, including a barracks complex; and several warehouses. 

On Tang Island the Marines were unaware that the Mayaguez crew members had 

been released by the Cambodians. The news that Washington had ordered the termination of military operations was unexpected and incomprehensible to them. The decision 

effectively stranded the Marines on Tang in dire straits. Austin and other on-scene 

commanders quickly convinced the chain of command to reverse the order, and the 

second wave of Marines was allowed to proceed to Tang.1 Once there they informed 

Austin that the crew had been released. However, the confusion had delayed the arrival 

of Marine reinforcements and therefore the amount of time to organize a withdrawal. 

Even worse, US forces were down to a handful of operational helicopters. The depleted 

force of five helicopters would only be able to transport 127 Marines. 

On the other hand, the recovery of the Mayaguez crew meant air and naval fire 

could support the Marines unconstrained, that is, if the Marines could communicate 

their locations well enough to effectively direct fires. The two groups of Marines on the 

western side of the island tried to link up, which precipitated ground fighting every 

bit as intense as the insertion process. Fortified enemy positions (bunkers and huts) 

separated the two groups. A small detachment from the northern group moved south 

to lead Austin’s group back to the larger contingent, but it immediately encountered 

automatic weapons fire and claymore mines. One Marine was killed and a number of 

others seriously wounded. 

CHAPTER 4

Day Four | Thursday, May 15
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

58

Austin and his Marines worked their way north, advancing aggressively into Cambodian fire. They wanted to disguise their weakness and link up with the larger force 

of Marines to reduce their vulnerability. They succeeded in advancing and picked up 

captured Khmer Rouge weapons to augment their meager firepower. Visibility in the 

dense jungle was approximately five to fifteen feet, so the American and Khmer forces 

were constantly within a few meters of one another. Between periodic rushes by the 

Khmer soldiers, the fighting was characterized by grenade duels. One Marine patrol 

working along the rocky shoreline overran a Cambodian log bunker, killing its three 

defenders. They discovered an abundance of captured US ordnance and a US-made 

PRC–44 radio tuned to Marine frequencies. 

SUNKEN KHMER ROUGE SWIFT BOAT

DOWNED CH-53

WEST BEACH

EAST BEACH

Knife-23

Knife-31

USS HOLT

SS MAYAGUEZ Knife-21

BLACK VELVET-1 (USS WILSON’S GIG)

HILL 440

APPROXIMATE MARINE 

POSITIONS

CICERE

KEITH AND MCDANIEL

AUSTIN, COMMAND SECTION 

AND MORTARS

TANG ISLAND

MARINE FORCES ON TANG ISLAND AFTER FIRST WAVE

© Osprey Publishing
Day Four | Thursday, May 15

59

During the intense fighting, the Marines managed to coordinate close air support 

despite the loss of their UHF radios:

Keith and the battalion air liaison officer, Capt. Barry Cassidy, improvised a 

radio relay system whereby information was forwarded on the battalion’s tactical frequency to the Airborne Mission Commander. . . who in turn relayed the 

information to the A-7s and F-4s flying close air support. Even more incredible 

was that Cassidy was with [Austin’s] command element while Keith was with 

the main force.2

This improvised communication linkup and the resultant close air support made a great 

difference. The gunship Spectre-61’s fire support for the Marines thereafter was quite 

effective at knocking out the enemy bunkers that lay between Austin’s southern group 

and the main body of Marines.3

 The two bodies of Marines finally joined up about noon, 

just prior to the arrival of the second wave of Marines aboard the five helicopters that 

were still operable. The reinforcements included Marines from Company E and three 

81-mm mortars. Unfortunately, Spectre-61 was leaving to refuel just as the second wave 

arrived.4 Knife-52 took a run at the east beach to reinforce Cicere’s Marines. A barrage of 

enemy fire erupted, hitting its fuel tank. Losing fuel and without the capability to refuel 

in flight, Knife-52 and its complement of twenty-seven Marines turned back to Thailand. 

They made it as far as the Thai coast before crash-landing close to where Knife-22 had 

made its emergency landing earlier in the day.5

Knife-51 and Jolly-43 also were forced to abort their insertion efforts on the east 

beach. Offloading on the west beach proved easier because the larger group of Marines 

on that side of the island had established a small perimeter around the landing zone. 

Knife-51 was able to discharge nineteen Marines and take aboard five wounded. Jolly43 inserted twenty-eight Marines and then headed off to refuel. Jolly-11 and Jolly-12 

inserted twenty-seven and twenty-six Marines, respectively, bringing the total number 

to 204 on the west beach.6 Austin used the additional Marines to expand his perimeter 

and dig in, not knowing at that point whether they would be remaining overnight.

* * *

Back in Washington, President Ford made his brief televised remarks to the nation 

announcing the safe recovery of the ship and crew just before 12:30 a.m. Next he spent 

a few minutes in the Oval Office with Kissinger; Scowcroft; Rumsfeld; and Robert T. 

Hartmann, the counselor to the president, before returning to his residence, where he 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

60

took one last call from Schlesinger at 12:35 and then accepted a rare sleeping pill from 

his personal physician.7

After speaking with the president, Schlesinger cancelled the fourth planned airstrike against the Cambodian mainland. Instead, all subsequent Coral Sea air missions 

would be close air support for the Marines on Tang Island. Thus, the fourth wave was 

redirected toward Tang to support the Marines. However, the Navy planes had not 

prepped for that mission nor did they have communications with the Marines, so the 

mission was aborted.8

Even after the Marines understood the Mayaguez crew had been released, they were 

unhappy with the decision by Jones and Schlesinger to order a cessation of offensive 

operations. The Marines had expended precious blood to take the island, and some in 

their chain of command wanted to complete the mission.9

 Nonetheless, Schlesinger 

saw no point in continuing the fighting on Tang Island and ordered a withdrawal. “At 

that point,” he recalled later,

I got some objection from Honolulu [Marine headquarters for Pacific operations], which ran along the lines of, “The Marines have landed and they are 

going to achieve their military objective!” I had to order the Marines off the 

island. No point in inflicting additional casualties on the Marines or the Cambodians, for that matter.10

For the next eight hours the US forces on the scene worked in harrowing circumstances 

to extract the Marines while minimizing casualties. 

* * *

With orders to disengage, the Marines turned their attention to evacuation, which would 

turn out to be every bit as harrowing as the insertion. The group isolated on the eastern 

beach was in constant danger of being overrun. Two attempts to extract these Marines 

and airmen in midafternoon were abandoned after enemy fire severely damaged 

Jolly-11 and Jolly-43. Both helicopters flew out to the Coral Sea, where they were safely 

recovered. Maintenance crews quickly patched Jolly-11 back into flying shape. Eventually, using a hose from the ship’s galley as a substitute for a new fuel line, they were 

able to get Jolly-43 reengaged as well.11 Along with Jolly-12, Knife-51, and newly arrived 

Jolly-44, there would be a total of five helicopters left to try to evacuate the Marines. 

Meanwhile two US Air Force OV-10 forward air control aircraft (Nail-68 and Nail47), arrived. Major Robert W. Undorf, USAF, in Nail-68 assumed control of close air 
Day Four | Thursday, May 15

61

support operations, which greatly improved as a result. The AC-130’s 105-mm cannon 

provided the most effective supporting fires, but they had to be carefully coordinated 

given how closely the Cambodians were clinging to Marine positions.12 Undorf also 

successfully directed supporting fire from the Wilson’s 5-inch gun, which took out several .50-caliber machine guns operating from a partially sunken Cambodian gunboat 

that had bedeviled US helicopters.13 Austin would later credit Undorf with turning the 

tide of battle.14

As welcome as the effective close fire support was, darkness was descending. 

Austin’s Marines on the western side of the island might survive overnight, but it was 

doubtful that Cicere’s group would. Consequently, the decision was made to attempt 

another run at evacuating Cicere’s group from the eastern beach. To further augment 

fire support and rescue personnel from downed aircraft, the Wilson’s commander 

called for volunteers to man the ship’s small boat (called a “gig”). Eight volunteers with 

“brown water navy” experience in Vietnam were dispatched on the gig. Once the gig 

was on station, some consideration was given to whether it could evacuate personnel 

from the eastern beach. The gig could take approximately ten men at a time, which 

meant thirteen or so would have to stay behind and risk being overrun. Cicere requested 

volunteers. After Marine Staff Sergeant J. Wyatt, Air Force pilot First Lieutenant John P. 

Lucas, and Marine Lance Corporal A. Louis Ybarra volunteered, all the rest did as well.15

As it turned out, the gig was used to support a helicopter evacuation instead. It 

darted in close to shore and used its mounted M-60 machine guns to distract Khmer 

soldiers from the incoming helicopters.16 While Undorf directed supporting fires from 

Spectre-11, the Wilson’s gig, and A-7s and F-4s, Jolly-11 darted in to extract the hardpressed Marines and airmen. Despite all the cover fire, Jolly-11 took heavy enemy fire. 

Khmer Rouge tossing hand grenades chased the US servicemen back to the rescue 

helicopter. They were cut down by helicopter miniguns, an Air Force photographer 

who joined the fight, and the Marines, who stopped to return fire. Having successfully 

extracted the survivors of Knife-23, Jolly-11 flew to the Coral Sea. A bit later, fearing one 

Marine had taken shelter in the wreckage of Knife-23, Jolly-12 risked yet another rescue 

effort. It hovered over the site with a rescue line while Knife-51 provided supporting 

fire. No Marine emerged from the downed helicopter, so after waiting for several minutes—during which it suffered damage and a crew member was wounded—Jolly-12 

departed for the Coral Sea. Both Jolly-11 and Jolly-12 sustained so much damage during 

the evacuation of the eastern beach that they were unable to fly again for the remainder 

of the operation. US forces were now down to three helicopters—Jolly-43, Jolly-44, and 

Knife 51—with exhausted crews that had been flying all day. 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

62

Also around this time, as light was fading, the decision was made to relieve pressure 

on the remaining Marines by hitting the Cambodians with a 15,000-pound BLU-82 

packed with almost eight tons of high explosive. BLU-82s were the largest nonnuclear 

bombs in the US arsenal. The use of the BLU-82 had been approved earlier in the 

operation to cut a landing zone out of the dense forest. Just before operations were 

launched, Gayler told Burns to put the BLU-82s on launch alert. Now, running out 

of daylight, helicopters, and patience, Gayler was anxious to alleviate the Marines’ 

increasingly precarious situation. Austin had been notified that the BLU-82 was 

available, but he never requested its use. As Austin reported on Cambodian pressure and the risk of being overrun during the withdrawal process, Gayler directed 

Burns to unleash the BLU-82 but to “insure caution” and “stay clear of the Marines 

and choppers.”17

A C-130 transport aircraft dropped the BLU-82 on the southern portion of the 

island, about a thousand yards from the Marines. Presumably Gayler’s purpose in 

using the huge bomb was to display the extent of US firepower and encourage the 

zealous Cambodians to consider letting the Marines depart the island with minimum 

interference. Burns later said the bomb was dropped for its “diversionary and inhibiting effect.” The blast, which created a small mushroom cloud and tore an area the size 

of a football field out of the island’s dense vegetation, surprised the Marines, ruptured 

Capt Davis’s G Company

2nd Lt Cicere’s Platoon

Capt Stahl’s E Company

WEST BEACH

EAST BEACH

USS WILSON

Mortar

Khmer Rouge Positions

Jungle Trail

US Positions

Heavy Machine Gun

Light Machine Gun

LEGEND

Radio

Jungle Trail

Khmer Rouge Headquarters

Patrol Boat

Abandoned Khmer Rouge 

Ammunition

TANG ISLAND

SITUATION 4:00 P.M. | MAY 15, 1975

Courtesy of Ralph Wetterhahn
Day Four | Thursday, May 15

63

eardrums, blew Nail-68 almost a 1,000 feet higher, and jolted Jolly-11’s automatic flight 

controls off-line.18 By some accounts, Cambodian activity following the detonation of 

the BLU-82 was greatly reduced, especially enemy traffic along footpaths.19 Even so, 

the Marines requested that the BLU-82 not be used again.20 

As night fell, Nail-68 ran out of fuel and was replaced by Nail-69, flown by Captain 

Gregory Wilson. Wilson, who had not trained for night operations, asked Spectre-11 to 

drop an illumination flare, which briefly sidelined the OV-10 by destroying Wilson’s 

night vision and disorienting him.21 Meanwhile, the decision to extract the Americans 

from the western side of Tang surprised the Marines. The relative merits of digging 

in to remain overnight and evacuating in darkness had been discussed, but the 

sudden arrival of helicopters was unexpected. Nevertheless, Knife-51 succeeded in 

picking up forty-one Marines while taking little damage. In the darkness, enemy fires 

proved much less accurate. Jolly-43 followed on the heels of Knife-51, lifting off with 

fifty-four Marines, more than double the normal load.22 Jolly-44 then took its turn, 

extracting thirty-four. As the Marine perimeter constricted, increasing the distance 

from the enemy, more supporting fires were called in on the Cambodians. However, 

the well-disciplined Khmer soldiers countered by moving closer to the evacuating 

Marines, occupying their abandoned positions. This made the dwindling number of 

Marines increasingly vulnerable.

Realizing time was running out, Jolly-44, which had barely avoided a midair collision 

with Jolly-43 in the darkness, opted to offload its Marines on the Holt rather than the 

Coral Sea in order to return to the island more rapidly. Without the benefit of its low-lightlevel television system and operating in total darkness, Jolly-44 attempted to unload its 

exhausted Marines. After making three passes at the Holt, Jolly-44 was talked in slowly 

by a flight mechanic until the rotors were within two feet of the Holt’s superstructure. 

Then, with the end of the helicopter protruding over the sea, the Marines exited through 

its front door onto the Holt. Jolly-44 immediately returned to the western beach.

In total darkness, the Marines’ reduced numbers made their position particularly 

vulnerable. Austin had departed aboard Knife-51, so Captain James H. Davis was in 

charge. He feared the last seventy-three Marines were in danger of being overrun. Nail69 heard the Marine commander observe, “We need to get off the LZ [landing zone] in 

15 minutes or we won’t get off at all.”23 The Cambodians could not see well either, but 

it seemed only a matter of time before they realized there were few remaining Marines 

and that they had moved down to the surf line. Nail-68 had lost radio contact with the 

Marines, but it flew low over the beach with its lights on, drawing enemy fire and verifying there were still Marines to evacuate. 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

64

To the relief of the Marines, Jolly-44 quickly reappeared on the western beach, but 

darkness made it difficult to find the increasingly small beach, much reduced by high 

tide. Thanks to a strobe light Davis just happened to have, and which he tossed out in 

front of the Marine position, Jolly-44 was able to find the Marines.24 It took off with fortyfour Marines and reported there was one more contingent left. One Marine recalls being 

out about fifty yards from the helicopter extraction point on the dwindling Marine 

line, and in jungle with foliage so dense there was only about ten feet of visibility. In 

the pitch dark they could hear the Khmer Rouge but could only detect their locations 

from muzzle flashes. A gunny sergeant “came around and removed about every other 

guy as they reduced the perimeter. He then sent a runner around to let us know that 

the next chopper was it. When the next bird [helicopter] came in, we were to empty the 

M-60 into the woods and get to the helicopter because it would be the last one out.”25

That helicopter, Knife-51, returning from the Coral Sea, was guided to the landing 

zone by Nail-69, which circled the beach flashing its landing lights. As it did so it drew 

enemy fire, which the circling AC-130 then suppressed. With the diverse sources of 

light, Knife-51 had trouble finding the Marines. But after three failures, Knife-51 went 

in with all its lights on, which drew intense fire from the Cambodians but enabled it 

to find the landing zone. Twenty-seven Marines climbed aboard. At the last minute a 

pararescueman, Technical Sergeant Wayne L. Fisk, left the helicopter and raced to the 

tree line to make sure no Marines were being left behind. While the vulnerable helicopter hovered, Fisk found two Marines who otherwise would have been left behind. 

Together they returned to Knife-51, which then departed. Once the extraction was 

complete, Captain Davis reported that he was “relatively certain” there were no more 

Marines left on Tang Island.26

Despite all the precautions and last-minute checks, and all the previous, selfless 

acts of heroism to recover bodies and stranded personnel, the unthinkable happened. 

Amid all the confusion, a three-member Marine machine-gun crew—Gary L. Hall, 

Joseph N. Hargrove, and Danny G. Marshall—was overlooked, and the body of another 

Marine was also left behind on the beach.27 With Marines having been evacuated to 

Thailand, the Holt, and the Coral Sea, it took a while to determine any Marines were 

missing. On board the Coral Sea, the Marines discussed plans to return to Tang to 

retrieve their missing comrades while Rear Admiral R. T. Coogan called for Navy SEALs 

from Subic Bay to be flown in. On the Wilson, volunteers were again requested to man 

the gig in case it was sent back to the island.28

After a platoon from SEAL Team One arrived, Coogan met with the SEAL team 

commander—Lieutenant (junior grade) R. T. Coulter—Lieutenant Colonel Austin, 
Day Four | Thursday, May 15

65

Captain Davis, and Gunnery Sergeant Lester McNemar to decide on a course of action. 

The SEAL commander proposed a night insertion to recover the missing Marines. 

Marines volunteered to go back in as well. Despite this proposal, Coogan did not 

want to risk more lives without knowing the Marines were still alive.29 Coogan asked 

whether the SEALs could return in daylight after a leaflet drop telling the Cambodians 

that they just wanted to recover personnel. The leaflets had already been prepared in 

French and the Khmer language.30 However, in light of the Khmer behavior over the 

past few days, the SEAL commander considered that plan unsound.31 The conversation grew heated as it became clear to the distraught Marines that a search for their 

compatriots would not be approved.32 In the end, the decision was made to approach 

the island and search for any signs of American survivors. The next day aircraft 

overflew the island electronically scanning for signals, and the Wilson cruised off the 

coast of Tang with all available crew and optical devices scanning the coast for the 

three Marines. Bullhorns were used to encourage any stranded Marines to attempt 

evacuation. A few Cambodians, who quickly hid themselves, were observed on the 

beaches. However, there was no sign of the three Marines.33

* * *

The White House was not aware of the three Marines left behind but did understand 

the evacuation had been hurried, difficult, and confused. When Kissinger and Scowcroft met with Ford at 9:50 on the morning of May 15, they repeated Captain Davis’s 

assessment, telling the president they were “reasonably sure that all the Marines got 

out.” Scowcroft also informed the president that the Wilson and Holt were continuing 

to cruise the island trying to observe and communicate with any Marines still on 

the island. With Marines and airmen in hospitals and bases in Thailand and others 

scattered over multiple ships heading in different directions, no casualty count was 

immediately available. In fact, it was five days before an accurate count was completed. 

Eighteen servicemen—including the three missing Marines—were killed assaulting 

Tang Island, and almost eighty more suffered wounds. Including the twenty-three 

personnel lost when the helicopter carrying Air Force security police went down, fortyone servicemen perished altogether. As critics were quick to point out, that tally was 

one more lost than saved with the return of the Mayaguez crew.34

PART II

Crisis Explanations

69

As has long been noted, the military operations during the Mayaguez crisis 

were fraught with danger. Any number of decisions made during those operations could have made a major impact on what subsequently happened 

and the casualties suffered by US forces. The difficult decision about whether to stay 

the night on the island or withdrawal under cover of darkness is a case in point. The 

USS Hancock was on the way with its load of additional helicopters and more Marines, 

which would have allowed a more orderly withdrawal and could have prevented the 

loss of the three Marines left behind. On the other hand, more casualties might have 

been sustained by the small remaining force of Marines on the island as darkness 

descended—and perhaps they would have been overrun by the more numerous 

defenders who were pressing close to their perimeter. Few commentators have been 

inclined to second-guess such decisions. 

The same is not true for the decisions made further up the chain of command, 

however. The key decision makers in Washington have been roundly criticized for their 

performance, typically with little appreciation for what they thought was at stake and 

what they were trying to achieve. In an earlier work on the Mayaguez crisis, this author 

argued the key decision makers were Ford, Kissinger, Schlesinger, and Scowcroft. With 

the rich detail now available about the crisis decision-making process, and depending 

on how influential behavior is assessed, a case might be made for including some other 

major participants, particularly Vice President Rockefeller and General Jones, or even 

for excluding Scowcroft from the set of key leaders. However, for many reasons, I believe 

the record supports the argument that Ford, Kissinger, Schlesinger, and Scowcroft were 

the key decision makers.1

 The analysis of critical crisis decisions proceeds on that basis.

Priorities

The paramount objective during the crisis, as Scowcroft later explained, “was to make 

it clear, to everyone, to our friends, to potential opponents, that notwithstanding 

CHAPTER 5

Critical Crisis Decisions
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

70

the fact that we had just withdrawn from Southeast Asia under fairly ignominious 

circumstances, if you will, that the United States understood its interests and was 

prepared to protect them.”2 Schlesinger later said the same thing, acknowledging 

the primary reason for the use of force was “to make quite clear to all parties that the 

United States was still an effective force.”3 Although the general goal was to reinforce 

the US reputation for defending its interests, the main concern in that regard was the 

Korean Peninsula. As Scowcroft related in 1980, “To the extent that we were looking 

anywhere specifically, it was primarily probably not Southeast Asia at that time, but 

at Korea,” where the renewal of the long-simmering conflict between the two Koreas 

was considered a real possibility.4

Kissinger emphatically made the case for a demonstrative use of force in his first 

private meeting with Ford and shortly thereafter in the first NSC meeting. Rockefeller 

chimed in at this meeting, mentioning the USS Pueblo. It was assumed the Mayaguez’s 

crew already had been taken to the mainland, so the analogy to the Pueblo was not 

raised to argue for the need to recover the crew but rather to emphasize that the crisis was a test of American will and a punitive response was imperative. For the rest 

of the NSC meeting, the decision makers considered a wide range of retaliatory and 

punitive options. 

The Pueblo was not Kissinger’s preferred historical analogy, however. Instead, he 

was thinking of the EC-121 incident (see sidebar).5

 He thought the US reaction to the 

North Korean downing of the US Navy’s EC-121 in international airspace with the loss 

of all thirty-one men was exactly what they should avoid. After returning from Kansas 

City for the third NSC meeting, he told the security council members, “I remember 

1969, when the EC-12l was shot down off Korea. We assembled forces like crazy. But 

in the end, we did not do anything.” To prevent inaction in the case of the Mayaguez, 

Kissinger argued for an aggressive and quick response. Between the third and fourth 

NSC meetings, he met privately with Ford and encouraged him to be resolute, saying, 

“This is your first crisis. You should establish a reputation for being too tough to tackle. 

This is a replay of the EC-121.” 

The corollary of the decision makers’ primary objective—an impressive demonstration of US power and determination to protect interests—was the need to avoid 

opposite outcomes, namely, a failure to act; a weak response; or worst of all, a humiliation akin to the Pueblo experience. Thus, when decision makers learned during the 

second NSC meeting that there was still a chance to isolate the crew from the mainland, they tailored military operations to include a quarantine and an assault on the 

island where they thought at least some of the crew were being held. But the ultimate 
Critical Crisis Decisions

71

priority was a strong demonstration of resolve. From the beginning Kissinger had 

argued the lives of the Mayaguez crew “must unfortunately be a secondary consideration.”10 He later denied this quote, but circumstantial evidence,11 and the subsequent 

decisions and behaviors of the key leaders—including Ford, Kissinger, Scowcroft, 

Schlesinger, and arguably Rockefeller—indicate they all agreed with this assertion. 

In discussing risk to the crew, Ford told Scowcroft, “We have to predicate all these 

actions on the possibility of losing Americans.” Schlesinger noted several times that 

the Cambodians could kill the crew at will, suggesting their ultimate fate was not in the 

hands of US decision makers. Similarly, Scowcroft made the point in an NSC meeting 

that boats had already been destroyed that might have carried crew members, thus 

reinforcing Ford’s point that they had already crossed the point of no return on taking 

such risks. The island assault and the bombing of the mainland were also undertaken 

despite the obvious dangers posed to the crew. 

Beyond the core group of senior decision makers, however, it is true that subordinate leaders, presidential advisors, and lower echelons of the military construed 

The EC-121 Incident

On April 14, 1969, the North Koreans shot down a US Navy EC-121 surveillance 

aircraft, killing all thirty-one servicemen on board.6

 North Korean motivations for the 

attack have long been disputed. Some have argued it was an accident, and others 

claim that the North Korean leadership expected military retaliation,7

 which did not 

occur because the United States was worried that a military response might involve a 

confrontation with the Soviet Union. 

It also has been argued that the Soviet Union’s ability to constrain North Korean 

provocations was less than commonly believed at the time. Cold War documents 

suggest the Soviets were concerned about North Korean bellicosity, but that North 

Korea ignored Soviet remonstrations. Instead, they focused on US behavior, period. The 

North Koreans believed such small acts of aggression as seizing the Pueblo in 1968 and 

downing the EC-121 in 1969 helped establish their reputation for deterrence and kept 

the United States at bay. Besides, the United States did not respond with military force 

to the seizure of the Pueblo, so the risks of another attack seemed marginal.8

In his memoirs, Henry Kissinger agreed with the North Korean assessment that US 

performance during the EC-121 crisis was weak: 

A leisurely process of decision-making creates a presumption in favor of 

eventual inaction. . . . In a crisis boldness is the safest course. Hesitation 

encourages the adversary to persevere, maybe even raise the ante. . . . Overall, I judge our conduct in the EC-121 crisis as weak, indecisive and disorganized. . . . I believe we paid for it in many intangible ways, in demoralized 

friends and emboldened adversaries.9

Kissinger was determined to do better during the Mayaguez crisis.
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

72

the military operations as a rescue mission and made decisions accordingly.12 Deputy 

Secretary of Defense Clements’s confusion on this point expressed in the third NSC 

meeting is a case in point. He interrupts to say the group should not “lose sight of our 

objectives,” which “are to get the Americans and the ship.” The president quickly got the 

conversation back to punitive options by asserting it had to be assumed some Americans 

had already been killed. “This is tragic,” he said, “but I think that we have to assume 

that it happened.” Ford asked whether anyone disagreed. When no one dissented, the 

conversation swung back to reprisals. Similarly, Kissinger responded to Philip Buchen’s 

interventions on behalf of crew safety with explanations for why the US response had 

to be punitive. If the United States only responded in kind to the provocation, “nobody 

can lose by challenging us,” he said. He also insisted repeatedly that a disproportionate 

response was necessary: “We have to use the opportunity to prove that others will be 

worse off if they tackle us, and not that they can return to the status quo.” He wanted to 

give the impression that the United States was “not to be trifled with” and “potentially 

trigger-happy.”13

Schlesinger and senior military leadership are sometimes depicted as disagreeing 

with the need for a punitive use of force in the Mayaguez crisis,14 but this is not the case. 

The secretary of defense also advocated punitive action. What Schlesinger insisted 

upon was a punitive use of force that was not so grossly disproportionate that it would 

be politically counterproductive. He believed a botched operation or overkill in the use 

of force would inflame public and congressional opinion and thus further undermine 

the credibility of US threats to use force. When Schlesinger tailored Pentagon orders to 

forces in the field to ensure US aircraft were on the lookout for the crew members, it was 

primarily to avoid killing them, which would have undermined the image of effective 

military power that Schlesinger wanted to burnish. The punitive actions he favored 

were those that were commensurate with the nature of the offense, which was a naval 

action, and discriminate, in order to minimize collateral damage—particularly with 

respect to the Mayaguez crew. 

Schlesinger repeatedly voiced support for sinking Cambodian naval assets,15

including using Coral Sea aircraft for this purpose. He said he wanted “to paste Cambodia to the point that they realized it was not worth it to them to keep the crew.”16 He 

argued for a sequence of military actions that would minimize chances of Cambodian 

reprisals. In the second NSC meeting he summarized US objectives as the need to 

prevent the ship from being taken to a mainland port, the need to recover the crew, 

and the need “to attack and sink the Cambodian Navy,” but “later, after we have our 

ship and our people out, in order to maximize the punishment.” Schlesinger worried 
Critical Crisis Decisions

73

that sinking Cambodian vessels might provoke them to retaliate against the crew, so 

he wanted to recover the ship and crew members on the island before punishing the 

Cambodians. Once the military operations began, however, Schlesinger wanted to 

inflict punishment.17 When news of the Cambodian broadcast mentioning the release 

of the Mayaguez arrived, he argued with Kissinger that the airstrikes should continue 

and won him over on that point. As for General Jones—the acting chairman of the Joint 

Chiefs and the senior military officer advising the president and the NSC—he clearly 

understood the distinction between the recovery of ship and crew and punitive strikes, 

and he sided with Schlesinger on a more discriminate and proportional response. 

Despite this, Jones did not hinder the key leaders from pursuing their punitive purpose.18

It also is important to note that Ford, Kissinger, and Scowcroft were in agreement 

with Schlesinger that excessive, counterproductive military force should be avoided. 

Ford and Scowcroft were determined to prevent the military from using too much force 

against the ship, arguing it would be a disaster if they accidently sank it. Also, Kissinger 

came around to Schlesinger’s view that the B-52s would probably elicit an unhelpful 

political backlash. Prior to this, Kissinger had leaked the possibility of using B-52s to 

reporters on his plane ride back from Kansas City. The angry response from the columnists may have convinced Kissinger that Schlesinger was right about a negative public 

response to the bombers.19 He told Ford privately the B-52s might be too much, even 

though a few days later during a flight to Europe he again leaked to newsmen the fact 

that their use was contemplated, presumably to underscore how intent US leaders were 

on using punitive force.20 Thus, the differences among these leaders over the purpose, 

level, and type of force used were matters of degrees and not principle. 

Certainly this is true with respect to the tension between demonstrating American 

resolve and protecting the lives of the crew. At no point during the crisis were the lives 

of the crew accorded paramount importance by any of the key leaders. The assault on 

Tang put the lives of the crew at risk, as has long been recognized.21 However, the iconic 

moment illustrating the latent incompatibility of punitive military operations and 

protecting the crew members occurred when US pilots reported “Caucasians” on the 

bow of the Sinvari, the wooden, 40-foot Thai fishing boat headed toward the mainland. 

Schlesinger’s exacting rules of engagement made the report possible and ensured the 

decision making would take place in Washington. When the decision was put to the 

key leaders in the White House, they were disturbed and even angry that the Pentagon 

was procrastinating on implementation of the blanket order to sink all boat traffic. The 

third NSC meeting was called to force the issue with the Pentagon, and the conversation 

in that meeting made it crystal clear the lives of the crew were a secondary concern.
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

74

Kissinger was again candid about his reasoning, saying it would have been better if they had just said “we will simply hit anything that leaves the island.” “Now,” 

he said, “we are debating with the pilot.” Kissinger’s comment animated Ford, who 

insisted he had given just such an order but that his orders were being flouted by the 

Pentagon. Ford called the situation “inexcusable” and promised an accounting would 

be made. After acknowledging they were confronted by “a different situation” because 

of the pilot’s report, Ford “reluctantly” agreed that destroying the boat after a positive 

sighting of Americans would be counterproductive. He then quickly drove the group 

to agreement on the need to destroy all the remaining Cambodian boats that could 

be found. When Counselor to the President John O. Marsh Jr. obtusely observed that 

some of those boats might “have Americans on it,” Kissinger spelled it out clearly: “I 

think the pilot should sink them. He should destroy the boats and not send situation 

reports.” Less information was better.

In all of this discourse it is clear that the lives of the crew were not the paramount 

concern. Schlesinger, by controlling the rules of engagement, had engineered circumstances so that the crew was discovered and would not be killed by accident. In that 

regard, he effectively imposed his position that a punitive demonstration of force had 

to be conducted without overkill or manifestly indiscriminate force. He succeeded in 

moderating the degree of force used, but the unanimous priority remained demonstrating US resolve and, as a corollary, avoiding humiliating hostage negotiations.

Execution Issues

Military operations were a foregone conclusion given the key decision makers’ overriding priority. However, there were a number of other important decisions to be 

made about the means employed to achieve the decision makers’ objectives. The 

diplomatic, military, and informational elements of national power had to be coordinated, and by and large the key leaders coordinated their activities well (figure 1). 

Yet individual decision makers sometimes misrepresented their true purposes, and 

in a few instances where they disagreed about the best way to achieve common goals, 

they acted in favor of their own preferences in ways that had a dramatic impact on 

the outcome of the crisis.

Diplomacy and Ultimatums 

From the beginning Kissinger managed diplomatic communications to further the 

primary objective. While decision makers waited for US military forces to arrive on the 

scene, diplomatic communications and public statements were cast as threats so that, 
Critical Crisis Decisions

75

as Kissinger explained, “we can get some credit if the boat is released.” He said that if the 

Cambodians buckled while US forces gathered, the United States could say “the release 

is in response to our statement.” As one commentator notes, the threats made it more 

difficult for the Cambodians to release the ship quietly without losing face, assuming 

they were ever inclined to do so.22 Later in the third NSC meeting, explaining why he 

favored making it known publicly that they had sunk Cambodian boats, Kissinger again 

noted that “it is not inconceivable that the Khmers will cave,” and if they did, it “should 

come in response to something that we had done.”23 In the second NSC meeting, which 

Kissinger missed, Joseph Sisco represented State and did not say a word. No diplomatic 

initiatives were discussed. 

Kissinger refused to release diplomatic communications to congressional investigators following the crisis, but years later they were declassified and made public. Their 

content was not an appeal for assistance but a warning of military retaliation—that is, 

a repetition of public announcements from the White House. In his memoirs Kissinger 

said he had an unsigned “oral note” attached to the formal message in Beijing that 

intensified the threat, saying, “The United States demands the immediate release of 

the vessel and of the full crew” and “if that release does not immediately take place, CAMBODIA WASHINGTON

12TH MAY 13TH MAY 14TH MAY 15TH 16TH

MAY 12TH MAY 13TH MAY 14TH MAY 15TH

Cam.

Time

DC

Time

12 p.m.– 6 p.m.– 12 a.m.– 6 a.m.– 12 p.m.– 6 p.m.– 12 a.m.– 6 a.m.– 12 p.m.– 6 p.m.– 12 a.m.– 6 a.m.– 12 p.m.– 6 p.m.– 12 a.m.– 6 a.m.–

12 a.m.– 6 a.m.– 12 p.m.– 6 p.m.– 12 a.m.– 6 a.m.– 12 p.m.– 6 p.m.– 12 a.m.– 6 a.m.– 12 p.m.– 6 p.m.– 12 a.m.– 6 a.m.– 12 p.m.– 6 p.m.–

2:10–2:18 p.m. 

Mayaguez 

stopped

11:10 a.m. 

US message 

delivered 

in China

1:18 p.m. 

Ship stopped 

at Tang

7:45–10:15 a.m. 

Crew on fishing boat 

moving toward 

mainland

8:55 a.m. 

Fishing boat with 

crew hit with 

riot control agents

3:56 p.m. 

US embassy in 

Middle East reports 

crew to be released

6:09–7:15 a.m. 

Marines assault Tang

6:07–6:26 a.m. 

Cambodian radio says ship to be released

7:25–8:22 a.m. 

Marines take ship

7:05 a.m. 

1st TACAIR leaves Coral Sea

9:49–10:00 a.m. 

USS Wilson recovers crew

10:29 a.m. 

2nd wave TACAIR strikes

10:50 a.m. 

3rd wave TACAIR strikes

6:15–8:15 p.m. 

Marines leave Tang

5:30; 8:00 a.m

Ford, then Kissinger notified

12:05–12:50 p.m.

1st NSC Meeting

1:50 p.m. 

White House calls 

it act of piracy

10:22–11:17 a.m.

2nd NSC Meeting

10:40 p.m.–12:25 a.m.

3rd NSC Meeting

1:00–2:00 p.m. 

US message 

delivered to UN

3:52–5:42 p.m. 

4th NSC Meeting

6:40–7:47 p.m. 

Ford briefs congressmen

7:00 p.m. 

UN says talking to Cambodians

9:15 p.m.

US responds 

to Cambodian 

radio message

12:27 a.m. 

Ford announces recovery 

of ship and crew

6:05 a.m. 

US forces ordered 

to isolate ship and island 

FIGURE 1. KEY EVENTS AND DECISIONS
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

76

the authorities in Phnom Penh will be responsible for the consequences,” which, as 

Kissinger notes, obviously meant the use of military force.24 These communications 

were intended to reinforce the American threat so that no matter what happened, US 

willingness to use force would be manifest.

As the congressional investigation noted, Kissinger did not explore options for discussing how to resolve the crisis without using force. He did not contact the Cambodians 

directly in Phnom Penh, Paris, or Moscow. He did not respond to the NSA intercepts 

suggesting Cambodian interest in a resolution to the crisis, or to the report from Tehran 

twelve hours before the military assault on Tang Island—both of which we know were 

developments that INR passed on to the upper echelons of the Department of State and 

NSC staff. Given the fuss Kissinger made about not being notified in a timely manner 

about the seizure of the Mayaguez, it is highly unlikely—not to say inconceivable—that 

he was uninformed of such developments. After the fact he did not deny knowledge 

of the Tehran cable but rather claimed it was news of dubious reliability. Kissinger 

mentioned all other diplomatic news in the NSC meetings, but not this cable. There is 

no mention of the report in the now declassified NSC minutes, and no NSC participant 

ever mentioned the cable in their memoirs or, with one exception, in any interviews.25 

Several are on record as not knowing about the report, and it is now easy to see why. 

Kissinger did not have to discuss the report because its Washington distribution was 

limited to the Department of State and a few members of Kissinger’s NSC staff.26 The 

other NSC members were not aware of the report, and Kissinger and Deputy Secretary 

Robert Ingersoll did not mention it during the fourth NSC meeting. Doing so would have 

been inconvenient given Kissinger’s candid assertion in the previous NSC meeting that 

he feared a diplomatic development that might sidetrack the use of force. In contrast 

to Sisco, who moved with alacrity on diplomatic initiatives he proposed, Kissinger 

dragged his feet on these matters, personally holding up diplomatic outreach to the UN 

for more than two days. He only approved the release of the communication early on 

the afternoon of May 14, a few hours before the final NSC meeting where the president 

gave orders for the island assault and mainland bombing to begin.

The other diplomatic issue discussed during the crisis was the value of an ultimatum with a deadline. The idea originated at the Department of Defense, which was 

struggling with how to assault a defended island while communicating the desire for the 

release of the crew unharmed. Military officers came up with the idea of using a bullhorn to communicate a simple ultimatum: “Produce all the Americans immediately, 

or we will harm you.”27 Schlesinger mentioned this option in the second NSC meeting 

that Kissinger did not attend. The idea of a broader ultimatum was attractive to some in 
Critical Crisis Decisions

77

the White House, but when Ford called Kissinger in Missouri he argued it would cede 

the initiative to the Cambodians, who could feign interest in a diplomatic solution but 

request more time or otherwise complicate military operations. Kissinger thought, 

“The risks were greater than the benefits, and the benefits were really domestic” (i.e., 

reassuring domestic critics that the Ford administration had given peace a chance).28

Hours before the third NSC meeting, Schlesinger and Jones were discussing the 

operations, and Schlesinger asked about preparations for communicating with the 

Cambodians through pamphlets and broadcasts into their radio network. He wanted 

to know about the scripts for the messages.29 It had occurred to the Pentagon that the 

ultimatum could be broadcast over Cambodian frequencies and international distress 

frequencies being monitored by the Khmer Rouge. DIA drafted the text for this version 

of the ultimatum, which was longer and had a deadline, saying the Cambodians had 

to “announce by 10:00 this morning their intention to release all crew members unconditionally and immediately” or “be fully responsible for the further consequences.” 

It closed by noting, “We are monitoring international distress frequencies to receive 

response.” General Jones mentioned the ultimatum during the fourth NSC meeting, 

which sparked an extended discussion.

Kissinger was again cool to the idea. Schlesinger, apparently understanding 

Kissinger’s qualms about embracing an initiative that would put the ball in the Cambodians court, simply asked if it was okay to issue a local ultimatum (presumably on Tang 

during the assault). Kissinger had no objections so long as those using the bullhorns 

did not negotiate but simply stated US demands. Donald Rumsfeld was in favor of the 

ultimatum if communicated privately, and Buchen favored the ultimatum, believing 

it was the best means to prevent harming crew members and neutral ships during the 

fast-approaching US military operations. Kissinger and Buchen exchanged some barbs 

over the issue. Kissinger countered Buchen by arguing military operations should come 

first and if they failed to secure the ship and crew, then a “credible” ultimatum could 

be issued, promising even more punishment until the ship and crew were released. 

Kissinger tightly controlled his staff at the Department of State.30 He was furious that the Mayaguez had been seized without his being immediately notified. He 

demanded and received by close of business that same day an explanation for the 

tardy notification. He largely operated from his office in the White House, with Under 

Secretary Sisco keeping him apprised of developments at the State Department. A 

State Department official’s remark—“We know what we have to do, we just have to 

wait for the means to do it to arrive on the scene”—perfectly reflected Kissinger’s 

preferences but not the institutional proclivities of the diplomatic bureaucracy.31
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

78

However, with all the information now available, it is evident that career officials at 

State did try to get Kissinger to exercise more diplomacy.32

For example, Sisco tried to convince Kissinger to approve routine diplomatic 

communications, assuring him they were cosmetic only and would not interfere with 

the use of force. He wanted to notify US missions overseas and other nations, provide 

guidance to the ambassador in Thailand (who was furious about being kept in the dark 

and had complained bitterly to the State Department about it),33 and, most important, 

notify the UN Security Council. Sisco understood the substance of diplomacy was 

being bypassed, but he nonetheless pushed Kissinger to communicate with the UN and 

other countries at least enough to provide some political cover for the pending military 

operations. Kissinger finally approved notification of other countries by phone when 

it was too late for any interference. In doing so he stipulated that he did not want the 

“usual pansy briefings” or “to give the impression of super reasonableness.” The whole 

point was to signal a ready willingness to use force. In that same conversation Sisco 

sought quick approval for his other three diplomatic communications, offering to read 

them over the phone or have them hand-carried in the next five minutes for Kissinger’s 

approval. Kissinger said he wanted to see them but left them unattended on his desk. 

Later, after the Cambodian broadcast prompted a response from the White House 

that was released to the press, Kissinger passed this news to Sisco, who thought the 

attempt to communicate with the Cambodians made good political sense. In that conversation Kissinger told Sisco he could notify the UN Security Council if he wanted, but 

added “l just don’t see why it can’t wait until first thing in the morning.” Sisco convinced 

a reluctant Kissinger to do it right away to avoid criticism and had the message sent to 

Ambassador Scali within ten minutes. Later, after the crew was recovered, Kissinger 

again spoke with Sisco, admitting the three messages hand-carried to him earlier were 

still on his desk. Concerning the notification of overseas posts, Sisco said he considered 

it a “dead” issue at that point. However, Kissinger told him to do it anyway because he 

wanted other countries informed on the successful US operations.34

Initially Kissinger was concerned about staging military operations from Thailand, 

which he knew would not grant permission. In the first NSC meeting he argued that 

aerial reconnaissance, but not combat missions, were permissible. Otherwise the Thais 

would demand that US forces depart, which would further weaken the US position in 

Southeast Asia. However, as the crisis progressed the injunction against using Thaibased forces relaxed. Thai-based fighters were ordered aloft by Scowcroft to interdict 

the Mayaguez when it was thought to be moving toward the mainland. In the third NSC 

meeting there was debate over conducting operations out of Thailand a day earlier or 
Critical Crisis Decisions

79

waiting a day until the Marines arrived from Subic Bay in the Philippines on board the 

carrier USS Hancock and the amphibious assault ship USS Okinawa. Kissinger said 

the Thai government would be upset, “but they will also be reassured” and “the Thai 

military will love it.” He, along with others, eventually supported the earlier operations 

even at the expense of irritating the Thais. Later, after the recovery of ship and crew, 

Kissinger and Sisco discussed notifying the embassy in Thailand so that the ambassador 

could reassure the Thais. Sisco thought the Thais were most interested in getting the 

Marines off their territory, but Kissinger corrected him, saying that “the major thing the 

Thais want to know is that it worked.” 

Kissinger knew from the CIA that Thai military leadership was privately “extremely 

pleased” the United States was acting decisively. So when the Thai premier complained 

about US operations, he was ignored, as was the US charge d’affaires’s cable admonishing Washington to “play by the rules” and respect Thai sovereignty. In the fourth 

NSC meeting, Deputy Secretary of State Ingersoll’s only intervention was to ask about 

removing the Marines from Thailand quickly to avoid further irritating the Thais. 

Kissinger did not say anything then, but when Ingersoll raised the issue again on the 

morning of the sixteenth in the State Department staff meeting, Kissinger cut him off, 

saying, “First of all, I want that panic to stop about Thailand.” After joking about sending 

tranquilizers to the US ambassador in Thailand, who had complained of “an unbelievable lack of coordination and foresight in failing to keep me informed,”35 they discussed 

Thai reactions, and Kissinger’s view was that it would blow over. When Philip Habib, 

assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, pushed back and suggested 

an apology to Thailand, Kissinger repeatedly dismissed the idea as “absurd.” He finally 

cut off the persistent Habib with the definitive comment: “We will not apologize.”36

In sum, and contrary to other accounts,37 Kissinger was not interested in using 

diplomacy to resolve the crisis.38 Like Schlesinger, he used his control of his department to promote his preferred outcome. With good reason39 he was “worried that 

in the next 48 hours some diplomatic pressure will occur” that might interfere with 

military action, and he used his control of diplomatic communications to prevent that 

development. Apparently unbeknownst to Ford,40 he ignored direct communications 

with the Cambodians and signals that the Cambodians were looking for a peaceful 

resolution, delayed contacting the UN secretary-general for two days, and kept news of 

the cable from Tehran from the NSC.41 If he had handled any of these issues differently, 

the diplomatic surprise he feared could have taken place, strengthening arguments 

in favor of waiting longer for more forces to arrive on the scene. Kissinger also used 

his influence with Ford to ensure the use of military force was as demonstrative as 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

80

possible. He prevailed upon Ford to keep airstrikes going after the Cambodian broadcast announced an intent to release the ship, and he did the same after the news of 

the crew’s safe recovery.

Lethal Quarantine

The first of three key execution issues for military operations was how to manage the 

quarantine of the Mayaguez and its crew from the mainland. Ford’s initial orders on 

the ship were highly discriminate compared to later orders for the quarantine of Tang 

Island. When Scowcroft woke Ford at 2:23 a.m. on the morning of the May 13 to tell him 

the Mayaguez apparently was just fifteen minutes from Kompong Som, Ford wanted US 

aircraft to interdict the ship as Scowcroft recommended but not sink it:

Scowcroft: With your approval, Mr. President, if we can get some planes in 

the air. . .

Ford: I think you ought to try that. It doesn’t seem to me there is any other 

alternative, Brent. But dammit, they hadn’t better sink it now!!!

Scowcroft: No sir; that would be disastrous.

Ford: That would be the ultimate in stupidity . . .

42

During the second NSC meeting when Kissinger was absent, there was a discussion 

on the use of force to interdict naval traffic between the island and the mainland. In 

response to Ford’s question about whether they were keeping the gunboats at bay, General Jones told him, “We have not opened fire on them. We have scared some of them 

away by making passes at them.” Rockefeller suggested they should just sink gunboats 

until the Cambodians gave in. In response, Schlesinger made his argument in favor of 

conducting punitive action after recovering the ship and any crew members found on 

Tang Island to reduce the likelihood of Cambodian retribution. Acknowledging this, 

Ford agreed, saying, “You do not sink them, necessarily, but can you take some preventive action?” Continuing, Ford said that in addition to preventing boats from leaving the 

island, the Pentagon should also “stop all boats coming to the island.” When he summarizes the agreed-upon actions at the end of the meeting, Ford reiterated that these two 

steps should be taken.

Returning to the Pentagon, Schlesinger and Jones discussed the guidance from 

the president in the second NSC meeting and how the quarantine of Tang would be 

managed. Schlesinger emphasized to Jones the modulated use of force he wanted, 

saying boats headed for the mainland should only be sunk if they could not be turned 

around any other way. “I don’t want indiscriminate shooting,” he said.43 Jones passed 
■

■–■ May 12–15 ■–■ May 15 ■–■ May 15 

■

■–■ May 15 

POULO WAI

CAMBODIA

KOH TANG KOH TANG

KOH RONG SAM LEM

■

1 10 1 1 1 4 4 5

4

3

4 1 2

3

4

5

3

1

2

1

1

6

7

8

5

9

3

4

10

1

2

■■

■■

■

■

■■■

■

■■■■■

■

■

■■

MAYAGUEZ 

■

AND CREW LOCATIONS

1 Mayaguez captured 

at 1420hrs on May 12.

2 Mayaguez anchors 

overnight at Poulo Wai.

3 Mayaguez seen 

heading north towards Kompong Som.

4 Mayaguez diverts to 

Koh Tang at 1325hrs on May 13 and remains overnight.

5 Mayaguez crew placed 

on Thai fishing boat on the morning of May 14.

6 Mayaguez crew arrives at 

Kompong Som harbor at 0948hrs on May 14, but is refused entry.

CARRIER STRIKES BY USS CORAL SEA1 0705hrs: Armed

reconnaissancemission. The mission is cancelled and the aircraft are recovered at 0830hrs. A refinery north of Kompong Som is identified.

2 0845hrs: Strike mission

against Ream airfield.Three Cambodianaircraft destroyedand several structuresdamaged.

KOH TANG EXTRACTION1 Jolly-11 and Jolly-43 fail to 

extract Knife-23 survivors at 1430hrs.

2 Jolly-11—with support from 

Jolly-12, Knife-41, Jolly-44, Spectre 11, A-7Ds, F-4s, USS Wilson, and other 

forces—rescues Knife-23 survivors at 1820hrs.

3 C-130 drops a BLU-82 

on Koh Tang shortly after the Jolly-11 rescue.

4 Starting at 1840hrs, 

Knife-51 rescues 41 Marines on West Beach. Jolly-43, Jolly-44, and Knife-51 (after returning from USS Coral Sea) recover 

the remaining Marines. Knife-51 is the last to leave at 2000hrs.

KOH TANG ISLAND ASSAULT1 0415hrs: 11 CH-53Cs 

and HH-53Cs departUtapao for Koh Tang and USS Holt.

2 0603hrs: Knife-21 

and Knife-22 approach West Beach. Knife-21 deploys Marines, but takes fire and crashes in the sea. Knife-22 aborts and is forced to land in Thailand.

3 Knife-23 and Knife31 

try to land on East Beach. Knife-23 deploys Marines and is shot down. Knife-31 is destroyed by gunfire. 

1

KEY

Mayaguez movementsMayaguez crew movementsMovements of US forces

7 Mayaguez crew moved 

to Koh Rong Sam Lem naval compound wherethey stay the night and depart at 0729hrs on May 15.

8 Thai fishing boat with

Mayaguez crew seen 

heading to Koh Tang at 0935hrs.

9 USS Wilson intercepts 

the Thai fishing boat at 1008hrs.

10 Crew returns to

Mayaguez at 1205hrs.

Mayaguez towed out of combat zone, and crew gets ship underway.

3 1020hrs: Mission against

Kompong Som area and Phumi Phsar naval base.

4 1155hrs: Launch of

fourth mission cancelled.

Knife-32 aborts and rescues the Knife-21 crew, deploying Marines in the west of theisland. Jolly-41 aborts but tries repeatedly to land Marines on West Beach. Jolly-42 and Jolly-43 land on West Beach.

4 Jolly-11, Jolly-12, and 

Jolly-13 deliver Marines to the Holt.

5 Mayaguez is 

boarded and secured by 0822hrs.

1

2

OPERATIONS AGAINST SS MAYAGUEZ AND KOH TANG

Osprey Publishing ©
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

82

these orders along, specifying that Tang Island would be isolated by intercepting 

all boats with carefully modulated force. The guidance was so restrictive it greatly 

reduced the possibility of accidental sinkings. It highlighted the importance of careful 

reconnaissance and emphasized “the decision to fire on or sink any boats resides in 

Washington.” In effect, the Pentagon extended Ford’s specific guidance on carefully 

modulated escalation of force for dissuading movement of the Mayaguez and applied 

it to all naval traffic between Tang and the mainland. Schlesinger elaborated on Ford’s 

guidance, but his instructions were not inconsistent with Ford’s guidance on some sort 

of “preventive action” short of sinking boats leaving Tang Island. 

Between the second and third NSC meetings Ford decided to provide more specificity about the interdiction effort. He could see that sinking the ship they were rescuing 

would be disastrous. He called Schlesinger to emphasize the need to prevent the 

movement of the Mayaguez with very carefully calibrated escalation of force. Scowcroft 

followed up with similar instructions to Wickham, emphasizing that if the ship moved it 

should be interdicted with as little force as possible and that the president would make 

the decisions on each escalation of force. The guidance from Ford and Scowcroft happened to be fully consistent with the orders the Pentagon had already given the on-scene 

commander, with one exception. The White House wanted highly discriminate escalating force options for the ship but automatic interdiction of all other Cambodian 

naval traffic, even though it was not known whether the Cambodian gunboats carried 

Mayaguez crew members. This point was not so subtly underscored when Scowcroft 

revealed Ford’s lack of trust by telling General Wickham the White House would need 

a copy of the execute orders on interdicting Cambodian boats. 

Subsequently, Scowcroft monitored the interactions between US planes and boats 

as best he could by having his aide, Major McFarlane, monitor Pentagon communications. Scowcroft kept Kissinger and Ford informed on how aggressively the quarantine 

was being enforced.44 The White House impression was that the Pentagon was stonewalling when it came to sinking Cambodian gunboats in accordance with Ford’s blanket 

interdiction orders for Cambodian gunboats. Ford said as much during the third NSC 

meeting. After a discussion on why the boats had not been sunk, Schlesinger, and then 

Kissinger, argued it would be too problematic to explain attacking a boat after Caucasians were sighted on it. The president then relented but was still upset about what he 

believed was lack of compliance with his standing orders. 

Ford clearly understood the risks he was running and was willing to take responsibility for his decision. When the NSC members discussed how to explain publicly the 

one boat sunk, Ford embraced his decision: “My answer would be, that we have ordered 
Critical Crisis Decisions

83

that no enemy boats should leave the island or go out to it, but that if they did, they would 

be sunk.” And when Kissinger and Schlesinger discussed how and whether this could 

be kept “low-key,” Ford again emphasized his personal decision: “The order was issued 

that no boats should leave.”

The Pentagon at that point complied. Following the third NSC meeting, the Pentagon sent out top secret orders to field commanders with the requirement to “sink 

all Cambodian small craft in the target areas of Koh Tang, Paulo Wai, Kompong Som, 

and Ream” without knowing whether they held Mayaguez crew members or not. Ford 

was not mollified, however. He later expressed his anger at the Pentagon in a private 

conversation with Kissinger and Scowcroft: “I am disturbed at the lack of carrying 

out orders. I can give all the orders, but if they don’t carry them out. . . . I was mad 

yesterday.”45 He was also quite angry in the fourth NSC meeting after Kissinger asked 

why boats were not being sunk and why US destroyers were not placed between Tang 

Island and the mainland for that purpose. From the president’s point of view, his 

directions were clear but not being followed. 

Years later Kissinger bluntly characterized the Pentagon’s delaying tactics from 

the White House’s point of view. He said that despite presidential orders in the second 

NSC meeting to quarantine the Mayaguez, Schlesinger “balked at military action” and 

basically stalled:

Wickham (later army chief of staff), requested instructions as to what to do 

about that vessel. In light of the President’s explicit orders to sink every ship 

approaching or leaving the island, the query was inexplicable except as a 

maneuver to avoid being blamed should anything go wrong [i.e., killing crew 

members]. Scowcroft, meticulous as always, checked with the President, who 

confirmed his original directive. . . . An hour and a half later, at 9:48 P.M. Washington time, Wickham was back with a new query [when a pilot observed the 

Caucasians on the bow of the fishing vessel].46

Based on all the discussions about carefully modulated force for interdicting the ship, 

the Pentagon could have argued it was complying with the spirit of presidential direction 

and logically applying it to all vessels capable of carrying the Mayaguez crew. Moreover, 

in the second NSC meeting Ford had insisted on “the quickest possible communication 

to me” and, as noted above, summarized his approved actions by saying “we would use 

the aircraft to stop any boats leaving the island,” not to “sink them necessarily” but to 

take “some preventive action.” Ford reinforced this guidance by calling Schlesinger, 

who reassured Ford the military would use carefully escalated force, beginning with 
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riot control agents. It was further reinforced by Scowcroft’s passing the same guidance 

to Wickham. 

For all these reasons, it might seem that the Pentagon’s extreme care in vetting 

the use of force against vessels, including Wickham’s request for additional presidential guidance (which Schlesinger approved),47 was consistent with Ford’s guidance 

on wanting to be kept informed and call the shots. Also, the request for presidential 

reconsideration could be, and was, justified by noting the new information available: 

the sighting of possible Mayaguez crew members on deck. Finally, presented with the 

very choices and control the White House demanded, the president ultimately chose 

not to sink the boat with Caucasians.

However, the Pentagon made no such excuses. Rather than trying to explain away 

perceived Defense Department recalcitrance, both Schlesinger and Wickham have gone 

on record confirming it.48 Wickham acknowledges that he and General Pauly gave the 

“do not shoot” order “in defiance of the instructions from the NSC.” Wickham said it 

would seem a “serious offense” but that it was “real-time interceding,” which he argues 

“saved the lives of that crew.”49 Schlesinger also acknowledged stonewalling the White 

House. “I refused to sink the boat,” he said, because “to say the least, it seemed to me it 

would destroy our own purposes to sink a ship which would have killed the Americans 

we were trying to save.”

Interviewer: Did you apprise the White House of this ship with the Caucasians aboard?

Schlesinger: Yes, indeed.

Interviewer: And it was then that the White House said to sink it?

Schlesinger: Yes, the White House said, “We told you to sink all ships, so sink it!” 

Obviously this would have been self-defeating. So I spent the next three hours 

[the time needed for the ship to sail to the Cambodian mainland] fending off 

calls asking why I had yet to sink the ship.

Interviewer: What reasons were you giving for not doing it?

Schlesinger: I started by saying the ship had Caucasians on it and [I] didn’t want 

to risk killing the crew. I got orders back saying I’d been instructed to sink all traffic and therefore to sink it. I’d say, “Go back and talk to the President about this.”

Interviewer: This is clearly a critical point, because had you followed the order 

the entire outcome would have been much different.

Schlesinger: It would have been tragic. We would have combined the humiliation of the United States with another example of alleged Defense Department 

fumbling. It would have been tragic and ludicrous at the same time.
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Interviewer: Your strategy was essentially to keep the White House at bay?

Schlesinger: I stalled for three hours.50

The three hours Schlesinger referred to ran from approximately 8:15 p.m., when Wickham responded to the order to sink the boat by saying “we may lose the thing here in the 

next few minutes,” until approximately 11:00 p.m. when President Ford, in the midst of 

the third NSC meeting, gave the orders to use riot control agents on the vessel with the 

Caucasians but sink all other boats. 

Timing

The second key military issue was the timing of the operations. Here the Pentagon was 

compliant with senior civilian preferences, arguably more so than necessary or advisable. There was much discussion in NSC meetings about the arrival times of US forces, 

how long they needed to prepare for their missions, and the risks attendant to assaulting 

the island and retaking the ship, all of which were interrelated. In the first NSC meeting 

it was agreed little could be done until US forces assembled, but the urgency of the situation was clearly agreed upon and communicated down the chain of command. In the 

second NSC meeting there was more detailed discussion of timing, mostly with respect 

to the anticipated arrival of various US force elements. However, participants also noted 

the tradeoffs between waiting for more force and moving more quickly. For example, 

with respect to retaking the Mayaguez, there was discussion about using Marines and 

helicopters from Utapao or waiting until the USS Holt arrived. Schlesinger said: 

The Navy people are trained in boarding. It might be preferable to wait for the 

Holt because it will be manned and able to do it. We will then have the dominant force in the area. But, of course, this may give the Cambodians time to 

change the situation or to try to prepare themselves. Therefore, it may be better 

to go by first light tomorrow.51

After returning to the Pentagon following the second NSC meeting, Schlesinger told 

Wickham that he considered a twenty-four-hour delay reasonable, and a few hours later, 

he told Scowcroft the same thing, saying his “inclination is to go first light Thursday” but 

also noting they “could wait until Friday for the USS Hancock to arrive,” which would 

have added its large compliment of Marines and ten helicopters, including four AH-1J 

Super Cobra attack helicopters.52

Rockefeller argued in favor of quick action, saying, “The longer we wait the more 

time they have to get ready.” But he also understood the risks of quick action. In an eerily 
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prescient moment, he worried that in an island assault we “may lose more Marines 

trying to land [on the island] than the Americans who were on the boat originally.” 

He was not comfortable with the island assault, reminding Ford again toward the end 

of the meeting that “I think we have some questions about operating on land against 

the Cambodians.” Scowcroft thought the urgent need was to prevent the crew or ship 

from being taken to the mainland and that once the Holt was between the island and 

mainland the situation would be more stable. The decision makers also discussed using 

lethal force against the Cambodian boats, acknowledging that doing so might convince 

the Cambodians to relent but also might precipitate reprisals.

In the third NSC meeting the relative risks of delaying or accelerating military 

operations were again discussed at length. With the risk of humiliating hostage negotiations negated by the decision to isolate Tang Island by sinking boat traffic, Kissinger 

emphasized the risks of using insufficient force: “Later you can do more. It might work 

with the 270 [Marines]. But it is a risk. It should be decisive and it should look powerful.” 

And again, “If anything goes wrong, as often does, I think against 100 [Khmer soldiers] 

you would lose more Americans because you do not have overwhelming power.” “On 

balance,” he said, “I would like to get a more reliable force.” When dominant force was 

available, Kissinger said it would be possible to “seize the island, seize the ship, and hit 

the mainland.” A few moments later General Jones emphatically agreed:

I would urge against going this daylight. The Marines would just be landing at 

Utapao. The helicopter pilots would be tired. Nobody would be mated up yet. 

It would be a difficult operation to be launching at that time, especially since 

we could not follow up the same day.53

With Schlesinger, Kissinger, and Jones all in agreement on the need to delay, Ford backed 

away from authorizing early operations on the fourteenth. 

The debate then revolved around whether to go on the fifteenth or sixteenth. The 

Pentagon’s option paper that Jones had distributed54 explained why a forty-eight-hour 

delay was advantageous. The primary risk of military operations on the fifteenth was 

the “serious disadvantage of slow insertion (270 men per wave at 4+ hour intervals).” 

Alternatively, a “coordinated assault at first light on May 16 would “carry lower military 

risks” and “enhance the prospects of quick success and minimize the loss of life.” However, the paper noted that the disadvantage of going on the sixteenth was less chance of 

surprise and more time for the Cambodians to “put forward preconditions for the return 

of the ship and/or crew.” 

The discussion of military risk seesawed back and forth over this issue of whether 
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a one- or two-day delay was necessary. Schlesinger thought 270 Marines probably 

could take Tang but said the Pentagon preferred “to land with 1000.” He argued for the 

two-day delay, saying, “We need the morning of the 16th for a coordinated assault.” 

He considered it a “close call,” and acknowledged that delaying gave the Cambodians 

more time, during which they might “decide to execute our men.” Schlesinger also said 

delaying gave the forces on the island more “time to prepare” and to “scuttle the ship.” 

Jones then weighed in: “The suggestion is to go with the first light on the 15th,” which 

Kissinger agreed with, remarking “I would go for the island at daybreak of the 15th.” 

Schlesinger objected to this, declaring “the problem with that is that the Coral Sea will 

not be there” and that “if you want an overwhelming force on the island, you should 

wait until the 16th.” That seemed to sway Kissinger, who then said, “The ideal time for 

what I have in mind is the 16th. That would not just include the island but Kompong 

Som, the airport and boats.” Ford agreed: “If you wait until the 16th, you have maximum 

capability.” But then he mused, “We do not know what will happen in 24 hours. They 

have options also. We can make a decision tomorrow if we want to. But we should have 

orders ready to go so that they can move within 24 hours.” Kissinger agreed, summing 

up why he preferred a one- to a two-day delay: “Forty-eight hours are better militarily. 

But so much can happen, domestically and internationally,” the implication being that 

political or diplomatic developments might complicate or remove the opportunity to use 

force. With that hanging in the air, Ford stated, “We should be ready to go in 24 hours,” 

but he added, “We may, however, want to wait.” Schlesinger then acknowledged that the 

Department of Defense would “be prepared to go on the morning of the 15th.” 

A few moments later, Ford discussed military preparations and concluded that 

“unless there is some unusual development, the actual action will take place 24 hours 

later.” It was not clear whether he meant the twenty-four-hour delay already agreed upon 

or another day’s delay. Schlesinger encouraged him to mean the latter, clarifying, “On 

the 16th.” Kissinger encouraged Ford to make that decision later, but Ford responded, 

“The preferable time is 24 hours later,” seemingly indicating his inclination to wait until 

the sixteenth. Kissinger demurred, citing not the Pueblo crisis but the April 1969 EC-121 

crisis when the North Koreans shot down an unarmed American reconnaissance aircraft. He agreed the sixteenth was “when the best forces will be available,” but argued 

“that has to be weighed against other considerations for the extra 24 hours that you lose.” 

He believed long delays while forces were assembled could eventually lead to inaction 

and acceptance of the new status quo, which happened in the EC-121 crisis.55

As the discussion continued Kissinger told the NSC members he thought that 

“we should do something that will impress the Koreans and the Chinese.” Rumsfeld 
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worried about further delay, and Kissinger agreed, saying that “if we are going to do an 

integrated attack, I think we have to go in 22 hours [i.e., the fifteenth]. We should not 

wait for a later cycle.” But he quickly added, “I cannot judge if there would be a problem 

in taking the island. We’re saying that it will be one annihilating blow. I cannot judge 

if 270 Marines can do it.” Rumsfeld said there would be 500 Marines, and Kissinger 

showed he understood the limited rotary lift available to transport the Marines, stating 

“but there will be 270 for four hours.” Ford wondered if there were Marines on the Coral 

Sea who could help, and Kissinger noted the Coral Sea could support the attack on the 

island but insisted on the importance of the initial landing:

Kissinger: . . . We have to be sure that the landing has a chance of success.

Jones: The probability that the Americans are gone causes the problem. I think 

we have a high probability.

Kissinger: Then my instinct is with Rummy [Donald Rumsfeld]. We should go 

tomorrow night or earlier.

Ford: Everything will be ready. But, if you do it in the next cycle, you have the 

problem of Thailand.

Kissinger: The ideal time would be Thursday night [i.e., the sixteenth]. But I 

am worried that in the next 48 hours some diplomatic pressure will occur, or 

something else. So we have to weigh the optimum military time against the 

optimum political time. For foreign policy and domestic reasons, tomorrow 

is better.

Ford: The Thai [sic] will be upset.

Kissinger: That is correct, but they will also be reassured.

Rumsfeld: Can we be sure there is anybody on the island? We might just take 

a walk.

Kissinger: If the Americans are on the mainland, then we have to rethink.56

In short, the question of whether to wait another twenty-four hours hung delicately 

in the balance and easily could have been influenced by advice from General Jones. 

All the decision makers agreed the military risk would be lower if they waited another 

twenty-four hours, but they also believed it quite possible they would lose the entire 

crew, and thus their reason to use force, or that some political or diplomatic development would arise that precluded the use of force. (Less than five hours later the cable 

from Tehran arrived at the Department of State, which was just the sort of potential 

diplomatic development Kissinger worried about.) At the beginning of the fourth NSC 

meeting, William Colby’s intelligence update verified at least some of the crew was 
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already on the mainland. As Kissinger had observed in the previous NSC meeting, if 

it was discovered (from such sources as imagery, signals intelligence, or Cambodian 

broadcasts) that the entire crew was on the mainland, they would “have to rethink.” 

There would be no point in attacking the island if it was known there were no crew 

members there. Similarly, there would be no excuse for the mainland airstrikes, which 

were justified as support for the island assault.57

There were numerous opportunities for General Jones to argue the assault on Tang 

was too risky. He urged a twenty-four-hour delay in the third NSC meeting because he 

believed going sooner would be too risky, but he otherwise indicated US forces could and 

would be ready to go on the fifteenth with acceptable risk. Between the third and fourth 

NSC meetings the need to delay another day was discussed at both the White House 

and the Pentagon. Rumsfeld weighed in with Ford privately, arguing that “the longer 

the delay the weaker the United States looks, the greater the danger to the lives of the 

people, and the greater the likelihood that the critics will get into the act.” The Pentagon 

felt differently. Schlesinger in particular had been outspoken about the advantages of 

delay in the third NSC meeting, more so than General Jones. There was a reason for this.

Before the fourth NSC meeting, Jones had met with the other Joint Chiefs to review 

the question again. Presumably they knew that subordinates such as Vice Admiral 

George P. Steele, the Seventh Fleet commander, were asking for more time.58 However, 

the Chiefs decided another delay was not necessary. In an interview not long after the 

crisis, Jones said the Joint Chiefs were concerned about the need to move before the 

crew was imprisoned on the mainland. Thus, “on balance the Chiefs decided that the 

degree of risk in going as planned on the fourteenth [i.e., the fifteenth in Cambodia] was 

acceptable and that the urgency of the recovery should govern.”59

This explanation for the Joint Chiefs risk assessment is hard to understand. The 

decision had been made in the previous NSC meeting to allow the boat with Caucasians 

to reach the mainland and to sink all other patrol boats. Hence, any further risk of the 

crew being taken to the mainland was virtually eliminated. The only remaining reasons to accept higher than necessary military risk were the hopes that moving quickly 

would encourage the Cambodians to capitulate rather than conduct reprisals60—a 

debatable proposition—and Kissinger’s expressed fear that delaying another day might 

result in some kind of diplomatic breakthrough or gambit that would sidetrack military 

operations. It seems most likely that the Joint Chiefs wanted to accommodate White 

House preferences. Jones essentially acknowledged this years later in an oral history 

interview, saying, “There was great pressure to act very quickly and to act before all the 

forces were in place, to take that risk,” which the Chiefs decided to do.61
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When the president asked for the Pentagon’s recommendation in the fourth NSC 

meeting, Schlesinger deferred to General Jones, and Jones did not ask for twenty-four 

more hours. Instead he said, “We recommend that we land tonight on the island and 

on the ship.” He told the NSC members the island could be taken with “high assurance 

of success.” He thought, “The 175 Marines can secure themselves, with gunships and 

tactical air [emphasis added],” indicating his understanding that the assault would 

have close air support. Jones continued: “When the second group arrives, we can cut 

off the neck of the island and move out.” He then showed the NSC members a picture 

of the island and noted that

the Marine in charge has reconnoitered it. A close check indicates an open 

area with trails leading into the woods. This is the preferred landing zone. 

Also, they might land on the beach. It is wide enough. It is the only opening on 

the island. Later, we would want to cut the island in two. With somewhat over 

600 Marines by nightfall, we should have a good feel for what is there. We can 

perhaps withdraw the next day.62

Jones concluded his presentation by saying “that is the operation as we recommend it, 

as a joint recommendation from all the Joint Chiefs.” 

With Jones’s presentation concluded, the NSC discussed timing and synchronization of the island assault with the retaking of the ship. In doing so it became apparent 

that the schedule was slipping and that attacking at “first light” might be a “moot question.” When Ford observed the Marines already appeared to be “40 minutes behind your 

schedule,” Jones did not ask for a delay but replied, “They should still make it.” With 

that reassurance, the orders were given to launch, and the NSC turned its attention to 

whether B-52 or Coral Sea strikes would be authorized.

Thus, after all the discussion, civilian decision makers were left with the impression that taking the island was not a high-risk endeavor. Accordingly, and consistent 

with their overarching goal, they gave priority to conducting the military operations 

sooner rather than later, recognizing that unnecessary delay ran the risk of having 

all military operations suspended by some unexpected development. Having been 

advised by senior military leadership that the military operations were not high 

risk, the NSC members discussed how long to hold the island and what to do with 

prisoners taken, but they did not delve deeper into Kissinger’s inquiry as to whether 

270 Marines [actually 175, given the rest were sent to take the Mayaguez] in the first 

wave were sufficient. 
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Punitive Mainland Strikes

Ford, Kissinger, and Scowcroft were correct in thinking the Pentagon was reluctant 

to implement the blanket order to sink all boats. They also believed the Pentagon was 

chary of attacking the mainland. Indeed, Ford came to believe Schlesinger was “far 

less eager to use Mayaguez as an example for Asia and the world” than Kissinger or 

himself. Worse, he thought Schlesinger had “contravened” his authority on mainland 

airstrikes.63 In reality, Schlesinger and the Pentagon were less obdurate on the issue 

of mainland strikes than the president believed.64 Indeed, in retrospect it is clear 

Schlesinger worked to ensure the punitive strikes took place even after it was known 

that the crew had been safely returned and that the Marines needed the Coral Sea

for recovery operations.

The issue of whether and how to strike the mainland had three major components. 

The first issue was whether striking the mainland could be justified in terms of the 

Cambodian provocation. The Pentagon options paper noted that bombing mainland 

targets might “convince the Cambodian government of our resolve” and “serve as a 

potent warning” to others. But it also noted the “paucity of useful military targets,” the 

minimum effectiveness of bombing an agrarian society, the possibility the crew would 

be executed in retaliation, and that the act was of “questionable legality.”65

The question of international law was discussed in the third NSC meeting, and 

the group settled on Kissinger’s argument that “our aircraft are suppressing hostile 

action against our operation.” The problem was identifying any real Cambodian military threats to US operations. Pentagon leaders did not think there were any on the 

mainland, but Colby helpfully observed “there are about three T-28’s at Kompong Som 

airfield” that were “a potential threat . . . against our forces.” Ford focused on this, asking twice that Colby verify the information and thereafter accepting the argument that 

mainland strikes could be justified as necessary to protect the Marines. 

The next issue was whether to use B-52s or carrier aircraft. This matter emerged 

in the press as a key difference between Kissinger and Schlesinger during the crisis, which it was. However, neither man was as adamant as sometimes depicted.66

Kissinger came to see Schlesinger’s point that the use of B-52s would exact too heavy 

a political penalty and made that point privately to Ford. Schlesinger was always 

against using B-52s, but the Pentagon made them ready to strike in accordance with 

the president’s orders. Also, Schlesinger did acknowledge in an NSC discussion that 

“B-52s may represent the best image for what Henry [Kissinger] is trying to accomplish.” An advantage of the B-52s was that they could launch from Guam without 

any other country’s permission and could reach their targets within six hours. Ford 
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privately told Kissinger before the fourth NSC meeting that he only kept the B-52 issue 

alive to encourage the Pentagon to deliver the full set of carrier strikes he wanted. If 

so, he made a convincing show during the fourth NSC meeting, sparking substantial 

discussion about how the B-52s could damage the port (for example, destroying the 

breakwater) in ways that carrier aircraft could not.

That left the question of how many carrier airstrikes there would be. Ford specified 

continuous airstrikes, but because the Mayaguez’s crew was returned shortly after US 

military operations began, only four waves of aircraft launched from the Coral Sea. 

Ford learned that two of the four strikes never hit targets, and he was furious about it. 

Already suspicious that the Pentagon was reluctant to implement his decisions to use 

military force, Ford became convinced that Schlesinger had contravened his orders 

for the first and fourth airstrikes. For decades it looked like Ford was correct, but with 

all the information currently available, it is evident that poor communication played a 

much larger role than previously assumed. 

Ford, Kissinger, and Scowcroft have all expressed surprise that the first strike was 

cancelled.67 They all insist they ordered the strike “put on hold” pending a quick presidential decision about the import of the Cambodian broadcast suggesting the crew 

would be released. Somehow that order to hold was translated at the Pentagon into an 

order to cancel all strikes. Ford later claimed that when he spoke to Schlesinger a short 

while later, the Defense Secretary reported “first strike completed,” which Ford took to 

mean targets had been hit. To make matters worse, the White House came to understand 

the first wave of aircraft had been assigned a mission of “armed reconnaissance,” and 

according to one source, told not to expend ordnance unless attacked.68 Ford called the 

Pentagon mishandling of the first mission “high-level bumbling.”69 Kissinger indicates 

the White House did not understand what armed reconnaissance meant:

At our daily morning meeting the next day, Ford was still irate that the first wave 

had not used its ordnance. He recognized that there could have been some confusion due to the pause ordered to discuss the Khmer Rouge statement; what 

rankled him was that he had never been told of the “armed reconnaissance”—

whatever that meant—and that, in fact, Schlesinger had left him with the opposite 

impression when he had reported “first strike completed” after the first wave.70 

The Pentagon assigned the armed reconnaissance mission to suit its preferences 

for more discriminate and proportional military operations. When Schlesinger and 

Jones discussed military operations prior to the fourth NSC meeting, Schlesinger 

emphasized that any mainland attacks were to be “surgical” and avoid hitting the two 
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ships of unknown nationality in Kompong Som harbor. The two men agreed on the 

initial “armed recce mission” to identify water and shore targets of opportunity more 

closely related to the military operations for recovering the Mayaguez and assaulting 

Tang Island—such as Cambodian gunboats in Kompong Som harbor that had been 

sighted—and to reduce chances of collateral damage. This decision was consistent with 

the Pentagon’s draft concept of operations, which envisioned the Coral Sea strikes as 

supporting the operations to recover the ship and crew. Coral Sea planes were “to engage 

Cambodian shipping in designated area,” “maintain continuous armed reconnaissance 

during daylight,” and “prepare to strike mainland targets, if directed.”71 

Contrary to what Kissinger claimed in his memoirs, the Pentagon told the White 

House its intent. In the fourth NSC meeting, General Jones described the Coral Sea 

strikes, saying they would “be used with great precision. We would first send armed 

reconnaissance and then go for heavy targets like construction, POL [petroleum, oil, 

and lubricant facilities], the warehouses, etc.” No one asked for a definition of “armed 

reconnaissance,” which meant “a mission with the primary purpose of locating and 

attacking targets of opportunity,” but Jones and Holloway later clarified the mission. 

Jones said the first wave “would go after mobile targets” and Holloway said it “will hit 

targets connected with the operation” (i.e., naval vessels and aircraft that could theoretically reach US forces). 

When Ford said the Pentagon should expect the cyclic Coral Sea operations to be 

continuous and Kissinger added they should be done “ferociously” and “not just hit 

mobile targets, but others as well,” Schlesinger promised, “We will hit whatever targets 

there are.” Buchen jumped in, worrying about the possibility of hitting neutral shipping. 

Acknowledging this, the president said he wanted to “hit the planes, the boats and the 

ships if they are Cambodian [emphasis added].” Schlesinger promised Ford that “we 

will make a positive identification that they are Cambodian,” and Admiral Holloway 

quickly added that the first wave of aircraft would report back, implying their eyes-ontarget experience would make later waves of aircraft more effective. Ford, Kissinger, 

and Scowcroft presumably thought this mean more destructive, whereas Schlesinger, 

Jones, and Holloway no doubt were thinking more discriminate. 

When Holloway left the NSC meeting to communicate the president’s orders to 

the Pentagon and on down to forces in the field, he specified that the “first event” was 

to be “armed reconnaissance with principal targets aircraft and military watercraft 

and avoidance of merchant ships in Kompong Som until their identity has been clearly 

established as Cambodian.”72 Holloway also noted the armed reconnaissance was to 

support the operation to capture the Mayaguez and assault Tang Island, which the NSC 
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had agreed would be the justification for the mainland attacks. Thus, those receiving 

the orders without the benefit of hearing NSC deliberations had the impression the 

mainland strikes were supporting actions of secondary importance. 

When news reached the White House about the Cambodian broadcast, Kissinger 

decided to put the first strike on hold while he explained the situation to Ford and then 

Schlesinger.73 He told Scowcroft to call the Pentagon to have the first wave “proceed 

on course but drop no ordnance until the President had made his decision [emphasis 

added].” Scowcroft is similarly explicit about the message he gave the Pentagon at 

8:30 p.m.: “I called the Pentagon and said don’t call them off, but don’t release them yet 

[emphasis added].” Wickham’s notes on the call from Scowcroft simply read: “Coral Sea 

not to release any ordnance on mainland. HAK [Kissinger] in w/Pres at this time. Will 

call back in 2 minutes.”74

Minutes earlier, however, using the White House direct channel to the NMCC, 

another member of Kissinger’s staff, William Stearman, also intervened for the same 

purpose. At about 8:25 p.m., Air Force Brigadier General Charles E. Word, the deputy 

director of operations at the command center, was providing an update to White 

House Situation Room personnel75 when Stearman interrupted to ask about the first 

wave’s time-on-target. Word said the planes would reach their target area at 8:45. 

Stearman then told Word: “Do not execute the Navy TACAIR [tactical air operations] 

against Kompong Som,” adding “this is from the President.” Word immediately picked 

up his red phone and broke into a conversation going on between the national command center’s conference room and Admiral Gayler’s Pacific Command headquarters. 

Identifying himself, Word said he had “just got a call from White House SITROOM 

[situation room] to hit area but do not release ordnance on harbor. In other words, 

Navy TACAIR is not to release any ordnance, period!” In the rush to stop the bombs 

the message that went to General Burns’s headquarters (code-named Blue Chip) 

and the Airborne Command Post (code-named Cricket) emphasized that Coral Sea

aircraft were not to release any ordnance. With multiple communications from the 

White House, Kissinger’s intent that the strike be put on hold pending a presidential 

decision was lost. Stearman’s message, delivered directly to the military command 

center, confused the more specific guidance Scowcroft gave Wickham.76 In this 

instance, the White House insistence on direct access to the NMCC backfired and 

undermined its control of operations.

Pacific Command followed up a few minutes later, requesting clarification about 

the White House instructions. Since General Word had emphasized not hitting the 

“harbor,” Gayler wondered if other mainland targets could and should be hit. Word 
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checked and confirmed that the prohibition on dropping ordnance “extended to all 

mainland targets as well as targets in the immediate vicinity.” However, the island 

landing and boarding of the ship could continue. Gayler also asked the command 

center if they had seen the report of the Cambodian broadcast. At 8:44, Word said 

he had further orders. General George Brown, the chairman of the JCS who did not 

attend NSC meetings but who was monitoring the military operations in the Pentagon’s command center, said he had 

just talked to the White House and that he was “going to stop all launches off the 

Coral Sea.” Admiral Holloway, from the Conference Room, rogered and said, 

“understand, cease cyclic strike operations form the Coral Sea immediately.” 

This order, which was heard on the red phone teleconference circuit, was 

confirmed by PACOM [Pacific Command], Blue Chip and PACFLT [US Pacific 

Fleet]. Authority to use Coral Sea assets for support of the island operations was 

reconfirmed by Admiral Holloway at [8:46 p.m.] to Admiral Gayler.77

It is not clear who Brown spoke to at the White House, but he believed he had approval to 

stop the mainland strikes and concentrate on supporting the Marines who were under 

duress. For Brown, who did not sit in on the NSC meetings, it must have seemed logical 

and consistent with presidential guidance to turn the strikes off and use the Coral Sea 

to support the Marines with close air support and as a recovery platform. After all, the 

official line captured in military orders relayed by Holloway was that the mainland 

strikes were, in fact, for the purpose of supporting the Marine assault. 

Meanwhile, at the White House, Kissinger discussed the issue with Ford from 8:29 

until 8:37. According to Kissinger, Ford was against calling off the strikes until the fate 

of the crew was known. In his memoirs, Ford confirms he wanted “to hold up the first 

strike until we had a better idea of what was happening.”78 With the dinner for the Dutch 

prime minister just getting started in the State Dining Room, Major McFarlane was 

asked to pass Ford’s decision to General Wickham at the Pentagon, which he did at 8:47. 

McFarlane told General Word to turn the first strike back on, adding the requirement for 

a bomb damage assessment prior to additional strikes (thus demonstrating the White 

House assumption that the first wave would hit something, but also delaying the next 

strike). General Word passed these instructions along one minute later, at 8:48, causing 

Admirals Gayler and Holloway to “compare notes over the teleconference as to their 

mutual understanding of the series of instruction from the White House.” While Gayler 

and Holloway conversed, the Coral Sea aircraft were checking in with the Airborne 

Command Post for their final instructions. 
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Schlesinger had no role in canceling the first strike because he was en route to the 

White House and, as it turned out, in favor of continuing the strikes. As he later said: 

When I arrived at the White House, there was a call waiting for me from the 

Pentagon informing me with some chagrin that the first airstrike had been 

called off by the White House. I immediately sought out Henry [Kissinger], and 

he handed me something from the FBIS [an information arm of the CIA], saying 

that Radio Phnom Penh had announced that [the Cambodian government was] 

ready to negotiate. I said this was a stall, and we could not give up the airstrikes. 

After a brief-but-intense discussion, he agreed we should restore the airstrikes. 

We both then went to the President and said this. The second airstrike went off 

as had been planned.79

With Schlesinger and Kissinger in agreement, Ford did not hesitate. He said, “Tell them 

to go ahead, right now.” Scowcroft, finally having his answer (not two, but twenty-two 

minutes later) passed the order to the Pentagon to resume strikes. In the process of 

confirming all strikes were back on, Scowcroft corrected McFarlane’s earlier orders and 

specified there would be “no pausing” for bomb damage assessments. 

General Word in turn notified Gayler at 8:52 that “General Scowcroft directed 

operations proceed with all Coral Sea assets as planned.” Gayler verbally passed these 

orders to General Burns at 8:58 and “all stations rogered.” At that moment “the aircraft 

from the Coral Sea were on station offshore of the target area under the control of the Airborne Command Post [emphasis added].”80 When Gayler gave his verbal order to Burns 

at 8:58 to proceed with the strikes, he reminded Burns that the aircraft still needed to 

identify the ships as Cambodian before hitting them. Repeating Brown’s earlier caveat, 

he also added that Burns had the authority to use the aircraft to support the Marines 

if he thought it necessary. Once again, a senior military officer not present in the NSC 

meetings assumed the mainland strikes were envisioned as support for the Marines 

and that they could therefore be turned off if doing so benefited the Marines. Burns 

responded that the armed reconnaissance mission might not produce much bomb 

damage, which proved correct. The aircraft jettisoned their bombs and returned to the 

Coral Sea. Jones later explained to the NSC that they did so because the pilots “found 

the shipping of other countries and did not want to take the risk.”

Thus, within a twenty-minute period of confusion stimulated by the Cambodian 

broadcast and multiple White House sources providing guidance, Stearman’s intervention turned the “hold” order for the first wave into a cancellation, and Brown’s 

guidance cancelled all the Coral Sea strikes one minute before the first wave was due 
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97

over its target area. However, contrary to some accounts of the crisis,81 the assorted 

and confusing interventions were sorted out in time to allow the first wave to complete 

its mission. It also is noteworthy that Schlesinger actually recommended the strikes 

continue despite the broadcast, that he was at the White House for the formal state 

dinner when the issue was being managed, and that the White House was issuing 

orders directly to the NMCC. All these points would later be forgotten or ignored as 

Ford and Kissinger came to believe Schlesinger was personally responsible for the 

failure of the first wave to hit targets. 

After Schlesinger left the White House dinner for the Dutch prime minister, he 

returned to the Pentagon and was updated on developments. Admiral Gayler was preoccupied with assisting the Marines, who were under heavy pressure. Between 10 and 

11:30 p.m., Gayler was working on getting Marines who had seized the Mayaguez transferred to Tang Island to assist their beleaguered colleagues, obtaining fire support from 

the Wilson for the Marines, investigating whether Coral Sea antisubmarine helicopters 

could ferry Marines to Tang, and getting Coral Sea air support for the Marines. Shortly 

after 11:00, news of the crew’s recovery was received. This development led to two quick 

conversations between Ford and Schlesinger: one at 11:15 and the other at 11:45 p.m. In 

the first call Schlesinger updated Ford on the airstrikes according to Wickham’s notes:

Schlesinger: 1st wave Coral Sea Recce armed. 2nd wave on way.

Ford: Second wave if on way, let them go ahead.

Schlesinger: We should keep it up until [we] get the Marines out.

Ford: Keep it up.82

Wickham’s notes indicate Schlesinger was forthright about the first wave being armed 

reconnaissance, but he did not go out of his way to say no targets had been hit. What 

Ford remembered from this conversation was Schlesinger reporting “first strike completed.”83 What Schlesinger took away from the conversation was that the mainland 

strikes should continue, a position he also apparently favored at that point. When Gayler 

called just before 11:30 to ask whether the third wave should strike in light of the crew’s 

promise that airstrikes would cease, Schlesinger and Brown discussed it. Despite the 

return of the crew, Schlesinger complied with Ford’s expectations and ordered the third 

wave to proceed. 

At 11:45 Ford checked in with Schlesinger again to confirm the entire crew was safe 

before he made his nationally televised address on the Mayaguez recovery operations. 

This was the call where other White House participants recall Kissinger encouraging 

Ford to “look ferocious” and keep bombing the mainland. Schlesinger reassured Ford 
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that the entire crew was safe and passed along Gayler’s information that the Mayaguez captain, on his own initiative, bargained with the Cambodians, saying he would 

arrange an end to the bombing. The president repeated what Schlesinger had just said, 

presumably for the benefit of the others in the Oval Office. Schlesinger then told Ford 

the Pentagon was continuing with the third wave of Coral Sea aircraft (they actually hit 

their targets at 11:50 while this conversation took place). According to Wickham’s notes, 

Ford responded by asking about the Marines:

Ford: What’s status of Marines?

Schlesinger: Heavily engaged on island. We can divert Coral Sea attack to help out.

Ford: 3rd wave diverted?

Schlesinger: We are prepared to do this.

Ford: Think this is right decision. HAK [Kissinger]?

Schlesinger: 4th wave would go to the island.

Kissinger: I would keep some attack on the mainland until we get Marines 

disengaged on island.

Ford: Moderated—some. We divert rest to help Marines on island. We ought 

to have perception of continuing pressure.84 

Wickham’s notes record a confused conversation with the status of the third and fourth 

waves of aircraft in play. Schlesinger suggested giving priority to supporting the Marines, 

and Kissinger asked for continuing attacks on the mainland. Ford appeared to rule in 

favor of both positions, acting upon Kissinger’s advice by indicating some aircraft should 

hit mainland targets while approving Schlesinger’s suggestion by noting others could 

help the Marines on Tang.85 In any case, White House interest in continuing pressure on 

the mainland was evident, despite Schlesinger communicating the value in diverting 

the fourth wave to help the Marines on Tang Island. After speaking with the president 

at 11:45, and then with two members of Congress86 around midnight, Schlesinger went 

to the Pentagon’s NMCC to better monitor ongoing military operations. In the center’s 

conference room, he and General Brown received a phone update from Admiral Gayler. 

After hearing Gayler’s update, Brown recommended that all further efforts be 

devoted to extracting the Marines without further casualties. Schlesinger agreed. That 

order went out at 12:12. At 12:19 Scowcroft called Schlesinger and read him the statement 

that the president was about to deliver to the nation. Apparently during this conversation Scowcroft agreed there was no reason for the Marines to persist in taking the 

island. Brown related this point to the admiral but also mentioned that “there is some 

interest in continuing the pressure of the mainland.” Brown asked Gayler for his views 
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99

on additional mainland targets. Gayler’s quick reaction was that there were “probably 

naval and air force targets in Cambodia as a whole,” but Brown specified the target area 

of interest was Kompong Som, not all of Cambodia. Gayler thought “some shipping 

might be scarfed up.” Brown’s reaction was that going after shipping was “probably not 

too useful and entails some risk to third country vessels,” which Navy aircraft reported 

seeing. Gayler, however, was told to “look at it and let us know what you think.” 

While Gayler did so, Brown and Schlesinger discussed the fourth strike. Schlesinger 

then decided to execute Ford’s order, telling Brown that “we should mount a fourth 

wave against targets on the Cambodian mainland.” This decision elicited pushback 

from Brown, Holloway, and Gayler, all of whom strongly weighed in against the fourth 

wave of airstrikes. They offered multiple reasons, the most important of which was the 

need to support the Marines: 

General Brown stated that the strikes had been turned off and recommended 

that we should not turn them on again. The major point, however, made by 

General Brown was that we had gained our objectives with the recovery of the 

ship and the crew and therefore there was no need for further strikes. Second, 

there were no appropriate targets worthy of strike in the Kompong Som area; 

and third, that the sorties from the Coral Sea were needed to help the Marines 

on Koah [Koh] Tang Island, who were not having an easy time. General Brown’s 

final point was that it was necessary to stop cyclic operations off the Coral Sea 

so she could position herself to serve as a close-in helicopter platform during 

the extraction of the Marines from Koah Tang Island. As long as the cyclic 

TACAIR operations were going on, the ship had to continually turn into the 

southwest wind when she launched and recovered her fighters, thus taking 

her away from the Island to the north. 

Admiral Holloway was quick to join the conversation and agreed with General 

Brown, pointing out that we had what we wanted, that the operation had been 

“clean”—we had no aircraft shot down; we had no POWs [prisoners of war]; 

there was no need to mount an SAR [search and rescue] effort for a shoot down; 

and there were no appropriate targets worthy of strike. General Brown asked 

Admiral Gayler what his views and recommendations were on the feasibility of 

sending in another wave. Admiral Gayler wholeheartedly concurred with the 

above positions of General Brown and Admiral Holloway for the same reason. 

Admiral Holloway called Admiral Weisner [commander of US Pacific Fleet] 

and got the same response.87
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Schlesinger listened while Brown queried the admirals on the subject of a fourth strike. 

It was apparent that all his military subordinates believed the fourth wave should not 

be sent in. Given that resistance, the fact that the Marines were hard pressed on Tang 

Island, and the lack of useful targets on the mainland, Schlesinger accepted Chairman 

Brown’s recommendation and redirected the fourth wave from the mainland to assist 

the Marines on Tang. The decision would cost him his job, but it also hastened the 

recovery of wounded Marines and facilitated the hazardous nighttime Marine evacuation from Tang Island, which was accomplished with minimal further casualties. The 

Coral Sea aircraft could not conduct close air support because their planes could not 

communicate with the Marines, but positioning the Coral Sea closer to Tang Island did 

prove critically important for rescuing damaged helicopters and wounded Marines.88 

At 12:35 a.m. on May 15, Schlesinger called Ford, who had finished his televised 

address to the nation and was preparing to retire for the night. Wickham’s notes indicate 

Schlesinger told Ford the B-52s were being stood down and that the Coral Sea aircraft 

were being used against Tang and “not the mainland.” There is no indication that he 

mentioned the fourth wave per se. Ford agreed that the main thing at that point was 

the safety of the Marines and that there was no reason to take the island, so they should 

disengage. Ford concluded the call by congratulating Schlesinger and the Defense 

Department for “a damn fine job.” Although Ford agreed that assisting the Marines 

was the priority, it does not appear that Schlesinger explained this meant a cancellation 

of the fourth airstrike. Orders then went out to stand down the B-52s, use Coral Sea 

aircraft to support the Marines, and devote the total effort to extracting the Marines 

without further casualties. The message to Gayler at 12:49 was specific about no further 

consideration being given to additional strikes on the mainland.

In sum, the Pentagon configured the first strike on the mainland consistent with 

Schlesinger’s preferences for a discriminate and proportional military response. The 

confusion surrounding the Cambodian broadcast was sorted out in time for the planes 

to attack, but given their assigned mission and rules of engagement, the first wave was 

not likely to hit targets. Once the crew was released, Schlesinger was fine with punitive strikes, recommending to Ford the continuation of the second strike as long as 

the Marines were engaged. When Schlesinger understood the pressure the Marines 

were under, he noted the third wave could be diverted to assist the Marines, and if not 

the third wave, then the fourth. Kissinger’s advice won out, and Schlesinger dutifully 

ordered the third strike and then also the fourth strike before cancelling the latter in the 

face of united opposition from his military commanders, who strongly felt that it made 

no sense and that it was far more important to support the Marines.89
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101

Thus, the primary difference between the White House and the Pentagon over 

mainland strikes was the scale and timing of the attacks, not the targets. Kissinger 

wanted asymmetric punitive strikes that made it clear Cambodia had paid a large 

penalty for seizing the ship, and he wanted them as early and for as long as possible. 

The Pentagon did not want so much force used that the strikes elicited political outrage, 

which would undermine the credibility of the US reputation for punishing provocations. In addition, Schlesinger wanted to delay punitive strikes until after the crew was 

released. Kissinger came to agree that B-52s would be too much if the carrier planes 

were available, but he still wanted as much force used as possible. The Pentagon never 

thought there were many good targets for that purpose, and Schlesinger preferred 

attacking the Cambodian navy rather than infrastructure on the mainland, but he was 

ready to oblige until it became clear the Marines were in trouble, at which point he gave 

priority to supporting the Marines.

However, the Pentagon was not as duplicitous about all this as the White House 

came to believe. Poor communications—some inadvertent and others less so—

exacerbated White House perceptions of Pentagon noncompliance. Schlesinger, 

Jones, and Holloway technically reported the armed reconnaissance mission to the 

NSC and to Ford. Nevertheless, a suspicious White House, already upset over lack of 

Pentagon compliance, had the impression that all four strikes would and had hit targets. The multiple and direct lines of communication from the White House Situation 

Room to the NMCC contributed to the confusion surrounding the first strike and its 

cancellation, but the first wave was designed to avoid collateral damage and improve 

accuracy for subsequent strikes rather than destroy useful targets, which the Pentagon 

thought were in short supply. Ford’s apparent willingness to listen to Schlesinger on 

the diversion of the third and fourth waves to assist the Marines was overtaken by 

interventions from Kissinger who advised in favor of the strikes. Perhaps Ford’s own 

somewhat ambiguous instructions about helping the Marine extraction inclined 

Schlesinger to believe his decision to cancel the fourth strike would be understood by 

Ford when all was said and done.90 If so, he was wrong. Unbeknownst to Schlesinger, 

the president’s confidence in him was at low ebb.

Adjustments to the Description of Crisis Behaviors

There was a great deal of information about decision making in the Mayaguez crisis 

soon after the event. Pleased with the outcome, Ford immediately granted in-depth 

interviews to two journalists and made his president’s daily schedule available to them.91

Because Ford was displeased with the performance of the intelligence community and 
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the Pentagon, he ordered an immediate search for all verbal and written military communications and intelligence activities during the crisis. Individual members of the 

NSC leaked accounts of the council’s decision making, some flattering and some not. 

Congress, displeased with the way the crisis was managed, held hearings and launched 

an investigation that uncovered a great deal of primary information, including a detailed 

chronology of incoming information and resultant decisions. Also, a few years after 

the crisis an NSC staff member with insider knowledge coauthored a book providing 

additional details on the crisis decision making. Shortly thereafter memoirs from the 

administration appeared providing more insider insights, including Ford’s 1979 memoirs that made it clear he believed the Pentagon had been insubordinate92 in executing 

his orders about airstrikes. Since then, numerous memoirs, interviews, and declassified 

documents have trickled out, enabling an even sharper depiction of crisis decision 

making—the milestone event being the declassification of the NSC minutes in 1996.93

It is worthwhile summarizing the most important enhancements to the detailed 

description of crisis behaviors enabled by new sources and scholarship over the past several decades. Doing so sets the stage for evaluating their impact on explanations of crisis 

behavior. The most important insight from the new sources, and particularly the NSC 

meeting minutes, is that US leaders attached even greater importance to a demonstrative 

use of force than previously believed. Two revelations make this particularly apparent: their 

decision to sink boats that might have been carrying crew members,94 and their decision 

not to delay military operations another day for fear of losing the opportunity to use force.

This desire for a demonstrative use of force and the willingness to risk the lives of 

the crew have long been noted, but the more recent declassified materials demonstrate 

just how explicit the decision making was on these points. Another substantial revelation, based on interviews and then circumstantially corroborated by NSC minutes, is 

that the White House was convinced that Schlesinger and the Pentagon were ignoring 

the presidential order to sink any boats coming and going from Tang Island, something 

Schlesinger later admitted was the case.95

This research also makes the following new contributions to a better description 

of the crisis:

• Schlesinger’s support for punitive measures and his preference for their sequencing 

so as to minimize the possibility of retribution from the Cambodians.

• The extent to which Kissinger used his control of diplomatic communications to 

prevent interference with the military operations, including more evidence that he 

withheld the news of the Tehran cable from the NSC.96
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103

• The actual manner in which the Pentagon stonewalled the White House for three 

hours, beginning with Schlesinger’s restrictive rules of engagement, Wickham 

and Pauly’s decision not to sink the boats, and Schlesinger’s ex post facto support 

for their decision and for slow rolling the White House with requests for additional 

presidential guidance. 

• The way in which the debate about delaying military operations was detailed, 

sustained, and provided ample opportunity for senior military leaders to request 

another twenty-four hours before launching the assault on Tang Island. Schlesinger 

later said he was inclined to keep pressure on the Cambodians, but it also appears 

that he and Jones acquiesced to accommodate White House preferences and 

because the rest of the Joint Chiefs were in favor of quick action. 

• The Pentagon being less obstructionist and duplicitous about the airstrikes than the 

White House supposed, and White House behaviors, including the insistence on 

direct access to the NMCC, actually contributing to the misunderstandings about 

the airstrikes.

• The significance of the NSC risk assessment on assaulting Tang Island being based 

on a smaller estimate of Cambodian strength issued by the Pacific Command rather 

than the higher estimate from DIA.97

Other minor descriptive details offered here also help illuminate crisis behaviors. 

Perhaps the most noteworthy are the Joint Chiefs’ hard-to-explain conclusion that the 

assault on Tang had a high assurance of success and the way Kissinger managed to 

isolate and deepen Ford’s suspicions about Schlesinger, both of which are discussed 

in the next chapter. 

105

Given the safe recovery of the ship and crew and the fact that casualty figures 

were unknown for days, the military operations were initially considered a 

great success. It did not take long for concerns to arise, however. The full extent 

of the casualties suffered, the bombing of the Cambodian mainland an hour after the 

return of the crew, and the invasion of an island to rescue people who were not there 

raised numerous questions about the way the crisis had been managed. Among the most 

pressing issues raised by reporters and members of Congress was why US forces sank 

gunboats leaving Tang Island. If the gunboats were carrying the crew to the mainland, 

sinking them would harm the people the United States was trying to rescue. If they were 

not carrying Mayaguez crew members, their exodus from the island only weakened the 

defensive forces there. 

Once it became clear that Tang Island had been much more heavily defended than 

the Marines were led to believe, critics also expressed concerns about the planning and 

execution of the military operations. It became clear that the assault on Tang narrowly 

avoided a complete fiasco. As one general noted, “We were lucky all of the Marines did 

not get killed.” The pilot of Jolly-11 agreed: “We were very lucky or someone was watching out for us, because the casualties we suffered don’t reflect the level of opposition we 

encountered.”1

 Twelve of the fifteen men killed in action2 died in one downed helicopter, 

and worse could easily have happened to any of the helicopters, almost all of which were 

knocked out of action by enemy fire. The Marines also suffered around fifty wounded 

in ground fighting, a surprisingly low figure considering they were outnumbered by 

better armed and entrenched Cambodian forces familiar with the terrain. 

The risks run by US forces were not only consequential for the lives of the crew and 

the forces themselves; they also carried major strategic implications. As John Guilmartin has argued, if the Marines had been defeated, it would have “entailed immense 

damage to American credibility and prestige,” with “the only real historical precedent 

being the 1961 Bay of Pigs debacle,” where “the units overrun were not American and 

CHAPTER 6

Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

106

the men captured were not members of the United States military.”3 Thus, above and 

beyond the lives lost during the military operations, it is worth pondering why the 

United States came so close to suffering a major debacle and how it avoided that fate.

Operational and Tactical Issues

It is widely agreed that only the skill and valor displayed by US forces prevented much 

higher casualties and a complete disaster. Many servicemen took extraordinary risks 

to execute the mission and, particularly, to save the wounded or otherwise evacuate 

the Marines and downed airmen. The bold tactics of the Marines to join their groups 

divided on the western side of the island also helped salvage the situation. As Guilmartin notes, many small decisions made by the forces before and during the event had a 

critical impact on outcomes:

The decision by the Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Service to install explosionretardant foam in the 450-gallon auxiliary tanks of HH-53s probably saved 

the United States a humiliating defeat. The marines’ insistence on going into 

what was advertised as a walkover fully armed and ready for battle probably 

had the same effect. The PACAF [Pacific Air Forces] decision not to install 

explosion-retardant foam in the 650-gallon auxiliary tanks of CH-53s in the 

interests of cost containment very nearly reversed the outcome.4

It is also worth noting that there were no US casualties as a result of inaccurate supporting fire, which is rather amazing considering the poor communications, proximity of 

US and Cambodian forces, and amount of ordnance expended. The creative measures 

employed by the Marines and airmen on Tang, the OV-10 forward air control aircraft 

and their pilots, and the AC-130s are largely responsible for that.

Why US forces came so close to defeat is also widely agreed upon. One critical concern raised by critics in this regard is why a numerically inferior assault force assaulted 

Tang Island when Marine Corps doctrine calls for a 3-to-1 numerical superiority during 

this type of operation. For many years the most common answer to this question was 

the failure to disseminate the best intelligence to the local Marine commanders. They 

ostensibly operated on the basis of intelligence estimates of approximately twenty 

Cambodian defenders on Tang. What made this seem particularly odd in retrospect 

was that Deputy Secretary of Defense Morton I. Abramowitz testified to Congress on 

the day of the assault that at least one hundred Khmer Communist troops were on the 

island. The failure to share the best available intelligence with the Marines was perhaps 

the most egregious military error made, but there were others. 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

107

Over the years, trenchant analysis by Guilmartin and others has raised a number 

of other salient questions about the planning and execution of military operations 

during the crisis:

• Why were the Marines denied permission to use the 1st Battalion, 9th Marines, 

which was fully trained and on alert?5

• Why were Navy SEALs or Marine Force Reconnaissance units not used to reconnoiter enemy positions on the island prior to assault?6

• Why did “no one in the operational chain of command above . . . a captain and a 

gunnery sergeant [do] a worst-case tactical assessment” of enemy capabilities?7

• Why were available reconnaissance aircraft not used to reconnoiter Tang Island 

defenses?8

• Why were the Cambodian antiaircraft gun emplacements identified prior to the 

Marine landing not neutralized?9

• Why was the assault planned for sunrise as opposed to just prior to first light, which 

ensured the helicopters would be easily visible to the defenders?10

• Why was an AC-130 gunship not on station when the Marines began their 

assault?11

• Why were Marine requests for the slow-flying OV-10 forward air control aircraft 

ignored until late in the afternoon, many hours after operations commenced?12

• Why was there “no workable plan to coordinate air and naval gunfire support with 

the assault?”13 

• Why was there a gap in AC-130 coverage of the assault force from late morning until 

late afternoon, when up to that point these aircraft had provided the only effective 

close air support?14

Most but not all of these issues have been resolved by careful scholarship. In 

general, the answers fall into three categories: command failure, insufficient jointness (defined as lack of familiarity with, or a disinclination to collaborate with, other 

service elements), and insufficient interoperability (e.g., inability to communicate 

between ground and air forces). These problems were exacerbated by the rushed 

operations and ad hoc, geographically dispersed command and control arrangements.15 Depending on the commentator, these factors are sometimes understood 

as extenuating circumstances. More often, the charge of micromanagement is levied 

against senior leaders to explain the planning and execution errors.
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As we shall see, the evidence for the micromanagement charge is mixed. However, 

the persistent concern expressed about micromanagement raises profound issues 

about the requirements for the “mission command” concept codified in joint doctrine. 

The micromanagement charge against senior leaders in the Mayaguez crisis also has 

contributed to the fraying of civil-military relations. Most of the commentators who 

attribute micromanagement to senior uniformed leaders are civilians, and most of 

those attributing it to civilian leaders are military or former military officers. This 

trend erodes the trust necessary for civil-military teams of leaders to manage national 

security challenges well. 

A more important issue than the extent to which senior leaders micromanaged military operations is the question of what they were trying to achieve and why. US leaders’ 

risk calculations were critically affected by what they thought was at stake during the 

crisis, and their inclination to use force sooner rather than later must be evaluated in 

light of those concerns. Put differently, if we are confused about why leaders made the 

decisions they did—and many commentators are—it will not be possible to evaluate 

those decisions well. Thus, a compelling explanation for the US response to the seizure 

of the Mayaguez is a prerequisite for evaluating the senior leader decision making, and 

for drawing lessons from the experience about such higher order issues as mission 

command and civil-military relations. 

Popular Competing Explanations

From the beginning, several alternative hypotheses for US behavior have been offered 

and embraced to varying degrees by commentators and analysts over the years.16 The 

diverse explanations are not necessary, however. One explanatory variable accounts 

for all US behavior with great consistency: US leaders’ determination to reinforce 

deteriorating American credibility and, in particular, to signal North Korea that they 

would defend South Korea despite developments in Indochina. The vast amount of new 

sources in the form of declassified documents and memoirs, carefully analyzed, makes 

this singular explanation more evident, not less. 

Knowing senior leaders’ overriding priority and how they managed the execution 

of diplomatic and military efforts to secure their objectives makes it possible to quickly 

assess the validity of alternative hypotheses for US behavior. Four popular explanations 

for US behavior circulated immediately following the crisis. Newsweek, Time, US News 

and World Report, and other news media depicted the US military response to the 

seizure of the Mayaguez as a rescue, an effort by Ford to shore up his sagging domestic 

political fortunes, a knee-jerk emotional reaction to the humiliation of losing Indochina, 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

109

and a punitive use of force to chasten the North Koreans and other countries who suspected they could take advantage of a United States in strategic retreat. 

Newsweek’s reporting is illustrative of the multiple explanations long considered 

relevant for understanding why the United States reacted to the seizure of the Mayaguez with force. The magazine’s cover carried the headline “The Rescue,” reflecting 

official US explanations for the quick military action. Newsweek also suggested Ford 

was motivated by domestic political concerns, citing a Republican congressman’s tagline for the affair—“Marines Rescue Ship, Crew and Ford”—to suggest Ford used force 

to resurrect his failing presidency, crippled by the fall of Vietnam and the unpopular 

decision to pardon President Nixon. The magazine also called US military operations a 

“two-day punitive expedition” and said Ford was “putting adversaries . . . on notice that 

the United States is not after all a paper tiger.”17 Finally, it suggested the US response was 

an emotional reaction to the humiliation of losing Vietnam, something to compensate 

for the “image of America’s despairing retreat from Indochina.” It quoted politicians 

expressing ardent satisfaction, such as Vice President Rockefeller, who “exulted,” “I’m 

very proud to be an American today.” It said Ford’s supporters “celebrated the recovery 

of the Mayaguez as though it were the battle of Thermopylae.” It ran a cartoon depicting 

Uncle Sam calmly evaluating responses to the seizure of the Mayaguez before succumbing to a first-class hissy-fit and lashing out militarily.18 

All these competing explanations appeared plausible and were embraced to varying 

degrees by commentators and analysts.19 Now, however, it is more evident than ever 

that the perceived need for a demonstrative and punitive use of force was the central 

motivation of US decision makers. The new sources and materials documenting the 

decision making during the crisis and the analysis of key decisions reinforce this core 

explanation for US behavior. The inadequacy of the most popular alternative explanations can be demonstrated with a quick review of their merits.

A Rescue 

There is no doubt decision makers hoped the crew would be released unharmed, but 

they did not have the means to rescue the crew and could not even ascertain their whereabouts with certainty. Moreover, they had higher priorities, which became clear to close 

observers of their behavior.20 The lack of military justification for mainland bombing, the 

willingness to run risks to the crew and to the Marines, and the admissions of key decision makers about their motives have long made a compelling case that the primary goal 

of decision makers was a punitive use of force that would reinforce US credibility, deter 

a belligerent North Korea, and perhaps encourage the Cambodians to release the crew. 
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110

New evidence reinforces this conclusion. During the first NSC meeting, when decision makers thought the crew was already on the mainland, the only options discussed 

were punitive measures. When decision makers learned the crew could be isolated from 

the mainland, they embraced a quarantine even at the significant risk of killing the crew 

and carried on with the plan for punitive strikes. It was hoped the Cambodians would 

release the crew, but the manifest willingness to sink boats possibly carrying the crew 

makes it perfectly clear decision makers had higher priorities than the lives of the crew.

Domestic Politics

Those who believe “Ford used the crisis for political advantage”21 make the mistake of 

reasoning from effect to intent. There is no doubt that the initial public response to the 

use of force was highly favorable. A day after the crisis the White House had received 

3,254 telephone calls, 3,062 of which were in favor of the president’s actions, and 5,404 

telegrams, 5,068 of which also favored the president.22 However, those effects were short 

lived and, most important, were not likely and could not have been anticipated.

At the time the nation was torn and deeply ambivalent about the use of force in 

Vietnam. Respect for the presidency was at an all-time low. Public, news media, and congressional reactions during and after the crisis indicate “another example of ineptitude 

and failure was not likely to elicit much sympathy” and that the “only hope for public 

plaudits required the successful rescue of the ship and crew, the president’s publicly 

stated objective.”23 This is not to say the White House ignored political reactions and 

consequences. Ford and his advisors considered and monitored congressional reactions 

throughout the crisis.24 They discussed how to portray their decisions to Congress and 

the public, especially but not only with respect to the use of B-52s. They did observe 

that there were signs of support for a firm response.25 There were, for example, some 

colorful remarks from congressmen and senators favoring the use of force, which are 

often cited as evidence of the country’s mood or to imply the president knew or could 

have expected the use of force to be popular. For example, when initially contacted by 

the White House, Senator James O. Eastland (D-MS) said, “Blow the Hell out of them,” 

and Congressman Tip O’Neil responded, “Those bastards, we can’t let them get away 

with this. They’ll harass us forever.”26 

However, other members of Congress were mildly supportive or noncommittal, just 

thanking the White House callers for the information. Still others objected to the use of 

force as a matter of principle. The White House knew from questions posed by reporters, 

interest groups,27 and members of Congress that many preferred a diplomatic solution 

and would question Ford’s decisions if any harm came to the crew. They had a foretaste 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

111

of the likely reaction from the heavily Democratic Congress (which held fourteen- and 

fifty-seat majorities in the Senate and House, respectively) when Ford and his advisors 

met with “the most important” members of Congress during the crisis.28 The elected 

representatives applauded Ford when he entered the Cabinet Room but immediately 

offered up tough questions, taking their oversight role and the War Powers consultation provisions seriously. They asked whether there were Americans “on the boats that 

will be destroyed”; “why are we going into the mainland of Asia again [with ground 

forces]”; “can’t we wait”; why “are we just going into Koh Tang shooting”; and “did we 

give Cambodia a deadline”? Democratic leader Michael J. Mansfield (D-MT) said, “I 

want to express my deep concern, apprehension and uneasiness at this near-invasion 

of the Indochina mainland.”29 Similarly, in congressional hearings held on May 14, 

congressmen asked administration officials to explain how sinking Cambodian boats 

that might hold crew members was consistent with rescuing the crew.30 Congressional 

concerns were so manifest at the time that Kissinger told Ford he thought Schlesinger 

had changed Ford’s orders on bombing the mainland to assuage congressional ire.31

Even after the fortunate release of the crew and the New York Times ruling that 

Ford had pulled off a “domestic and foreign triumph,” many pundits and members of 

Congress were critical and wanted an investigation of the president. Gaylord A. Nelson (D-WI) said he did not question the popularity of Ford’s decision but nevertheless 

thought it was wrong, noting that “these incidents are matters for negotiation, not force.” 

Senator George S. McGovern (D-SD) said, “I continue to be alarmed and puzzled as 

to why military action of this kind was taken before an opportunity was given to the 

diplomatic process.” Congresswoman Elizabeth Holtzman (D-NY) went further, saying 

the president’s resort to force “appears to have been illegal and unconstitutional” and 

an “overreaction.”32 As Ford noted in his memoirs,

Predictably, liberals in both the press and Congress were harshly critical of 

my decisions. In a column entitled “Barbarous Piracy,” Anthony Lewis of the 

New York Times intoned: “Once again an American government shows that 

the only way it knows how to deal with frustration is by force. And the world 

is presumably meant to be impressed.” In Congress, Senator Mansfield and 

Representative Holtzman assailed me for my alleged failure to observe the 

War Powers Act. . . . Missouri Senator Thomas [F.] Eagleton went several steps 

further. He introduced three separate amendments to the War Powers Act 

designed to plug its “loopholes” and prevent me—or any President who followed me—from taking the steps I had taken to save American lives. Then he 

asked the General Accounting Office, the auditing arm of Congress, to deter-
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mine whether I had ordered the bombing of Cambodia “for punitive rather 

than defensive purposes.” Such reactions, I thought, were hopelessly naive.33 

It was not just partisan politics that induced Eagleton and others in Congress to launch 

the investigation into Ford’s management of the incident. The nation was deeply divided 

over the lessons of Vietnam. As Ford suggests, those who had concluded the use of 

American military power in Vietnam was misguided, if not actually counterproductive, 

were predictably bothered by the quick resort to force in the case of the Mayaguez,

34 and 

they were a whole lot more skeptical of executive branch use of force than Congress had 

been when it passed the Tonkin Gulf Resolution giving President Lyndon B. Johnson 

authority to expand the Vietnam War. 

Similarly, the news media were alert to any missteps by the administration and 

could be counted upon to ask hard questions and advertise any perceived deficiencies 

in Ford’s decision making. Indeed, in the middle of the crisis, when the press learned 

that US aircraft had attacked Cambodian vessels, reporters immediately wanted to 

know whether the Mayaguez crew members might have been killed during those 

attacks, asking questions such as “so, are we to destroy these men in order to save 

them?” Reporters also asked whether the sinkings meant diplomatic efforts had been 

exhausted, given that Kissinger had said the previous evening that no military action 

would take place otherwise.35 It was so clear that reporters were in a hostile mood that 

one of their own, White House correspondent John F. Osborne, chastised them, saying 

he had “the impression that some of the reporters would have been happy if the Mayaguez affair had proved to be an unmitigated disaster rather than a flawed success.” 

Osborne thought Watergate, foreign policy reversals, and other factors had “created a 

deep and seemingly insatiable media appetite for disaster and official victims.”36 His 

comment enraged his readers, leading Osborne to comment that they too seemed 

anxious to find another catastrophic failure by senior leaders. The hostile media and 

the great divide in public opinion wrought by the Vietnam trauma helps explain why 

Ford’s great surge in popularity was so short lived. His public approval ratings fell off 

quickly and precipitously as details of the incident and casualty figures became better 

known. Within days the news that more men died than were saved set off a new round 

of commentary complaining the incident had been mishandled. Within a few short 

months, nothing was left of Ford’s briefly enhanced popularity.37 

More pertinent than the public and congressional response after the fact is what Ford 

and his advisors thought the likely reaction to the use of force would be before the outcome 

was known. They knew there would be support and opposition to using force, which they 

discussed. They knew a great deal would hinge upon what the Cambodians did, and 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

113

they were not optimistic. The odds of recovering the ship were good, but they agreed the 

Cambodians might scuttle or sink it. The odds against success were great,38 and decision 

makers admitted as much when they acknowledged after the event that they had been 

“lucky.”39 Ford knew he would be harshly criticized if the crew was harmed, which seemed 

a likely outcome. The decision makers repeatedly observed the Cambodians might kill 

crew members in retaliation at any time. They already assumed crew members taken to 

the mainland were effectively “lost” and likely dead. They also knew that twenty-three 

US Air Force personnel had been killed in the helicopter accident, and they guessed that 

as many or more Marines could be killed in taking Tang Island.40

What is most relevant to this discussion is whether Ford based any of his decisions 

on anticipated public and congressional reactions. With one exception, the opposite is 

the case. The president made it clear in the first NSC meeting that he would do what he 

thought was necessary, saying, “I can assure you that, irrespective of the Congress, we 

will move.” He was equally resolute in the other NSC meetings and in private conversations about doing what was in the nation’s best interest. In the fourth NSC meeting, 

when discussing the upcoming meeting with selected members of Congress to “consult” 

in accordance with the War Powers Act, Rockefeller asked what should be done if the 

group opposed the president’s plans. Kissinger quickly said Ford “would have to go 

ahead anyway,” and Ford did not disagree.41 

Ford’s decisions backed up his assertion that he would act regardless of political 

consequences. Early on he told multiple people, including his wife and a congressman, 

that he had a very hard decision to make. He made the decision, agreeing with Kissinger 

that the lives of the crew were “unfortunately a secondary consideration,”42 and, as he 

later said several times, he was not inclined to revisit difficult decisions once he made 

up his mind. He was resolute in NSC meetings and private conversations about doing 

what was in the nation’s best interest rather than what might be popular. He used force 

earlier than what the Pentagon recommended, consciously ran high risks of killing 

the crew members, and knew in advance that employing force would entail significant 

human and political costs. But he was undeterred by these considerations. NSC members spent considerable time discussing how to manage public perceptions of their 

actions.43 Kissinger told Ford to ignore the idea of an ultimatum because its benefits 

were only “domestic,” (that is, a sop to domestic critics) and warned him he would “take 

as much heat for a big strike as for a small strike.” Ford took that advice, and in fact, by 

some accounts, he was more steadfast than Kissinger about the matter.44

Reading all the recorded deliberations, it seems evident decision makers were 

bracing for a storm of criticism45 and yet never let that fact influence their decisions. 
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114

Kissinger even opined that acting in the face of political opposition could be helpful, 

convincing foreign observers that Congress and public opinion could not tie the hands 

of a willful president. The one exception was Ford’s decision not to use the B-52s, which 

his advisors thought would elicit a political backlash.46 Even then Ford only relented 

in the last NSC meeting after being reassured by the Pentagon that it could deliver the 

desired amount of aerial bombardment with carrier aircraft that would conduct cyclic 

strikes until he ordered them to stop. 

Emotional Catharsis 

It is difficult to parse out emotion and reasoning in the decision-making process, especially when they appear mutually reinforcing. This might seem to be the case in the 

Mayaguez crisis. The evidence against decision makers using force as an “emotional 

catharsis” is the purposeful strategic reasoning of those who favored asymmetric punitive force and the relative restraint of those who demonstrated a concern with avoiding 

indiscriminate and grossly disproportionate force. Again, the NSC meeting minutes, 

other deliberations, and telephone conversations reinforce the conclusion that the key 

decision makers were highly purposeful during the crisis and driven by strategic reasoning rather than emotion. They also knowingly took risks that increased the chances 

of failure—including rushed military operations and foregoing B-52 strikes, which 

would not have been the case if they were driven primarily by the desire to bludgeon 

Cambodia in pursuit of an emotional release. 

Kissinger and Rockefeller reacted to the news of the seizure with the most emotion, 

but both had strategic reasons for doing so. Unlike the rest of his staff at the State Department, Kissinger immediately was alarmed by the news. He cursed and insisted, “We are 

not going to sit here and let an American merchant ship be captured at sea and let it go 

into the harbor without doing a bloody thing about it.” He demanded immediate action, 

saying he wanted to see if the Navy could intercept the ship. “We haven’t reached the 

point yet where American ships get captured by Cambodians,” he said. When William 

Hyland asked him what could be done about it, he shot back that he was not the chief 

of naval operations, before musing “but if we cannot handle the Cambodians . . .” and 

leaving the thought unfinished. One thing he was certain about: “I know you damned 

well cannot let Cambodia capture a ship a hundred miles at sea and do nothing.”47 Yet, 

as Kissinger made clear in the first NSC meeting, he had a firm geostrategic rationale 

for his reaction, and as the crisis went on, he articulated that rationale time and again.

Vice President Rockefeller is the other senior leader who initially characterized the 

event in emotive terms. He favored a “violent response,” he said, because the Communists 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

115

“only understand force.” He said it was imperative “to show that we will not tolerate this 

kind of thing,” without being specific about the thing that was intolerable. Other NSC 

members discussed the ruthless nature of the Khmer regime but also speculated that 

Cambodia might be motivated by territorial sovereignty and oil reserves. In contrast, 

Rockefeller immediately ascribed hostile motives to the Cambodians in seizing the Mayaguez. He claimed that “if we do not respond violently we will get nibbled to death” and 

that “unless the Cambodians are hurt, this pattern will not be broken.” At one point he 

argued for unconstrained action, telling Ford, “You should do everything you can as soon 

as possible.” His rationale for this was again the blanket assertion that “if the communists 

do not think that you will react strong and fast, they will keep on doing this.”

Like Kissinger, Rockefeller offered a strategic rationale for his recommendations 

from the beginning, arguing the American response would “be seen as a test case” in 

Korea and elsewhere and that it was imperative not to get caught in an extended hostage 

crisis. He did acknowledge political risks, saying, “Public opinion will be against it [the 

use of force] in order to save lives” but arguing the president had to act anyway. While 

always emphatic about the need for a forceful response, he did distinguish between 

alternative courses of action and their attendant risks. He favored airpower, including 

B-52s, over an assault on the island with ground forces, which he feared might lead to 

high casualties. Thus, his interventions were not devoid of strategic logic or unrefined 

by relative risk assessments.48 

In sum, all the key decision makers carefully reviewed incoming information and 

its impact on courses of action. They considered the relative risks of different military 

operations and of launching them on three alternative days, the likelihood of successfully recovering the ship and crew and the risk to the forces involved, and the potential 

domestic and international reactions to their decisions. They also discussed likely 

Cambodian motives throughout the crisis and decided they were irrelevant given the 

Khmer Rouge had the hostage option so long as they held the crew. With respect to risking the lives of the crew, the declassified conversations underscore the ruthlessly cool 

purposefulness of the decision makers who, as one critic observed early on, “preferred 

the risk of killing our own men to the risk of ‘humiliating’ negotiation.”49 Newsweek 

reported that from the first NSC meeting onward “there wasn’t a dove in the place,” but 

neither were there any Dr. Strangeloves.50

Devaluing Explanation

Journalists in May 1975 were able to identify the primary contending explanations for 

US behavior during the Mayaguez crisis from senior leader pubic statements, inside 
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116

sources, and expert opinions. But, as a columnist in the Christian Science Monitor noted, 

journalists did not have the wherewithal to assess the relative explanatory value of those 

explanations. He argued the real explanation for the US response to the seizure of the 

Mayaguez remained murky because news accounts were “shaped by conflicting and 

what appear to be self-serving reports of what happened in those behind-the-scenes 

presidential sessions.” He hoped “at some point historians may be able to provide a clear 

chronicle of the President’s decision making process” but said, until then, the public 

would not know “what really happened.”51

This eventually came to pass. A copious amount of information about the Ford 

administration’s decision-making process during the crisis became available. What 

is surprising is that scholars did not translate that abundant information into a compelling explanation for US behavior. Instead, the cumulative effect of scholarship 

has been to undermine understanding of US behavior in the crisis. Scholars have 

concentrated on description at the expense of explanatory analysis, embracing 

multiple explanatory variables rather than critically examining the evidence for its 

explanatory efficacy. As a result, multiple competing explanations for US behavior in 

the Mayaguez crisis have persisted for decades. A quick overview of scholarship on 

the crisis illustrates the point.

The two most notable studies done soon after the crisis, both of which stood out 

for their access to primary information, were the August 1975 General Accounting 

Office (GAO) report and 1978’s Crisis Resolution: Presidential Decision Making in the 

Mayaguez and Korean Confrontations.

52 The authors of the GAO report did not claim 

to explain US behaviors, noting they were “restricted by the executive branch from 

analyzing the decision making process at the highest levels.” Like the GAO, the authors 

of Crisis Resolution also took a pass on explaining US behaviors. Instead they sought 

insights from a descriptive model that did not specify relationships among its diverse 

variables.53 In describing crisis decision making they note that the desire to rescue the 

crew, avoid another Pueblo humiliation, and demonstrate US resolve were all motives 

for US behavior. They do not establish the priority of these competing objectives, and by 

concentrating on Ford as the key decision maker, overlook the important roles played 

by Kissinger and Schlesinger.54

My research in the 1980s took a different approach. A 1985 article in Political Science 

Quarterly and a longer treatment in the 1989 book Belief Systems and Decision Making in 

the Mayaguez Crisis, published by the University of Florida Press, offered a belief system 

explanation for crisis behavior. With the information now available, it is clear that my 

original research missed or misstated important aspects of the crisis decision making. 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

117

It missed the Pentagon’s insubordination in initially refusing to sink all boats coming 

and going to Tang Island. It overstated the extent to which the decision makers had 

conflicting priorities. We now know the concern with a demonstrative use of force was 

consistently the higher priority. It also overestimated the extent to which Schlesinger 

viewed the military operations as a rescue mission when in reality he consistently 

supported punitive measures as well, but with his preferred sequencing and timing. It 

noted but underestimated the willingness of Ford and his advisors to risk the lives of 

the crew, and it portrayed Ford as an arbiter among strong subordinate experts when 

in reality he was consistently guided by Kissinger’s advice.55 

For these reasons Belief Systems and Decision Making in the Mayaguez Crisis is no 

longer adequate, but its basic explanation for US behavior still holds true and is actually 

strengthened by the new data available:

The broad decision that force was necessary resulted from the belief shared 

by four key US decision makers that deteriorating American prestige and 

credibility were threatening developments that had to be arrested. In particular, the decision makers were concerned about the probability of North 

Korean aggression based on perceptions of American weakness and lack of 

resolve. . . . From this . . . flowed two corollaries, one positive and the other 

negative, which explain US behavior with more specificity. First, the United 

States needed a show of force to substantiate the deterrent efficacy of US power. 

Second, the United States absolutely could not afford another blow to its prestige, especially not a gratuitous humiliation from a minor power which had just 

recently participated in the forced removal of US influence from Indochina. 

Subject to whatever constraints might arise at the scene of the event, these two 

propositions guided the specific US military actions. 

First, the Mayaguez and Tang Island were quarantined to facilitate the recovery 

of the ship and forestall the internment of the crew on the mainland. It was 

hoped that these actions would prevent a display of Cambodian insolence, 

even though they risked the lives of the crew. Then, as soon as barely sufficient 

US forces were available, the assault on Tang Island began, with strikes conducted against mainland targets, ostensibly to rescue the crew but primarily 

to influence perceptions of American power and credibility. This explanation 

holds despite the belief of many in the military that their orders were motivated 

primarily by a desire to rescue the ship and crew since it was the motivations 

of the key decision makers that defined US objectives.56
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In 1993 Oxford University Press published Lucien Vandenbroucke’s Perilous 

Options, a well-researched book containing multiple in-depth cases studies, including 

a multichapter analysis of the Mayaguez crisis. It benefits from numerous interviews 

with both White House and Pentagon participants and was the first source to raise the 

allegation that the Pentagon was slow to implement the presidential order to sink all 

boats coming from and going to Tang Island. Vandenbroucke takes an eclectic approach 

to explaining US behavior, embracing all the explanatory factors originally identified 

by Newsweek.

57 He seems to place the most emphasis on the emotional catharsis explanation. “Anger at the new Communist regimes in Indochina . . .ran high,” he says. “The 

administration ended up displaying an almost unthinking preference for the language 

of force.” He concludes: “the administration’s handling of the Mayaguez fell short of 

cool, careful deliberation. When the ship was seized, the administration reacted with 

deep anger. From the start, there was strong sentiment among the president’s advisers 

to lash back.”58

But Vandenbroucke also embraces other explanatory factors. He argues that “Ford’s 

domestic fortunes also subtly influenced . . . White House perceptions” and that “from 

the onset Ford ‘was not unconcerned with the effect of the crisis on his popularity.’” 

Furthermore, he asserts that “US policymakers were also gravely concerned about the 

country’s image,” “the real purpose of the mainland strikes [was] to provide a lesson 

for the Cambodians and the others,” and “the Ford administration was determined 

to prevent another such humiliation [that is, a Pueblo incident].” Vandenbroucke also 

sees the military operations as a genuine rescue effort, arguing Ford “was seriously 

concerned about the welfare of the crew.” Vandenbroucke contends all these concerns 

influenced US decision makers, but over time the concern for the crew diminished in 

comparison with other factors, especially for Ford:

Ford’s original reaction was more reserved; at the outset he also showed strong 

concern about the safety of the crew, and his first decision was to explore 

military as well as diplomatic responses. But as the crisis wore on, the urge to 

retaliate and restore US prestige gained sway. By the time the Marines took off 

for Koh Tang, the crew’s welfare had become merely one consideration among 

many others. Ultimately, the fear of another national humiliation, the urge to 

punish Cambodia, and the wish to show US resolve seem to have generated 

almost blind enthusiasm for a forceful response.59

Thus, he argues that “notwithstanding Ford’s concern about the crew, hostility toward 

Cambodia and the administration’s bellicose mood influenced White House decisions 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

119

and attitudes from the start.”60 He believes blind enthusiasm for force led to cognitive 

dissonance as US leaders “rapidly concluded that the Cambodians’ failure to respond 

to the diplomatic messages delivered in Beijing meant that they were not interested in 

a peaceful solution.” He also thinks US leaders were so “eager to retaliate against Cambodia” they “apparently wished away key shortcomings of the plan.”61 

As the foregoing analysis demonstrates, it is now clear that US leaders were not 

driven by anger, or domestic political calculations, or concern for the welfare of the crew; 

it is also evident that Ford did not change his mind on his priorities over the course of 

the crisis. On the contrary, the NSC minutes reveal decision makers who were calm, 

resolute, and calculating, men who from the beginning gave priority to geostrategic 

purposes and consistently ranked the lives of the crew a secondary consideration. Neither were decision makers blinded by cognitive dissonance and wishful thinking. They 

correctly identified likely Cambodian motives in their first meeting and dismissed them 

as irrelevant.62 They carefully and repeatedly assessed risks as the crisis progressed. The 

risks of assaulting Tang Island were not correctly assessed, especially by subordinate 

military commanders, but the Joint Chiefs and the NSC did not ignore or wish the risks 

away. They discussed the risks at length and delayed operations a day as a result. Then 

the president accepted the unanimous recommendation of the JCS that the operation 

could be executed with acceptable risk and a high assurance of success, which in the end 

and in terms of anticipated casualties, proved an accurate assessment, largely because 

of good fortune and the incredible efforts of US servicemen. 

The senior leaders also directly confronted, and debated, the risks of military 

operations harming the crew, which they considered a secondary concern. Schlesinger 

differed from the other key decision makers on how much the crew should be put at 

risk by US military operations, but Ford, with support from Kissinger and Scowcroft, 

consciously decided to risk the crew by sinking Cambodian boats until Schlesinger’s 

imposed rules of engagement led to a pilot reporting the likelihood of crew members 

being sighted. At that point, they debated again and Schlesinger won over Kissinger to 

the view that the political blowback from killing the crew would be too detrimental to 

the image they wanted to project of a United States prepared to defend its geostrategic 

interests. Risks to the crew, like the risk of the island assault, were not overlooked or 

wished away.

In 1995 John Guilmartin’s A Very Short War was published by Texas A&M University Press. Guilmartin was a participant in the military operations during the crisis. 

He makes good use of new primary source material from military sources, such as 

command and unit histories and interviews with military participants. He examines 
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120

the “interactions among policy, strategy, operations, and tactics” but devotes most of 

the book to an examination of the military operations, especially command and control 

arrangements. Relying heavily on numerous primary sources involved in the Mayaguez 

military operations, Guilmartin demonstrates how unpredictable developments (i.e., 

Clausewitzian “friction”) affected outcomes. He finds fault with on-scene commanders 

for failing to anticipate enemy opposition and identifies numerous other command 

failures, including the fact that there was “no workable plan to coordinate air and naval 

gunfire support with the assault.”63 Disaster was only averted by truly heroic efforts by 

the forces hastily assembled and sent into combat. He draws particular attention to the 

performance of the OV-10 pilots who intervened to coordinate fires and the helicopter 

pilots who repeatedly flew into withering Cambodian fires, but he argues the fighting 

forces themselves were most responsible for saving the situation:

The problem was resolved and catastrophe averted not by superior high-level 

communications but in spite of them. It was done by subordinate commanders, 

junior officers, and NCOs [noncommissioned officers] acting on their own initiative in response to the demands of the tactical situation, employing a general 

awareness of strategic objective and policy goals.64

Guilmartin indicates he relied on Belief Systems and Decision Making in the Mayaguez 

Crisis for his brief depictions of Washington decision making,65 but his conclusions about 

US leader priorities differ significantly. He believes decision makers “were prepared 

to give priority to the avoidance of hostage negotiations at the expense of the crew’s 

welfare,” and that in turn, those two objectives (avoiding negotiations and the welfare 

of the crew) “clearly took precedence over a demonstrative application of force.” He 

offers no evidence for this ranking of priorities; he just argues it makes sense because 

the bombing “could be orchestrated at leisure,” whereas the assault on Tang Island was 

where “the enemy ability to interfere was greatest.” He thinks it stands to reason that 

US leaders would give priority attention to the assault on Tang Island.66 This conjecture 

gets decision makers’ priorities exactly wrong. US leaders consistently gave priority to 

the demonstrative use of force, with the avoidance of hostage negotiations a secondary 

priority. The assault on Tang Island was rushed to accommodate those priorities. 

The final university press book on the crisis is Robert J. Mahoney’s The Mayaguez 

Incident: Testing America’s Resolve in the Post-Vietnam Era. Mahoney’s 2011 work is the 

only scholarly analysis to date that benefited from the declassified NSC meeting minutes.67 Like Guilmartin, Mahoney stresses the strategic import of the crisis, which he 

considers underappreciated, and generally sympathizes with the decision makers. He 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

121

provides a comprehensive account of the crisis, moving back and forth between events 

in the field and decisions in Washington to depict senior leader decision-making and 

its impact. Using the NSC minutes, Mahoney clarifies the extent to which the White 

House was willing to risk harming the crew, the fact that Kissinger strongly dissented 

from other NSC members who advised against any delays in military operations, and 

other descriptive details not previously disclosed.68 However, Mahoney gets some 

descriptive details wrong,69 in part by uncritically accepting Ford’s and Kissinger’s 

memoirs.70 More importantly, he too weakens his explanation by embracing multiple 

explanatory factors.71

On the all-important question of what the United States was trying to achieve, 

Mahoney asserts that “the NSC’s first priority was to send a strong message to the Cambodian government, as well as the world writ large, that the United States, although stung 

by setback in Vietnam, was not a hollow power.”72 Actually, the intended audience was 

North Korea and its patrons, not Cambodia. In any case, a few paragraphs later he seems 

to hedge on this conclusion. He cites Kissinger’s memoirs, which claims White House 

leaders “were primarily worried about the safety of the crew” but also concerned about 

international perceptions. Mahoney observes, “The two main priorities, advancing (or 

restoring) American prestige and the rescue of the Mayaguez and her crew, were so interrelated that it was possible one could not have been accomplished without the other.” 

Nevertheless, after reviewing White House decisions on risks to the crew, Mahoney 

acknowledges “the prioritization of punitive action over the release of the crew.”73

Elsewhere, however, he weakens and confuses this apparent explanation by giving 

credence to other explanatory variables. He believes the US response was “shaped by the 

assumptions and predispositions of the members of the NSC” that in turn were “shaped 

in part by the pressures at all levels—international, domestic, political, and personal.”74

In describing crisis behaviors, he sometimes implies beliefs drove behavior,75 but he only 

explicitly assigns explanatory weight to a few factors. One such factor was fear of another 

Pueblo humiliation, which he believes was particularly influential for Ford. Mahoney 

argues Ford refused to delay military operations another twenty-four hours because 

he “was determined not to allow a repetition of [the Pueblo].”76 Like Vandenbroucke, 

he also thinks Ford was influenced by domestic political considerations, saying “Ford 

needed to address his weak power position as an unelected president and head of a 

party in shame.”77 Unlike Vandenbroucke, he rejects the emotional catharsis explanation, stating “the NSC’s direction was not simply a reckless, emotional reaction to an 

apparent challenge to US power.” He argues decision makers accessed risks carefully 

and quickly, concluding “their actions were on the whole logical.”78 
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In short, The Mayaguez Incident appears to ascribe the greatest significance to the 

decision makers’ desire for a demonstrative use of force for geostrategic reasons but 

confuses this explanation by assigning explanatory efficacy to other variables without 

adequately assessing their import. Ford was not influenced by domestic political considerations. Instead he was determined to act forcefully regardless of domestic political 

consequences. Also, the Pueblo crisis was not a critical factor in Ford’s decision on when 

to launch military operations. Mahoney asserts the contrary based on Kissinger’s and 

Ford’s memoirs, which contain a number of major inaccuracies. The Pueblo was not 

mentioned during the fourth NSC meeting when Ford decided against further delays. 

By then Ford had done what he could to prevent a humiliating hostage scenario by quarantining the ship and Tang Island. At that point the primary argument against delay 

was the threat of a sudden diplomatic or political development that might preclude the 

opportunity to use of force at all.79 

Other Noteworthy Explanations

University press books are the focus of this inquiry because they carry the presumption 

of academic rigor. What is interesting about the record of scholarship from these sources 

is how, despite an ever-increasing amount of primary data, they confuse rather than 

clarify the explanation for US decision making. The three most recent university press 

books use new primary sources to make valuable contributions to a fuller description 

of the crisis decision making, but they do not do justice to explanatory analysis.80 All 

three books largely jump from detailed description to findings and prescriptions, lightly 

passing over explanatory analysis, which readers must ascertain on their own. The deleterious consequences of this trend in scholarship have been explored elsewhere.81 The 

basic point is that devaluing explanation diminishes an understanding of the Mayaguez 

crisis and retards the growth of cumulative knowledge in the field. 

What is true for the field also holds for individual learning. Those wanting to understand the Mayaguez crisis and, by extension, what it can teach about crisis decision 

making need a careful examination of the best evidence for alternative hypotheses and a 

clear conclusion as to what explanation is best supported by the evidence. In that regard, 

we need to evaluate two additional explanations for decision making and outcomes in 

the Mayaguez crisis that have currency: faulty intelligence and misperception.

Faulty Intelligence

From the beginning, faulty intelligence has been cited as a key factor in explaining 

crisis decision making during the Mayaguez incident. Early on key leaders were upset 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

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by conflicting and frequently changing reports from the field. Kissinger makes this 

point in his memoirs, giving the faulty intelligence argument a big boost. His overall 

assessment was that “intelligence had been poor throughout. At too many stages, starting with the very first NSC meeting, decisions were made on the basis of information 

that had turned out to be almost totally wrong.” Kissinger said Colby’s first briefing 

to the NSC “turned out to be wrong in every detail” and argued that “in the absence 

of accurate intelligence, no meaningful course of action could be formulated.” More 

recently, Donald Rumsfeld has made similar arguments.

82

It is true that reporting on the ship’s location assumed it was being taken to the 

mainland and that assumption was incorrect. The Cambodians did want to take the 

ship to the mainland, but the wily captain of the Mayaguez convinced them it was not 

possible for technical reasons (e.g., broken equipment, shallow waters).83 Ford, Kissinger, 

and Scowcroft also were irritated by rapidly changing reports of the ship’s location. Now, 

however, with access to the NSC minutes and other data, we know Kissinger was grossly 

exaggerating the impact of poor intelligence. 

Colby’s first briefing was not wrong in every detail (he was correct in his depiction of likely Cambodian motives, for instance), but more to the point, those details 

were not critically important to Kissinger, who knew what he wanted to do from the 

beginning and just had “to wait for the means to do it to arrive on the scene.”84 The 

discovery that the ship was anchored off an island instead of moored at a mainland 

port shifted the debate from general punitive operations to those that would quarantine the ship and crew and punish Cambodia until they were released or retaken, but 

it did not change the decision makers’ priorities or critically impede the formulation 

of policy in the crisis. Indeed, we now know that Kissinger at one point argued for less

information on the crew’s whereabouts because it complicated the punitive military 

operations he favored. 

In the immediate aftermath of the crisis, Kissinger acknowledged faulty intelligence was not a major factor. Columnist Joseph Kraft, who called Kissinger on May 

16 for insider information about the crisis, opined the intelligence was “off,” particularly with respect to the location of the crew members.85 “You can’t blame them for 

not knowing about the island,” Kissinger said. “Why should the CIA have up-to-date 

intelligence on every island off Cambodia?” Kissinger went on to say intelligence 

believed some of the crew were moved off the island, but it turned out that all of 

them had been, and he again concluded, “You can’t blame them, the intelligence, for 

not having known that they were moved.”86 Schlesinger made the same arguments 

when questioned about “faulty intelligence” in a May 18 interview on ABC’s Issues 
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and Answers program. He said intelligence was not wrong; he and the other decision 

makers just did not know if the entire crew had been removed from Tang or not. And 

General Jones in a later interview said the same thing with respect to the location of 

the crew.87

The actual performance of the intelligence community during the fast-moving 

crisis was much better than characterized by senior leaders in their memoirs. Colby 

pushed back against those who wanted to blame faulty intelligence in his community’s 

postmortem report on intelligence performance.88 Recent scholarship agrees, concluding the problem was not so much poor intelligence as Colby’s (and others’) failure to 

sufficiently emphasize the imperfect nature of the incoming information offered to the 

NSC, which has been characterized as “a failure of expectation management.”89 However, General Jones did on several occasions remind the NSC that estimates of enemy 

strength were guesses, and the general discussion in NSC meetings acknowledged 

points of uncertainty. 

There were, however, two very real failures involving intelligence during the crisis, 

one of which has received much commentary and the other none at all. Congressional 

investigators quickly discovered that the Marines conducting the assault on Tang only 

received the initial intelligence estimate of 20 to 30 (or fewer) irregular soldiers defending the island with light weapons and not the later and more accurate assessments of 90 

to 100 Khmer soldiers rereinforced by a heavy weapons squad of 10 to 15 persons (from 

IPAC), or the DIA estimate of 150 to 200 heavily armed troops that circulated in the Washington area. The Marines also did not receive the May 13 report from an AC-130 gunship 

that its sensors suggested a sizeable ground force on Tang Island with at least three 

gun emplacements positioned in a one-hundred-yard curve.90 A 6,000-foot minimum 

altitude restriction also hampered the Marine assault commander, Lieutenant Colonel 

Randall Austin, when he conducted aerial reconnaissance of Tang Island in an Army 

U-21 aircraft. The minimum altitude restriction had been imposed by local commanders 

to protect Navy P-3 reconnaissance planes from 20- and 40-mm weapons thought to be 

on the Cambodian gunboats, but later permission was received to fly lower.91

A Pacific Command inspector general’s report later indicated the proximate cause 

of the Marines not getting the latest intelligence was that the command locations hosting the Marine assault forces were inadvertently omitted as addressees on message 

distribution. Other missed opportunities to get the intelligence to the Marine commander seemed the result of time pressure; unwieldy command structures (including 

the fact that General Burns did not have a dedicated intelligence officer); insufficient 

jointness; and, according to some accounts, personality conflicts.92 In light of all the 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

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factors involved, the egregious breakdown in intelligence dissemination is probably 

better understood as a command and control collapse than an “intelligence” failure.

The critical import of the failure to disseminate the updated intelligence to the 

Marines has been questioned for two reasons. Some argue the Marines had no choice 

but to fly into the teeth of Cambodian defenses given the mission they were assigned. 

Lieutenant Colonel Austin made his decisions on the assumption that he would be 

facing relatively few irregular forces but also in light of his assigned rescue mission: 

I learned of the Air Security Police Plan after arriving in Utapao. This, tied with 

the talk of leaflets and bullhorns [to inform the Cambodians of US demands 

for the release of the crew] led to the conclusion we would not be faced with a 

large force. Our major concern was devoted to how we would release the crew 

if the villagers were holding them as hostages. [I] just didn’t think this kind of 

intelligence existed.93 

Austin’s views on whether he would have landed elsewhere if he had known the higher 

intelligence estimate changed in the aftermath of the crisis and years later. He initially 

said he would have conducted the mission “more covertly,” but a little later said that, 

given the mission, he would not have changed the landing location in any case. 

Senior officers up the chain of command were also of mixed minds.94 Some argue 

the higher intelligence estimate would have required a reconsideration of the plan, 

and others emphasize that even those who had the higher estimate judged the risks 

acceptable given the pressure from Washington to act quickly.95 Like Austin, Burns 

seemed disposed to think of the Cambodians as an inconsequential force given the 

assigned mission:

I honestly believe—and people may deny it, but having seen the events that took 

place—the people in Washington were convinced that it was a very inconsequential force on the island. Otherwise they wouldn’t have had me be prepared 

to go in with 75 or 100 air policemen.96

At the same time, Burns later said he understood the mission was high risk, but again, 

the nature of the mission affected the risk assessment:

When the plan came forward on what we were going to do, it bothered me. We 

only had 175 Marines we could put in that first wave if all the choppers were 

mechanically sound and arrived. You normally like to have something in the 

neighborhood of 3-to-l superiority plus preparatory fire. I told them, “We can’t 

afford preparatory fire,” but I did say, “We can use 20-millimeter or gas.” [Later, 
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when] Hunt [Major General Ira A. “Jim” Hunt, his deputy commander] came 

and showed me where they were landing, I was really concerned. I thought 

that was an awfully risky operation because obviously they were going to be 

landing right within a couple of hundred feet of the inhabited area. He said 

he had been talking to the Marines, that the Marine commander had in fact 

flown over the island, and had selected the landing zone himself. I thought, for 

example, it might have made more sense to land in the south where there was 

no inhabitants that we knew of and work your way up. He said, “Well, I am told 

by the Marines who looked the island over that it would take them a full day to 

work from the south end of the [4-mile-long] island to the north. By that time 

the crew could all have their throats cut. If they could quickly envelop them, 

they had a better chance of securing the crew.” I said, “Okay, I will accede to 

the guy’s judgment that has to do the job.”97

Burns had the better intelligence on enemy strength and yet decided to trust the judgment of his subordinate commander, characterizing his plan as “gutsy.” He was unaware 

that the Marine commander made his decision on the false assumption that he would be 

facing a smaller force, but the general was quite aware that his superiors in Washington 

believed there were larger stakes involved and the risk of assaulting Tang quickly with the 

forces available was acceptable. Burns noted Admiral Gayler had raised the question of 

“why the hurry” a number of times and “the answer coming back from Washington didn’t 

really address that question” but rather “indicated that we should proceed.” So they did. 

After the crisis, Burns’s military and civilian superiors in Washington took responsibility and said they believed the assault on Tang was a reasonable risk,98 which raises 

the question of how military and civilian leaders in Washington calculated risks. With 

the NSC minutes now declassified, we better understand how the NSC assessed the 

risk of assaulting Tang. 

In his memoirs, Kissinger again blames the intelligence community for a faulty 

assessment of Cambodian strength: “We were told some of the crew were being held 

by only a very few Khmer Rouge guards” on Tang Island.99 Since Kissinger quotes the 

NSC minutes elsewhere, it seems he is dissembling on this point. In reality, the NSC 

members were told and assumed there were at least one hundred Khmer soldiers on 

Tang. In the third NSC meeting Schlesinger used the one-hundred Cambodian-force 

figure, saying it was a “Marine estimate.” It does not appear that he cited this estimate 

of enemy forces to downplay risk, however, because he used the figure to explain why 

the Pentagon “would prefer to land with 1,000 [Marines].” When Kissinger and Colby 

questioned why one hundred defenders should be such a concern, General Jones 
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explained the limited lift capacity, long cycle time, the need to split the Marine force 

between those taking the ship and those assaulting the island, and the fact that precise 

enemy strength was not known. When President Ford questioned the reliability of the 

one-hundred-defender figure, Colby observed it was probably reliable given that the 

Khmer regime had just arrived in power and probably not had the time to man the 

island with more defenders. 

What is still unknown is why Colby and other NSC members were using the IPAC 

estimate of 100 Khmer forces on Tang Island rather than the larger estimate of 150 to 200 

Cambodians that DIA put out and that, in retrospect, appears to have been more accurate. Colby was one of the decision makers encouraging fast action; thus, his response to 

Ford’s question about the reliability of the 100-defender figure might seem like wishful 

thinking, but it must be remembered that all the estimates of enemy strength were 

based on extrapolations and guesswork. Khmer forces on Tang Island were estimated 

based on gunboat activity and radio intercepts that suggested a Khmer battalion size 

force, which were known to be typically understrength (i.e., 200–220 rather than 540 

men). Since the actual size of the Cambodian defending force was unknown, it may be 

that the intelligence analysts working the issue and preparing Colby for the NSC meeting just decided to go with the IPAC estimate as the middle ground between a grossly 

optimistic estimate of twenty or so irregular forces and the DIA assumption that a near 

battalion-sized force had been placed on the island.

At one point in the NSC discussions, Schlesinger asked, “Is there any change in our 

estimate regarding the forces on the island?” Colby responded, “No,” indicating he was 

the final arbiter on intelligence estimates. However, it is not known how CIA analysts 

adjudicated the differing intelligence assessments. The intelligence community’s 

postmortem assessment ignores this issue,100 which really was an in-house difference 

of opinion between two Defense Department intelligence entities. Defense officials 

told congressional investigators “that the Defense Intelligence Agency and Intelligence 

Pacific did agree on the nature of the probable opposition” and ignored the investigators’ assertion “that the two estimates, which differed widely, were not reconciled.”101

There is some support for the assertion that the estimates were reconciled insofar as 

Morton Abramowitz, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for international security 

affairs (East Asia and Pacific Affairs), testified to Congress on the afternoon of May 14 

that “the estimated strength on the island was 100 Khmer Communists.” Presumably 

he would have given Congress the prevailing “best estimate,” and in fact he said he did, 

acknowledging “we may be very wrong about the size [of the Khmer force but] that is 

a best estimate.”102
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Whatever the explanation, the use of the 100- rather than the 200-defender estimate 

was consequential. With 100 defenders the NSC decided to delay a day until more forces 

were on the scene. Presumably with an estimate of 200 defenders, they would have been 

even more worried about a potential military failure. With only 175 Marines in the first 

wave, the attack was being made with about half the force normally recommended 

(a 1.75 to 1 rather than a 3 to 1 advantage). Assaulting 200 entrenched troops with a 

numerically inferior force likely would have forced a reconsideration of the operation, 

making it also more likely that decision makers would have considered waiting another 

day until more Marines and helicopters were on the scene. 

Misperception

Another line of reasoning used to explain the US response is misperception. Some 

sources conclude that US leaders, known to have been concerned about a repeat of the 

Pueblo affair, misperceived the dangers of the Cambodians holding the ship. Blinded 

by the powerful historical analogy with the Pueblo crisis, the argument goes, decision 

makers failed to consider that the seizure of the Mayaguez might have been a local 

commander’s decision rather than a centrally directed act of hostility toward the United 

States.103 In this vein it is often argued that if the United States had waited a little longer, 

the Cambodians would have released the ship and crew as they did in other cases. The 

disparity in the relative power of the United States and Cambodia is often cited as prima 

facie evidence that Cambodian leaders could not have had hostile intentions and would 

have released the ship and crew. 

Ford inadvertently gave this thesis a boost in his memoirs when he claimed his decision to not use B-52s stemmed from an intervention by the White House photographer 

David H. Kennerly. According to Ford, in the fourth NSC meeting Kennerly suddenly 

asked if anyone had considered that the seizure might be just the action of a local commander, implying there was no centrally directed or malign intent on the part of the 

Cambodian government.104 Ford said he believed the point had merit, so he ordered 

tactical instead of strategic bombing. By this account, Kennerly’s observation was a 

revelation that influenced Ford’s decision in favor of comparative moderation. Commentators frequently cite this passage from Ford’s memoirs as evidence that up until that 

point US leaders were operating under the misimpression that the Cambodian actions 

were centrally directed as a “deliberate provocation by the new [Cambodian] regime.”105

We now know that in the first moments of the first NSC meeting it was quickly surmised that the Mayaguez was stopped by a local commander on general orders to assert 

Cambodian sovereignty over offshore islands with their potentially “rich oil deposits,” 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

129

which were claimed by Vietnam as well.106 Colby explained this was the likely Cambodian motive for stopping the Mayaguez and other ships previously, and Clements later 

reminded the NSC members of the same, saying, “We should not forget that there is a 

real chance that this is an in-house spat,” with oil rights being the point of contention. 

Ford’s response was, “That is interesting, but it does not solve our problem,” a point 

upon which there was general agreement. Ford had already agreed with Kissinger on 

the overriding need for a demonstrative exhibition of US power, which rendered Cambodian motives of secondary importance. What was critical was demonstrating US 

resolve, and the discussion in the first meeting was all about punitive responses. Also, 

in a later Oval Office conversation with Kissinger and Scowcroft, Ford acknowledged 

that he was just using the B-52 option to encourage the Pentagon to conduct potent tactical airstrikes.107 For both of these reasons, Ford could not have considered Kennerly’s 

intervention eye-opening unless he forgot everything that he had previously said. Ford 

was either inserting some drama into his memoirs or just giving Kennerly, whom he 

considered “like a son,”108 a flattering mention. 

Many commentators echo Kennerly, portraying the Cambodians as innocent 

bystanders surprised by American belligerence.109 Cambodian intentions cannot be 

known with certainty, especially given their lack of formal communications to US authorities. However, the longer the crisis went on the more evidence there was that Cambodian 

behaviors were centrally directed and hostile to US interests.110 As has long been argued, 

the Cambodians did not just stop, search, and release the ship, thereby asserting their 

sovereignty. They fired on US reconnaissance aircraft and made determined efforts to 

get both the crew and the ship to a mainland port, at great risk to themselves and the 

crew. These behaviors made an impression on US leaders. Colby’s comment to the NSC 

was that Cambodians’ determination to get the crew to the mainland suggested they 

understood the value of the crew as hostages. Ford agreed, saying after the crisis was 

over that the Khmer Communists “didn’t search the ship and release it” but rather “took 

control and kept it,” inclining him to believe a confrontation was inevitable.

Later, more specific Cambodian behaviors were made known from interviews with 

the Mayaguez crew. The Cambodians repeatedly characterized the crew as “spies.” The 

Cambodians’ English-speaking interpreter told the ship’s captain that the crew could 

be held captive for “two months possibly,” but that only higher authorities in Phnom 

Penh could decide for how long.111 He added, “You must stop the bombing before they 

will let you go.” At one point, there was a press report suggesting the Cambodians would 

release the Mayaguez after “US apologies and return of Khmer aircraft that were flown 

to Thailand.” One hundred and one planes were flown to Thailand by pilots loyal to 
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the previous US-backed Cambodian government. Whether this was the quid pro quo 

the Cambodians hoped to obtain is not known. What is clear from crew interviews 

and communication intercepts is that Cambodian authorities in Phnom Penh told Ta 

Mok, the regional commander in Kompong Som, to release the crew in order to bring 

US military operations to an end.112 Considering the contents of the Tehran cable, the 

Chinese may have helped authorities in Phnom Penh understand that larger US retribution was on the way.113 

After the crisis, in a fifth NSC meeting, US decision makers again discussed the 

latest information on possible Cambodian motives. They surmised the Cambodians had 

moved the ship from the smaller island of Poulo Wai to the larger Tang Island because 

it was better defended. This, along with the fact that the crew was taken to the mainland for interrogation, suggested to Kissinger “that the operation was really centrally 

controlled.” Then, a few days after the crisis Kissinger sent Ford a memo updating him 

on what had been learned from debriefing the crew: 

The account given by the MAYAGUEZ Captain . . . does not, however, offer any 

explanation of what motivated the Cambodian authorities. From the Captain’s 

account, it appears that the decision to release the vessel and crew was not 

triggered by our military actions on Wednesday evening (EDT) [i.e., the assault 

on Tang and mainland airstrikes] but was probably tied to the threats of those 

actions and to growing American military presence and activity. That is, presumably, why the Cambodians responded to the Captain’s offer to turn off the 

American military if they released him and the crew.114

As Schlesinger later pointed out, given US objectives and Cambodian behaviors, it 

really did not matter how centrally controlled Cambodian behaviors were: “The fact 

of the matter is that we had to be sure that the Cambodian government acquired the 

responsibility at some point, because only the Cambodian government could deliver 

both the ship and the crew.”115 US leaders were intent on pressuring central authorities 

in Cambodia until they asserted control over their forces. At the same time, it is clear 

from the Cambodians’ own behavior that they understood the value of controlling the 

crew and were determined to put themselves in a position where they could hold the 

crew for an indefinite period. 

In short, there was little misperception on either side about the behaviors or motives 

of the other side. The Cambodians understood US behaviors and motives. They just 

responded too slowly to US threats to prevent US military operations, although releasing the crew when they did no doubt prevented worse from happening. US leaders had 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

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little to go on in interpreting Cambodian motives, but Colby appears to have gotten it 

right in the first NSC meeting where it was also agreed Cambodian intentions were of 

secondary importance since they were positioning themselves to hold the crew hostage 

if they concluded there were benefits from doing so. 

Correcting the Record

Recent scholarship has confused the basic explanation for US behavior in the Mayaguez 

crisis. Concern about declining US credibility was not a lesser, tangential concern or 

one among several or many influential concerns. It was the overriding concern of US 

decision makers and their controlling objective. All the new evidence from declassified 

documents makes this more evident, not less. Worse, however, scholarship has also 

forgotten or ignored the major intended target of the US military operations, which was 

not Cambodia or Southeast Asia but rather North Korea.116 Although US leaders hoped 

the resort to force would signal US resolve to protect its interests more generally, their 

immediate concern was the Korean Peninsula. 

All the key US decision makers believed North Korea was the most likely candidate to test American resolve, and the subject came up quickly and repeatedly in the 

NSC discussions during the Mayaguez crisis. Vice President Rockefeller insisted that 

“many are watching us, in Korea and elsewhere.” Kissinger was particularly adamant 

about signaling China and North Korea that they should not underestimate US resolve 

(see sidebar). When Kissinger argued, “We should seize the island, seize the ship, and 

hit the mainland,” he added, “I am thinking not of Cambodia, but of Korea and of the 

Soviet Union and of others.” Later he emphasized again that “the Koreans and others 

would like to look us over and to see how we react” and yet again: “I think we should do 

something that will impress the Koreans and the Chinese.”117 The day after the crisis 

Ford confided to the shah of Iran that he had perhaps “overreacted” in order “to show 

the Koreans and others our resolve.”118 In a phone conversation with a reporter after 

the crisis, Kissinger said Ford acted “decisively; enough so it didn’t look like we were 

blinking,” and then added “even China and North Korea,” thus identifying the countries 

he considered the primary participants in the stare down.119

Of the four tentative explanations for US behavior offered by Newsweek immediately 

following the crisis, the most accurate was the assertion that US military operations were 

a “two-day punitive expedition” designed to compensate for the “image of America’s 

despairing retreat from Indochina.” Newsweek also accurately identified the intended 

target of the demonstrative use of force; its reporters wrote that the Ford administration wanted to hearten allies and caution adversaries—“especially the trigger-happy 
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North Koreans”—by demonstrating the US could and would still aggressively defend 

its interests and honor its treaty commitments.120 

What Newsweek reported was common knowledge at the time. In 1975 US leaders 

emphasized their apprehensions about North Korea, and the media parroted them before, 

during, and after the crisis. Newsweek’s coverage was hardly unique in singling out the 

“trigger-happy North Koreans” as the target US leaders hoped to impress with the punitive 

strikes on Cambodia.121 The New York Times did the same, reporting that “leading Administration officials” said military operations during the Mayaguez crisis were “undertaken 

in part to alert North Korea and other Communist countries that the United States was 

ready to meet force with force to protect its interests.” Under the subheading, “A Korean 

Crisis Feared,” the Times noted that “there have been no overt signs that North Korea is 

preparing to attack South Korea,” but “administration officials have said for some time 

that the next major trouble spot in Asia would probably be the Korean Peninsula.”122 

Kissinger was the likely source for the New York Times article. He had been particularly diligent and forthright about his concerns in this respect. For example, he had 

been lobbying senators outspoken in their opposition to the Vietnam War to enlist their 

support in signaling North Korea that the United States would defend South Korea. On 

the day the Mayaguez was seized, these senators released a statement intended to head 

off a Korean crisis.123 Whoever the senior administration official was, he told the reporter 

that “he believed the North Koreans, at the least, would have to consider more seriously 

the American commitment to South Korea than they might have immediately after the 

fall of South Vietnam to the Communists in April.” The article also noted North Korea’s 

leader, Kim Il Sung, visited China in April “to seek support for an invasion of South Korea 

but apparently did not receive it.”124 

In Schlesinger’s interview on Issues and Answers, his interlocutor specifically asked 

him whether the “salutary” message delivered during the Mayaguez crisis had gotten 

through to North Korea. The interviewer wanted to know how the United States would 

react “if the Koreans should start something.” Schlesinger said the United States would 

apply the lessons of Vietnam, which the interviewer misconstrued to mean possible use 

of nuclear weapons. Schlesinger clarified that he was talking about “destroy[ing] the 

heart of enemy power,” rather than

simply spend[ing] our time parrying their offensive operations. Now, whether 

this is overwhelming power immediately, what the precise reaction of the 

United States would be, I cannot at this time state, but I would emphasize that 

it’s necessary for us to recognize, and the North Koreans to recognize, that the 

United States is bound by a mutual defense treaty to South Korea.125
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Other news media and pundits around the time of the event also underscored 

the extent to which North Korea figured in the US leadership’s calculations.126 When I 

interviewed Scowcroft in 1980, he volunteered that “to the extent that we were looking 

anywhere specifically, it was . . . Korea.”127 In addition to being worried about North 

Korea aggression, there was also the concern that South Korea, doubting US security 

guarantees, might be tempted to acquire nuclear weapons.128 Since then, however, 

scholars have forgotten or ignored the North Korean factor. For instance, the 1978 

Crisis Resolution study downplayed the decision makers’ concern with North Korea. 

The authors emphasized other elements of the international context and relegated the 

specific concern with North Korea to a footnote.129 The next two scholarly treatments of 

the Mayaguez noted the importance of North Korea. My 1989 book Belief Systems and 

Decision Making in the Mayaguez Crisis argued US leaders were primarily interested in 

a demonstrative use of force and that North Korea was the principal concern. It drew 

attention to South Korean anxiety about North Korean intentions: 

William Colby, the man responsible for providing the National Security Council 

with intelligence estimates, five years later remembered Kim Il Sung’s trip well: 

“Kim Il Sung trotted over to Peking and he was obviously trying to drum up trade 

for an attack in Korea. . . . The fact is, he thought, the Americans are weak, I can 

take advantage, why don’t I do it, all I need is support from my big sponsors.” 

The Japanese and the South Koreans had reached a similar assessment of North 

Korean motives. On 29 April, South Korean President Park Chung Hee predicted 

a North Korean attack sometime in 1975. On 10 May, two days before the seizure 

of the Mayaguez, more than one million South Koreans rallied in Seoul to express 

support for renewed vigilance against the North Koreans. Even politicians 

opposing Park Chung Hee’s government attended. The South Koreans adopted a 

resolution calling on the United States not to “forget the lessons of Vietnam” and 

urging America to strengthen its defense treaty with South Korea.130

Ironically, the concern about North Korea that was well understood decades ago 

has been obscured by scholarship since then. Vandenbroucke’s Perilous Options in 1993 

focused on the US “overreaction” to the seizure of the Mayaguez, but it noted that the US 

response “may have had a sobering effect on foes of the United States in Asia, helping, 

perhaps, restrain the North Koreans, who had been increasingly belligerent toward 

South Korea.”131 Both Guilmartin’s A Very Short War, published in 1995, and Mahoney’s 

2011 The Mayaguez Incident ignored North Korea, not mentioning it as a key concern 

of US decision makers.132
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The North Korean Factor

Recent declassified documents and other new materials reinforce the notion 

that US leaders were concerned about an aggressive North Korea. In the period 

leading up to the Mayaguez crisis, Kissinger was using David Rockefeller as a 

secret channel to the North Koreans with the mission of making sure they knew the 

United States would respond with alacrity to a North Korean attack.133 Kissinger 

personally delivered the same message to China. Three days before the Mayaguez

crisis, Kissinger met with Huang Chen, chief of the People’s Republic of China 

(PRC) liaison office in Washington, and other Chinese diplomats. A briefing paper 

from Kissinger’s staff encouraged the meeting, observing that although “we have 

no hard evidence that Kim came to China seeking support for military action 

against South Korea, it seems likely that he was reviewing his options in the wake 

of developments in Indochina.”134

Kissinger opened discussions with Huang Chen by saying he had read an editorial 

in the People’s Daily asserting “the United States is in a period of strategic passivity.” 

Kissinger explained how wrong and dangerous this misperception was:

My main point is that we are not in a period of strategic passivity, and we will 

not remain passive. We now need a brief period of reassessment, but in many 

respects we are in a psychologically stronger period as we don’t have to 

debate Vietnam every week. So, my main point is that we have absolutely no 

intention of remaining passive. . . . With respect to Korea, I want to make clear 

that under no circumstances will we tolerate a military attack on Korea, and a 

military attack on Korea will involve the certainty of American involvement. 

We will support peaceful evolution on the Korean Peninsula. We are prepared 

to discuss measures which would bring about the dissolution of the United 

Nations Command. And we will work to create conditions for coexistence 

on the Peninsula. But we are not prepared to accept another attack on the 

American presence.135

Kissinger also made his case for the North Korean threat to a group of liberal 

senators who had been outspoken in their opposition to the Vietnam War. In the 

period leading up to the Mayaguez crisis he tried to convince them that the danger 

of North Korean aggression was real and imminent. Coincidentally, on the day of 

the Mayaguez seizure these senators released a statement intended to head off 

a crisis on the Korean Peninsula. The statement’s opening line bore witness to 

Kissinger’s influence: “Let no nation read the events in Indochina as the failure of 

American will.”136

William Stearman, the NSC staff member who argued with Kissinger against more 

airstrikes after the return of the crew, noted in an oral interview that

I realized later the reason he was doing this had nothing to do with Cambodia. It was aimed at North Korea. At that time, we had a lot of intelligence that 

North Korea was planning to launch a strike against South Korea because 

they thought we had been so demoralized by the fall of Indochina that now 

would be a good time to attack. So Henry [Kissinger] was sending a message 

to Kim Il Sung by continuing the bombing. In retrospect, I think he was right. 
Explaining Decisions, Behaviors, and Outcomes

135

As a matter of fact, I was quite concerned myself about a possible North Korean attack at that time. Many of us were. There was a lot of intelligence that 

indicated they were seriously thinking about it.”137 

Two months after the crisis, Kissinger argued in a personal memo to Ford that his 

actions had reassured South Korea, but he also observed, “The Korean peninsula 

remains, however, the single most dangerous area in Asia.”138

Over time scholars have overlooked the focus on deterring North Korea for two 

reasons. The tendency toward descriptive, multivariate accounts of the crisis weakens 

understanding of the basic explanation for US behavior, thus diminishing the focus 

on deterrence and increasing the chances that scholars will also overlook the focus 

on deterring North Korea. Also, with the passage of time and considering the fact that 

North Korea never initiated war, it is natural for decision makers as well as scholars to 

downplay the concern about such a threat. For example, Kissinger does not even mention this motivation in his memoirs, preferring to talk about international perceptions 

of US resolve more generally. 

Yet those studying North Korea and its external relations per se have moved in 

the opposite direction over time. Scholarship on North Korea now stresses that it was 

clearly the case that Kim Il Sung in April 1975 wanted to reunite the Korean Peninsula 

by force and that he asked for Chinese support to do so.139 Even after being rebuffed 

by China, Kim continued to pursue diplomatic and military efforts to reduce international support for South Korea in hopes of setting the conditions for a successful 

conflict. Throughout the first half of 1976, North Korea pursued an all-out diplomatic 

offensive to build international support for a UN resolution to dissolve the UN Command in Korea and force the withdrawal of foreign forces under the UN flag.140 North 

Korea made considerable progress toward this goal before making a fatal misstep. After 

more than a year of escalating tensions with threats, destruction of UN Command 

property, and gang assaults on UN Command guards, the North Koreans brutally 

hacked to death two US Army officers with axes on August 18, 1976. The grotesque 

murders backfired, alienating many nonaligned states and severely undermining the 

North Korean diplomatic position. Observers at the time concluded the North Koreans 

wanted a lethal overreaction from the United States that would substantiate North 

Korean allegations that the US presence in Korea was aggressive and likely to trigger 

a war. However, under Scowcroft’s leadership the US response (contrary to Kissinger’s 

recommendations141) was a restrained show of force that produced no North Korean 

casualties. The restraint apparently worked to the United States’ advantage: “The 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

136

pro-North Korea draft resolution was withdrawn on September 20, just before the 

UNGA [UN General Assembly] was convened, apparently because of North Korean 

expectations that its resolution would be rejected while the pro-South Korea resolution 

would be adopted.”142

The United States continued to monitor Kim Il Sung’s diplomatic and military 

moves closely throughout the following year. In January 1976 a top secret military 

assessment of North Korea produced for the NSC noted two trends that were consistent with Pyongyang’s long-standing priorities. There had been an “across-the-board 

strengthening of military capabilities so as to enable the North Korean armed forces 

to implement a variety of military options with maximum effectiveness,” and an effort 

to “maximize the capability to move rapidly, undetected, and in strength from forward positions in close proximity to the DMZ [demilitarized zone].” Nevertheless, the 

assessment concluded, “We see no evidence either in these military developments or 

in North Korea’s political posture to suggest the imminence of an invasion or a major 

military probe.”143

US leaders never assumed a North Korean invasion of the South was imminent. 

They hoped and eventually believed China had turned Kim down when he requested 

support for war and that it was unlikely the North Koreans would risk an armed conflict without Chinese support. Yet they knew North Korean leaders were drumming up 

support for war and that they would initiate a conflict if they could secure the requisite 

support and take advantage of American fatigue and disarray. In order to deter China 

and other countries from siding with North Korea, Kissinger and other US leaders 

wanted to signal that the United States was ready and fully determined to protect South 

Korea—regardless of public opinion and congressional restrictions. For all these reasons, it is not possible to fully appreciate what US leaders were trying to do and what 

they thought was at stake during the Mayaguez crisis without understanding their deep 

concern about possible North Korean aggression.
A US Air Force surveillance photograph shows two Cambodian gunboats alongside the SS Mayaguez dead in the water off the 

island of Poulo Wai. Official US Air Force photo
Above: On the morning of May 

12, 1975, President Gerald R. Ford 

(right) listens in the Oval Office as 

National Security Advisor and Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger 

argues the significance of the 

Mayaguez seizure. Courtesy of the 

Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library

Left: In the Cabinet Room at the 

White House, Deputy Secretary 

of State Robert S. Ingersoll (left), 

President Ford, and Secretary of 

Defense James R. Schlesinger 

(second from right) during the 

first National Security Council 

meeting. White House Chief of 

Staff Donald H. Rumsfeld looks 

at an enlarged photo in the background. Courtesy of the Gerald R. 

Ford Presidential Library

Bottom left: Henry Kissinger (left), 

Vice President Nelson A. Rockefeller, and Deputy National Security 

Advisor Brent Scowcroft (in background) during the first National 

Security Council meeting. Courtesy of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
Top left: The director of the Central Intelligence Agency, William 

E. Colby, advises the National 

Security Council on the Mayaguez

situation on the evening of May 

13, 1975. Courtesy of the Gerald 

R. Ford Presidential Library

Left: Air Force Security Police from 

Nakhon Phanom, Thailand, volunteered to retake the Mayaguez but 

one of the CH-53s crashed, killing 

all eighteen policemen as well as 

the five-man helicopter crew. Official US Air Force photo

Bottom: The acting chairman of 

the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force 

General David C. Jones (standing), 

briefs the National Security Council on possible military options 

during the second meeting on the 

Mayaguez crisis. Courtesy of the 

Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
Top left: Henry Kissinger emphasizes a point during the third 

National Security Council meeting, 

where the fate of the boat with 

crew members on the bow was 

discussed. Courtesy of the Gerald 

R. Ford Presidential Library 

Left: President Ford (right) and 

William Colby examine a map 

of Cambodia during the third 

National Security Council meeting. Courtesy of the Gerald R. Ford 

Presidential Library

Bottom: From left, Donald Rumsfeld, Henry Kissinger, Brent Scowcroft, and Nelson Rockefeller hold 

an impromptu meeting following 

the third National Security Council 

meeting. Courtesy of the Gerald R. 

Ford Presidential Library
Above: On May 14, 1975, General 

David Jones—the acting chairman 

of the Joint Chiefs of Staff—shows 

aerial photographs of Cambodia 

next to a chart displaying arrival 

times for US forces during the 

fourth National Security Council 

meeting. Courtesy of the Gerald R. 

Ford Presidential Library

Left: Using visual aids, General 

David Jones explains the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff’s recommendations 

for military operations during the 

fourth National Security Council 

meeting on the Mayaguez. Courtesy of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library

Bottom left: James Schlesinger 

in the Cabinet Room at the White 

House during the fourth National 

Security Council meeting. Courtesy of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
Above: Admiral James L. Holloway 

III—the chief of naval operations—

makes a point during the fourth 

National Security Council meeting. 

Courtesy of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library

Left: White House Counsel Philip 

W. Buchen (left) and Donald Rumsfeld at the fourth National Security 

Council meeting on the Mayaguez.

Courtesy of the Gerald R. Ford 

Presidential Library

Bottom left: Henry Kissinger (right) 

and Donald Rumsfeld during the 

fourth National Security Council 

meeting. Courtesy of the Gerald 

R. Ford Presidential Library
Above: Henry Kissinger in the Oval 

Office after the fourth National 

Security Council meeting, advising 

President Ford on his upcoming 

meeting with members of Congress. Courtesy of the Gerald R. 

Ford Presidential Library

Left: Henry Kissinger (left) and 

James Schlesinger talking prior to 

a May 14 meeting with bipartisan 

congressional leadership regarding the seizure of the SS Mayaguez. Courtesy of the Gerald R. 

Ford Presidential Library

Bottom left: Representative Carl 

B. Albert, D-OK; President Ford 

(center); and Senator Mike J. Mansfield, D-MT, during the May 14 

meeting with bipartisan congressional leadership. Courtesy of the 

Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
Left: Gerald Ford and 

Henry Kissinger simultaneously gesture toward 

a map of the Cambodian 

coastline during their 

May 14 meeting with 

members of Congress in 

the Cabinet Room at the 

White House. Courtesy of 

the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library

Bottom: Senator John 

C. Stennis, D-MS, (left) 

pokes his finger into Gerald Ford's chest following 

the May 14 meeting with 

bipartisan congressional 

leadership on the Mayaguez. Stennis urged Ford 

publicly to “be as severe 

as necessary.” Brent Scowcroft is in the background.

Courtesy of the Gerald R. 

Ford Presidential Library
Top left: A US Air Force aerial surveillance photo from May 14, 1975, 

showing both the east and west 

beaches on Tang Island, Cambodia. Official US Air Force photo

Left: A US HH-53C helicopter 

coming in under heavy fire and 

tear gas on Tang Island. Courtesy 

of Wayne K. Stewart

Bottom: A US Air Force surveillance image shows Knife-23 (left) 

and Knife-31, destroyed CH-53C 

Sea Stallion helicopters, on east 

beach on Tang Island. Official US 

Air Force photo
Right: A port view of the USS Harold E. Holt in the Gulf 

of Thailand during rescue operations of the merchant 

vessel Mayaguez. The small landing pad is visible. 

National Museum of the United States Air Force

Below: US Marines from the USS Harold E. Holt

storm aboard the merchant ship Mayaguez to recapture the ship and rescue the crewmen being held 

captive. No one was found aboard the ship. Official 

US Marine Corps photo
Above: A US Air Force aerial surveillance photo shows the US Navy 

ship USS Holt (right) as it pulls 

alongside the container ship Mayaguez to allow the Marine boarding party to board. Official US Air 

Force photo

Top left: The Marines stormed the 

Mayaguez to recover the ship captured by the Cambodians. No one 

was aboard, but the crewmen were 

returned later by a fishing boat.

Official US Marine Corps photo
Far Left: Major Ray E. Porter 

(left) and Captain Walt Wood of 

the US Marines raise the American flag above the Mayaguez on 

May 15, 1975. Naval History and 

Heritage Command Vietnam Collection. Photo by YN3 Michael Chan

Left: USS Holt tows the Mayaguez away from Tang Island. 

National Museum of the United 

States Air Force

Below left: Merchant mariners 

from SS Greenville Victory discuss 

with Commander Robert A. Peterson (center), commanding officer 

of USS Holt, how they will prepare 

Mayaguez for a tow. Official US 

Navy photo

Bottom left: Sailors from the USS 

Henry B. Wilson rescue wounded 

Marines off of Tang Island. Courtesy of Wayne K. Stewart
Top left: USS Wilson gig returning 

with additional wounded. Courtesy 

of Wayne K. Stewart

Left: US Marines abandon their 

damaged CH-53 helicopter, Knife22, after an emergency landing in 

Trat Province, Thailand, during the 

Mayaguez operation. Official US 

Air Force photo

Bottom left: The sunken Cambodian patrol boat with .50-caliber 

machine guns off Tang Island that 

bedeviled U.S. helicopters; it was 

spotted by Nail-68 and destroyed 

by the USS Wilson’s 5-inch gun. 

Official US Air Force photo
Top left: The impact on Tang Island 

of the 15,000-pound BLU-82, the 

largest conventional bomb in the 

Air Force’s arsenal at the time. 

Courtesy of Wayne K. Stewart

Left: US Navy A-7 Corsairs conducting an airstrike on Tang Island. 

Courtesy of Wayne K. Stewart

Below: Smoke rounds fired by 

Henry B. Wilson on the eastern 

side of Tang and riot control agents 

delivered by A-7s drift out to sea. 

The Wilson expended 176 5-inch 

shells in support of the Marines that 

were instrumental in the evacuation 

from the eastern side of the island.

Naval History and Heritage Command Vietnam Collection
Top Left: US Air Force OV-10 Broncos such as this one provided critical battle management and close 

air support during the combat 

operations on Tang. Official US Air 

Force photo

Left: Two CH-53s making a rescue run under heavy fire at Tang 

Island, Cambodia. Courtesy of 

Wayne K. Stewart

Bottom left: USS Wilson loading 

its gig, code-named Black Velvet-1. The gig was used to provide 

fire support for Marines (Mayaguez and Holt in the background). 

Courtesy of Wayne K. Stewart
Top left: In the national security 

advisor's office on May 14, 1975, 

Robert C. "Bud" McFarlane, 

Scowcroft’s assistant, talks with 

the National Military Command 

Center, passing instructions to the 

Pentagon on airstrikes. Counselor 

to the President John O. Marsh 

stands nearby. Courtesy of the 

Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library

Left: View of the aircraft carrier 

USS Coral Sea underway in the 

Pacific, 1975. Courtesy of National 

Museum of Naval Aviation, Robert 

L. Lawson Photograph Collection

Bottom left: Smoke rises from 

a warehouse in the Cambodian 

port of Kompong Som (formerly 

Sihanoukville), bombed by aircraft 

from the carrier Coral Sea. Naval 

History and Heritage Command 

Vietnam Collection

Bottom right: Henry Kissinger and 

Brent Scowcroft (foreground) on the 

phones in Kissinger’s West Wing 

office discussing the Mayaguez

operations, having stepped away 

from the after-dinner coffee with 

Prime Minister Uyl of the Netherlands. Courtesy of the Gerald R. 

Ford Presidential Library
Top left: Secretary Schlesinger 

talks on the telephone in Kissinger’s West Wing office just before 

9:00 p.m. on May 14, ensuring airstrikes were turned back on. President Ford is seated in the background, having briefly stepped 

away from the dinner with Prime 

Minister Uyl. Courtesy of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library

Left: President Ford, listening on 

the telephone in Kissinger’s West 

Wing office as Secretary Schlesinger 

communicates with the Pentagon 

to ensure that airstrikes suspended 

by Ford after news of the Cambodian broadcast are turned back on. 

White House photo by David Hume 

Kennerly. National Archives

Below: In the national security 

advisor's office at the White House, 

Brent Scowcroft (back to camera), 

Henry Kissinger, and National 

Security Council staff discuss the 

contents of a US response to the 

Cambodian broadcast with White 

House Press Secretary Ron Nessen 

(center) on May 14. Courtesy of the 

Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
Above: Mayaguez crew returning 

on a Thai fishing boat after having been released by Cambodian 

authorities. Courtesy of Wayne 

K. Stewart

Left: Mayaguez crew boarding 

USS Wilson after their release 

by the Cambodians. Courtesy of 

Wayne K. Stewart
From left: on May 14, Brent Scowcroft, Scowcroft’s assistant Bud McFarlane, Henry Kissinger, and Gerald 

Ford in conversation in the Oval Office. McFarlane is informing the group that the Mayaguez crew has been 

recovered. Courtesy of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
Above: President Ford (right) and 

Henry Kissinger shake hands just 

after receiving news of the safe 

return of the Mayaguez crew on 

May 14, 1975. Courtesy of the 

Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library

Left: Donald Rumsfeld (left) offers 

his congratulations to the president after hearing of the Mayaguez crew’s safe return. Henry 

Kissinger stands in the background. Courtesy of the Gerald 

R. Ford Presidential Library
Clockwise from left: Bud McFarlane, Donald Rumsfeld, Henry Kissinger, Gerald Ford, and Brent Scowcroft 

comment on Secretary Schlesinger’s phone call informing the president of the Mayaguez crew’s release and 

recovery. Courtesy of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
In the White House Briefing Room on May 15, 1975, President Ford makes a statement to the media following the 

recapture of the SS Mayaguez. Courtesy of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
Above: AC-130 gunships such as this one provided fire support for Marines being extracted from Tang Island in the dark. 

Department of Defense photo

Left: Night bombardment of Tang Island by AC-130 gunships.

Courtesy of Shawn K. Salrin and Kohtang.com

Bottom left: The body of Marine Lance Corporal Ashton 

Loney, seen here under a poncho during a lull in the action 

on Tang's west beach on May 15, 1975. Loney was killed in an 

ambush and remains one of five servicemembers missing from 

the battle. Courtesy of Fred B. Morris
Left: A SEAL team ready to embark 

for a rescue mission for the three 

missing Marines lost in battle with 

the Khmer Rouge on Tang Island. 

The fate of these Marines—Private 

First Class Gary L. Hall, Private 

Danny G. Marshall, and Lance 

Corporal Joseph N. Hargrove—

remains open to speculation 

and controversy. Courtesy of Michael 

Chan

Below: Wounded Marines being 

interviewed beside the Coral Sea 

following the rescue of the Mayaguez. 

Courtesy of Raymondo Davis
137

F

oreign policy analysis arose from dissatisfaction with the assumption that states 

behave as unitary rational actors. Graham T. Allison’s classic study on the Cuban 

missile crisis, Essence of Decision, makes this point.1

 The book “focuses principally on explanation” because, Allison says, we naturally want to know why the Soviet 

Union and the United States acted as they did.2 “The logic of explanation,” he argues, 

“requires singling out the relevant, critical determinants of the occurrence, the junctures at which particular factors produced one state of the world rather than another.” 

However, Allison does not actually explain the missile crisis. He is straightforward 

about this, stating he did “not settle the matter of what happened and why.” Instead, he 

tried to “uncover many new or previously underemphasized features, and afford a rich 

source of hypotheses about the causes of various outcomes.”3 

Ultimately, however, knowledge can only advance if scholars settle on best explanations for discrete cases so that, over time, comparative analysis can yield discernable 

behavior patterns. Given the imposing data requirements of most decision-making 

models, anything less is difficult to justify. The point is to simplify and clarify alternative 

explanations for behavior so that they can be compared with the best available empirical 

evidence to determine the best possible explanation for the state behavior in question. 

Self-consciously examining alternative explanations helps reduce subjectivity and 

increases confidence in the findings. It also makes it easier for researchers with additional empirical evidence to update results in a compelling manner. One luminary of 

foreign policy analysis labels this a “disciplined-configurative” case study approach and 

contrasts it with a “configurative-ideographic” case study approach.4

 The configurativeideographic approach allows “facts to speak for themselves or bring out their significance by largely intuitive interpretation, claiming validity on the ground that intensive 

study and empathetic feel for cases provide authoritative insights into them.”5 

The argument here is that the configurative-ideographic approach has not served 

us well with respect to the Mayaguez crisis. Ole Holsti notes the danger of theoretically 

CHAPTER 7

Refining the Explanation | Rationality,

Bureaucracy, and Beliefs
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

138

uninformed case studies is that they will add “levels of analysis” that result in an undisciplined proliferation of categories and variables. It may then become increasingly 

difficult to determine which are more or less important, and ad hoc explanations for 

individual cases erode the possibilities for broader generalizations across cases.6

 

This is what happened with scholarship on the Mayaguez. Multivariate descriptive 

accounts of the crisis, combined with ex post facto assertions from prominent leaders 

that their primary objective was the safe return of the crew, have encouraged numerous 

mischaracterizations of the crisis as a “rescue operation.”7 Assessing the behaviors of 

decision makers while assuming they were primarily interested in rescuing captives 

rather than signaling North Korea and other countries has led to false conclusions 

about decision-maker behaviors, including the assertions that their decision making 

was plagued by cognitive dissonance and wishful thinking. 

If scholars researching the Mayaguez crisis had used a “disciplined-configurative” 

case study approach, they at least would have been obliged to consciously make an 

argument for the weight of the diverse explanatory variables they cited. However, too 

many researchers doing case studies of crisis decision making follow Allison’s example 

rather than his advice. That is, they propound multiple competing hypotheses about 

what motivated behavior without making a case for which hypothesis is best supported 

by the available evidence. Raising multiple explanatory variables without making a case 

for the most compelling one muddies the explanatory waters. 

Such confusion is unfortunate, weakening our understanding of specific cases like 

the Mayaguez and retarding the growth of cumulative knowledge in the field. It also 

is unnecessary—at least for the Mayaguez crisis. It is possible to imagine cases where 

multiple variables carry explanatory weight, and yet impossible to determine when 

and where they mattered. That is not true of the Mayaguez crisis. The evidence has long 

favored a singular explanation for US behavior that also distinguishes when secondary 

but reinforcing concerns (such as preventing a Pueblo-like humiliation) mattered and 

why plausible but ultimately false hypotheses with little to no explanatory weight do not 

(such as a desire to further Ford’s political fortunes). The abundant new data on decision 

making during the crisis reinforces the basic explanation for US behavior. 

Although the primary concern of US leaders in the Mayaguez crisis is now clear, its 

origins are not. At issue is whether the pursuit of a demonstrative use of force was something any leader occupying the White House would have embraced at that time (i.e., 

because they were driven by environmental circumstances), whether it was the product 

of bureaucratic struggle in the White House between influential leaders with different 

viewpoints, or whether it was because of some other factor. I considered such questions in 
Refining the Explanation | Rationalit y, Bureaucracy, and Beliefs

139

Belief Systems and Decision Making in the Mayaguez Crisis by comparing the explanatory 

adequacy of alternative decision-making models, namely the rational actor, bureaucratic 

politics, and belief systems models. Here we will revisit these models briefly and consider 

their relative utility in light of the new primary sources now available.

Rational Actor

The distinguishing characteristics of the rational actor model are the simplifying 

assumptions that the national state is a unitary actor making decisions in a manner that 

maximizes the chances of obtaining priority objectives.8 Thus, a rational actor explanation for US behavior in the Mayaguez would be inadequate if the behavior could not be 

explained on the nation-state level of analysis or if the behavior was insufficiently rational 

by the model’s criteria. Initially the Mayaguez crisis seems like an ideal candidate for a 

rational actor analysis because “the basic decision to respond with force was reached with 

unanimity, based on geopolitical rationale, and not marred by any major misperception concerning the nature of the circumstances surrounding the event.”9

 But in a 1985 

Political Science Quarterly article, I argued that a rational actor analysis of the crisis was 

insufficient, in part because the decision-making process was insufficiently rational.10 

Decades ago a strong case could be made that key decision makers “were unable 

to see that some of the decisions they supported ran the heavy risk of working against, 

instead of toward, their objectives.” According to this view, Kissinger wanted a convincing 

demonstration of American power but pushed for the use of force so aggressively that “he 

almost produced the antithesis of his affective concepts: an unmitigated military disaster.” 

Similarly, Schlesinger wanted a strong, proportionate use of force but resisted airstrikes 

that proved to be “the impetus for the release of the crew and the margin of victory in any 

assessment of which side took the worst beating.”11 We now know from new materials 

and particularly the declassified NSC meeting minutes that these arguments are flawed.

In reality, Kissinger was more moderate than depicted by postcrisis news reports. 

He backed away from supporting the B-52 strikes, which he agreed might entail too 

high a political cost, and he was careful not to rush the military response at the risk 

of failure. He preferred “overwhelming power” precisely because failed operations 

would be disastrous for the impression he wanted to make. He argued that, “on balance,” it was preferable “to get a more reliable force” and helped persuade Ford to 

accept a twenty-four-hour delay. He even acknowledged that another twenty-fourhour delay had military benefits but questioned whether it was necessary and if it 

sufficiently offset the political risks of a sudden diplomatic overture. He claimed he 

was not competent to judge the military necessity of further delay and called upon 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

140

Pentagon leaders to do so. With the full benefit of all Kissinger’s comments in the NSC 

meetings he attended, it is no longer possible to assert that he was not sensitive to the 

risk of military failure.

Likewise, we now know Schlesinger did not resist all airstrikes and that he wanted 

strikes sufficient to demonstrate to Cambodia that it made a grave mistake in challenging the United States. He insisted on controlling and sequencing air attacks to the 

extent possible, but he was not against airstrikes per se. In the third NSC meeting, he 

recommended to Ford that “we sink the speedboats” that were remaining, just not the 

fishing boat with suspected Caucasians. After the fishing boat was allowed to proceed to 

the mainland, Schlesinger again told Ford, “I think we should destroy the boats that still 

remain at the island [i.e., the patrol boats].” Later in the meeting he supported sinking 

twenty-five Cambodian patrol boats at Ream Naval Base. 

In the fourth NSC meeting Schlesinger argued there was value in the news media 

knowing US forces were massing and in discovering the use of B-52s was being debated 

because it reinforced perceptions that the United States was willing to punish Cambodia. He believed the United States would benefit from the perception that it was willing 

to use force but was also for exercising some restraint in the means actually employed. 

In that regard, he said the news media should be told about “selective” rather than a 

“few” airstrikes to emphasize the targets were carefully chosen. Schlesinger favored 

continuing airstrikes even after the Cambodian broadcast mentioning the release of 

the Mayaguez. He ordered the third wave to strike even though the crew was safely in 

US hands and even though he asked Ford whether the third wave should be diverted 

to help the Marines on Tang. He only canceled the fourth strike because of the unanimous conviction of his military subordinates that doing so was necessary to assist 

the Marines, and perhaps remembering that the president had agreed some planes 

from that strike group could peel off to assist the Marines. He also argued for delaying 

another twenty-four hours so that Tang Island could be attacked with more force (1,000 

Marines), which would have substantially reduced the risks associated with the island 

assault. With all this being known, it is clear that Schlesinger did not underestimate the 

importance of ensuring Cambodia paid a high price for seizing the Mayaguez. 

Decades ago, it was possible to argue that, collectively, the decision makers were so 

anxious to demonstrate US resolve that they unnecessarily rushed operations and almost 

precipitated a military disaster that would have diminished rather than enhanced US 

prestige.12 However, it is difficult to make that case today given the details of the decision 

makers’ extended discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of another twenty-fourhour delay (see the discussion on timing in chapter 6). There was not a rush to judgment 
Refining the Explanation | Rationalit y, Bureaucracy, and Beliefs

141

but rather an extended discussion that led decision makers to underestimate military 

risks compared with the political risks of further delaying operations. 

The military risks seemed lower because decision makers were assuming Tang 

Island was defended by one hundred Cambodian defenders and not double that number. All the service chiefs estimated the military risks of assaulting Tang as “acceptable” 

and advised the president that the military operations could be conducted with a high 

assurance of success. It must be said that the Joint Chiefs were proved correct. The combat operations actually cost fewer casualties than the estimated twenty to thirty killed, 

although it now seems nearly miraculous given the level of resistance encountered and 

the number of helicopters shot down. 

The risks of waiting seemed high to decision makers because they feared developments might preclude the opportunity for a demonstrative use of force. At any time it might 

have been discovered that the entire crew was already on the mainland or had already 

been killed by the Cambodians or that some new political development like a diplomatic 

overture precluded the use of force. These were realistic concerns, as brutal Khmer behaviors13 and the cable from Tehran reporting the imminent release of the crew demonstrate.

In sum, we now know key decision makers fully understood they could fail from 

using too much and too little force and debated the right force levels at length. It is quite 

possible to disagree with their risk assessments and priorities but no longer possible to 

argue they were insufficiently rational. More generally, and contrary to postcrisis leaks 

to the press that mischaracterized the debate in the NSC meetings as a donnybrook 

between Kissinger and Schlesinger, the NSC meetings were notable for the extended 

and candid debate about options for using force and its attendant risks.14 

For example, in the first NSC meeting, and before it was known that the ship and 

crew could still be quarantined from the mainland, the NSC debated means of coercion, 

considering the relative merits of mining the harbors, seizing a harbor, quarantining a 

harbor, and capturing an island with lucrative oil deposits. Schlesinger argued, “If we 

mine the harbor, they will simply sit. We have got to do something that embarrasses 

them.” Kissinger saw “a lot of advantage in taking the island rather than mining the 

port,” but said it was important to know “how big a battle it would be and other relevant 

factors.” When the subject turned again to mining the harbor, Schlesinger mused that 

it might be possible to “accomplish the same thing by quarantine as by mining.” But 

Kissinger thought that would lead to “a confrontation and a crisis regarding every ship,” 

and Schlesinger agreed that “we would have to be tough in such confrontations.” 

Much of the NSC meetings are devoted to that kind of give-and-take, exploring 

options and their relative merits. Thus, with the major exception that the president was 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

142

increasingly angry about perceived Pentagon efforts to thwart his will, the NSC minutes 

demonstrate that Ford ran a wide-ranging and reasoned discussion of alternative courses 

of action and associated pros and cons. After the crisis when some media accounts were 

playing up the feud between Kissinger and Schlesinger,15 the president’s political advisors 

insisted the NSC meetings were marked by calm deliberation and were not a “bareknuckle backroom brawl.”16 The detailed meeting minutes indicate they were correct. 

There is a more fundamental reason the rational actor model proves insufficient, 

however. The model’s assumption of a unitary actor precludes any understanding of 

the impact of individuals on the outcome of the crisis, which in the case of the Mayaguez crisis was profound. With almost any secretary of state other than Kissinger, 

diplomacy would have played a larger role. A decision in favor of issuing an ultimatum 

or taking the Tehran cable seriously—or at least sharing it with the NSC—or giving 

the UN time to play a role could easily have delayed military operations and perhaps 

stopped the assault on Tang Island. Similarly, it now seems clear that if Schlesinger 

had not insisted on strict rules of engagement for sinking the boats or had strictly 

followed Ford’s orders, the Mayaguez crew would have been killed when the fishing 

boat was sunk in compliance with Ford’s standing instructions. It is also possible 

that more aggressive enforcement of the quarantine might have prompted the Cambodians to retaliate by killing the crew and blaming it on US warplanes, which some 

evidence suggests they considered doing.17 In short, the rational actor model would 

have perhaps explained the general preference for a forceful response but not the 

actual decisions that determined the crisis outcomes.

Bureaucratic Politics

Bureaucratic politics is a subset of decision-making research that attempts to explain 

foreign policy decisions by examining what takes place inside the “black box” of state 

behavior assumed by the rational actor model. The central proposition in decisionmaking analysis is that “to reconstruct how nations deal with each other, it is necessary 

to view the situation through the eyes of those who act in the name of the state: decision 

makers.”18 The distinguishing features of the bureaucratic politics model are politicized 

decision making and decision makers with bureaucratic predilections and motives. 

Rationality is limited by leaders pursuing their department’s or agency’s interests in 

competition with other elements of the government. A bureaucratic politics explanation 

for US behavior in the Mayaguez crisis fails if the decision makers do not engage in bargaining, coalition building, and maneuvering for their own ends that affect outcomes, 

or if their objectives do not reflect their bureaucratic positions.
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My 1985 article argued a bureaucratic politics explanation illuminates the differences between Kissinger and Schlesinger and the lengths to which they went to secure 

their preferred outcomes but not their respective policy preferences, which could not 

have been predicted from their department’s institutional interests. Both points still 

hold, but the first point requires emphasis. With the new information available today it 

is especially apparent that the outcome of the crisis cannot be understood apart from 

the interventions of both men and their interaction.

Schlesinger and Kissinger fought an ongoing battle for influence inside the Ford 

White House that affected the outcome of the crisis. Kissinger withheld information from 

the NSC, slow rolled diplomatic efforts, and used his proximity and influence with Ford 

to engineer a demonstrative; disproportionate; and, with respect to the lives of the crew 

and mainland Cambodians, indiscriminate use of force that he thought would enhance 

the US reputation for use of power. Schlesinger used leaks to the press and control over 

military operations, even to the point of being insubordinate, to prevent what he thought 

would be a grossly disproportionate and indiscriminate use of force that would harm US 

prestige. Kissinger, backed by Ford, pushed back by demanding direct access to the NMCC 

for more timely information and to bypass Schlesinger with direct orders when necessary. Schlesinger and his Pentagon subordinates saved the Mayaguez crew by refusing 

to implement the blanket order to destroy boats leaving Tang and also likely saved some 

military personnel by reducing the number of airstrikes on the mainland. These actions 

also deflected more severe criticism of Ford’s handling of the crisis.19

Although the conflict between Kissinger and Schlesinger was reported even while 

the crisis was underway, the precise extent of their differences and how they influenced 

the outcome of the crisis is now much better understood. For example, their differences 

over the blanket order to sink Cambodian boats had a greater impact on outcomes than 

their differences over bombing. Also, it is now more evident that the differences between 

Schlesinger and Kissinger actually became a broader struggle between Schlesinger 

and the Ford White House, including Ford, Kissinger, and to a lesser extent Scowcroft20 

and others.21 

Kissinger was quite candid about his deteriorating relationship with Schlesinger in 

his memoirs. He discussed his policy differences with the defense secretary and noted 

they were substantive, not personal. “However justified Schlesinger’s grievances were 

initially,” Kissinger commented,

he let them run out of proportion. He resented my close relationship with Ford 

and mistakenly saw me as the principal obstacle to comparable intimacy with 

the President. What had started out as a perhaps legitimate grievance turned 
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step by step into a systematic effort to reduce my influence. Whether the issue 

was Cyprus or arms control, supplies for Israel during the Middle East war, the 

Mayaguez crisis or East-West relations, Schlesinger behaved as if he were the 

leader of the opposition to me in a parliamentary system.22

Over time these substantive differences between Schlesinger and Kissinger morphed 

into a larger problem between Schlesinger and the White House that reduced Schlesinger’s credibility and influence. By the time the Mayaguez crisis took place, there was 

already a track record of White House suspicion about the Pentagon’s reliability under 

Schlesinger’s leadership (see sidebar). 

Even before becoming president, Ford expressed his fondness for Kissinger23 and 

his dislike of Schlesinger. His first act as president was to ask Kissinger to stay on, 

promising he would work to get along with him.24 Ford respected Kissinger’s acumen and experience and also appreciated his self-deprecating humor and respectful 

cooperation.25 With Schlesinger, it was far different.26

While still vice president, Ford speculated he would keep Kissinger and cashier 

Schlesinger if he became president.27 As Ford indicated in his memoirs, and many others have corroborated, Schlesinger’s aloof and condescending manner irritated Ford.28

Substantively, prior to assuming the presidency, Ford objected to Schlesinger’s handling of congressional relations29 and, over time, to other aspects of his performance:

Within a week of inauguration, Ford heard that Schlesinger was taking credit 

for instructing the JCS to check with him on any orders from the White House 

during the presidential transition. The implication that Schlesinger wanted to 

preclude President Nixon from attempting some semblance of a military coup 

greatly upset Ford, who considered the move a slur against the uniformed military leaders and “an attack on the authority of the commander-in-chief.”30 Ford 

apparently never discovered that it was his own advisors (Philip Buchen and Clay 

T. Whitehead) who asked Schlesinger to be on guard against the possibility that

Nixon might refuse to leave office and “call on the military to bail him out.”31

Some of Schlesinger’s communication problem with Ford was the president’s 

own doing. Early on Kissinger obtained Ford’s signature on a memo from Ford to 

Schlesinger specifying that the secretary of defense had to communicate to the president through Kissinger on anything of policy import and through military assistants 

on any other matters.32 So, in addition to Kissinger’s proximity to Ford in the White 

House, he also managed to insert himself between the president and his defense 

secretary. Kissinger also cultivated the sympathies of the number two person at the 

Defense Department, which did not work to Schlesinger’s advantage. For example, 

the White House used Deputy Secretary of Defense Clements to investigate the flap 

about potential military loyalties during Nixon’s transition and also to summon Admiral 

Holloway as White House doubts arose about General Jones’s performance during the 

Mayaguez crisis.33

The Kissinger-Schlesinger Feud
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145

White House suspicion of Schlesinger deepened as Scowcroft and Ford received 

what they considered untimely and inaccurate information from the Pentagon at the 

beginning of the Mayaguez crisis.45 In the second NSC meeting Ford expressed irritation 

about late and inaccurate information from the Defense Department, asking do “you 

have people on the ball in the Pentagon?” “Quite a few,” Jones responded. But Ford did 

not back off, demanding to know how information was flowing to “Brent [Scowcroft] 

and then to me.” Scowcroft piled on, complaining about time lags and inaccuracy of 

the information provided. Ford then insisted on receiving information immediately, 

saying, “There must be the quickest possible communication to me.” 

Schlesinger tried to counter Kissinger. He tried to get Clements fired, which did not 

enhance his reputation with Ford.34 He also used White House restrictions on reporting 

channels to tighten his own control over the Department of Defense. When notifying all 

senior defense officials about White House instructions, Schlesinger instituted his own 

reporting rules—only he, Clements, or Wickham could communicate with the White 

House on national security or defense policy.35 Schlesinger also used leaks to the press 

to get his point of view heard, mostly through his public affairs spokesman, Joseph 

Laitin, which often irritated the White House (including repeatedly during the Mayaguez

crisis). Kissinger countered by keeping Ford informed about Schlesinger’s leaks, describing them on one occasion as “very damaging” and making “it look like you—or usually 

I—are not doing our own jobs just right.” The president was furious.36

Tensions between Kissinger and Schlesinger reached new heights during the excruciating withdrawal from Southeast Asia, an extended crisis that culminated the month 

prior to the Mayaguez crisis.37 There was friction over the timing of the evacuation, over 

Scowcroft directly ordering military forces to move, and how the situation was represented 

to Congress, all of which frayed relations between the Pentagon and White House.38

Kissinger explained the issues to Ford in a manner that was unflattering to Schlesinger.39

Kissinger ascribed underhanded political motives to Schlesinger and his department, saying, “C-141 transports were leaving Saigon each day with well documented 

empty seats to prove that, if there were any casualties, it would be someone else’s 

fault—Ambassador [Graham A.] Martin’s or mine.”40 With Kissinger controlling 

most communications to Ford on the matter, Ford not surprisingly came to believe 

Schlesinger was being insubordinate. In his memoirs Ford said he “later found out that 

many of those planes that I thought were being loaded were flown out empty” and 

“according to my sources, that order came from Schlesinger.”41

Schlesinger believed the Department of State did not appreciate the urgency of 

evacuating refugees and Americans. On April 1 he told Ford that South Vietnam had 

sixty to ninety days at most before collapsing. The country fell before the month ended.42

Schlesinger wanted Ford to order Martin “to remove Americans who may be in the line 

of advance.”43 Kissinger’s own head of intelligence at State, William Hyland, said Martin’s 

delays endangered both the American and Vietnamese lives Ford wanted to save. Hyland 

describes the Pentagon’s airlift operations as a “triumph for the United States,” but Ford 

thought otherwise and resented Schlesinger because of it.44 Thus, going into the Mayaguez crisis, Ford’s confidence in Schlesinger was already compromised.
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Ford’s frustration with Schlesinger grew along with his suspicion—correct as it 

turned out—that the Pentagon was not following his orders about sinking Cambodian 

boats. In the third NSC meeting, Ford raised the issue of insubordination. After Kissinger 

complained that the NSC was in the position of “debating with the pilot,” Ford noted that 

should not be the case since “I gave the order at the meeting to stop all boats. I cannot 

understand what happened on that order, because I heard that it did not go out until 

3:30.” Schlesinger had to insist to the president that his sources were wrong: 

Schlesinger: It went out by telephone within half an hour after you gave it. 

Jones: We talked to Burns, the Commander out there, immediately. The confirming order went out later. But our communications are so good that we can 

get all the information back here immediately to Washington in order to make 

the decisions from here.

Ford: Was the order given, and at what time, not to permit any boats to leave the 

island or come into it? I was told it was not given until 3:30. That is inexcusable.

Jones: That was the written order, not the verbal order.

Ford: Let’s find out when it was given.

Clements: To assist General Jones, I was with him in the Situation Room when 

he gave the order even before he left the White House.

Ford: Let’s find out what happened. It is inexcusable to have such a delay.46 

This exchange reveals an extraordinary lack of trust on Ford’s part. He was convinced 

his orders were being ignored and he was angry about it, as he later told Kissinger and 

Scowcroft during one of their Oval Office exchanges between the third and fourth 

NSC meetings. While encouraging Ford to be ferocious, Kissinger also encouraged his 

suspicions about Schlesinger and Pentagon foot-dragging:

Kissinger: I think you will have to be clear you want a strong effort. I think you 

should take out the port. The airfields aren’t so significant. You will take as 

much heat for a big strike as for a small strike.

President: As I recall, I asked Jones to come up with targets, planes, and 

strike plans.

Kissinger: But I have the sense the McNamara syndrome is so important that 

they will not be so ferocious. It may be the B-52 strike is too much. The Coral 

Sea may be better if they do it with vigor. It depends on the pilot’s instructions. I 

think Gayler is disastrous—McCain wouldn’t give us these problems. A pep talk 

by you to the Chairman in front of his DOD [Department of Defense] superiors 

will help get what we need. Using B-52’s may be paying too much of a price.
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President: We won’t have carrier strikes unless they can convince me they 

are meaningful.

Ford went on to say he was “disturbed at the lack of carrying out orders. I can give all the 

orders, but if they don’t carry them out. . . .I was mad yesterday.” Continuing, he said again 

that he would make it known that he favored the B-52s “unless they can show they can do 

as much with tacair,” which Kissinger thought was “a good way to get at the problem.”47

In the fourth NSC meeting Ford again expresses his distrust of the Pentagon. He 

was surprised that the USS Holt was not immediately positioned between the island 

and the mainland to interdict boat traffic. He said he was “amazed at this” and that he 

could not understand why the Holt was rushed to the scene if it was not to be used for 

interdiction. Jones said the Pentagon “did not want to tip our hand to the operation” and 

added that he did not recall any specific instructions to use the Holt for interdiction. As 

the crisis progressed, Kissinger weighed in with Ford to keep the airstrikes going against 

the mainland, trumping Schlesinger’s recommendation that the Coral Sea aircraft be 

used to help extricate the Marines. 

Schlesinger fought back, leaking Kissinger’s role to the press. In contrast to 

Kissinger, who clamped down on State’s public affairs office to assist White House 

image makers who wanted to underscore Ford’s management of the crisis, Schlesinger’s spokesman fed the press information. One such leak quickly caught Kissinger’s 

attention. Fred S. Hoffman of the Associated Press reported that while “Secretary of 

State Henry A. Kissinger favored tougher action,” Defense Secretary “Schlesinger 

was concerned about a possible overreaction.” Other news outlets reported the 

same theme with variations. The Albuquerque Journal said that “Kissinger wanted a 

quick and punishing strike even if the crew was put in danger” but “the defense chief 

advised caution for fear of over-reacting.”48 Kissinger saw the Associated Press report 

and called Schlesinger to complain just before 1 a.m. on the fifteenth. Schlesinger 

appeared ignorant of the news report, so Kissinger summarized the contents, telling 

Schlesinger “you and I differed throughout this” and that “you were for moderation 

and I was not.” Schlesinger changed the topic to the Department of State panic over 

Thai reactions to the US use of force, but Kissinger quickly returned to the purpose 

of his call. He emphasized the management of the crisis “was the best cooperation,” 

that he felt very good about it, and he encouraged Schlesinger to take the same line, 

trying to convince him that it was in the country’s interest for them to present a united 

front to the press and the world.49 

The next day, during a fifth NSC meeting where the results of the Mayaguez crisis 

were reviewed, Kissinger had an opportunity to stoke the president’s suspicions about 
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Schlesinger. In describing military operations, and airstrikes in particular, Jones told Ford: 

There were four waves. The first was armed reconnaissance. They did not 

expend ordnance. They found the shipping of other countries and did not want 

to take the risk. The three subsequent waves went against the airport, against 

the POL facilities, and against support facilities.50

Apparently Jones was not aware the fourth wave was cancelled by Schlesinger based 

on the advice of Brown and others. Kissinger says he saw Ford’s face reddening as Jones 

provided his explanation, but the conversation did not prompt Ford to articulate any 

concerns. The conversation carried on as Jones explained the operations against Tang 

Island. But then Kissinger returned to the airstrikes, asking “how many aircraft were 

used altogether.” Jones mentioned thirty-two to forty. Schlesinger then stimulated the 

president’s ire by adding “not the 81 that had been on the carrier.”51 

Either Schlesinger was so absorbed with his understanding of the value of limited 

force that he was unaware that he was on thin ice with Ford, or he was bluntly asserting 

his prerogative to manage the details of military operations to the president.52 If so, Ford 

recognized the challenge. Kissinger recalls that “when it became clear that the Coral Sea 

had made far from the maximum effort he had ordered, Ford interrupted the meeting 

and invited me to step out of the Cabinet Room with him for a moment. He asked me to 

summarize my understanding of the orders he had given.”53 Kissinger did so in a brief 

conversation that lasted less than three minutes, failing to mention that he had asked 

the Pentagon to put the first attack on hold while Ford considered the Cambodian 

broadcast. Ford “returned to the NSC meeting without another word” and “coldly” told 

Schlesinger, “Jim, I would like a full factual report giving a summary and chronology 

of what happened. It should include orders, summary results, photographs, etc., and 

indications of what we did when.”54 

The next day, May 16, Ford was still fuming when he again discussed the issue 

with Kissinger and Scowcroft, both of whom pointed the finger of blame at Schlesinger: 

Ford: My recollection is I told Holloway to continue the strikes until I said to stop. 

Scowcroft: That is my recollection. And you told Schlesinger. 

Ford: I want a detailed summary of the orders which went out and any changes 

which were made. I want an assessment of the operation—including the time 

sequence of takeoffs and what happened. 

Kissinger: You should ask for all the orders that were issued from the beginning 

of the operation. 

Ford: That should include the orders from the Pentagon to CINCPAC [commander 
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in chief, Pacific Command] and from there to commanders on the scene. I want 

the DOD submission compared with the orders issued in the NSC.

Kissinger: I think Schlesinger, when he heard the Congressional attitudes, 

changed the orders.55

Ford responded to Kissinger’s blunt charge of insubordination56 by saying the orders 

might have been changed by CINCPAC (i.e., Admiral Gayler). Kissinger was not dissuaded, stating that “the whole operation was conducted not as a military operation 

but in order to demagogue before the Congress.” Returning to the need to investigate 

Pentagon compliance, the president said, “It seems to me that what happens in the 

Situation Room is being bypassed by what goes on in the NMCC.”57

The memorandum directing the investigation was prepared for Ford, and he signed 

it and provided it to Schlesinger on May 18, giving the defense secretary forty-eight 

hours to provide “a detailed and comprehensive chronological exposition of events 

and activities” and “a copy of each order, verbal or written, which was issued directing 

military plans and operations.” He gave Schlesinger until the end of the week to make 

“any observations or suggestions which you consider would contribute to improvement 

in the ability of the National Security Council machinery to deal effectively with crisis 

situations.” He also told Schlesinger to conduct the review on a “very close hold basis.”58

Schlesinger’s staff saw the investigation as an opportunity to raise the issue of the 

reporting chain and to complain about the multiple direct White House orders issued to 

the NMCC, including those from Major McFarlane.59 Schlesinger decided against that, 

perhaps because, as he suggested to reporters the day after the crisis, he did “not believe 

there will be many inclined to persistently argue with what has been a laudable and 

successful operation.”60 He was wrong about that insofar as Ford was concerned. Ford 

remained furious over the insubordination he suspected in the case of the cancelled 

fourth airstrike and was determined to get to the bottom of it.

When the Department of Defense report arrived at the NSC, McFarlane analyzed 

it for the NSC staff. Then, reporting his findings, McFarlane said in a memo to Scowcroft that it appeared an honest effort had been made to comply with the president’s 

request for an investigation but that the information raised many questions. What most 

impressed McFarlane, a Marine, were the “serious deficiencies in the planning and execution of the fire support plan” for the Marines. However, he also noted “breakdowns in 

command and control over mainland air strikes.” He observed the “temporary suspension of the first wave” resulted in a halt to all strikes by General Brown. Orders to turn 

it back on were issued, but he says that, “mysteriously,” “no ordnance was delivered by 

the first wave.”61 He made no mention of the fourth wave, which is the one that really 
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upset the president, but questioned the small number of aircraft sent in each wave and 

the long separation between the launch of the first and second wave.62

Ford said the Pentagon response to his inquiry into the cancellation of the fourth 

strike was “not satisfactory” and that he never resolved the issue, deciding to “let the 

matter drop” because the operation had been successful. Yet Ford still held Schlesinger 

accountable, and a few months later he fired Schlesinger. Ford had multiple reasons 

for letting Schlesinger go, but a primary and perhaps decisive reason was Schlesinger’s 

insubordination during the Mayaguez crisis.63 Kissinger seems to agree, noting in his 

memoirs that “although no heads rolled then, Ford never recovered confidence in his 

Secretary of Defense.”64 Certainly Ford always associated Schlesinger with contravening 

his orders for the fourth airstrike. Years later the incident loomed large in his explanation 

as to why he dismissed Schlesinger. He said that he had ordered mainland strikes and 

“after one strike, [Schlesinger] terminated them without getting further orders from me. 

It was a deliberate case as I understand it, of not carrying out the order of the commander 

in chief. I don’t know why.”65 For his part, Schlesinger was angry about his dismissal, no 

doubt believing he had served Ford better than Ford understood.66

The extent to which Kissinger and Schlesinger struggled to implement their preferred approach to their shared objectives is more evident now and certainly accords with 

behaviors predicted by the bureaucratic politics model.67 However, it remains the case 

that their respective policy positions could not have been predicted from their department’s institutional interests—which is a common complaint about the bureaucratic 

politics model that has been discussed at length previously.68 But for a quick reprise, the 

behavior of the secretary of defense in the Mayaguez crisis and the Joint Chiefs contradicted the assumption of the leading advocate of the bureaucratic politics model that the 

military prefers a minimum of restraint if called upon to use force. A case can be made 

that Schlesinger’s preferences were generally consistent with historic military ethos 

that emphasize proportional and discriminate use of force, but they were not identical. 

Schlesinger favored a punitive response; he just did not want it on the scale that 

Kissinger and others recommended because he feared a counterproductive political 

backlash. He also wanted the punishment sequenced in a way he believed would be 

more likely to coerce the release of the crew, after which the punitive destruction of 

Cambodian naval assets could take place. Schlesinger refereed a difference of opinion 

between the Air Force and the Navy over the use of B-52s at the front end of the crisis, 

ensuring that debate ended consistent with his preferences. He also opposed turning off 

mainland strikes after learning of the Cambodian broadcast, whereas his subordinates 

canceled all strikes until the situation was clarified. 
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Schlesinger took advice from his subordinates, but he never acted inconsistently 

with his own beliefs and objectives. He crafted the original rules of engagement that 

ensured careful vetting of boats before lethal force was used, and when those rules 

led to a question about attacking the fishing boat with the crew members, he argued 

against indiscriminate use of force that would have collapsed any public support for the 

military operations. When Generals Wickham and Pauly took the initiative to stonewall 

the White House on sinking boats suspected of carrying Mayaguez crew, Schlesinger 

backed them up and later even assumed responsibility for the decision, claiming the 

behavior as his own. Schlesinger accepted the chairman of the Joint Chiefs’ recommendation to focus on extracting the Marines without further casualties after the third 

wave bombed the mainland and to divert (in effect, cancel) the fourth wave for the same 

reason, but those decisions were consistent with his own preferences as his telephone 

conversations with Ford reveal.69 

The nation’s chief diplomat more assertively defied his department’s institutional 

interests. Kissinger argued for and helped engineer a strong and quick military action 

and assisted this course of action by foregoing diplomatic opportunities. In sum, it still 

holds true that the belief systems of key decision makers had “more influence on their 

respective bureaucracies than vice versa,” and that in the secretary of state’s case, “the 

State Department operated as a virtual appendage of Kissinger’s belief system.”70 Thus, 

the Mayaguez crisis substantiates previous research that concluded “the bureaucratic 

politics paradigm is useful in crisis studies mainly for its account of the bargaining 

process” rather than for an “explanation of why people’s attitudes differ.”71 

Belief Systems

Belief systems analysis is also a subset of decision making research. Like bureaucratic 

politics, it acknowledges senior leaders compete to promote their own agendas. However, it ascribes the origins of senior leader preferences to their belief systems rather than 

the interests of the organizations they lead. Belief systems are “the set of lenses through 

which information concerning the physical and social environment is received,” which 

“orients the individual to his environment, defining it for him and identifying for him 

its salient characteristics.”72 Belief system analysis tends to focus on the most senior 

leaders and often the titular leader in particular: presidents, prime ministers, and other 

heads of state.73 A body of belief system research has focused on crisis decision making 

because crises accentuate the role of the most senior leaders “making cognitive theories 

potentially more relevant,”74 as proved true during the Mayaguez crisis. A belief system 

explanation for US behavior would prove inadequate if the decision makers’ behaviors 
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did not reflect their established belief systems, or if their beliefs were the same that any 

decision maker in similar circumstances would have held—which would suggest the 

decisions were driven by environmental factors.

My 1985 article argued that “the general desire to use force was perfectly predictable from common knowledge of key decision makers’ belief systems” and that senior 

leaders with different belief systems “would have reacted to the seizure of the Mayaguez differently.”75 The divisive Vietnam War reinforced a schism in the belief systems 

of senior American foreign policy experts. Those who supported the war believed the 

Vietnam experience validated the assumption that one country falling to Communism 

made it much more likely its neighbors would fall as well (the so-called domino theory) and underscored the necessity of honoring alliance commitments.76 In contrast, 

critics of the war effort believed Vietnam illustrated the need to scale down the United 

States’ international role and cooperate more with the UN. Thus, if the latter group had 

occupied the White House in May 1975, the Mayaguez crisis would have been managed 

differently. This assertion was further substantiated by comparing key leader beliefs in 

similar crises, particularly the Pueblo and Iranian hostage crises, where US leaders with 

different beliefs decided against the use of force.77

Declassified documents support these claims. On the day the Mayaguez was seized, 

Kissinger forwarded a memorandum on the “Lessons of Vietnam” to Ford that argued

we need to shore up our positions elsewhere once our position in Vietnam is 

lost. We may be compelled to support other situations much more strongly in 

order to repair the damage and to take tougher stands in order to make others 

believe in us again.78 

Similarly, after the crisis, Kissinger recommended that Ford exploit the results to reinforce perceptions of American resolve. When preparing Ford for his meeting with the 

shah of Iran the day after the crisis, Kissinger recommended that Ford “tell [the shah] 

you used more force than necessary.” Ford did so, telling the shah that “we perhaps overreacted, to show the Koreans and others our resolve,” adding the American response 

“showed the world we weren’t hamstrung.”79

These declassified documents and conversations demonstrate that the decision 

makers made the same points privately that they did publicly,80 albeit with less reserve. 

As noted in the introductory chapter, Ford, Kissinger, and Schlesinger repeatedly went 

on public record explaining their concerns in the months leading up to the Mayaguez 

incident. They emphasized the deleterious consequences of the Communist victories 

in Cambodia and Vietnam, which ended thirty years of determined efforts by both 
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153

Republican and Democratic presidents to keep Indochina noncommunist. They 

appealed repeatedly to Congress for enough aid to forestall the demise of the two 

countries and argued their fall would precipitate a crisis in the credibility of US security 

guarantees. As a congressman, Ford habitually supported the use of American military 

force in Indochina, including bombing,81 and said he believed the domino theory was 

essentially correct. After Southeast Asia fell and US forces were evacuated, Ford was 

“damned mad” about his countrymen’s refusal to graciously accept the resultant flood 

of refugees. He said he was concerned about the further expansion of Communism 

and international perceptions of US weakness. Concerned about perceptions of US 

weakness, Ford was quoted prior to the Mayaguez crisis as saying “I have to show some 

strength in order to help us . . . with our credibility in the world.”82 

Kissinger was even more emphatic about the validity of the domino theory in terms 

of the impact on US credibility. He said, “I know it is fashionable to sneer at the word 

domino theory [yet] letting Vietnam and Cambodia go down the tube would have serious 

consequences in terms of our credibility.” He believed the Southeast Asian debacle would 

inevitably lead other nations to test the will of the United States. When asked by a reporter 

if $150 billon and 55,000 American lives had not proved America’s will and credibility, 

Kissinger’s response was that past sacrifice notwithstanding, Indochina was dependent 

on US aid and if the aid was not forthcoming the United States would be held accountable. 

Kissinger so consistently reiterated warnings of an impending credibility crisis that he 

was asked during an interview on April 12 whether his harping on the topic made it a selffulfilling prophecy. “No,” he replied, arguing the problem would not go away by ignoring 

it. After the fall of Vietnam, Kissinger told reporters off the record that “the United States 

must carry out some act somewhere in the world which shows its determination to continue to be a world power.”83 During the crisis, he explained the stakes to his audience in 

Missouri: “Given our central role, a loss in our credibility invites chaos.”84 

Scowcroft, one of only three men privy to foreign policy formulation in the White 

House, was also judged a key leader during the crisis. Like Kissinger, he believed the 

domino theory was valid in terms of its effects on confidence and credibility, even if his 

subordinate role precluded making public statements to that effect at the time. Inside 

the White House he was regarded as Kissinger’s alter ego by Ford and others because 

the two men worked so closely together and were the only two who briefed Ford daily 

on national security issues. Scowcroft later explained, “We worked so well together 

because we had similar outlooks and because we in fact knew what the other would 

have thought, would have done, in a particular circumstance. So while we had a few 

very sharp disagreements, there were rarely disagreements of philosophy.” At the time 
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of the Mayaguez crisis, he too believed it was essential to “project an air of strength 

and confidence and decisiveness to our friends; that they could still rely on the United 

States.”85 Scowcroft also shared Kissinger’s preference for erring on the side of too much 

rather than too little force, supporting the B-52 strikes. 

Like Ford and Kissinger, Secretary Schlesinger proclaimed the domino theory 

“overly discredited” and predicted the fall of Cambodia and Vietnam could be disastrous for US credibility. Schlesinger joined Ford and Kissinger in pushing a recalcitrant 

Congress to provide funds for Cambodia and South Vietnam, even evoking the onus 

of national disgrace: “Other great powers in history have earned the term perfidious 

because of their desertion of their allies, and I would hate to see the United States earn 

that particular reputation.” He bluntly said it was important that the fall of Indochina 

“clearly be marked as the result of the ineptitude of the [Cambodian and South Vietnamese] governments rather than due to a cutoff of American aid,” and he joined Ford 

and Kissinger in pressuring Congress to provide funds to forestall defeat.86 

In sum, all four decision makers shared some similar, salient beliefs about their 

extant international environment. They believed a growing perception of US impotence 

was threatening and inimical to US interests. They expected a test of American security 

guarantees, most likely from North Korea, which served as a common focal point for 

the decision makers’ acute angst about declining American credibility. Their concerns, 

expressed publicly and privately, were so evident that Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore’s prime 

minister who was visiting the White House a week before the Mayaguez was seized, 

came away with a clear impression of the US leadership’s frame of mind, saying that 

“they are looking for a crisis.”87

Belief systems researchers sometime label such beliefs about behaviors in the 

international system as “cognitive concepts,” which in the Mayaguez crisis drove the 

decision makers “affective concepts,” that is, their perceived interests and objectives. 

Another category of beliefs are the actor’s perceptions about the options available for 

a decision, which can be referred to as “procedural concepts.”88 In the Mayaguez crisis 

most of the key decision makers had some particular and less visible beliefs that were 

not evident from their public statements prior to the crisis. These concerns manifested 

themselves forcefully during the crisis but could only be reconstructed in retrospect 

after examining crisis behaviors.

Kissinger, for example, had specific views on the use of military force in crises. By 

1975 he was already a veteran of several such crises and had reached some conclusions 

about the use of force. He believed it was better to use too much rather than too little 

force, and to use it quickly before the opportunity to do so was lost. He was particularly 
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chagrined at the US performance during the EC-121 crisis. He mentioned the lessons 

he drew from this incident in his memoirs but also to Ford during the Mayaguez crisis. 

He thought it demonstrated that

a leisurely process of decision-making creates a presumption in favor of 

eventual inaction. . . . In a crisis boldness is the safest course. Hesitation 

encourages the adversary to persevere, maybe even raise the ante. . . . Overall, 

I judge our conduct in the EC-121 crisis as weak, indecisive and disorganized. . . . I believe we paid for it in many intangible ways, in demoralized 

friends and emboldened adversaries.89

In addition to moving quickly, Kissinger believed Vietnam demonstrated the need to 

use more rather than less force:

The bane of our military actions in Vietnam was their hesitancy; we were always 

trying to calculate with fine precision the absolute minimum of force. . . . Perhaps the most difficult lesson for a national leader to learn is that with respect 

to the use of military force, his basic choice is to act or to refrain from acting. 

He will not be able to take away the moral curse of using force by employing 

it halfheartedly or incompetently. There are no rewards for exhibiting one’s 

doubts in vacillation; statesmen get no prizes for failing with restraint. Once 

committed they must prevail.90

With the benefit of declassified NSC meeting minutes and conversations between 

Kissinger and the president, it is now clear that the secretary’s behavior perfectly 

reflected these beliefs. His concern that indecision and weakness led to demoralized 

friends and emboldened adversaries weighed heavily on Kissinger in the Mayaguez 

crisis, and his belief that power must be committed decisively or not at all reflected his 

advice to the president during the crisis. Believing American prestige was fast approaching a nadir, the last thing Kissinger wanted was an emboldened North Korea or another 

American military failure due to halfhearted use of force. 

Schlesinger shared Kissinger’s concern about American credibility but not his 

predilection for rapid and overpowering military force. The Vietnam experience 

inclined him to believe disproportionate and indiscriminate use of force would 

tarnish US prestige and elicit a political backlash. After the crisis was over he underscored his preference for a proportional and discriminate use of military force by 

saying US military operations were a “very prudent use of force” that constituted a 

“firm and measured response to the highhanded and crude use of force” and one that 
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compared favorably with the period before he became secretary of defense “when we 

were running a thousand, approximately, B-52 sorties a month and several thousand 

tactical air sorties.”91

The only belief that seemed to weigh particularly heavy with Scowcroft was 

the Pueblo analogy. Kissinger never mentioned the Pueblo incident and was more 

impressed by the parallels with the EC-121 crisis. In NSC deliberations Schlesinger 

emphasized the Cambodians already had the crew and could kill them at will, so 

preventing another Pueblo-type incident was a moot issue from his point of view. 

Later he said he hardly remembered any discussion of the Pueblo and that it had 

not influenced his own thinking. Scowcroft, however, was very aware of the Pueblo

analogy and was anxious to prevent its repetition by blocking the movement of the 

ship and crew to the mainland. He thought the Pueblo very naturally came to mind 

and, although he did not know if it was a stronger preoccupation on his part than 

anyone else’s, said, “I know I felt very strongly about it.”92 Following the crisis Scowcroft repeatedly explained the decision making by referring to the desire to prevent 

a recurrence of the Pueblo incident.93 

Perhaps befitting a new president leaning on the advice of his national security 

experts, none of Ford’s discernible beliefs differed substantially from his subordinates’ 

views, or more specifically, from Kissinger’s and Scowcroft’s. His growing conviction 

before and especially during the crisis that he could not trust the Pentagon under 

Schlesinger to execute his orders fully and with alacrity inclined the White House to 

monitor operations more closely and open direct channels to the NMCC. However, this 

degree of intense oversight had no discernible impact on outcomes. Concern about 

Pentagon compliance led to the late-night third NSC meeting, during which Ford made 

the decision to let the fishing boat proceed to the mainland. This was Schlesinger’s recommendation, which Kissinger eventually seconded, and which Ford finally accepted. 

If the meeting had not taken place, Schlesinger would have been free to pursue his 

preferences, and the outcome likely would have been the same. One might argue that 

intense White House supervision inclined the Pentagon to comply with White House 

preferences for hasty operations, but the NSC minutes belie this interpretation. There 

was obvious White House interest in moving before the opportunity for military operations was lost, but no one wanted a military failure. The reason operations were not 

postponed an additional twenty-four hours, as Schlesinger and Jones personally preferred, is that the USS Hancock was further delayed and because the Joint Chiefs favored 

taking action. So, Jones faithfully passed along their collective recommendation and 

assurance that the operations had a high chance of success. 
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It is possible that if Ford had trusted Schlesinger more than he trusted Kissinger, he 

might have accepted some of his recommendations on the ultimatum or operational 

delays, and doing so could have dramatically changed outcomes. But there was no 

chance of such a development going into the crisis, and his distrust of Schlesinger intensified during the crisis. The only outcome that might have been changed by a lessening 

of Ford’s anger was Schlesinger being fired. If Schlesinger had better communicated the 

reason for the cancellation of the fourth strike, and perhaps reminded the president that 

he said the strike could be divided between attacking the mainland and assisting the 

Marines, it might have mollified the president. However, even that is doubtful since Ford 

was correct in his understanding that the Pentagon was choosing not to automatically 

sink boats as he ordered.94 Thus, Ford’s suspicions about Schlesinger and the Pentagon—which were correct to some extent, if not in all particulars— doomed Schlesinger 

as secretary of defense but otherwise had no impact on crisis outcomes.

The correlation between precrisis beliefs and crisis behavior was compelling, particularly for Secretary Kissinger. He predicted the United States was going to be tested 

in an international crisis, probably by the North Koreans. He feared America would 

lack the will to respond. When he heard the news of the Mayaguez’s seizure, he moved 

quickly to convince Ford of the situation’s seriousness and argued forcefully in the first 

NSC meeting for a demonstrative military response. In Kansas City he publicly predicted 

a quick and firm American reaction, which is what happened. He stifled a plan to give 

the Cambodians a deadline that might have complicated military operations, and he 

argued repeatedly for using more rather than less force. His diplomatic communications 

were threats of retaliation, and his appeals to the UN were delayed until they could 

not affect military operations. Direct communications with the Cambodians were 

ignored in favor of using the slower and less-effective international news media, and 

he chose not to share with the NSC the news that the Chinese expected the crew to be 

released soon. He constantly briefed and guided the president, twice encouraging him 

to launch additional airstrikes even though the crew had been safely returned. Kissinger 

prevented a repeat of what he considered an inept handling of the EC-121 crisis, and 

he was ecstatic with the results. Not only had he signaled American determination to 

a doubting world and a belligerent North Korea, he also reaped the unexpected bonus 

of the safe recovery of the crew, which precipitated a significant but short-lived boost 

in Ford’s popularity and the attendant perception that America could and would still 

use force to protect its interests.

Schlesinger’s behavior also consistently reflected his belief system. He favored 

making an example out of Cambodia but wanted a proportionate and discriminate 
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military response that was managed to minimize any military blunders, including 

unacceptable collateral damage—particularly to the Mayaguez crew. He wanted to 

concentrate on Tang Island, where he preferred delaying and using more force, and 

on Cambodian naval assets, which he wanted attacked with great care. He wanted to 

avoid disproportionate airstrikes on the mainland and particularly the use of B-52s, 

thinking they would constitute overkill and foster an image of a blundering America 

lashing out indiscriminately. Although he lacked Kissinger’s access and influence with 

the president, he had the advantage of controlling the details of military operations. His 

behaviors—both his advice to the president and his orders to his subordinates—closely 

reflected his beliefs, even to the point of insubordination. He ensured decisions to sink 

each Cambodian naval asset were made in Washington, and he disregarded orders to 

the contrary from the White House. He argued repeatedly against B-52s, for delaying 

military operations, and against taking undue risk with the lives of the crew. He did his 

best to ensure mainland attacks were limited and discriminate, and he ignored Ford’s 

order for a final strike against the mainland when it became clear it could only be conducted by accepting greater risk to the Marines. 

Scowcroft shared Kissinger’s reluctance to take chances on calculating “with fine 

precision the absolute minimum of force.” He generally supported more rather than 

less force, including B-52 strikes. On other issues, such as the ultimatum or timing 

of military operations, he agreed with Kissinger or remained silent. Scowcroft rarely 

spoke in the NSC meetings, and when he did, it was only to provide factual information. 

However, during the second NSC meeting, with Kissinger absent in Kansas City, he 

made one of his rare remarks in response to a direct request by Ford for his views, and 

it revealed his preoccupation with preventing the crew from reaching the mainland. 

He told Ford two military operations were needed, the first against the ship to “stop it 

from going to Kompong Som,” and the second against the island to “stop the Americans 

from going to the mainland.” 

It is evident from the third NSC meeting minutes that Kissinger and Scowcroft 

agreed on the need to isolate the crew from the mainland. However, Scowcroft personally considered it imperative to prevent a recurrence of the Pueblo, which would have 

exacerbated the post-Vietnam image of American impotency. He behaved accordingly, 

especially when Kissinger’s absence in Kansas City afforded him more latitude for decision making. Scowcroft then took on a larger role, working to prevent the Cambodians 

from delivering the crew to the mainland. He monitored news about the ship’s location 

and on efforts to quarantine Tang Island, keeping Ford well informed on both issues. 

At one point, pressured by time constraints, Scowcroft took direct action by ordering 
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American jets into the air to prevent the Mayaguez from reaching the mainland, before 

going to Ford for his authorization. He also recommended to Ford and received permission to destroy boats that might be moving the crew to the mainland. He was later 

crystal clear on why he did so: “What we were trying to do in the Mayaguez was prevent . . . the ship and especially the crew from being spirited away somewhere, where 

we’d certainly lose the possibility of rescuing them, and then be subject to the kind of 

humiliations that we were with the Pueblo and appear powerless.”95 

Ford relied heavily on his advisors, but he also realized the final decisions were his 

and, when made, they reflected his concern with deteriorating American credibility. It is 

clear from his positions in Congress and his comments before the crisis that he believed 

his advisors were right about the need to shore up perceptions of American credibility. 

After the significance of the situation was brought to Ford’s attention, he displayed a 

consistent preference for a military response, and later said repeatedly that once he 

made a tough decision, he was not inclined to second-guess it. His behavior during 

the Mayaguez crisis was consistent on this score, demonstrating his determination to 

punish Cambodia as an example to others even at the risk of harming the crew.

Yet, in some important respects the picture of Ford’s belief system and its impact 

on his behavior has changed thanks to more recent information. Earlier I argued Ford 

appeared to be the most flexible of the key leaders, often choosing compromise positions 

between his two formidable senior advisors, Kissinger and Schlesinger; two of his compromises included delaying military operations twenty-four hours but not forty-eight 

and ordering tactical airstrikes on the mainland but not B-52s.96 We now know this 

depiction of Ford as the arbiter between two strong personalities was flawed, and that 

on both of those issues, Ford followed Kissinger’s advice. Ford made a point of hearing 

everyone’s views and was the commanding presence in the meetings, announcing his 

decisions with authority. However, from the beginning he accepted Kissinger’s interpretation of the significance of the Mayaguez seizure and how to respond to it. 

Ford first learned of the Mayaguez seizure from Scowcroft but made no decisions 

until he had a chance to talk with Kissinger a little later that morning.97 After discussing 

the situation with the secretary of state, and accepting Kissinger’s interpretation of the 

event and what needed to be done in response, Ford displayed a consistent preference for 

a military response. Per Kissinger’s recommendation, he called the first NSC meeting and 

thereafter made a point of getting Kissinger’s views on every major decision, following his 

advice in each such case. Indeed, it is evident from the details of conversations that Ford 

sided with Kissinger over Schlesinger because he trusted him more. When Schlesinger 

raised an issue that Ford was unsure about, he consistently sought Kissinger’s advice. 
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For example, this was the case with operating out of Thailand, the ultimatum, firing on 

the fishing boat with Caucasians, delaying a second day, and continuing the airstrikes 

on the mainland rather than giving priority to helping the Marines. 

When Schlesinger asked about operating from Thailand, Ford checked with 

Kissinger and got back to the defense secretary with instructions. The same thing happened with the Pentagon’s suggestion of issuing an ultimatum. Ford only passed up 

opportunities for quicker and more decisive use of force when Kissinger advised doing 

so, that is, when Kissinger advised not to sink the boat suspected of transporting crew 

members, to delay military operations twenty-four hours, and to forego B-52s because 

of political fallout. Schlesinger supported all of these positions as well—before Kissinger 

did—but Ford only agreed after Kissinger came around to supporting Schlesinger’s 

position. Schlesinger’s views only prevailed if he first convinced Kissinger to agree 

with him. When Kissinger and Schlesinger did not agree, Ford sided with Kissinger 

every time, as was the case with aggressive enforcement of the quarantine, not issuing 

a time-based ultimatum, and insisting on a fourth set of airstrikes against the Cambodian mainland. Ford’s reliance on Kissinger98 was widely assumed at the time99 but 

obscured by his political aides, who were anxious to portray the president as firmly in 

command during the crisis.100

Summing Up the Best Explanation

Not surprisingly, the relative efficacy of the decision-making models corresponds well 

with their information requirements. With a general awareness of the international 

context and recent events, the rational actor model could hypothesize state behavior, drawing the likely explanation that the United States was reasserting itself after 

significant setbacks. However, it could not demonstrate that was actually the case or 

explain why US leaders in similar situations acted differently. The bureaucratic politics 

model required more detailed information about leadership relations and behaviors in 

the crisis. It anticipated and illuminated the ongoing struggle between Kissinger and 

Schlesinger but not their true motives during the crisis. The belief system model requires 

detailed information on individual leader beliefs and behaviors, which is difficult to 

acquire and substantiate. Nevertheless, it provides the best and fullest explanation for 

all the major decisions made and behaviors manifest during the crisis.

A minimally satisfactory explanation of US behaviors during the Mayaguez crisis 

needs to sort out competing explanations for why US decision makers ordered risky 

military operations not commensurate with their publicly stated objective of rescuing 

the ship and crew. The belief system explanation does that, demonstrating the rescue of 
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161

ship and crew was not the decision makers’ top priority. Nor were Ford and his primary 

advisors driven by a desire to shore up Ford’s lagging political fortunes, by the need for 

emotional catharsis following the tragic fall of Vietnam and Cambodia, or by faulty 

intelligence or misperceptions of Cambodian motives. Instead, the basic explanation 

offered decades earlier still holds. The decision to use force quickly was due to the 

belief shared by all key US decision makers that they needed to reinforce deteriorating 

American prestige and credibility, in particular to signal North and South Korea as well 

as other countries, that the United States would still honor its security commitments. 

With the benefit of new information and analysis, this basic explanation has been 

refined. We now know that the decision-making process was more driven by the decision makers’ geostrategic goals and more rational than previously thought. In other 

words, the agreement on the need to signal US resolve and willingness to use force was 

more controlling than previously appreciated, and although decision makers did not 

correctly assess the risk of rushed military operations, they did not overlook the issue. 

We also now know there was much more conflict between the White House and the 

Pentagon than previously understood and that it was fueled primarily by differences of 

opinion among key leaders as to which actions would best accomplish their collective 

goals. In that regard, the beliefs of the key decision makers were more powerful predictors of crisis behaviors than previously realized. 

The belief system analysis also explains the important subsidiary decisions made 

during the crisis about how to execute diplomatic and military options, including the 

slow-rolling of diplomacy, the decision not to issue an ultimatum with a deadline, the 

timing of military operations, and the number and purpose of the punitive mainland 

strikes. The most important subsidiary decisions were the order to sink boats that might 

have been carrying crew members, which was made because the lives of the crew were 

secondary to the larger geostrategic objectives of the decision makers, and the timing of 

the ill-fated invasion of Tang Island, which was rushed in order to minimize the chance 

of a political or diplomatic development that would have robbed decision makers of the 

opportunity for a demonstrative use of force. 

One indication of the adequacy of the belief system explanation is how easily it 

allows researchers to separate truth from fiction in decision makers’ postcrisis comments. The official line from the White House, communicated by press secretary Ron 

Nessen to the media, was that the decision to use force “was based 100 per cent and 

entirely on a single consideration, and that was getting the crew back and the ship 

back.”101 All the senior leaders made this point publicly.102 But they also indicated there 

were complementary objectives or serendipitous benefits from the rescue operations. 
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In other words, they reordered their actual motives for public consumption, and only a 

detailed account of crisis decision making makes the correct ordering manifest. 

The greatest misrepresentation was the insistence that the lives of the crew were 

the primary objective throughout the crisis. The next most misleading assertion was 

that the mainland airstrikes were necessary to protect the Marines on Tang Island. In 

fact, continuing the strikes on the mainland put the Marines at greater risk by denying 

them support from the Coral Sea. There were other less significant deceptions, including 

Kissinger’s insistence that “there was no chance during the crisis to resolve it diplomatically,”103 his assertion that B-52s were only considered briefly before it was known that 

Coral Sea aircraft could be used,104 and his claim that “we decided to end the air attacks 

as soon as we knew that the crew had, in fact, been released.”105 

Some of these senior leader statements and others identified in the foregoing 

analysis and at greater length elsewhere106 are merely misleading; others are blatantly 

not true. However, the decision makers also promulgated their actual motives, about 

which they were quite candid. They were explicit about the benefits of demonstrating 

US resolve, or in Kissinger’s words, that “the United States is prepared to defend [its] 

interests and that it can get public support and congressional support for those actions.” 

More starkly, off-the-record, “high-ranking sources” told the New York Times that “the 

seizure of the vessel might provide the test of American determination in Southeast 

Asia . . . the United States has been seeking since the collapse of allied governments in 

South Vietnam and Cambodia.”107 Scowcroft candidly acknowledged the determination to prevent the crew from being held captive on the mainland, a prime concern of 

his, and Schlesinger underscored his preoccupation with a “measured response” that 

compared favorably with previous, less discriminate uses of force.108 It is not difficult 

to sort out which of the decision makers’ public explanations for US behaviors are true 

given the details now available about their beliefs and crisis behaviors.

Remaining Issues

Two consequential issues remain that would benefit from further illumination. The 

first is why the estimate of Cambodian strength on Tang Island used in NSC meetings 

and congressional testimony was the lower IPAC estimate of 100 Cambodian defenders 

instead of the higher and ultimately more accurate DIA estimate of 150 to 200 Khmer 

troops. The second is why the Joint Chiefs estimated the risk of attacking Tang Island 

as acceptable with a high assurance of success. The answer to the first question may 

be as simple as some senior intelligence official making a determination to go with 

the IPAC estimate because they were closer to the scene.109 Lieutenant General Burns 
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163

indicates that the 100-defender figure was a compromise between IPAC, which leaned 

more heavily on a human intelligence source, and DIA, which leaned more heavily on 

signals intelligence.110 It may be that the CIA accepted this compromise and it became 

the figure used to brief the NSC.

The Joint Chiefs’ risk assessment is more puzzling. It ignored Marine Corps doctrine 

in several key respects,111 beginning with the rule of thumb that the attacking force 

should have at least a 3-to-1 superiority in numbers. For reasons explained above, it 

seems clear that senior leaders in the Pentagon were not familiar with the details of the 

plan;for example, they erroneously assumed the Marines would have the benefit of close 

air support while making their assault. If they had been assuming the larger number of 

defenders on Tang, it would have increased the chances of the Joint Chiefs reassessing 

their risk estimate. However, even assuming the lower estimate of 100 defenders, the 

judgment of military leaders favoring a helicopter assault with 175 Marines against 

100 entrenched defenders is surprising. If either decision had been made differently, 

the chances of military operations being postponed another day—and thus

indefinitely because of the crew’s release—would have increased substantially. Barring 

some unexpected revelation about how these two issues were decided, the basic 

explanation for US behavior during the crisis is not likely to change. 

165

A good description of the Mayaguez crisis has merit for both academic and 

policy purposes. For academics, a case study with an accurate depiction of 

crisis behaviors and a compelling explanation for them is useful for historical 

accuracy and for increasing the validity of studies generalizing from multiple cases. The 

Mayaguez incident figures prominently in a range of historical issues concerning the 

Ford presidency and the legacy of the Vietnam experience. For example, one historical account claims the crisis sidetracked the bureaucracy’s attempt to extract lessons 

from the Vietnam experience.1

 The crisis also is considered a key case in a wide range 

of other social science topics, from presidential compliance with the War Powers Act 

to assessments of NSC performance during crises. All such studies benefit from an 

accurate depiction of decision making during the crisis.

Among other things, the depiction of crisis decision making offered here ought 

to prompt a reassessment of James Schlesinger’s place in history. McFarlane testified 

to Congress that Schlesinger showed “poor judgment” in his decisions on how to 

use the military during the crisis and was “not really as knowledgeable as the crisis 

demanded.”2

 Schlesinger receives even harsher treatment from Ford and Kissinger 

in their memoirs. The detailed account provided in this study offers a more balanced 

perspective on his performance.

Schlesinger’s strong disapproval of using B-52s, and his tight rules of engagement 

for all air attacks on Cambodian shipping, saved the Mayaguez crew and, along with 

them, Ford’s reputation. He owned up to resisting the president’s direct orders to 

sink all boats traversing between Tang Island and the mainland, but it appears the 

stalling began with Generals Wickham and Pauly. In addition, we have shown that 

the president’s instructions insisted upon carefully modulated force. Ford’s two sets 

of instructions—carefully modulated force and automatic sinking of boats—were 

arguably confusing and inconsistent, which makes Schlesinger’s acknowledged 

insubordination seem less egregious. Similarly, it is clear from the detailed record 

CHAPTER 8

Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions
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166

provided in the preceding chapters that Schlesinger made an effort to carry out all the 

mainland airstrikes. Confusing miscommunications complicated the first strike, and 

the last strike as well. Schlesinger told Ford in the last conversation before he went to 

bed that the Coral Sea aircraft were being used against Tang and “not the mainland.” 

Ford’s response was to agree the safety of the Marines at that point was paramount. 

Presumably Ford would have agreed with Schlesinger’s decision to cancel the last 

strike if he had been reminded about the details of his conversation with Schlesinger 

and knew that Schlesinger initially complied with the order and only relented in the 

face of united opposition from his military subordinates in order to save the lives of 

wounded airmen and Marines.

With Kissinger standing between Schlesinger and the president, the defense secretary was often blamed unfairly for developments that irritated Ford. Examples have 

been provided above, but another case is the casualty figures in the Mayaguez operations. Nessen claims that the five-day delay in accurate figures undermined the 

credibility of the administration, and that “despite prodding from Ford, the Defense 

Department stalled” because it was “trying to avoid dampening the good news of the 

crew’s safe return.”3

 But according to Wickham’s notes, there was genuine confusion 

in the Pentagon about the real figures. Wickham reported “one KIA [killed in action], 

13 MIA [missing in action], 22 WIA [wounded in action]” on May 16. Later Wickham 

noted two calls from Scowcroft to Schlesinger about casualty figures. In the first, he 

told Schlesinger that “Rumsfeld and the President were angry at the casualty figures” 

and asked whether the wounded could be described as “injured as opposed to WIA?” 

Four hours later he called Schlesinger back to tell him that the “number of wounded 

was being cut back to 40 for the time being.”4 In other words, an effort to disguise the 

extent of casualties originated in the White House, not the Pentagon.

By all accounts, the normally affable Ford did not like Schlesinger, and Schlesinger’s departure was even more unpleasant than his tenure as Ford’s secretary of defense. 

Schlesinger was bitter about being fired by Ford. He argued with the president for 

almost an hour, trying to no avail to convince Ford that his performance was a benefit to the administration. The conversation between the two men “was one of the 

most disagreeable I ever had,” Ford later said.5 Schlesinger returned to the Pentagon 

steaming. When he submitted his personal letter of resignation, it might have carried 

a hidden barb: “I have the honor of tendering my resignation from this office, effective 

at a time in the near future as suits your desires. I wish you good fortune [emphasis 

added] in carrying the heavy and manifold burdens that you shoulder. Respectfully, 

James R. Schlesinger.”6
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

167

Schlesinger’s parting comment might be interpreted as “good luck, you’re going 

to need it” if you cannot recognize a competent subordinate. Adding insult to injury, 

Schlesinger left the Pentagon without a proper farewell. Wickham liked Schlesinger and 

considered him a competent, dedicated leader. He heard from someone that Schlesinger 

was going to be asked to step down and would be offered a different job of some sort. 

When he called Schlesinger to apprise him of this rumor, Schlesinger responded, “How 

interesting,” and acknowledged he had been told to report to the White House to see the 

president the following day. When the Pentagon heard that Schlesinger was leaving, the 

Joint Chiefs conferred on whether to hold a departure ceremony for Schlesinger. According 

to Wickham, they decided not to since they did not want to be perceived as unsupportive 

of the president. So, Wickham said, Schlesinger “just packed his bags and left.”7

History takes note of Schlesinger’s poor relationship with Ford, and some sources 

understand it came to a head during the Mayaguez crisis. But Schlesinger’s actual performance during the crisis has not been depicted accurately. Ford accused Schlesinger 

of incompetence,8 and Kissinger blamed him for the Pentagon’s torpor and even for 

inaccurate intelligence: 

Most of the communication mix-ups and sloppy intelligence reporting that 

plagued the Mayaguez crisis happened because the doubts of the Secretary 

of Defense compounded the trauma of the military. Clements excepted, the 

Pentagon seemed above all determined never again to be cast in the role of 

villain. The absence of the Chairman of the JCS, who was away on a trip to 

Europe, magnified the problem because his stand-ins were reluctant to use the 

direct access to the President which is the Chairman’s prerogative by law. In 

this case, the only channel of the White House to the Pentagon was via a Secretary of Defense who was extremely ambivalent about the President’s strategy.9 

Nothing in this indictment of Schlesinger is correct. Pentagon military leaders argued 

their views directly to the president, who reflexively checked with Kissinger each time 

before making a ruling. Schlesinger was concerned with being competent, not avoiding 

charges of villainy. He favored punitive strikes, just not counterproductive B-52 strikes, 

a point Kissinger eventually agreed had merit.

Ford probably had cause to fire Schlesinger for insubordination over the resistance 

to automatically sinking the Cambodian boats. However, if he had better understood 

the consequences of Schlesinger’s interventions and accurately recalled the conversations he had with Schlesinger, which demonstrate the defense secretary was much less 

duplicitous than Ford thought, he might have concluded that Schlesinger deserved some 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

168

leniency. But the president seemed unaware of the extent to which Kissinger had “gone 

out of his way to put it in [his] mind that Schlesinger had been willfully insubordinate.”10 

So Schlesinger departed, and Kissinger had the opportunity to see if partnering with 

Rumsfeld would be easier.11

In addition to correcting inaccurate historical findings, this case study’s compelling 

explanation of decision making is useful for improving research designed to substantiate 

generalizations based on multiple cases. An explanatory case study of US crisis decision 

making stipulates how or why something happened.12 In the case of the Mayaguez, we 

want to know why the United States reacted with military force, and how decision making 

affected the crisis outcome.13 It is not enough to examine multiple plausible explanatory 

factors and assert they all played a role. We must postulate and substantiate the factor 

that best explains behavior. If we cannot discriminate among competing explanatory 

factors, assessing which serves as the best independent explanatory variable, the ideal 

of the discipline—cumulative knowledge about political behaviors—is not possible. 

Scholarship on the Mayaguez crisis has not followed this pattern, a deficiency this 

study hopes to correct. The explanation of the Mayaguez crisis offered here provides a 

firmer foundation for cumulative knowledge than previous studies. It corrects previous assertions made about the crisis, many of which have been identified above. For 

instance, it should be clear from the foregoing analysis that Ford’s decision making 

was not primarily driven by analogous reasoning based on the Pueblo crisis, as some 

have asserted.14 It should be equally clear that it was not based on domestic political 

considerations. On the contrary, and to use Kissinger’s terminology, the president had 

steeled himself to be accused of villainy and went ahead and did what he thought was 

in the nation’s best interest. Despite all the evidence to the contrary, scholars continue 

to mistakenly ascribe domestic political motives to Ford.15

On the other hand, this research also substantiates some generalizations made by 

previous scholarship. For example, David P. Houghton cites Robert Jervis on the tendency of powerful states to act belligerently in the aftermath of foreign policy reversals: 

Jervis contends that states are likely to resort to belligerent foreign policy acts 

when they have experienced recent losses abroad or at home. Powerful states, 

in other words, seek to restore their international reputation and prestige in 

the wake of defeats or losses of some sort, and he contends that one can at least 

partially explain Ford’s Mayaguez operation or Reagan’s Grenada invasion 

this way (the former being a reaction to the fall of Saigon, the latter to the Iran 

hostage situation).16
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

169

The research here certainly supports Jervis’s supposition about the Mayaguez crisis and 

thus helps substantiate his broader generalization. 

This examination of the Mayaguez crisis makes a contribution to the effort to build 

cumulative knowledge on the factors that drive foreign policy decision-making. Past 

research on crisis decision making and bureaucratic politics has been criticized for 

“overstating the impact of bureaucracy over human agency” and “not being sufficiently 

analytically accurate about how and under what circumstances the impact of the 

bureaucracy prevails over other elements in government.”17 It is generally agreed that the 

president is able to exercise more control during crises that demand the attention of the 

national security system’s most senior advisors. Institutional forces are acknowledged 

to be more consequential in noncrisis decision making, but the precise way such forces 

influence the decision process is contested. Thus, “the extent to which bureaucracies 

either enhance or jeopardize prospects for rational decision making,” remains “one of 

the key issues” in foreign policy analysis.18 This study makes a contribution by demonstrating that even in crises individual leaders can undermine collective coherence and 

thus rationality, especially when they cannot resolve differences over group purpose 

or courses of action. 

Beyond the contribution to scholarship, the Mayaguez crisis is also a valuable case 

study for policy analysis. The crisis has been dismissed as a mere “historical footnote,”19 

but this reflects a poor understanding of the significant issues raised by the crisis, 

including what decision makers thought was at stake, the organizational mechanism 

used to manage the crisis, and the insights that can be generated from a close examination of the roles played by key leaders during the crisis. Properly understood, the 

Mayaguez crisis can be used to illustrate a number of important policy issues and to 

impart important lessons for senior policy makers.20 To further demonstrate the value 

of this case study and extract useful insights from it, we will now examine a number 

of such issues, beginning with whether US leaders accomplished their primary goal.

The Efficacy of Force

One scholar has argued it is ludicrous to claim that the Mayaguez was a successful 

display of resolve. He believes Cambodians and other observers in Asia drew different conclusions: 

The US military action was a spasmodic and ill-conceived response by the 

White House to the frustration of liquidating a failed two-decade commitment 

in Indochina, not a signal of American intentions to project force in Indochina. 
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170

Only in the imagination of US national security managers could a botched 

rescue mission be considered a successful show of force. American allies were 

not impressed.21

We now know this assessment is completely wrong with respect to explaining US 

motives. US military operations in the Mayaguez crisis were not an emotional outlet or 

primarily a rescue mission. Moreover, as previously discussed, the intended beneficiary 

of the show of force was not Cambodia, or Indochina more generally, as commentators so often misunderstand. Even during the crisis US leaders dismissed the costs of 

alienating Thailand. A cable from the Department of State to the US ambassador in 

Bangkok explained this matter-of-factly: “We realize that there may be costs with the 

Thais but the balance of interests requires that we be willing to take whatever risks may 

be involved in our relations with Thais.”22 The decision makers cared even less about 

relations with the Khmer Rouge. Chinese officials at a meeting in New York the following 

September suggested to Kissinger that the United States take the initiative to improve 

relations with Cambodia. Kissinger said the Khmer Rouge would have to moderate their 

language first. The Chinese foreign minister responded by saying he did not “want to 

provoke a dispute,” but then insisted that “the Mayaguez incident hurt their feelings. It 

will take them some time to forget.” Kissinger’s reply was blunt, “Well, it is up to them. 

They can’t do much for us.”23

Acknowledging the target of the show of force was North Korea, its patrons, and the 

rest of the world more generally, we still need to ask whether the Mayaguez response was 

a successful show of force—that is, did other countries interpret the event as a signal 

of American intentions to project force if challenged? Many commentators reviewing 

the Mayaguez crisis, like the one cited above, conclude the operations were a fiasco 

and could not possibly have had their intended effect. Almost all of these assessments 

do not bother to check the available evidence, perhaps assuming what other governments really thought is unknowable. However, public responses from other nations and 

declassified reporting from the Department of State on foreign government reactions 

do provide some indications of foreign reactions, and those indications suggest that 

most countries interpreted the event precisely the way US decision makers intended. 

Publicly, there were diverse reactions in the foreign press, depending on whether 

the news outlet leaned left or right. Of those depicting the US response in negative 

terms, quite a few summed it up as an overreaction to the Communist victories in Indochina. However, many also depicted the US resort to force as an unhealthy exercise in 

realpolitik. Those depicting the US response in a positive light typically argued it was 

justified to rescue the crew and defend the principal of freedom of the seas. Yet, many 
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

171

commentators applauding the US operations also recognized their value for signaling 

US resolve. In other words, whether the pundits approved or disapproved of the actions 

taken by the United States, many interpreted them precisely as US decision makers 

hoped they would—as a signal of US intentions to defend US interests despite being 

forced to abandon Vietnam and Cambodia.

Like foreign media, the attitude of foreign governments depended upon their political orientation. For example, even during the crisis Ford received feedback from the 

left-leaning Dutch Labor Party prime minister, who counseled restraint. Ford did not 

appreciate the advice. He later said the inability of the Dutch to understand that “decisive action would reassure our allies and bluntly warn our adversaries that the United 

States was not a helpless giant,” “annoyed the hell” out of him.24 Other reactions were 

varied. A national intelligence bulletin for May 16, 1975, stated: 

Public reaction in Britain and West Germany has been generally favorable. 

French press commentary, however, has been mixed. A spokesman for the 

Japanese Foreign Ministry implied approval for the action by telling newsmen 

that ships and “open waters must not be subject to seizure,” and said that Tokyo 

viewed American action as “limited.” Official and unofficial commentary from 

South Korea and Taiwan has been predictably favorable as was the Australian 

press. Of the Arab nations, only Algeria has weighed in heavily with invective 

against Washington.25

Regardless of whether they liked the response or not, foreign governments were even 

more inclined than news outlets to interpret the quick US resort to force as a signal of 

resolve to protect US interests. Intelligence community and US diplomatic assessments 

of foreign government reactions, based in part on host government conversations with 

US diplomats, indicate there were a range of positive and negative reactions, but in 

most cases the US purpose was interpreted in geopolitical terms. Close allies who felt 

threatened by their neighbors were predictably quite positive. Great Britain, Israel, Iran, 

South Korea, and Taiwan were supportive. To a lesser extent, so were the Japanese, and 

to a much lesser extent, the Filipinos as well.

A cable from London reported strong support in Britain but noted that “important 

political figures and respected journalists in private conversation continue to show 

some unease” about the willingness of the American people and Congress to support 

their international obligations. It added, however, that “solid popular and congressional backing given to the president’s handling of the Mayaguez incident has helped 

considerably to dispel this unease.” Yitzhak Rabin, the prime minister of Israel, told 
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172

Ford, Kissinger, Sisco, and Scowcroft that “we appreciate very much the handling of the 

Mayaguez incident by the United States.”26 The shah of Iran also expressed appreciation 

to Ford the day after the crisis when they met. 

Similarly, the South Koreans, disquieted by the fall of South Vietnam, were reassured by the use of force.27 They viewed Kim Il Sung’s visit to China with greater alarm 

than the United States but hoped and expected that he would receive a colder reception 

in the Soviet Union that would constrain his belligerence.28 Both the South Korean press 

and South Korean government officials lauded the US response. The English language 

Korea Herald said, “The decisive counteraction will weigh heavily in returning trust and 

strength to the US alliance with Asian nations.” Privately, the Korean ambassador to the 

nonproliferation treaty talks in Bern, Switzerland, told US officials that “the US handling 

of Mayaguez was exactly what Koreans and other Asians needed at this moment,” who 

he argued, found “the deft, swift and effective action” to save the Mayaguez and its 

crew “reassuring.” He added that the United States and its allies “could be thankful to 

Cambodians for setting up the Mayaguez affair at this time and making it possible for 

the United States to demonstrate its determination to use its power effectively in Asia 

even after Vietnam.”29 In Taiwan, editorials stressed the importance of the US show of 

strength, which was “the only language communists understand.” 

The Philippines and Japan were more circumspect, particularly given the US use of 

Thai bases without permission. Commentary in the Philippines stressed the Thai anger 

and suggested the experience was relevant for the Philippines, although the US embassy 

in Manila interpreted this as posturing for potential renegotiating of basing rights.

In Japan, US diplomats quickly moved to explain US behavior and reassure the 

Japanese that American resolve to honor treaty commitments was rock solid, that 

“the Secretary [Kissinger] had stressed the firmness of US resolve with regard to 

Korea” in particular, and that “Defense Secretary Schlesinger had gone a step further 

in warning the North Koreans against adventurism.”30 US diplomats in Tokyo noted 

little official reaction to the Mayaguez affair from the government. However, at least 

one Japanese official said he “understood the domestic psychological atmosphere” 

that impelled US action but wished the United States had waited a day or two for a 

diplomatic solution. The comment from the embassy was that despite this official’s 

reaction and “the heavy criticism we are sure to get from Japan’s left, we believe there 

will be substantial elements of the Japanese public” who would “at least ‘understand’ 

the decisive US action.”31

A few weeks later the US embassy in Tokyo sent a long message apprising Washington of Japanese thinking on their security interests. 
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

173

If the Japanese had been anticipating the fall of Saigon, they were not prepared for Kim Il Sung’s apparent effort to capitalize on the trend of events in 

Southeast Asia. His mid-April visit to Peking, read by most Japanese as a bid 

for Chinese support for military pressure against the ROK [Republic of Korea], 

sent tremors throughout the political establishment in Tokyo. . . . Subsequent 

events have combined to calm Japanese apprehensions. Peking obviously had 

no enthusiasm for the use of military force to reunify Korea, and the tone of 

Kim Il Sung’s statements on the subject (most recently in Romania on May 24) 

have moderated accordingly. Strong reaffirmations of the American security 

commitment to the ROK by President Ford, Secretary Kissinger and Secretary 

Schlesinger, and evidence of resurgent congressional support for this position 

were followed by proof during the Mayaguez rescue that the United States was 

willing and able to use force in defense of its principles when provoked.32

However, the embassy went on to note that “a residue of anxiety remains, hardened 

by a sense that Japan’s leverage is limited and options are few.” Countries in East Asia 

continued to mull the consequences of Indochina’s demise for some time, particularly 

the Japanese. A few months after the crisis a Japanese source quoted a senior Japanese 

diplomat in Tokyo as saying “our whole defense policy must be designed to prevent 

a North Korean invasion of South Korea.” The comment was explained as a reaction 

among Japanese defense thinkers due to “Communist victories in Indo-China and the 

withdrawal of American military power from the region.” The article went on to note 

that the Japanese did not think war on the Korean Peninsula was imminent but that 

they did consider it “the most immediately unsettling factor in northeast Asia.”33

Adversaries of the United States reacted negatively, of course, but in degrees, 

depending on their assessment of whether a strong United States was an impediment to 

their interests. North Korea’s response to the incident suggests it understood the underlying US message. Kim Il Sung’s regime called the US military response a “premeditated, 

villainous provocation against the Cambodian people.”34 Given that the United States 

followed up the Mayaguez operations with warnings that a new war in Korea might 

lead to the use of tactical nuclear weapons, it was hard to misinterpret the US message. 

It does not appear Kim was intimidated. He continued his efforts to secure support 

from other Communist nations for an effort to reunify the Korean Peninsula. A nowdeclassified Bulgarian assessment of Kim’s visit with Bulgarian leader Todor Zhivkov’s 

in June 1975 is revealing. It noted that “Kissinger and the US Defense Secretary repeat 

over and again that they will not tolerate in South Korea what happened in Indochina 

and will continue their commitments.” It went on to argue the correlation of forces were 
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174

not in Kim Il Sung’s favor for reuniting Korea by force. It noted that the United States had 

increased its forces in South Korea by 4,000 men and that they had better equipment 

than the North Koreans. The assessment did not mention the Mayaguez, but it clearly 

assumed American willingness to fight in the event the North commenced hostilities.35

China reacted with more anger than expected. Deng Xiaoping’s response in Paris 

when asked about the Mayaguez inclined Kissinger to believe the Chinese had practically given the United States the green light for teaching their unruly pupils a lesson 

and, in the process, reminding the Cambodians that they needed the protection of a 

great power like China. China watchers in Hong Kong, for example, openly speculated 

that the top leadership in Communist China was pleased the United States took such a 

firm stand because it would serve to stabilize the area. However, such reasoning appears 

off the mark. There are many indications that the Chinese were genuinely angry about 

the US military operations. China watchers in the State Department noted what they 

considered three officially orchestrated Chinese reactions. 

On May 15, Vice Premier Li Xiannian described the US response as an “act of 

piracy,” which was reported in the Chinese press. The People’s Daily on May 16 said 

that the United States responded on the pretext of a rescue when in fact the ship had 

been engaged in spying; therefore, the incident “shows that US imperialism has not yet 

learned the proper lesson from its defeats in Cambodia and Vietnam.”36 Later, more 

People’s Daily commentary lampooned the US military operations as inept, claiming the 

“great hullabaloo” Washington was making about the incident was a “farce,” “written 

and staged single-handedly by the very superpower which the small Indochinese countries completely defeated.” The commentary insisted that “the Chinese government 

and people will, as in the past, resolutely support the Cambodian people in their just 

struggle in defense of state sovereignty and against U.S aggression.”37

US diplomats ended up arguing the details of the Mayaguez incident with their Chinese counterparts. In one exchange Deputy Assistant Secretary William H. Gleysteen 

Jr. debated the issue in a luncheon conversation with China’s deputy chief of its liaison 

office, Han Hsu. Han and colleagues argued the Cambodians had the right to stop and 

inspect vessels in their territorial waters, that the United States was at fault “because 

of all the bombs it had dropped on Cambodia,” and that the United States was wrong 

to move militarily after the Cambodians had announced their intention to release the 

ship and crew. Gleysteen’s rejoinder was that the seizure was in international waters 

and illegal and that the United States had not learned of the Cambodian broadcast 

until too late. The Chinese at least “seemed to agree tacitly with Gleysteen’s point that 

bilateral relations would be better off without such incidents.” Yet another indication 
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

175

of China’s anger came from the shah of Iran’s twin sister, Princess Ashraf Pahlavi. She 

shared impressions from her meetings with senior Chinese officials with Ambassador 

George H. W. Bush, who headed up the US liaison office in Beijing at the time. The May 

22 cable reporting her comments said, “The princess mentioned twice that the Chinese 

were angry with us about the Mayaguez.”38

The commentary from US diplomats accompanying the reports of Chinese reactions explained the uncharacteristically strong language used by China, saying China 

“undoubtedly felt compelled to criticize US action in order to maintain its credentials 

with Cambodians, to meet domestic requirements and to avoid any impression that it 

was willing to ‘collude’ with the United States in resolving the matter.” The commentary 

also debated US responses to the Chinese rhetoric. Bush noted his advisors thought it 

better to let the issue fade away rather than prolonging the acrimonious exchanges. He 

said he understood this point of view, which had merit, but that on balance he thought 

it better to set the record straight about US attempts to communicate with Cambodia 

during the crisis through China, which had refused to assist. In addition, he thought it 

might be useful to remind the Chinese that such overblown rhetoric had a real impact 

on US-Chinese relations. A middle position of sorts was for Kissinger to again remind 

Huang Chen, chief of the PRC liaison office, in his next meeting with the Chinese in 

Washington that “the increasing references in PRC commentary to ‘US defeat’ in Indochina and our ‘strategic passivity’ and isolation” were misinformed and dangerous.39

Months later, in a large December 3 meeting with Ford, Chinese Vice Premier Deng 

Xiaoping, and others in Beijing, Chinese Foreign Minister Qiao Guanhua complained, 

“You are too emotional in your actions,” adding “the Mayaguez was totally unnecessary.” 

A little later he returned to the subject again, saying that 

you are always saying we are criticizing you, but I must say we think you have 

overdone it [in the Mayaguez affair] with regard to that small island. And 

according to our information, the Cambodian leaders did not know about 

the incident—it was the people on that small island themselves. And then 

the United States began the bombing after the Cambodian leaders agreed to 

return the boat.40

Kissinger replied, “We didn’t know this until after our military operation had begun,” 

which prompted laughter from the Chinese. President Ford thought it wise to remind 

China of its response to US diplomatic overtures, saying “it is accurate to say we made 

diplomatic efforts at the very outset, in order to find an answer without taking the military steps; and we were very disappointed those diplomatic efforts were not responded 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

176

to.” This too prompted laughter from Huang Chen and Foreign Minister Qiao, who 

pointed at Huang Chen in mock blame. Kissinger joked that the “Vietnamese have 

solved the problem anyway by taking over the island,” which produced more laughter. 

Vice Premier Deng wrapped up for the Chinese, stating “anyway, you have slightly overdone it with that incident. Because you are such a big country and Cambodia is such a 

small country.” The discussion then moved on to other topics.41

Both sides were making it clear to the other that they took their prestige seriously. 

The United States was suggesting that it would not tolerate provocation by small powers and that the Chinese were responsible for the behavior of their client. The Chinese 

seem to be saying that they understood the point, but that the United States should 

have acted with greater restraint. They argued the overreaction hurt US prestige, but 

perhaps their real concern was that the US bludgeoning of China’s client embarrassed 

China, and they wanted US officials to know such measures would harm US-Chinese 

bilateral relations. In any case, there seems little doubt that the Chinese understood 

the United States was communicating its willingness to use force in the aftermath of 

the withdrawal from Vietnam.

The response by Russia to the Mayaguez incident was quite restrained compared 

to China. The US embassy in Moscow reported that Soviet media treated the issue in a 

reserved and “fairly straight” manner, reporting the facts for the most part. Later, the 

embassy speculated about the Soviet treatment of the issue. US officials commented 

that “the Soviet response to the Mayaguez incident was so conspicuously cautious that 

it suggests a conscious policy decision to avoid using the issue as a handle to criticize 

the United States in the aftermath of the fall of Indochina.” The embassy explained 

that the Soviets

presumably saw no reason to take the United States on in connection with an 

event which was marginal to their own interests and which they could not have 

affected anyway. Likewise, their apparent absence of ties to the new Cambodian regime suggests that they might see some virtue in “teaching” Phnom 

Penh that it needs more friends than Hanoi and Peking. The publicity for the US 

diplomatic efforts via the Chinese also suggests that either Peking was unable 

to affect the outcome (i.e., lacks clout with the Cambodians) or chose not to 

affect it (i.e., does not value sufficiently its relations with the United States). 

Both points serve Soviet interests in treating the Chinese invidiously. Finally, 

on the question of the ship’s position at the time of its seizure, Moscow clearly 

wished to avoid taking a position which could backfire on its own [law of sea] 

position on innocent passage. Some Soviet media replayed the Cambodian 
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

177

charge about the alleged “intelligence” functions of the Mayaguez, but even 

this was carefully couched as the opinion of others.42

The US embassy’s explanation for the surprisingly subdued Soviet response to the 

Mayaguez makes sense and in no way suggests the Soviets were unaware of the point 

US leaders were making. 

Taken as a whole, governments interpreting US behavior in the Mayaguez crisis 

seem to have arrived at the correct conclusion that the United States was signaling its 

willingness to use force despite recent reversals in Southeast Asia. In some cases, they 

also speculated that the degree of force employed was excessive because the United 

States was feeling insecure about its position in the world. However, there was more 

speculation about an emotional overreaction in the popular press than in private diplomatic channels, where the norm was to think in terms of realpolitik.

The final observation one might make about the US response and foreign reactions 

is counterfactual. We can speculate about what might have happened if the Mayaguez 

had never been seized, particularly with respect to efforts to deter North Korean belligerence. The next major crisis with North Korea came the following year when the North 

Koreans used axes to murder two US military officers who were in the demilitarized 

zone. The officers were supervising a work party that was cutting down a tree obscuring the view of UN observers. The region went on high alert as the United States and 

South Korea weighed options, including military retaliation. Ultimately the two allies 

opted for just a symbolic show of force. American and South Korean forces entered the 

demilitarized zone and cut down the disputed tree. It has been argued by those with 

inside knowledge of the Ford administration that “the overwhelming military retaliation during the Mayaguez incident probably reduced the perceived necessity to use 

violent force in Korea”43 Although this observation is speculative, there is considerable 

evidence supporting the contention.

It is now clear that Kissinger favored the use of more force in response to the brutal 

axe murders. Habib remarked that “we took some very strong measures” but added 

“we didn’t do some of the things some of the people wanted to do.” He noted there were 

advocates for “great drastic actions that fortunately were not carried out.” For example, 

Kissinger, who by this time had been relieved of national security advisor duties but 

was still serving as secretary of state, issued guidance requiring the JCS to examine the 

option of using artillery fire to destroy the North Korean barracks at the same time that 

US and South Korean forces surged forth to cut down the tree. The response from the 

Joint Chiefs was that they were “forced to recommend against the use of artillery fire in 

connection with H-hour in the strongest terms.” They argued the forces cutting down 
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the tree would be completely exposed to return fire from the North Koreans and that the 

barracks probably would be empty anyway. More to the point, they said, was the “gross 

superiority of North Korean army artillery.” The Joint Chiefs said they were developing 

a range of alternative options which would use precision-guided air munitions, surface 

to surface missiles, and unconventional warfare (SEAL) teams to destroy North Korean 

installations of military or infrastructure significance. They also argued against other 

Kissinger-proposed options and concluded by noting South Korean President Park 

Chung Hee’s “strong feelings against the use of firearms in the tree cutting effort.”44

Kissinger was not happy with the muted US response to the incident. After the 

tree-cutting operation had taken place, he called Scowcroft to complain about the 

weak-kneed response. Scowcroft was then serving as Ford’s national security advisor, 

and he was pleased with the way the provocation was handled with restraint. Kissinger, 

however, said he was “sorry we didn’t decide to hit the barracks. I am not sure we still 

shouldn’t do that.” Scowcroft speculated on what the North Koreans “had in mind,” 

observing “they were apparently quite docile when we cut the tree down.” “Which,” 

Kissinger responded, “means they were scared out of their minds.” 

Kissinger: I am worried about how the other countries assess us. When you look 

at the Soviet and Chinese reaction it is very mild—you have to assume that they 

thought we would do something drastic. Now they see us just chopping down a 

tree—which looks ridiculous. Habib tells me it was illegal to fire across the zone.

Scowcroft: God Henry. So it is not illegal to murder people.

Kissinger: No, that was wrong but not illegal. They were doing it in the JSA [joint 

security area] where they had every right to be. They were illegally killed but 

two wrongs don’t make a right. If you are not a Mormon you won’t understand 

that. You can’t build justice on two wrongs.

Scowcroft: We are trying to keep them in their cage.

Kissinger: Scowcroft you are getting too literal—I am being sarcastic.

Scowcroft: I know, I know. . . .

Kissinger: Let me get to another phone—I want to ask you questions and I don’t 

want Habib to have another heart attack.

Scowcroft: O.K.

(Kissinger goes to another phone)

Kissinger: Hello?

Scowcroft: Yes.

Kissinger: What do you think about shelling them after all?

Scowcroft: I don’t think it is a bad idea.
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

179

Kissinger: The negative is that [Senators Strom] Thurmond, [Charles H.] 

Percy, [Jacob K.] Javits and some others have called for going to the UN on it 

rather than doing anything.45

Kissinger went on, trying to enlist Scowcroft’s support for more military action. He suggested that Scowcroft should tell Ford “we feel unfulfilled about this” and see if he would 

be open to additional options. When Kissinger closed the long conversation, he asked 

Scowcroft to “try to get to [Ford] as soon as you can and call me back.” In the end, Ford and 

Scowcroft decided against any further military action. However, it seems clear that if the 

Mayaguez incident had not taken place, the Ford administration would have felt much 

greater pressure to respond to the North Korean provocation with military force, which 

would have entailed far greater risk of escalation and presumably greater loss of life.

A final point needs to be made about the Mayaguez crisis and the efficacy of force 

in international relations. In the years following the incident, the US response to the 

seizure of the Mayaguez became widely viewed in US policy circles as an unproductive overreaction. During the 1976 presidential campaign, candidate Jimmy Carter 

repeatedly castigated Ford for his handling of the crisis. When he became president 

and had to respond to the Iranian seizure of the US embassy in Tehran, Carter made it 

clear that he intended to avoid a repetition of the Mayaguez crisis. As late as April 1978, 

Carter was still referencing the Mayaguez when resisting efforts by his national security 

advisor, Zbigniew Brzezinski, to convince him that the threat of force was inherent in 

the conduct of foreign policy.46 Thus, the Mayaguez crisis and perceptions of how it was 

managed became part of the ongoing national debate about the efficacy of force in a 

real and direct manner. Just as President Carter and his advisors made policy decisions 

based in part on their understanding of the Mayaguez crisis,47 future leaders may do 

the same. In that regard it is important for policy makers to consider not only how they 

might have managed the crisis differently, but also to have an accurate appreciation 

for how other nations viewed the US response. To date, those researching the crisis 

have typically offered their own assessment of US performance while overlooking the 

evidence for how other nations reacted and whether US leaders accomplished their 

objective of signaling US resolve.

Mission Command and Micromanagement

It might be assumed that the Mayaguez crisis cannot yield insights on such contemporary command-and-control concepts as “mission command” because the incident took 

place so long ago, but that is not the case. The mission command concept predates the 
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180

crisis, extending back at least to World War II. Also, despite the recent emphasis on the 

concept in joint doctrine, US military leaders have been struggling to apply and refine 

the concept for decades.48 Moreover, many commentators on the Mayaguez believe 

the incident showcased the advent of global communications that present special 

challenges to executing the mission command approach. The overwhelming majority 

of those studying the crisis believe US decision making and operational performance 

were crippled by senior leaders using newly available communication technology to 

keep abreast of developments in the field and then micromanage their subordinates, 

which is precisely what the mission command approach seeks to avoid. By examining 

the charges of micromanagement during the crisis, we can gain insights on how and 

whether following the mission command approach currently advocated in joint doctrine would have improved performance during the crisis. If not, asking “why” may 

yield insights for the current approach to mission command. 

The mission command concept requires conducting “military operations through 

decentralized execution based upon mission-type orders.” To be successful, mission 

command “demands that subordinate leaders at all echelons exercise disciplined 

initiative and act aggressively and independently to accomplish the mission.”49 One 

issue is whether a commander taking aggressive, independent initiative at one level 

will issue direction to subordinates that impinges upon their ability to do the same. To 

avoid this, the concept requires commanders to be on guard against “micromanagement.” Indeed, the concept’s default position is for commanders to “demonstrate trust 

by exercising restraint in their close supervision of subordinates”50 and to “delegate 

decisions to subordinates wherever possible.”51 Thus, “mission command begins with 

a bias to decentralized decisionmaking,”52 which many consider appropriate for the 

increasingly complex decision-making environment.53

Micromanagement, considered the opposite of decentralized decision, is what 

many commentators on the Mayaguez crisis believe crippled US decision making. In 

fact, the most persistent and widespread lesson gleaned from the Mayaguez crisis, other 

than the general perception that the Ford administration overreacted, is the belief that 

the military operations were heavily micromanaged, particularly by civilian authorities, with nearly disastrous results. Many sources with military experience agree with 

the Marine brigadier general who summarized that the key lesson from the crisis was

modern communications are wonderful but they also are deadly. The capability to talk over thousands of miles from the very highest levels to the frontline 

foxholes takes many of the important decisions out of the hands of the responsible commander, the man on the scene.54
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181

It is hard to find a source on the Mayaguez crisis that does not attribute deleterious 

micromanagement to senior leaders,55 and many argue the incident is noteworthy in part 

because it was a “harbinger of shifts in warfare and diplomacy enabled by new global 

communication technologies” that have encouraged deleterious micromanagement.56 

However, this popular lesson from the Mayaguez incident is mistaken. The way 

command and control was exercised during the crisis does not demonstrate the dangers 

of micromanagement. Rather, command and control problems during the Mayaguez 

crisis illustrate the importance of distinguishing unhelpful micromanagement from 

helpful oversight. There actually were more egregious examples of insufficient oversight 

than there were of harmful micromanagement during the incident. And where there 

were cases of inappropriate micromanagement with potentially consequential results, 

they originated with military, not civilian, leaders. 

To review the charges of micromanagement and determine which have merit, it 

helps to distinguish the roughly three levels of micromanagement asserted in the literature: those that are fictitious or offered without evidence or explanation, those that are 

accurate and substantive but not consequential, and those that are real and potentially 

significant. Many sources express the concern that modern communications facilitate 

micromanagement without making the case that it actually occurred: 

Despite the global distances, local commanders were now under the constant 

watch of their chain of command, from the President to their immediate 

headquarters. Commanders could now listen in, comment on, and override 

decisions by their field subordinates. The President could literally micromanage a tactical situation instead of focusing on a strategic or long-term view. 

A local commander’s initiative and ability to make decisions was therefore at 

risk of disappearing.57

Similarly, Guilmartin claims global communications gave leaders in Washington a 

“false impression of positive control,”58 but he does not provide evidence for this assertion. As previous analysis makes clear, the White House worked hard to exert control 

over the Pentagon precisely because Ford, Kissinger, and Scowcroft were increasingly 

concerned that the Pentagon was not complying with presidential orders. Rather than a 

false sense of control, the White House had an exaggerated concern about losing control 

over the operations. Ford in particular believed, and said, that he feared the Pentagon 

was acting independently in pursuit of its own priorities. Scowcroft demanded direct 

access to the NMCC, and he and his aide, Major McFarlane, tried to keep abreast of 

developments by listening directly to military communications. The Pentagon was 
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irritated by this level of information gathering and White House decisions on the 

timing and extent of military operations, especially the number of mainland strikes. 

When Schlesinger was required to explain all orders given during the crisis and offer 

his views on how the national security system could be improved, he suggested that 

less management by the White House would be helpful:

“Washington’s role should be to define the larger goal . . . while attempting to 

avoid too many and too frequent interventions.” The president and his White 

House advisers, Schlesinger asserted, “are concerned that nothing go awry—

and are searching for apparent mistakes.” By contrast, people in DoD “have far 

more information and are in the position of having to execute any decisions in 

a fast-moving situation.”59

The Pentagon wanted latitude to conduct operations as it saw fit, but it did not make the 

case that White House oversight impaired operations or outcomes during the crisis.

Other sources insist micromanagement took place simply because Washington 

asked for information updates that were trivial and a nuisance. One such example was 

Washington asking the Marines, in the heat of battle, whether they had a Khmer interpreter with them.60 Similarly, Mahoney argues that “Ford’s questioning of Schlesinger, 

Jones, and the military went beyond micromanagement during the crisis. On several 

occasions he openly questioned the rapidity of movement of forces into the area.”61 Yet 

it is hard to see how asking questions about the ability to communicate with the adversary or how rapidly forces were moving to the area constitutes micromanagement. US 

leaders explaining their decisions to congressional leaders and the public needed to 

know whether it was possible for the Marines to communicate with Cambodians or 

only shoot them. The ability to speak to the Khmer Rouge might have enabled a helpful 

cease-fire after it was known that the crew members were safe. The arrival time of US 

forces also was highly relevant to Ford’s decision on when operations would commence.

Still other sources falsely assert that Ford and Kissinger “gave long-distance orders 

to military commanders on the scene during the 1975 Mayaguez crisis” and that, ipso 

facto, doing so constituted micromanagement.62 Edward N. Luttwak appears to have 

started this rumor. He argues “the advent of instant worldwide communications now 

permits all sorts of phenomenal interventions direct from the White House” and claims, 

without citing a source, that “during the 1975 Mayaguez incident, President Ford spoke 

directly with Navy pilots actually over the target, to make tactical decisions in minute 

detail.”63 Major General John K. Singlaub, USA, in his memoir goes a step further, 

claiming that
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183

at one point, Air Force fighter-bomber pilots orbiting the island where the 

Mayaguez crew was held by the Khmer Rouge were startled to hear the distinctive, Mittel-Europa murmur of Henry Kissinger in their earphones. The 

White House had used a command override channel to deal directly with the 

operation’s air support. In so doing, Kissinger bypassed the entire local command structure and fouled up the operation. The operational commander, Lt. 

General John J. Burns, USAF, had been about to order the Marine helicopters 

not to land on an island held by the Khmer Rouge, but his radio channel to the 

operational aircraft was blocked by the Flash Override from Washington.64

As an Army War College study observes, this never happened, and in fact, could not 

have happened given the communications extant at the time.65 Kissinger has also been 

personally blamed for the decision to drop the BLU-82 and for ordering the assault on 

Tang Island.66 Luttwak’s and Singlaub’s theme, asserted but unsupported by evidence, 

is replicated in a number of war college papers.67 There is no evidence Ford or Kissinger 

spoke to pilots or directed their tactical decisions in minute detail, unless this refers to 

Ford’s decision on whether or not to sink the trawler with the undetermined number 

of Caucasians on board. As will be argued below, it was entirely appropriate for the 

president to make this decision. 

Other sources making the case that micromanagement occurred offer concrete 

examples, but upon inspection, they are either appropriate acts of oversight or inconsequential. For example, one source argues that Admiral Gayler micromanaged when 

he bypassed both Lieutenant General Burns and Marine Colonel John M. Johnson to 

order Lieutenant Colonel Austin on Tang Island to neither “hazard his force” nor “take 

offensive action without waiting for reinforcements,” and when he ordered the 15,000-

pound BLU-82 dropped without consulting the Marines on Tang.68

Gayler informing the Marines not to hazard their force created confusion about 

their mission because they did not yet know the crew had been safely recovered. That 

should have prompted a conversation that updated and clarified the mission for the 

Marines, but the instructions from Gayler were not inappropriate. After the return of 

the crew, no one in the White House or the Pentagon wanted additional casualties or 

unnecessary risks taken by the Marines. The decision to employ the BLU-82 without 

consulting the Marines is more egregious, and it did complicate operations by dislocating aircraft and stunning the Marines. However, some believe it also at least temporarily 

suppressed Cambodian resistance and otherwise does not appear to have harmed the 

Marines. In any case, it should be noted that both decisions were made by a military, 

not civilian, leader.
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Vandenbroucke also condemns micromanagement, implying it came from the 

White House: “both USSAG [Lieutenant General Burns] and the forces at Utapao 

received continuous guidance from higher commands. Recognizing the stake the White 

House had in a successful rescue, Burns anticipated that Washington would control the 

operation tightly.”69 He makes the case that Washington not only demanded information 

in inappropriate detail70 but in such volume as to be debilitating:

CinCPac’s and the NMCC’s thirst for information was unquenchable. They 

demanded that USSAG report almost continuously, and in extraordinary 

detail, on its planning as well as on the smallest developments in the Gulf of 

Thailand. USSAG chief of staff [Major] General [Earl J.] Archer [Jr., USAF] later 

described these demands as “crushing.” “I sat there with my hand glued to the 

telephone,’’ he recalled.71

It is true that the demand for information must be attributed in part to the White 

House. Ford and Scowcroft were insistent on the need for timely, detailed updates, and 

this pressure for information could only have increased the Pentagon’s penchant for 

demanding information from the field. Although the continuous demand for updates 

must have been irritating, Vandenbroucke offers little to no evidence that it impaired 

operations or affected outcomes negatively. One might surmise that hastily assembled 

and untrained staff trying to coordinate joint operations would be distracted by such a 

barrage of questions, but no one has traced any major mishap back to supporting staff 

being overwhelmed with phone calls and issues from higher command. 

Vandenbroucke makes a more serious case for micromanagement when he asserts 

senior military leaders interfered by directing the movements of individual units on 

the scene:

During the Mayaguez operation, on-scene commanders were dismayed when 

the Commander in Chief of U.S. forces in the Pacific (CinCPac), located thousands of miles away in Hawaii, tried to direct the movements of individual units 

and planes on or above Koh Tang. Key on-scene commanders spoke acidly after 

the operation about the intrusive and excessive guidance they received from 

CinCPac and senior military commanders in Washington.72

It is true that field commanders resented the interventions by higher military authorities,73 but it is not evident that they micromanaged operations. An example offered by 

Vandenbroucke is a telephone call from a general in the NMCC to the captain of the 

Holt. The general wanted to know how fast was the Holt was going, and when he was 
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

185

told it was proceeding at 80 percent power, ordered it to “make full power,” terminating 

the call before it could be explained that “1052-class destroyers like the Holt were prone 

to engine trouble.”74 This exchange, as unhelpful as it was, had no impact on the crisis 

or its outcome. Again, it is also important to note that such examples of micromanagement involve higher military authorities, and not civilians, as is typically alleged. For 

all the strong language about micromanagement, there are only a few concrete and 

consequential examples, which brings us to the third and most important category of 

micromanagement described in the literature on the crisis. 

One example of micromanagement with potentially great consequence was the 

selection of the Marine units for the assault:

Often, senior officers in Washington and Hawaii decided on matters of the 

smallest operational detail, ignoring the traditional prerogatives of the commander in the field. Early in the crisis, III MAF [Marine Amphibious Force] 

commander [Major General Carl W.] Hoffman was amazed when he saw the 

orders from higher headquarters sending Marines from the Philippines and 

Okinawa to Utapao. The message designated a specific rifle company by name 

to execute the recovery of the Mayaguez. No one, however, had asked the 

commanders of the battalion the company belonged to which company they 

thought could do the job best.75

According to Wetterhahn, “the 1st Battalion, 9th Marines, were nearing the end of their 

one-year tour on Okinawa and could not be extended except in case of an emergency. 

The III MAF commander sought authorization to extend the unit, but it was denied.” 

Wetterhahn believes administrative issues took precedence over performance at Marine 

headquarters, “so a fully trained unit stood down while an outfit just beginning its predeployment training cycle was chosen.”76 It cannot be known whether the Marines with 

the higher readiness would have planned and performed differently. It seems churlish 

to even raise the question, given how well the Marines performed in such harrowing 

circumstances. But it is possible that a different unit with higher readiness might have 

produced a better outcome, perhaps by interacting with Air Force personnel better and 

thus obtaining more realistic intelligence estimates of enemy strength. In any case, it does 

seem the decision on which Marines to use should have been left up to local commanders.

Another example of micromanagement comes from Vice Admiral George Steele, 

the Seventh Fleet commander, who asserted that

we requested permission to fly reconnaissance flights in the area, and later, 

specifically over the island of Koh Tang. Despite repeated requests to do this, 
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it was denied until so late that the reconnaissance flight’s photographic results 

could not be processed in advance of the actual assault on the island. I think 

that this is another example of a disastrous attempt to micromanage, from 

distant headquarters with inadequately trained staff, large operations in which 

communications play so great a part.77

It is unclear why the permission for reconnaissance flights was delayed or for how 

long and with what consequences. It seems possible better reconnaissance of enemy 

positions might have inclined the Marines to insist on better plans for fire support 

during the assault. General Burns ruled out preparatory fires in deference to the 

safety of the crew, which made fire support during the assault all the more critical. 

In this regard not having a plan for gunship fire support and forward air controllers 

on the scene from the beginning seems much more consequential than the delayed 

reconnaissance flights. Once again, none of these limitations were imposed by civilian 

decision makers.

Another example of Washington interference with potentially disastrous consequences concerns the timing of the assault on Tang Island. One source that concludes 

“Ford interfered in a major military operation” offers the following argument:

One of the problems involved in having the president direct such an operation—as opposed to providing broad guidance and leaving the details to the 

military personnel on the spot—was that Washington was not always aware 

of all the issues involved in carrying out such an operation. And in the case of 

the operation to free the Mayaguez, a major problem arose from Washington’s 

failure to understand what only those in the immediate area were aware of: the 

time of first light. The Marines’ attack on Koh Tang was scheduled to begin at 

sunrise, but daylight at Koh Tang actually arrived twenty-six minutes before 

the official sunrise. As a result, when the Marines attacked, they did so without 

the advantage of surprise and in the full light of morning.78

We now know Ford asked Jones whether the Marines could make it to their destination 

at the prescribed time, and Jones replied that they could. If he had said otherwise, 

Ford might have considered another delay. In any case, it appears questionable as to 

whether the amount of light available was a decisive factor. The Marines ruled out a 

night insertion, and the Cambodians, exercising good fire control, waited until the 

helicopters were offloading before opening fire. Even if the assault had begun at the 

crack of first light, it is not clear the Cambodian defensive fires would have been any 

less devastating. 
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One of the most commonly cited examples of Washington interference with potentially critical consequences was the decision to turn off the second wave of Marines 

headed for Tang Island. Mahoney asserts that “after micromanaging many of thedetails 

of the rescue operation, Ford and Kissinger treated the extraction of the marines as an 

afterthought. Ford’s order for the marines to ‘disengage as soon as possible’ resulted 

in the second assault wave on Koh Tang being turned off apparently by overzealous 

subordinates.”79 But the White House giving the Pentagon permission to terminate 

military operations is not a case of micromanagement. As Mahoney himself notes, it 

was a subordinate in the military chain of command—Admiral Gayler—who turned 

the general guidance from the White House into a specific order to cancel the second 

wave of Marines without consulting the Marine commander on Tang. Admiral Steele 

argued that “this complicated, jury-rigged command arrangement and detailed 

management from the JCS level endangered and nearly destroyed the forces on the 

island.”80 However, the order was quickly rescinded, so the impact of the delay was 

greatly reduced if not eliminated.81

Taken as a whole, the charges of micromanagement are overblown. The heavy 

reporting requirement was irritating rather than injurious. There are only a handful 

of cases where higher authority appears to have made decisions that would have 

been better left to subordinates (e.g., the choice of the Marine unit for the assault, 

the use of the BLU-82). None of these seem especially consequential given the other 

operational problems such as the failure to disseminate accurate intelligence and to 

arrange for good close air support. Moreover, and contrary to much of the literature, 

all the tangible examples of deleterious micromanagement came from military, not 

civilian, leaders.

One of the best-informed and most strident critics of US government performance 

in the Mayaguez crisis disputes this conclusion. Wetterhahn insists military operations 

were “micromanaged from no less than the office of the president of the United States” 

and that Ford even outdid President Lyndon Johnson in micromanaging military operations.82He reviews the White House decision on whether the pilot should try to disable 

the fishing trawler with the crew members and asks whether the president should be 

making that kind of decision. However, if the risks were explained by the pilot, why 

shouldn’t the president be the one to decide whether to risk the lives of the crew? The 

outcome of the entire crisis turned on this issue. In any case, the president did not decide 

on whether to order the pilot to shoot off the boat’s rudder. The pilot initially 

volunteered that he could do so, but later, perhaps after discussion with senior military 

leaders who apprised him of what was at stake, decided against it, concluding it was too 

risky. 
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Wetterhahn also raises the issue of the controversial mainland airstrikes, asking 

“whether a president should be deciding how many aircraft and strikes should be 

used to carry out a presidential order in the first place.” His answer is that a president 

should “instead simply tell the navy to destroy mainland targets that might affect the 

Koh Tang operation and let the navy determine how and with what force to do the 

job.” For Wetterhahn, the lesson from the Vietnam War, illustrated by the Mayaguez

crisis, is that 

Washington and the Pentagon had over the years improved communication 

links and computer systems needed to automate battlefield actions. As a result, 

tactical decisions kept moving higher and higher up the chain of command, the 

domain where the larger, strategic decisions are customarily made.83

Ironically, Kissinger agreed with these points made by Wetterhahn. He argued during 

the NSC deliberations that managing the attacks on the boats was a tactical issue best 

left to the pilots, that they should have been allowed to act on the blanket orders to sink 

the boats and not have reported on their activities. 

Schlesinger disagreed and did his best to impose strict rules of engagement that 

would allow Washington to calibrate the amount of risk taken. As a result, the crew 

survived and the United States avoided a worse outcome. Given all that was at stake, it 

was appropriate for Ford to make decisions about how far he was willing to go in risking 

the lives of the crew. It was also appropriate for Ford to decide how much of a risk he 

was willing to run with Congress by bombing the mainland after the recovery of the 

crew. Years later Scowcroft offered an explanation for why presidents will always insist 

on this level of control in a crisis, emphasizing the tension

between the need for the president to manage these sorts of things, and the 

utility of the man on the scene being told what it is he is supposed to do and then 

letting him do it. As a military man, of course, I am attracted to the latter. As a 

practical matter, however, as I watch what is involved in these isolated kinds of 

military situations—I am not talking about a general conflict or anything—the 

president’s political neck is on the line. As a matter of course, he is going to be 

very reluctant to leave in the hands of some unknown military commander 

decisions which could have a great impact on his political well-being. Therefore, the military has to expect that it is going to be subject to intense scrutiny 

in carrying out crisis interventions. Whether it is optimally the better way to 

do it is almost beside the point. . . . An incumbent president is simply not going 

to leave these things up to the vagaries of the local US military commander.84
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189

Scowcroft is right but for the wrong reasons. It has less to do with the president’s “political neck being on the line” and more to do with the fact that small military engagements 

for political purposes require intense scrutiny by senior leaders in order to ensure 

military operations do not risk the very objectives they are trying to achieve. During 

a major war, where everything hinges upon military victory and precedence is given 

to military success, the assumption that the president and his cabinet officials should 

limit themselves to broad strategy decisions and leave all other operational and tactical 

details to subordinates holds for the most part. But virtually all the great theoreticians 

and practitioners of operations “other than war” (also called small wars, irregular wars, 

and low-intensity conflict) conclude that in such matters even tactical operations can 

have strategic significance.85 Thus, the details of tactical operations deserve scrutiny 

by senior leadership, and the president was right to concern himself with the details of 

how, when, and where Cambodian boats would be sunk and with when and how much 

mainland bombing would take place. 

This is not to say expert views on risk or other antecedent elements of the decision-making process should be overlooked. On the contrary, senior leaders need to be 

well-informed on their subordinates’ estimates of risk and likely outcomes. The key 

White House decision makers during the Mayaguez incident—specifically Ford and 

Kissinger—were quite solicitous of military judgment about the risks involved in various 

military options under consideration, including the assault on Tang Island. With those 

expert views known, however, they made the decisions about how much risk to their 

objectives they were willing to accept. They miscalculated the risk of the island assault 

not in spite of best military advice, but because of it.

In the Mayaguez crisis, insufficient oversight was a greater problem than harmful micromanagement. Higher authorities should have asked harder questions about 

the plans to assault Tang Island and the risks being run during the assault. Egregious 

omissions in the tactical plan should have caught the attention of higher military 

authorities who, if they had made determined inquiries, would have quickly discovered the Marine plan was based on the incorrect assumption of token resistance. As 

already noted, the assault plan violated Marine Corps doctrine on a large number 

of points, including the lack of pre-assault reconnaissance, pre-assault strikes, 

armed escort for the troop helicopters, dedicated airborne forward air controllers, 

and naval gunfire support. As a Center for Naval Analysis study concluded, “Except 

for the exclusion of pre-assault strikes, we have found no explanation of why the 

above tactics were not incorporated or, in the case of pre-assault reconnaissance, 

were not adequate.”86
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As previously noted, Lieutenant General Burns later explained his assessment of 

the Marine plan when he received it at his headquarters in Utapao. Unaware that the 

Marines did not have the better intelligence estimate that depicted a large Cambodian 

defensive force dug in on the island, Burns was alarmed at the apparent risk:

When . . . Hunt [Major General Jim Hunt, Burns’s deputy] came and showed me 

where they were landing, I was really concerned. I thought that was an awfully 

risky operation because obviously they were going to be landing right within a 

couple of hundred feet of the inhabited area. He said he had been talking to the 

Marines, that the Marine commander had in fact flown over the island, and had 

selected the landing zone himself. I thought, for example, it might have made 

more sense to land in the south where there was no inhabitants that we knew 

of and work your way up. He said, “Well, I am told by the Marines who looked 

the island over that it would take them a full day to work from the south end of 

the island to the north. By that time the crew could all have their throats cut. 

If they could quickly envelop them, they had a better chance of securing the 

crew.” I said, “Okay, I will accede to the guy’s judgment that has to do the job.”87

Burns followed a mission command approach by exercising restraint in the supervision 

of his subordinates and delegating as much of the decision making to his subordinate 

as possible, given that the Marine commander was closer to the area of operations 

and responsible for executing his plan. However, under the pressure of limited time, 

fatigue, and dispersed command and control, both Burns and the assault commander, 

Lieutenant Colonel Austin, were operating under false assumptions. Burns thought 

the Marines had the higher estimate of enemy forces and knew there would not be 

pre-assault fires; the Marines assumed they had the latest intelligence and that there 

would be pre-assault fires.88 More scrutiny from Burns and direct queries to the Marine 

commander might well have brought these erroneous assumptions to the fore. Simply asking Austin, “How do you expect to land your helicopters in the face of 100–200 

well-armed and entrenched Cambodian defenders?” should have quickly revealed the 

differing estimates of enemy forces and the misunderstanding about preparatory fires.

Another example of insufficient oversight concerns the estimate of risk in assaulting Tang Island discussed in the NSC meetings. Ford acceded to one twenty-four-hour 

delay when his advisors agreed it was too risky to go on the fourteenth. He could have 

been convinced to delay another twenty-four hours. Scowcroft argued the urgency of 

military operations was driven by the need to prevent the crew and ship from being 

taken to the mainland, but that was a moot point given the decision to sink Cambodian 
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191

boats. Kissinger, the most influential advisor to the president, was not interested in a fine 

calculation of force. He wanted to make an unmistakable international impression,89

which meant avoiding any embarrassing military mishaps. He pushed back against 

Colby and Rumsfeld when they seemed to dismiss such risk too easily, explaining the 

danger of the small initial Marine assault force. He also invited the military’s assessment 

of risk on several occasions by saying he was not competent to render judgment on the 

risks involved in the island assault. Schlesinger obliged, arguing for the sixteenth, but 

neither General Jones nor Admiral Holloway chimed in. Jones had qualms about going 

onthe fifteenth, but the otherChiefs were in favor of doing so. He might have acquiesced 

to their views because he discovered the USS Hancock was moving toward the scene 

slower than first reported due a malfunctioning screw. Later Jones noted, “We were 

depending on that ship coming from Okinawa [he meant Subic] very badly,” and at the 

time of the island assault it was still about thirty-five hours away.90 So, when Schlesinger 

explicitly turned to Jones in the fourth NSC meeting to make the Pentagon’s recommendations, Jones advised going on the fifteenth, saying, “We can do it with high assurance 

of success” and that doing so was “a joint recommendation from all the Joint Chiefs.”

Although it is perhaps understandable that the Joint Chiefs assumed authorities 

further down the chain of command were ironing out the details of the plan, they were 

responsible for assessing and explaining risk to the White House. They knew that the 

greatest risk came from the limited transport available for the first wave of Marines and 

explained this well to civilian leaders. With only a handful of helicopters, the first wave 

of Marines could at best insert 270 men, after which they would have to wait another 

four hours for the next wave. But actually the Joint Chiefs, and their spokesman, General 

Jones, missed an important point. The first wave was at greater risk than acknowledged 

because a portion of the 270Marines would be sent to the ship. This meant that only 175 

Marines would be assaulting Tang Island in the first wave.91 But neither the Joint Chiefs, 

nor the acting chairman of the JCS, nor any of the civilian advisors initially noticed the 

oversight. Instead of almost a 3-to-1 ratio of assault to assumed defending forces on 

Tang, it would be a 1.8-to-1 ratio—a significantly greater risk. Later, in the fourth NSC 

meeting, Jones noted it would be 175 Marines inthe assault on the island, but he failed to 

mention that this meant higher risk for the assault. Arguably, compared to the absence of 

close air support, the difference between 175 and 270 Marines was of lesser import. But 

the point is that greater scrutiny of the plan by any ofthe Chiefs or by any of the civilian 

advisors who considered and debated this issue at length could very well have inclined 

Ford to delay the additional day that Schlesinger, and, to a lesser extent, Jones wanted.

The most serious charge of micromanagement leveled in the literature on the Maya-
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192

guez crisis is that senior civilian leaders rushed military operations unnecessarily and at 

great cost to the servicemen they sent in harm’s way. Mahoney, for example, argues that 

“the operation was being driven from the very top” and that “people at the strategic level 

not trained in military planning” were “making operational and tactical decisions,” which 

“was a recipe for disaster.”92 This observation, common in scholarship on the Mayaguez

crisis, has been widely accepted by policy makers and academics. For example, a study 

on the Iran rescue operations makes the following claim about the Mayaguez operation:

Pressured by Ford and Kissinger to launch the rescue mission on 14 May instead 

of the following day, Jones argued that it would be difficult, if not impossible. 

The various forces involved in a rescue bid would have to be coordinated 

properly, and many of the necessary forces had not yet even arrived in the area. 

Nevertheless, Ford decided that the mission should be launched immediately.93

This is factually inaccurate, as is the broader charge of civilian micromanagement it 

suggests. Military operations were not forced over the objection of best military advice 

but in conformity with it. Military operations were driven from the top, but not inappropriately and not exclusively by people untrained in military planning. The acting 

chairman of the JCS, representing all of the Chiefs, weighed in heavily on the timing of 

military operations. He secured one day of delay, and there is reason to believe could 

have easily delayed them another day if he had made the case that the risks of failure 

were too high. Under pressure from the other Joint Chiefs, Jones did not make that case. 

We cannot know what he would have done if the issue of only 175 Marines assaulting 

Tang Island had come up, but it seems clear that more scrutiny to reveal the actual risks 

being run would have been helpful. For this reason we can argue more rather than less 

oversight was needed in the Mayaguez decision-making process.

With a clear picture of command and control during the crisis, it is possible to 

extract some pertinent insights for the mission command concept. What the Mayaguez 

crisis illustrates is that the mission command approach can fail from lack of oversight 

just as easily as it can fail due to micromanagement and fail just as easily from “anticipatory compliance” as from insubordination.

94 Subordinates like the Marines assaulting 

Tang and the Joint Chiefs advising the president must feel free to provide candid risk 

assessments and to question their superiors until they are confident they understand 

intent and operating parameters.

What this suggests is that the open, collaborative, no jeopardy, “just the truth from 

your viewpoint” kind of culture pioneered by the military for its after-action review 

processes is just as important prior to operations (when they are being planned) as it is 
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193

during operations (when they are being executed) and afterwards (when they are being 

reviewed to determine why things went the way they did). That was not the case during 

the Mayaguez crisis. The Marine assault commanders realized they would encounter 

heavier resistance than a few irregular forces and yet did not question their mission 

assignment.95 The Marines wanted close air support but did not successfully explain 

their concerns or the risks of their assault plan to Lieutenant General Burns. In turn, 

Burns did not probe the Marine plan seeking an explanation for the risks being run or 

discuss the types of fire support that could be made available.96 If either side had shared 

more information and their concerns, the competing intelligence estimates of enemy 

forces would have been reconciled and the assault plan could have been improved with 

workable close air support. Similarly, General Jones did not question the assault plan 

closely enough to raise questions about the advisability of 175 Marines assaulting a large 

body of well-entrenched enemy forces with heavy weapons, or the adequacy of close 

air support. Ford’s civilian advisors, and particularly the much-excoriated Kissinger, 

actually raised more concerns about the risks of the Marine assault in the NSC deliberations than military leadership in the Pentagon did when reviewing the plan. Thus 

Jones, as well as Schlesinger, was not able to successfully explain the actual risks of the 

assault to Ford and other members of the NSC. 

The Mayaguez crisis suggests the need to be as concerned about the adequacy of 

oversight as with the danger of micromanagement. Yet the mission command concept 

disproportionately emphasizes the latter. It encourages commanders to “demonstrate 

trust by exercising restraint in supervision of subordinates.”97 However, trust should also 

allow appropriate questions to be raised to clarify intent and risk. When all concerned 

are trusting others to focus on mission success, it is easier to fully explore the reasoning 

behind decisions without raising concerns about competence, confidence, or credibility 

that tend to complicate communication. 

In the Mayaguez crisis there was not enough trust between the Marine and Air 

Forces in the field to sustain tough questioning of the assault force plan or higher 

decisions on close air support. Nor was there enough trust between the White House 

and the Pentagon to support more penetrating analysis of the risks associated with 

assaulting Tang Island and less direction of mainland strikes. The Joint Chiefs relaxed 

their oversight of plans and their risk assessment in deference to perceived White House 

preferences for moving quickly, and Schlesinger offered cryptic responses to Ford 

instead of bluntly explaining why he canceled the last airstrike. In short, undue fear of 

micromanagement can encourage a lack of trust that complicates effective command 

and control. In some cases, subordinates may even refuse to share information with 
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superiors in hopes of compromising their situational awareness and discouraging 

interference in their decision making. 

For example, during the crisis on the Korean Peninsula precipitated by the North 

Korean axe murders of American officers, senior military officers chose to distance 

themselves from Washington. “Recalling the micromanagement by officials in Washington who had reacted to the seizure of Mayaguez the previous year,” General Richard 

G. Stilwell, USA, commander in chief of UN Command, “took steps to head off the tendency to skip echelons in the command and control system with high-level queries.” “To 

preclude Washington micromanagement,” he and key members of the UN Command 

staff “cut potential communications links between the President and subordinate commands.” General Stillwell did so even though he and his chief of staff, Major General 

John Singlaub, believed the operations they were overseeing could easily escalate to 

general war. Singlaub later noted, “It was my estimate, shared by many of the staff, that 

the operation stood a fifty-fifty chance of starting a war.” Still, Stillwell and Singlaub felt 

safer being out of touch with the president and his senior advisors.98

Some students of mission command have questioned the concept’s bias toward 

decentralized decision making, arguing that sometimes conditions favor more centralized decision making.99 But the vast bulk of the literature on the subject, and recent 

senior leader statements, emphasize the dangers of micromanagement, not the lack of 

sufficient oversight.100 The condemnation of micromanagement in the Mayaguez crisis 

over the past thirty years and up until the present day has contributed to this broader, 

ongoing concern with micromanagement, and thus encouraged widespread worry 

that information sharing will lead to micromanagement.101 These trends suggests the 

possibility that in our current military culture, and even the culture operative in the 

national security system more broadly,102 leaders have trouble distinguishing between 

and properly balancing oversight and micromanagement.

This is especially true for operations short of large-scale force-on-force warfare. The 

persistent tendency in military culture to ignore the distinctions between warfighting 

and politico-military operations, and their differing requirements for success, further 

complicates the exercise of mission command. Officers involved in leading politico-military operations need to appreciate the greater level of scrutiny they will receive from 

both military and civilian leadership, and senior leaders need to pay greater attention 

to subordinate behaviors to ensure they are consistent with senior leader priorities. For 

example, General Brown, who unlike General Jones did not sit in on the NSC meetings, 

apparently did not appreciate the punitive nature of the mainland strikes. He too readily 

turned White House guidance to hold off the strikes into a blanket order to call them 
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

195

all off, thus exacerbating White House–Pentagon tensions. Misconstruing information 

requests from higher authorities as micromanagement and evidence of insufficient trust 

is another problem. Senior leaders may rightly delve into the details of operational and 

tactical planning because their understanding of the political objectives allow them to 

identify and assess risks that may not be apparent to those conducting the operations. 

Even those who currently flag the danger of micromanagement acknowledge it is no 

virtue for superiors to be poorly informed of what lower echelons are doing. On the 

contrary, the imperative for shared awareness makes it critical that senior leaders be 

acutely aware of what is happening at lower echelons, which also implies they may need 

to intervene on occasion to ensure alignment with higher level priorities.103

Defense Reform

It is often remarked that the Mayaguez incident was one of a series of cases that 

propelled defense reform interest in Congress and concluded with the landmark 

Goldwater-Nichols legislation of 1986 that mandated greater jointness. It is less well 

known that Scowcroft’s assistant during the crisis, Robert McFarlane, played a major 

role in the reform. His conviction that reform was required stemmed, in part, from his 

after action analysis of what went wrong during the crisis.104 The Mayaguez crisis also 

inclined the Joint Chiefs to pay more attention to special operations105 and stimulated 

direct input into the landmark legislation that created the US Special Operations Command. First Lieutenant Gary L. Weikel, an Air Force HH-53 pilot during the crisis, was 

deeply bothered by how special operations forces were not used or ill-used during the 

operations. The AC-130 gunships were underutilized, the SEALs were not used at all, 

and after the special operations helicopters proved their worth during Vietnam and the 

Mayaguez crisis, the Air Force “wasted no time in dismantling the C/HH-53 squadrons 

and capability.”106 Weikel wrote a National War College paper on the topic that impressed 

the faculty. More directly, he provided evidence of the Air Force’s failure to support 

special operations aviation to the Senate Armed Services Committee that motivated 

Representatives Dan Daniel (D-VA) and Earl D. Hutto (D-FL) to support legislation to 

create the Special Operations Command.107

Flag officers who served during the Mayaguez crisis also became proponents of 

reform. Admiral Holloway led the investigation of Operation Eagle Claw, the failed 

attempt to rescue the Americans held hostage in Tehran, and drafted the conclusions of 

the resultant “Holloway report.” As Holloway recalls, the report “was frankly critical of 

the planning process, specifically the Chairman’s decision to conduct the planning with 

an ad hoc organization outside of the JCS structure.”108 Holloway’s colleagues signed 
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the report even though they thought it would “probably be the end of their military 

careers.”109 The Holloway report contributed momentum toward the Goldwater-Nichols 

and Special Operations Command reforms. 

General Jones also emerged from the crisis convinced of the need for change. He 

would end up playing a key role in subsequent reforms. Authoritative sources consider 

Jones’s testimony and public stance on the need for reform to be the “most important 

factor in the enactment of the Goldwater-Nichols Act.”110 Jones later explained the impact 

of the Mayaguez on his thinking about the need for reform in an interview:

It convinced me also of some of the difficulty of the problems of the joint system. If you look at our record of joint activity, we have had great problems of 

execution. There have been exceptions: the landing at Normandy and Korea 

at Inchon. But we’ve had our Gulf of Leyte, and we had terrible problems in 

Vietnam in joint operations. We have had them since then—the Iranian Crisis 

and Grenada. We found out in the aftermath [of the Mayaguez] that the command arrangements were down through CINCPAC, but below that it tended 

to get divided. We somewhat lucked out. Although we lost some troops on the 

island, we were quite fortunate to get the crew members back.111

Weikel, Jones, Holloway, and McFarlane experienced the Mayaguez crisis in different 

ways, respectively as a participant in the operations, as acting chairman of the Joint 

Chiefs, as a service chief, and as a White House aide monitoring the crisis decision 

making and conducting the White House assessment of the Pentagon’s after action 

report. However, they all saw the need for change and played major roles in bringing 

about defense reforms that have transformed the way the US military performs both in 

conventional and irregular wars. Because of what they and many others learned from 

the crisis, major defense reforms are an important part of the historical legacy of the 

Mayaguez crisis.

One lesson from this experience is that it is possible to learn from failure—although 

it is difficult—and that it requires “insider” and “outsider” perspectives to come up with 

solutions. Both the Goldwater-Nichols and Special Operations Command reforms were 

fiercely resisted by the Pentagon. This is to be expected, given that organizations naturally pursue autonomy and resist outside direction. Reform required some farsighted 

individuals within the system working with those outside the system who could clinically evaluate system performance as a whole.

The current chairman of the JCS, Marine General Joseph F. Dunford, has argued 

the Pentagon has another major performance challenge that requires organizational 
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change. He noted the high likelihood of any future conflict being transregional, multidomain, and multifunctional:

From my perspective, our current planning, our organizational construct, and 

our command and control is not really optimized for that fight. . . . In terms of 

true integration—in other words, decision-making authority that integrates 

a fight across a region, across a domain, or across a function . . . if you believe 

what I believe . . . and then look at the nature of what the fight might be against 

peer competitors in the future, I don’t think we’ll be able to be as responsive, 

I don’t think we’ll be able to generate the tempo, I don’t think we’ll be able to 

frame decisions and act in a timely manner as much as we should unless we 

make some fundamental changes, again, to our organizational construct—the 

way we plan, the way we develop strategy, and . . . our command and control.112

The kind of organizational change the chairman is talking about will not be easy, but 

neither were the reforms that improved joint and special operations capabilities. What 

the Mayaguez crisis teaches is that such reforms are possible, particularly if those 

involved in the military operations can learn from the shortcomings and are willing to 

act on what they have learned. 

National Security Council Reform

An in-depth description and analysis of the Mayaguez crisis also can be used to impart 

lessons about NSC decision making. Two things immediately stand out. It was the only 

time a president ever used the NSC to directly manage a crisis. Ford used the council 

as his decision-making body rather than empowering a smaller group to manage the 

event as happened during the Cuban missile crisis and other similar events.113 The other 

salient aspect of the decision making is the amount of conflict it generated. Despite all 

senior officials agreeing on overarching priorities from the outset, which should have 

boded well for a unified effort, they executed their decisions in a manner that contributed to competition, conflict, and ultimately Schlesinger’s firing.

Kissinger believes the two issues are related. In his memoirs, he argues that managing the crisis directly through the NSC was a mistake, that it was too “unwieldy to 

supervise operations in that much detail,” and that trying to do so allowed Schlesinger 

to thwart the president’s will. He claims the two mainland strikes that did not hit targets 

“demonstrate the risk of planning military operations in the National Security Council 

without any preparatory work by a subordinate group and without some official short 

of the President being made responsible for the hour by hour coordination.” Kissinger 
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198

notes, “The NSC is better designed for overall decisions than for micromanagement” 

and explains why:

The President had ordered all-out strikes at the NSC meeting and, in the 

absence of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, there was no military 

officer sufficiently close to him to transmit the orders unambiguously through 

the chain of command. This gave the Secretary of Defense—who is actually, 

in our system, not directly in the chain of command—what turned out to be a 

decisive voice. To those of us in hourly contact with the President, it was inconceivable that he could have meant that the first wave be confined to armed 

reconnaissance in which no ordnance would be expended. How various NSC 

members in less frequent contact with Ford perceived his directives should not 

have been left to their subjective interpretations. The NSC is too unwieldy to 

supervise operations in that much detail. This is why President Kennedy created the so-called Ex-Comm (Executive Committee of the NSC) in the Cuban 

Missile Crisis and why the Nixon and Ford Administrations generally backed 

up the NSC with the Washington Special Actions Group (WSAG) at the deputy 

secretary level. In this case, senior officials at the NSC meeting were dealing 

directly with the President on tactical questions or created the impression 

with their subordinates that they were doing so. That made it hard to trace the 

responsibility for individual acts.114

Boiled down, Kissinger is arguing that “those of us in hourly contact with the President” (i.e., those who knew Ford’s intent) were fit to “supervise operations in that 

much detail,” whereas “NSC members in less frequent contact with Ford” and who 

“perceived his directives” through “their subjective interpretations” wrongly “created 

the impression with their subordinates that” because they attended an “NSC meeting 

[they] were dealing directly with the President on tactical questions.” In short, Kissinger 

believed his proximity to Ford gave him the right to supervise policy implementation on 

the president’s behalf and that Schlesinger’s attempt to manage Defense Department 

implementation of presidential orders was illegitimate and ineffective. 

Kissinger is wrong about Schlesinger’s role, both legally and bureaucratically. 

Legally, Schlesinger was in the chain of command (figure 2). As one history of the Joint 

Staff notes, Kissinger apparently was “unaware of the 1958 amendments to the National 

Security Act, which established the chain of command as running from the President 

through the Secretary of Defense to the combatant commanders.”115 Kissinger was 

primus inter pares in terms of his close relationship with Ford, but as a practical matter 
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

199

the secretary of defense and other cabinet officials had the authority to oversee the 

details of any presidential decisions involving their departments and agencies. 

Bureaucratically, Kissinger’s proximity to the president did not afford him the 

undisputed authority he thought it should. In saying “the NSC is better designed for 

overall decisions than for micromanagement,” Kissinger was not saying he was against 

micromanagement.116 Rather, he was saying the president did not have time to microPresident

(Commander in Chief, 

Armed Forces)

Secretary of Defense

Chairman, 

Joint Chiefs of Staff

CINCPAC

Pacific Fleet

7th Fleet

Pacific Air Force

7th Air Force

Local 

US Command

National Security Council: 

President, Vice President, 

Secretaries of State 

and Defense

Advisory: Director of 

Central Intelligence and 

Chairman of the 

Joint Chiefs of Staff

Marine Task 

Group 79.9

ABCCC

Fighter

Wing

Fighter

Wing

Fighter

Wing

Special

Operation

Wing 

(Helo)

Marine

assault

commander

Mayaguez

boarding

party

Coral 

Sea

Group

USS

Wilson

USS

Holt

Airborne battlefield command and control center (ABCCC)

 Command (with operational control)

 Command less operational command 

 Coordinating role

FIGURE 2. MILITARY CHAIN OF COMMAND IN 1975

US General Accounting Office
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manage and should have allowed Kissinger to do so through an interagency subgroup 

supporting the NSC. He is correct that presidents, and cabinet officials for that matter, 

typically are too busy to manage the details of complex national security problems. 

Presidents historically have relied upon smaller groups for both crisis support and routine policy formulation and implementation. Also, reading the NSC minutes, it is easy 

to see where Kissinger might have thought it difficult to keep discussion of fine points 

on track with so many people in the room. Minor players felt free to add their voices to 

the discussion and frequently sidetracked the debate. 

However, it is not true that these interagency committees are better equipped to 

authoritatively oversee the implementation of policy. The Mayaguez crisis illustrates a 

president can have difficulty implementing his decisions through powerful departments 

and agencies. How much truer it is to say a presidential subordinate will face even more 

difficulties in this regard. Kissinger himself came to realize “that the more he was perceived as the controlling voice on policy the more likely the agencies and departments 

were to assert their prerogatives during implementation.” He noted that it was easy making 

policy but not coordinating and implementing it. He found being dual-hatted as national 

security advisor and secretary of state increased his dominance in policy making but 

decreased his ability to implement the policies because the other departments, feeling 

they had not had a say in policy formulation, resisted policy implementation all the more.117

What Kissinger wanted was control so that he could impose coherence on both 

policy formulation and implementation. But he was not the president and did not have 

the formal or informal authority to control the Department of Defense.118 Kissinger’s 

relations with Melvin R. Laird and Rumsfeld, the secretaries of defense who preceded 

and followed Schlesinger, were just as fraught with tension. Also, as subsequent history 

illustrates, internecine battles between national security leaders are common (for example, between Zbigniew Brzezinski and Cyrus R. Vance, George P. Shultz and Caspar W. 

Weinberger, Colin L. Powell and Donald Rumsfeld). Typically these conflicts arise over 

inherently interagency issues that neither State nor Defense can manage alone but for 

which they refuse to follow the lead of the other or the national security advisor.

Moreover, Kissinger overestimates the value of one man’s perspective dominating all the others. The decision making in the Mayaguez crisis was improved, not 

diminished, by having multiple perspectives advocated in the NSC. Ford’s risk of 

catastrophic failure would have increased without the debate in the NSC about the 

wisdom of B-52 strikes and the need to delay operations a day. In retrospect, it is unfortunate the debate over delaying another day was not deeper and more protracted.

Despite his heavy reliance upon and confidence in Kissinger, Ford could see he ben-
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

201

efited from multiple perspectives. When he fired Schlesinger, he also ended Kissinger’s 

stint as both secretary of state and national security advisor. He later explained that 

doing so was “critical to restoring the proper functioning of the government’s foreign 

policy apparatus,” arguing that “from an institutional standpoint it was long overdue”:

The National Security Council was set up in 1947 so that a president would have 

an independent think tank in the White House that could make independent 

evaluations from the Pentagon and State Department and elsewhere so that 

the president wouldn’t be captive of the bureaucracy. When Kissinger had both 

State and NSC, there was not an independent evaluation of proposals, and 

I never liked that arrangement that I inherited. And when the time came to 

make some [other] changes at the Pentagon and CIA, it was logical to tell Henry, 

“I’m gonna just leave you as secretary of state and upgrade Brent Scowcroft.”119

Even if decision making is improved by multiple competing perspectives, as has long 

been argued,120 we are left with the control issue that Kissinger raised. He charged 

Schlesinger with thwarting presidential intent. Kissinger overstated the case for insubordination on the airstrikes. Schlesinger and Jones did not hide the nature of the first 

strike package, and Schlesinger exercised what he (and probably most others) considered appropriate latitude in cancelling the fourth strike to aid the Marines on Tang 

Island. It has been argued that “Secretaries of Defense going back to Forrestal had 

routinely taken it upon themselves to cancel Presidential orders when they judged them 

to be . . . overtaken by events.”121 Arguably this was the case with the fourth airstrike. 

However, by his own admission, Schlesinger was insubordinate on the orders to sink 

Cambodian vessels. He could have cited confusing presidential directives demanding 

a finely modulated use of force,122 but his defense was that he did the right thing, both 

for the nation and for Ford’s reputation. Regardless of how one adjudicates the propriety 

of what he, Wickham, and Pauly did in sidestepping the presidential order for sinking 

of all Cambodian vessels coming and going to Tang Island, their behavior underscores 

the control problem Kissinger raised. How can a president have high confidence that 

his policy will be implemented consistent with his will when he does not have time to 

personally supervise the issue and key actors on a sustained basis?

One option is for the president to designate an individual to lead the effort on 

his behalf. This is the solution Kissinger preferred, and as we have just examined, it 

does not work well. The other key presidential advisors resent the person designated 

as the lead and often refuse to take direction from that individual. They suspect the 

person assigned to lead the effort is pursuing their own interest and the interests of 
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202

their organization, rather than the president’s and/or nation’s interests. This perceived conflict of interest is the same that General Jones identified in his testimony 

to Congress on the Joint Chiefs:

Jones called the service chiefs’ conflict of interest a “spokesman-statesman” 

dilemma. He said he did not see how the existing arrangement could work 

given the resource and mission issues that heightened this conflict. He called 

it “unreasonable to expect the service chiefs to take one position as service 

advocate . . . and a totally different position in the joint arena.”123

Similarly, it is difficult to ask a cabinet official to both represent his or her department 

and also play the role of statesman, working for the national interest writ large. The 

Project on National Security Reform identified this problem in its lengthy report on 

national security system performance:

In the national security system as currently constituted, Cabinet officials play 

dual roles. They are both advisors to the president on overall policy integration, 

and they are champions of their departments and agencies and those organizations’ equities and agendas. Delegation of presidential authority does not work 

well because . . . “the needs of any President and those of his officialdom are 

incompatible.” They are incompatible because Cabinet members must balance 

their roles as presidential advisors with their statutory obligations to build, 

manage, and safeguard strong departmental capabilities. Therefore, Cabinet 

officials bring their and their agencies’ issues up to the president for settlement, 

while the president must try to impose a cross-cutting vision through his own 

“personal initiative, his mastery of detail, his search for information, his reach 

for control.” The US government since World War II “has often tried . . . tinkering with structure” to reduce the tension between the president and his Cabinet 

officials, but to little effect.124

The Project on National Security Reform’s remedy was to give the president the authority 

to appoint distinguished leaders without organizational leadership responsibilities to 

run empowered cross-functional teams dedicated to managing a high-priority issue 

full-time within a larger reform framework that assured departments and agencies that 

they would be able to weigh in with the president to define the scope of the team’s purpose and strategy.125 The way the teams should work has been explained elsewhere.126 

The point to be made here is that the Mayaguez is one of many cases that substantiate 

the need for reforming how the national security system currently integrates the efforts 
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

203

of diverse departments and agencies to pursue intrinsically interagency missions.

Civil-Military Relations

The Mayaguez crisis also has value as a case study in civil-military relations. The alleged 

micromanagement by the White House, the Joint Chiefs’ desire to accommodate White 

House preferences that contributed to an underestimation of the risks of assaulting 

Tang Island, the insubordination by the Pentagon, and the firing of Schlesinger—in part 

because he accepted the unanimous recommendation of his senior uniformed officers 

to cancel the last airstrike—are all examples of friction in civil-military relations that 

deserve scrutiny. The loss of life, made particularly unbearable by the fate of the three 

Marines left behind,127 still ignites indignation over these perceived shortcomings in 

the decision process.

The case of Pentagon insubordination in sidestepping presidential orders on the 

automatic sinking of Cambodian vessels is particularly poignant because it is so clear 

cut, yet so defensible in retrospect as having been responsible for securing “the margin 

of victory.” If the boat with the Mayaguez crew had been sunk, many of the crew members would have been killed or badly injured. The United States would have suffered 

great damage to its reputation, and the public and Congress would have been furious, 

producing a backlash that would have further called into question whether the United 

States had the will and competence to protect its interests. 

Yet the Mayaguez affair represents more than just a major case of frayed civilmilitary relations. The crisis and the way it was managed are often described as a fitting end to the nation’s excruciating experience in Indochina, which broke the trust so 

necessary between the nation’s leadership, military, and populace. As the novelist and 

Vietnam veteran Karl Marlantes put it,

America didn’t just lose the war, and the lives of 58,000 young men and women; 

Vietnam changed us as a country. In many ways, for the worse: It made us 

cynical and distrustful of our institutions, especially of government. For many 

people, it eroded the notion, once nearly universal, that part of being an American was serving your country.128

Many view the Mayaguez as the last act in an awful tragedy that began and ended 

with deception and poor leadership. In that sense the crisis was a harbinger of the 

direction civil-military relations would take over the next few decades as “no more Vietnams” became the silent rallying cry of many Americans. For many in the military, the 

Mayaguez showcased the civilian micromanagement they believed doomed military 
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operations in Vietnam. Military officers widely believe civilian leaders second-guessed 

and tried to run military operations instead of making national strategy and ensuring the 

popular support and resources necessary to win the war were available. For many, the 

Mayaguez, with its near-catastrophic failure of the assault on Tang Island, tragic loss of 

life, and misleading explanations, seemed to epitomize the entire Vietnam experience. 

For most civilian leaders, the Mayaguez incident did not reveal any such broader 

insights into the nation’s military. To the extent Ford, Kissinger, and Scowcroft found 

Pentagon performance unsatisfactory, they attributed it to Schlesinger’s poor leadership rather than the military more generally. However, well after the crisis Kissinger 

identified some institutional military characteristics that others have seized upon to 

help explain civil-military friction in more recent years.

When Kissinger explained the poor results and the “new crisis of confidence 

between the President and his Secretary of Defense” that, he said, “would culminate 

in Schlesinger’s dismissal five months later,” he also attributed some behaviors to the 

Pentagon more generally. In the same passage where he blames Schlesinger for “most 

of the communication mix-ups and sloppy intelligence reporting” during the crisis, 

Kissinger highlights the Pentagon’s determination “never again to be cast in the role 

of villain.” He attributes a more general Pentagon listlessness to the aftereffects of the 

Vietnam War:

One of the most painful casualties of the Vietnam War was the morale of the 

Pentagon. The idea of reengaging in Indochina only two weeks after the evacuation of Saigon evoked revulsion. When the Pentagon is less than enthusiastic, 

it does not reinterpret orders—as the Foreign Service is wont to do—but fulfills 

them literally without any additional initiative on its part. Given the complexity 

of military deployments, the practical effect is the same as procrastination. 

Throughout the Mayaguez crisis, the Pentagon dutifully assembled the forces 

as it was ordered to do. But it was clearly reluctant, offered no ideas of its own, 

left it to the civilians to prod it into action, and—remembering the outcry after 

the B-52 bombing of the Hanoi area—reflexively opposed the use of the strategic bombers.129

Kissinger’s charge of passivity is plainly false. The Pentagon had specific views on 

how military force should be used and acted on those views to the point of insubordination. Pentagon leaders also took the initiative on detailed rules of engagement 

and an ultimatum. Schlesinger and his top military leaders were not passive, but 

they did disagree with Kissinger on some specific issues like the rules of engagement, 
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

205

ultimatums, and B-52s. 

It seems more likely Kissinger’s real complaint was that the Pentagon was insufficiently pliant. It was too adamant about using proportionate and discriminate force, 

and given the documented insubordination present during the crisis, it seems like a 

fair complaint. The critical exception is the Joint Chiefs’ willingness to accommodate 

the White House by supporting the hasty assault on Tang Island. But even that decision 

only serves to reinforce the popular view in the military that it is important for military 

leaders to help the White House make better strategic choices and calculate risks with 

greater precision. This willingness to challenge the White House perspective and work 

toward a Pentagon-preferred solution may be a long-standing military penchant, but it 

was greatly reinforced by the perceived failure in Vietnam. 

Military leaders who believe Vietnam demonstrated that America’s political elites 

are prone to poor and/or politicized strategic thinking and the micromanaging of 

military operations are more inclined to challenge, or even attempt to control, the way 

the military is used so that there will be “no more Vietnams.” Over time, many senior 

civilians have come to believe the Pentagon will frame military advice in ways that 

encourage presidents to take Pentagon-preferred courses of action. In particular, the 

concern expressed by civilian leaders is that the Pentagon crafts an artificial set of military options to steer the president in the direction the Pentagon prefers.130 In that sense, 

Kissinger’s complaint that the Pentagon was insufficiently on board with President Ford 

during the Mayaguez crisis was a harbinger of future civil-military relations, as was the 

military’s concern with civilian micromanagement.

By correcting the false narratives that have grown up around the Mayaguez crisis, 

this study can make a contribution to ameliorating strains in current civil-military 

relations. The analysis offered here disproves the heavy-handed micromanagement 

thesis that many military officers writing on the Mayaguez crisis emphasize. In reality, 

as a careful reading of the NSC minutes illuminates, civilian leaders were careful when 

it came to the issue of military risk. It is not hard to understand why. Political leaders 

need and want successful military operations as much as military leaders. They also, for 

political reasons, want to avoid allegations that they forced the military to act contrary 

to its recommendations. 

The incident also amply demonstrates the limitations of the current NSC system. 

Even in a fast-moving crisis with a large degree of direct presidential management and 

senior leader agreement on priorities, it was not possible to achieve unified effort. In 

addition, the nation’s senior military advisers were not able to calculate and explain 

well the risks of proposed military operations. The Goldwater-Nichols and Special 
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206

Operations Command reforms have remedied some of the joint planning and command 

and control issues revealed by the Mayaguez affair, but the larger NSC system remains 

essentially unchanged and inadequate.

In that sense it can be argued there is unfinished business from the Mayaguez

crisis. Many leaders—military and civilian—have drawn attention to the need for 

national security reform over the past two decades, but reform has proven elusive. 

However, here too the example of the Mayaguez crisis is a balm to civil-military relations. After the crisis, military and civilian leaders were able to learn from experience 

and improve organizational performance for the benefit of all those who go in harm’s 

way. Today no one believes the nation or its military would be better off if the joint 

reforms and creation of Special Operations Command had not happened. Similarly, if 

military and civilian leaders could partner again to improve the way the NSC and its 

staff manage critical national security issues, it would be a boon to better civil-military 

relations. The nation’s military members, foreign service officers, intelligence professionals, and other civil servants who risk so much for the nation’s welfare deserve 

nothing less than the best possible national security policy, strategy, planning, and 

decision-making system. It is not right, nor is it politically expedient, to ask them to 

serve in any other circumstances.131

The Morality of Force

This case study cannot resolve the moral issues surrounding the decision making 

during the Mayaguez crisis. It is not possible to study the crisis for long without becoming familiar with the names of the brave serviceman who lost their lives on or near Tang 

Island in mid-May 1975 and reflecting on their sacrifice and how their lives might have 

been saved. For many, their loss, juxtaposed with the apparent errors made during the 

crisis, is overwhelmingly tragic. Vice Admiral Steele is said to have remarked, “I just feel 

those men died in vain. . . . It was just a terrible rush to get it done.”132 This sentiment is 

understandable, especially because with the benefit of hindsight, it is clear that even a 

brief delay would have avoided much loss of life.

Others disagree, believing that despite the losses, the military operations were 

justified on several levels. Schlesinger took this view in a later interview: 

Much of the intellectual community had gotten to the point where they were 

opposed to any American military involvement in Southeast Asia. And I think 

that there were a number of people who were out to demonstrate that this incident was another failure of American decision-making. They were carried away 
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

207

by issues that were secondary. For example, they often pointed out that we lost 

more lives [in the rescue effort] than there were members of the Mayaguez crew. 

That strikes me at least as secondary and possibly irrelevant. It was a matter 

of principle, and we were not going to allow acts of piracy against American 

vessels. There was a view that the United States was this “pitiful, helpless giant,” 

to borrow a phrase from Mr. Nixon, and we could not let that view continue. 

And we had to get that crew back. We achieved everything we wanted, and in 

my mind, we did the right thing.133

Another White House participant, Robert Hartmann, the counselor to President Ford, 

reviewed the terrible losses, asking whether it was worth it and answering his own 

question in the affirmative:

Thirty-eight Americans lost their lives, including a whole helicopter load of 

twenty-three airmen who crashed in Thailand before the shooting started, 

and three Marines who were missing when the survivors pulled out of Koh 

Tang Island. Twenty to forty American lives to rescue thirty-nine other Americans. Was it worth it? Of course it was. Protecting unarmed US citizens in their 

peaceful pursuits is why we have police and military forces. It’s what organized 

society, as opposed to anarchy, is all about.134

There are others who correctly understood the primary purpose of the military operations and still judged them worthwhile:

President Ford’s swift action at the time . . . had a lasting effect for the good. It 

said to our enemies and to the world that while America might have withdrawn 

from Vietnam and been forced to acquiesce in the hostile takeover of that 

nation, our adversaries would make a mistake to think that we would ignore 

provocation, particularly when American lives were involved.135

While this research cannot resolve differences of opinion over the merits of the military 

operations balanced against their costs in lives lost, it can help sharpen that debate. 

Many commenting on the crisis attribute false motives to US leaders, or misunderstand 

what President Ford and his advisors thought was at stake. For example, Kissinger is 

frequently quoted for his explanation of the crisis in his memoirs where he concludes, 

“We had entered Indochina to save a country, and . . . ended by rescuing a ship.”136 But as 

Kissinger knows better than anyone, Ford did not order men into combat to rescue the 

ship. They were sent to underscore the resolve of the United States to protect its interests and more specifically to communicate to North Korea and its patrons that South 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

208

Korea was not theirs for the taking, even though the United States had withdrawn its 

military forces from Vietnam and Cambodia. It should at least be acknowledged that 

the president ordered military action during the crisis in pursuit of national geostrategic 

objectives and not for falsely ascribed and less worthy motives, such as burnishing his 

own political fortunes. 

The debate also ought to be informed by a realistic assessment of the outcomes 

generated by military action. At this far remove it may seem that chances of conflict on 

the Korean Peninsula were too remote to risk lives in the Gulf of Thailand, but at the 

time the threat was widely perceived as real and significant in the press, the intelligence 

community, and among American leaders and US allies in Asia. It will never be known 

with certainty whether the use of military force during the crisis helped deter North 

Korea and other adversaries—thus helping to save lives by reducing the likelihood 

of war—or simply saved a lesser number of lives by helping mute the US response to 

the North Korean axe murders a year later. The results of any use of military force for 

purposes of posturing will be attended by such uncertainty. What can be said from a 

review of declassified intelligence and diplomatic assessments from the period is that 

the military operations successfully communicated to those countries in the region 

precisely the message US leaders wanted to send.

In addition, it should be recognized that although things went wrong during the 

execution of the military operations, no other nation could have projected military 

force in a similar manner. In that sense, the overall conduct of the operation showcased American military power. Schlesinger went further, saying “in my judgment 

this was a great triumph of American arms; that we could respond so quickly to an 

unexpected event, at such a distance, and respond so effectively, and with a high 

degree of discrimination against chosen targets.”137 Subsequent fine-grained analysis demonstrated how terribly wrong things had gone, how much better they should 

have gone, and how much the valor of US forces prevented a total fiasco, but the rapid 

projection of American military power to the scene was a stark reminder to other 

countries of inherent US capabilities. 

Some who may not dispute the motives or the demonstrative impact of the military 

operations may nonetheless hold US leaders culpable for incompetence. To them, it may 

seem that the advantages of waiting another day clearly outweighed the disadvantages 

of not doing so, and that ordering the military to move too quickly was reprehensible. The 

analysis offered in this case study supports the conclusion that US leaders could have 

delayed another day without greatly diminishing what they were trying to achieve.138 Yet 

there are mitigating factors that need to be considered before reaching that conclusion. 
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

209

It should be acknowledged that the best military advice available to the president 

supported his decision to not wait another day. It also is important to remember that 

although the recovery of the crew members was a decidedly secondary objective 

that was considered an unlikely development, US leaders believed the only chance 

for such an outcome required maintaining pressure on the Cambodians. US leaders 

were conscious of the fact that the Cambodians could kill the crew any time they 

pleased, and thus there was an incentive to move as quickly as possible. Colby noted 

in the third NSC meeting that if the Cambodians started killing the crew members 

in reprisal, “it would be very difficult for us,” meaning there would be great political 

pressure to cease and desist and appeal for a resolution by diplomacy. Schlesinger 

agreed, saying, “It is a close call.” He also acknowledged “the pressures of time” and 

that it was “possible that the Cambodians will decide to execute our men.” The reputation of the Khmer Rouge was such that the crew were considered “goners” if they 

got to the mainland.139

In such circumstances, and as Schlesinger later argued, the solution was to “paste 

Cambodia to the point that they realized it was not worth it to them to keep the crew.”140 

In other words, he wanted the Cambodians to believe they were in the way of an oncoming train that would stop for nothing. To extend the metaphor, slowing the train or 

ushering it on to a side track temporarily ran the risk of releasing pressure and giving 

the Cambodians the impression they might be able to negotiate a better outcome. This 

is why Schlesinger was in favor of continuing the air attacks after receiving the news of 

the broadcast but in favor of discontinuing them after the crew was safely recovered in 

order to assist the Marines.

For some observers, none of these considerations lessen the moral opprobrium 

attached to the conscious decisions to risk lives for the purposes of “signaling” resolve 

to other nations. They will argue, as have US leaders in other crises such as the North 

Korean seizure of the Pueblo and its crew or the Iranian seizure of the US embassy and 

its personnel, that the top priority should be the lives of those captured and that military 

operations can only put those lives at risk. While this is a defensible position, making 

the lives of individual citizens a nation’s top priority can have perverse effects, as other 

countries have discovered.141

It also should be noted that many of those who go in harm’s way on the nation’s 

behalf do not expect that their safety will be their countrymen’s top priority if a merciless power captures them. The captain of the Pueblo, Lloyd Bucher, has said that 

as his ship and crew approached the North Korean mainland he “accepted the realization that if any help was still contemplated by our Seventh Fleet or Fifth Air Force, 
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

210

its objective could no longer be rescue, only retaliation.”142 Later, commenting on the 

military operations in the Mayaguez crisis, he again said, “I certainly expected this 

type of operation to be mounted for us . . . we all expected it.”143

Elizabeth Ann Swift, a diplomat held hostage in Tehran during the Carter administration, has made the same point at length in an oral history interview about her 

experiences. Interestingly, she was one of the foreign service officers who served on the 

Department of State task force for the Mayaguez operations, which perhaps influenced 

her perspective:

The fact that the US government didn’t break relations with the Iranian government within the first couple of days of us being held, is just mind-boggling to 

me still. I assumed that some sort of Cambodian type rescue like the Mayaguez

would be run rather quickly, and was nothing but astounded that it wasn’t run. 

[I] assumed we’d all be killed if they ran it but assumed that the government 

would have to.144

Swift was asked about whether she felt abandoned after so much time passed, and 

she said no, that she “had assumed all the way along that everybody back in the States 

was desperate and worried about us.” Neither did she feel abandoned by her organization: “There was no way the State Department was going to abandon us. I had too 

many friends, and I’ve never quite understood how people could feel that they were 

abandoned.”145 Swift did not believe the country could afford to make her safety the 

top priority, and she understood the president might have to make the difficult choice 

to resolve the issue through military force: 

There was no question in my mind that the president had the right to make 

a decision that might cost me my life . . . that he might take some sort of 

decision that would get the Iranians so mad that they would execute us, or 

something like that. . . . When I signed up for the Foreign Service, I signed up 

for whatever happened. I cannot say that I was particularly delighted with the 

thought that I might get shot or killed, and if you’d asked me did I want them 

to come to our rescue physically, I would’ve told you no, because I thought 

a good many of us would get killed. But I would never have said it is not the 

right of the President of the United States to make that decision. And I know 

he would make it realizing that indeed he might get a lot of us killed, but that 

is one of those awful decisions you have to make as the president. A lot of my 

colleagues didn’t feel that way.146
Findings, Issues, and Prescriptions

211

Bucher, Swift, and many others who serve their country in dangerous circumstances overseas believed there are limits to the extent to which their country can 

protect them or should, as a matter of first priority. But not all citizens feel this way. After 

their Mayaguez ordeal some crew members sued the government for putting their lives 

at risk. More recently, the Obama administration was harshly criticized for not making 

the welfare of hostages its top priority.147 The debate about what citizens owe their country and vice versa will continue, but hopefully the analysis of Mayaguez crisis offered 

here clarifies the issue and brings some balance to the discussion.

There is always a long chain of factors affecting the risk to lives during combat: 

the priorities adopted by White House leaders; the risk assessment of the most senior 

uniformed officers in the Pentagon; the command and control arrangements military 

authorities put in place; the training US forces have received; the willingness of their 

fellow servicemen to repeatedly risk themselves in attempting to recover those under 

duress; the competency of those maintaining vehicles and aircraft; and the sheer chance 

of being confused, unaware, and lost in the pitch dark. Yet despite all of these uncertainties, the servicemen ordered into combat during the Mayaguez military operations 

went willingly. In light of that, the one moral certainty we have is the debt of gratitude 

we owe our fellow citizens who risk their lives for the collective security and prosperity 

the rest of us enjoy. 

213

The purpose of this study was to fill in or otherwise improve some key descriptive 

details about the Mayaguez crisis, provide a compelling explanation for US behavior based on all available evidence, and extract lessons about command and control 

of US forces and civil-military relations more generally. The results correct a body of research 

that, to date and on the whole, has mischaracterized motives for US behavior. As a result, the 

wrong lessons from the crisis have been promoted, and the significance of the crisis has been 

underestimated. In addition, the literature on the Mayaguez has been a source of additional 

friction for US civil-military relations by promulgating the false—and persistent—narrative 

that civilian leaders micromanaged the crisis at high costs to US servicemen. Military leaders 

commenting on the crisis almost invariably repeat the false narrative of micromanagement,1

a misapprehension that unnecessarily complicates civil-military relations. 

This study offers a more accurate description of the crisis and a more compelling 

explanation for US motives and behaviors, thus offering useful insights for scholars, 

defense leaders, and students of the national security system. For example, numerous 

sources mischaracterize the Cambodians as innocent bystanders abused by a bullying 

United States driven by emotional fallout from defeats in Indochina and a president 

intent on furthering his political fortunes at the expense of American and foreign lives. 

The truth is far different, as this study has shown: 

• Cambodia was anxious to assert sovereignty over potentially oil-rich islands, but 

its determination to hold the Mayaguez crew was centrally directed, as were its 

military actions during the crisis. Cambodian authorities only relented when it 

became clear the US military response would be too costly for them.

• US leaders accurately assessed Cambodian motives in the first NSC meeting, but 

considered them irrelevant given circumstances and broader US objectives.

• President Ford was not motivated by domestic political considerations, nor even by 

the intent to rescue the Mayaguez crew, which he was in a poor position to achieve. 

In fact, he was willing to run substantial risks the crew would be harmed. 

Conclusion
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

214

• US leaders’ collective preference for the use of force was not an emotional reaction 

to the humiliation of withdrawal from Vietnam either.

Instead, US leaders were singularly motivated by geostrategic concerns. The decision 

to use force quickly was due to the belief, shared by all key US leaders, that they needed 

to reinforce deteriorating American credibility and, in particular, signal North Korea 

(and to a lesser extent, South Korea) that the United States would honor its security 

commitments. In order to deter China and other countries from siding with North 

Korea, US leaders wanted to signal the United States was ready and fully determined 

to protect South Korea—regardless of public opinion and any congressional reservations. They also wanted to convince South Korea there was no reason to contemplate 

acquiring its own nuclear weapons. Only to a far lesser extent did they hope—while 

considering it unlikely—that their willingness to use force would incline the Cambodians to desist and release the crew. 

Thus, it is impossible to fully appreciate what US leaders were trying to do and 

what they thought was at stake during the Mayaguez crisis without understanding their 

concern about possible war on the Korean Peninsula. Their desire to use force, and the 

ultimate value of the sacrifices made by US servicemen, must be understood in that 

light. This explanation differs from the bulk of the Mayaguez literature and especially 

the university press books on the Mayaguez over the past several decades. A detailed 

explanation for how scholarship went awry has been offered elsewhere,2

 but it should 

be noted here that the problem was not the one cited in recent commentary about the 

irrelevance of academia to public policy. 

In recent years, prominent national security practitioners and theoreticians have 

raised the concern that the academy is too cloistered,3 too focused on “models and 

methods,”4 and insufficiently willing to comment on policy issues—to the point that 

academic work is unintelligible and irrelevant.5 The conclusion here is that scholarship on the Mayaguez crisis does not suffer from these faults but rather the opposite. 

The scholarship erred by “jump[ing] from detailed description to ‘findings’ and strong 

commentary, passing lightly over explanatory analysis” and the attention to methodology it requires.6

 In paying too little attention to methodology, and rushing past 

explanatory analysis to commentary, these studies lost sight of basic factors in the 

decision-making process, such as the primary role North Korea played in decisionmakers’ geostrategic calculations.

For the defense community, the study challenges some deep-seated prejudices and 

encourages introspection. The dominant narrative among military authors and senior 

military leaders commenting on the Mayaguez crisis is wrong. The event was not an 
Conclusion

215

iconic example of gross civilian micromanagement. Instead, it is better understood as 

a caution against insufficient oversight:

• The only detailed military issue that civilian and military leaders disagreed about 

was the sinking of Cambodian boats. Given the stakes and import of the issue for 

US objectives, it was appropriate for President Ford to make this judgment call.

• What micromanagement there was came from military leaders, and arguably, it 

was not consequential in terms of outcomes. 

• What was consequential, and might have reduced or eliminated the tragic loss of 

life during the crisis, was better joint military planning and risk assessments. In 

particular, better oversight should have revealed the inadequacy of plans for close 

air support and the actual risks of the assault plan for Tang Island.

Leaders involved in the crisis or responsible for evaluating it later came to appreciate 

the need for reforms that would provide improved joint planning and operations, and 

a more robust special operations capability. In this regard, major defense reforms are 

an enduring legacy of the Mayaguez crisis, and a positive development that hopefully will supplant the false micromanagement narrative currently so dominant in 

the literature. 

In retrospect, it is surprising that the Mayaguez crisis facilitated defense reform but 

not national security reform. Congress was able to get beyond the widespread confusion about Ford’s motives and the assumption that the crisis was simply an emotional 

overreaction to defeat in Indochina, and arrive at accurate conclusions about the need 

for defense reform. However, the Mayaguez crisis also perfectly depicts the need for 

NSC reform, and yet to date neither Congress nor the executive branch have been motivated to act on that need. The principal argument for NSC reform is the inability of the 

president to consistently generate unified effort from the executive branch. Despite the 

president’s personal involvement, the lack of unified effort was a major problem during 

the Mayaguez crisis as it has been in so many other national security issues.7

News media quickly picked up on major differences between Kissinger and 

Schlesinger, and later the level of angst Ford had about his ability to control his own 

Department of Defense became evident. Research has revealed other major challenges 

to unified effort during the Mayaguez crisis as well, such as the following: 

• Kissinger used his control of diplomatic communications to ensure military force 

was used, including withholding news of a diplomatic initiative from the NSC.

• Pentagon leaders consciously stonewalled the White House for three hours to avoid 

sinking boats that might be carrying Mayaguez crew members.
The Mayaguez Crisis, Mission Command, and Civil-Military Relations

216

• The White House assessment of Pentagon obstruction and duplicity on airstrikes 

was exaggerated and uninformed as to how White House behaviors and the president’s own guidance helped limit the number of strikes on the mainland.

The import of the Mayaguez crisis for NSC reform has been confused by scholarship and 

senior leader memoirs that cast blame elsewhere, such as Kissinger’s assertion that the 

intelligence community’s failure dramatically impaired the decision-making process. 

However, it also is true that NSC reforms are especially difficult because congressional 

committee structure is built around departments and agencies and no one committee 

has responsibility for considering the performance of the NSC system as a whole. 

As numerous studies have shown,8

 the inability to consistently generate unified 

effort and other shortcomings indicate the current national security system, which has 

been in effect since 1948, is outdated and needs to be reformed. For decades, presidents 

and their key subordinates have had to work around the system to try to engineer the 

outcomes they desired, a task that has proven fraught with conflict and frequently led 

to poor outcomes. The Mayaguez crisis is just one case among many that demonstrates 

the need for managing high-priority national security issues with small empowered 

teams built for collaboration rather than competition.9

A final, editorial comment about the crisis and its relevance for civil-military relations may be in order. The research findings offered here underscore several additional 

observations:

• Only good fortune and the skill, initiative, and valor displayed by US forces prevented much higher casualties and a complete disaster. 

• The merits of using military force in the Mayaguez crisis will always be debated, but 

it is clear US leaders pursued geostrategic goals and that they successfully conveyed 

their deterrent message.

• In that regard, the sacrifices made by US servicemen during the final battle of the 

Vietnam War might have been avoided, but they were not in vain.

The first point about the skill and valor of US servicemen is made better elsewhere and 

in greater detail,10 but the latter two points are uncommon and deserve elaboration. 

Thirty years ago the epigraph I chose for a book on the Mayaguez crisis was a quotation from Thucydides’ history of the Peloponnesian War. Pericles believed a strength he 

and his fellow Athenians shared was that they were “capable at the same time of taking 

risks and of estimating them beforehand.” My thought was that American citizens need 

the same ability to assess risks realistically, especially when it comes to foreign powers 

seizing hostages. Aware of the decision-makers’ dilemma, the community “ought not 
Conclusion

217

to demand the most improbable outcomes: that military operations will be perfectly 

executed rescue missions or that tolerance and inaction will impress friends or influence enemies.”11 Decades later it is not clear from commentary on the Mayaguez crisis, 

or the quality of national debate over security issues in general,12 that our collective 

understanding of such basic leadership dilemmas has increased. Perhaps a final contribution this study can make is to reinforce appreciation for the onerous decisions senior 

leaders have to make in such circumstances, thereby helping ameliorate our sometimes 

fractious civil-military relations while also honoring the sacrifices US servicemen and 

civil servants are often called upon to make. 

219

Preface

1. Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates, Address at the United States Military Academy (speech, 

West Point, NY, February 25, 2011), http://archive.defense.gov/Speeches/Speech.aspx?SpeechID=1539.

2. Jim Garamone, “Dunford Urges New AF Officers to Lead in Academy Graduation Address,” 

DoD News, May 26, 2017, http://www.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/1195252/dunfordurges-new-af-officers-to-lead-in-academy-graduation-address/.

3. For example, in keeping with this sentiment, the Air Force named its Enlisted Heritage 

Research Institute at Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Alabama, after Chief Master Sergeant 

Wayne Fisk, “the last man off of Koh Tang Island during the rescue of the crew of the SS Mayaguez” 

and “truly a warrior’s warrior.” See http://www.airuniversityfoundation.org/enlisted-heritage-hall

.html for more on Sergeant Fisk and the institute. 

4. “The Mayaguez rescue could have served as a fitting metaphor for the whole of our war in 

Southeast Asia. Like the war, the Mayaguez incident is recalled, when it is recalled at all, more for its 

mistakes than for the lessons of duty and honor exemplified in the conduct of the men who fought it. 

That is unfortunate. For in that encounter, as in the war that preceded it, Americans fought for love 

and honor, and their service should be remembered in this country as an affirmation of human virtue 

and a priceless element of our national self-respect.” John McCain, “Address to United States Air Force 

Academy” (speech, Colorado Springs, CO, October 18, 1996), https://www.mccain.senate.gov/public

/index.cfm/1996/10/post-8a71f4b4-541f-4186-8f49-8a919d6f1a12.

5. This is as true for the popular press as it is for scholarship on the crisis. See “A Military Mission 

Gone Wrong,” CBS News, January 24, 2001, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/a-military-mission-gone

-wrong/; and Matthew M. Burke, “The Truth about the Lost Marines of the Vietnam War’s Last Battle,” 

Newsweek, January 24, 2017, http://www.newsweek.com/2017/02/03/us-marines-disappearedmayaguez-last-battle-vietnam-war-547106.html.

6. Stephen Randolph, “Uncovering the Lessons of Vietnam,” Foreign Service Journal, July–August 

2015, 52–53.

7. Burke, “Truth about the Lost Marines.” Burke’s article notes “the brutal war that started with 

a lie may have ended with one as well.”

8. Christopher J. Lamb, “The Mayaguez Crisis: Correcting 30 Years of Scholarship,” Political 

Science Quarterly 133, no. 1 (Spring 2018). 

9. Christopher Jon Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making in the Mayaguez Crisis (Gainesville: 

University of Florida Press, 1989), 279.

10. John McCain, “Dedication of the Mayaguez Memorial” (speech, US embassy, Bangkok, 

Thailand, November 11, 1996).

Notes
Notes

220

Introduction

1. There is disagreement over when the Vietnam War ended, but the Vietnam Veterans Memorial 

Fund maintains the participants in the Mayaguez rescue were part of the Vietnam conflict and the 

names of those lost during the Mayaguez operations are inscribed on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. See William Triplett, “Out With a Whimper: The Tragedy of the Mayaguez,” Veteran, July 1994.

2. Ford considered the crisis the “tensest moments” of his presidency. See Thomas M. DeFrank 

and Gerald R. Ford, Write It When I’m Gone: Remarkable Off-the-Record Conversations with Gerald R. 

Ford (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 2007), 63.

3. The Ford and Kissinger quotes in this section are from Christopher J. Lamb, Belief Systems 

and Decision Making in the Mayaguez Crisis (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1989), 63–76. 

4. US Congress, House Foreign Affairs Committee, Subcommittee on International Political and 

Military Affairs, Seizure of the Mayaguez, Hearings on the Mayaguez Incident, pt. 4 (Washington, DC: 

General Accounting Office, 1976) (hereafter GAO report), 80. This report details fifteen killed in action, 

three missing in action, fifty wounded in action, and twenty-three nonbattle deaths. The nonbattle 

deaths comprise eighteen Air Force Security Police and five crewmen who were killed on May 13 when 

their helicopter crashed in Thailand as they were assembling for possible use in retaking the Mayaguez.

5. The first university press book on the crisis was the author’s Belief Systems and Decision Making in the Mayaguez Crisis. It was a distillation of my doctoral dissertation, which in turn drew upon 

research published a few years earlier: Christopher Jon Lamb, “Belief Systems and Decision Making 

in the Mayaguez Crisis,” Political Science Quarterly 99, no. 4 (Winter 1984–85): 681–702.

6. Some key participants have gone on record multiple times about what they thought, said, 

and did during the crisis. Some recent studies on the crisis rely heavily on the memoirs of Ford and 

Kissinger, but these sources must be used with caution as they sometimes contradict what they 

actually said and did during the crisis. The general approach taken in this book is to assign greater 

credibility to a participant’s remembrances offered during or shortly after the crisis rather than years 

later, unless corroborated by other sources.

7. Tapes of conversations among major participants in the Cuban missile crisis have been made 

public, but issues have been raised about their accuracy. See Ernest R. May and Philip Zelikow, The 

Kennedy Tapes: Inside the White House during the Cuban Missile Crisis (1997); and Sheldon Stern, “What 

JFK Really Said,” Atlantic, May 2000, http://www.theatlantic.com/past/issues/2000/05/stern.htm.

8. For a discussion of why the event should be classified as a crisis, see Lamb, Belief Systems and 

Decision Making, 5–11. 

9. Vandenbroucke says the US response was “an improvised, flawed operation that narrowly 

avoided defeat.” Guilmartin argues it “nearly produced disaster,” and Mahoney claims it “came perilously 

close to ending in disaster.” Lamb, “Belief Systems and Decision Making,” 682; Lucien S. Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options: Special Operations as an Instrument of U.S. Foreign Policy (New York: Oxford 

University Press, 1993), 72; John F. Guilmartin, A Very Short War: The Mayaguez and the Battle of Koh Tang 

(College Station: Texas A & M University Press, 2010), 155–56; and Robert J. Mahoney, The Mayaguez Incident: Testing America’s Resolve in the Post-Vietnam Era (Lubbock: Texas Tech University Press, 2011), 261. 

10. There are even conspiracy theorists who assert the Mayaguez was consciously led into Cambodian waters to precipitate an international incident and that it held classified cargo, which was the 

cause of the quick US military response. The sparse and circumstantial evidence for these claims is 

not reviewed here due to space constraints. The ship, owned by Sea-Land Corporation, was en route 

to Sattahip, Thailand, from Hong-Kong, and carrying a non-arms cargo for military bases in Thailand.

11. Marines and sailors from the USS Pawnee boarded the West Indies schooner Susan Jane

on September 10, 1861, as part of the Union blockade of the Southern states. James E. Wise and Scott 
Notes

221

Baron, The 14-Hour War: Valor on Koh Tang and the Recapture of the SS Mayaguez (Annapolis, MD: 

Naval Institute Press, 2011), 18.

12. Scowcroft cited in Robert L. Pfaltzgraff and Jacquelyn K. Davis, National Security Decisions: 

The Participants Speak (Lexington, MA: Lexington Books, 1990), 273–74.

13. National Security Council meeting minutes, May 12, 1975; May 13, 1975 (10:22–11:17); 

May 13–14, 1975 (22:40–0025); and May 14, 1975 (all declassified March 20, 1996), Gerald R. Ford 

Presidential Library, Ann Arbor, MI (hereafter NSC meeting minutes). Unless otherwise noted, all 

quotes from dialogue in NSC meetings come from these minutes. 

Chapter 1

1. Scowcroft notes that when he first mentioned the Mayaguez to Ford, they were not sure if the 

news was “fact or fiction.” Pfaltzgraff and Davis, National Security Decisions, 273; and Bartholomew 

H. Sparrow, The Strategist: Brent Scowcroft and the Call of National Security (New York: PublicAffairs, 

2015), 156.

2. Henry Kissinger, Years of Renewal (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011), 548. 

3. Hyland would try hard to stay abreast of the fast-moving developments, telling INR he needed 

detailed chronologies and situation reports.

4. James Cannon, Gerald R. Ford: An Honorable Life (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 

2013), 376.

5. Ron Nessen, It Sure Looks Different from the Inside (Chicago: Playboy Press, 1978), 118. 

6. Just before noon on May 12, Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) message traffic confidently 

assessed Cambodian motives for stopping the Mayaguez and the earlier Panamanian freighter. DIA 

noted there were “long-standing disputes between the Cambodians and Vietnamese over ownership 

of Poulo Wai and several other small islands in the Gulf of Thailand.” Based on intercepted communications, DIA asserted the Cambodians were “eager to reassert their claims to this territory.” Indeed, it 

appears Vietnamese threats prompted Cambodia to increase its garrison of 10 soldiers on the island 

to 300 on September 5, 1974. See Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) update on the Cambodian Khmer 

Rouge seizure of the US merchant ship MAYAGUEZ in the Gulf of Siam about 60 miles off the Cambodian 

coastline. The ship, owned by Sea-Land Corp., was en-route to Sattahip, Thailand, from Hong-Kong, 

carrying a non-arms cargo for military bases in Thailand. Department Of Defense, May 12, 1975. U.S. 

Declassified Documents Online, tinyurl.galegroup.com/tinyurl/3nUUn6. Accessed April 3, 2017. For 

the 1974 augmentation of Cambodian forces on Poulo Wai, which is based on reporting in the Far 

Eastern Economic Review, see Luanne J. Smith, “An Analysis of Events Leading to the Chinese Invasion 

of Vietnam,” (thesis, Naval Postgraduate School, 1980), 9–11.

7. Mahoney points out that this assumption was introduced in messages from the embassy in 

Jakarta and the defense attaché in Manila based on the captain of the Mayaguez’s distress message. 

Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 21–23. 

8. Gerald R. Ford, A Time to Heal: The Autobiography of Gerald R. Ford (Norwalk, CT: Easton Press, 

1987), 276; Richard G. Head, Frisco W. Short, and Robert C. McFarlane, Crisis Resolution: Presidential 

Decision Making in the Mayaguez and Korean Confrontations (Boulder: Westview Press, 1978), 110; 

and Walter Isaacson, Kissinger: A Biography (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2013), 649.

9. NSC meeting minutes. 

10. Trevor Armbrister, A Matter Accountability: The True Story of the Pueblo Affair (London: Barrie & Jenkins, 1970), 259. A more recent account is Jack Cheevers, Act of War: Lyndon Johnson, North 

Korea, and the Capture of the Spy Ship Pueblo (New York: Penguin, 2014), 115, 167. Cheevers agrees 
Notes

222

Clifford argued against a military response, saying he did not think it was worth risking a resumption 

of the Korean War. 

11. For comparisons of the US responses in the Pueblo and Mayaguez crises, see Lamb, Belief 

Systems and Decision Making, 252–55; and David P. Houghton, “Spies and Boats and Planes: An 

Examination of US Decision-Making during the Pueblo Hostage Crisis of 1968,” Journal of Cold War 

Studies 17, no. 4: (2015) 6, 32–35. 

12. Major General John A. Wickham, USA, Military Assistant, Secretary of Defense, 92 pages of 

declassified personal notes from two spiral notebooks, one dated April 28 to May 14, 1975; the other 

May 14 to June 2, 1975, from the James R. Schlesinger Papers, Library of Congress; declassified January 

5, 2017 as OSD MDR Case 15-M-2584 (hereafter Wickham notebooks). 

13. Document 286, Telegram from the Department of State to the Liaison Office in China; Washington, May 13, 1975, 0013Z, in Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, vol. 10, Vietnam, 

January 1973–July 1975 (hereafter FRUS 1969–1976, vol. 10). 

14. Ibid., Document 299, Telegram from the Liaison Office in China to the Department of 

State; Beijing, May 15, 1975, 0253Z. By one account, US representatives in Beijing persisted, and 

shortly after midnight in Washington, DC (but late morning on the thirteenth in China), Ambassador George H. W. Bush, then chief of the US liaison office in Beijing, interrupted a picnic at the 

Ming Dynasty tombs to present a diplomatic note to Chinese foreign ministry officials. See John 

Prados, Keepers of the Keys: A History of the National Security Council from Truman to Bush (New 

York: Morrow, 1991), 364.

15. Some sources indicate Air Force General George S. Brown, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs 

of Staff, was in Europe for NATO meetings, but his director of operations, Lieutenant General Ray B. 

Sitton, indicated he had taken a fishing vacation in Canada. Sitton and Brown’s assistant, General 

John W. Pauly, sent a helicopter to fetch him back to the Pentagon. Edgar F. Puryear, George S. Brown, 

General, US Air Force: Destined for Stars (Novato, CA: Presidio, 1983), 259.

16. Burns notes that Gayler returned to his headquarters in Honolulu after the initial planning 

and before the military operations were executed. Lieutenant General John L. Burns, USAF, oral history 

interview, June 5–8, 1984, transcript, Air Force Historical Research Agency, Maxwell Air Force Base, 

Montgomery, AL, 437 (hereafter Burns interview). 

17. General David C. Jones, USAF, oral history interview, August 5 and October 15–17, 1985; 

March 13–14, 1986, Air Force Historical Research Agency, Maxwell Air Force Base, Montgomery, AL 

(hereafter Jones interview); Burns interview; and Wickham notebooks.

18. NSC meeting minutes. Kissinger was initially concerned about a competing geostrategic objective: shoring up defenses in Southeast Asia against further potential Communist aggression. He told the 

NSC, “Lee Kuan Yew [prime minister of Singapore who had visited the White House the previous week] 

has asked us to stay in Thailand as long as possible to give him time to work on getting the defenses of 

Malaysia ready. Bombing from Thailand will get us out quickly.” Kissinger would later change his mind 

and give higher priority to a faster military response even at the expense of irritating Thailand. 

19. This misunderstanding is emphasized by Herspring, who cites the Crisis Resolution book as 

his source. Dale R. Herspring, The Pentagon and the Presidency: Civil-Military Relations from FDR to 

George W. Bush (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2006), 225; and Head, Short, and McFarlane, 

Crisis Resolution, 111–12.

20. Head, Short, and McFarlane, Crisis Resolution, 112.
Notes

223

Chapter 2

1. From the moment his ship was commandeered, Captain Miller had “proceeded at half speed” 

in a “delaying action,” “figuring that our military should take some action.” Miller at a press conference 

at Singapore following the incident, quoted in “The Captain’s Log: A Tale of Terror,” Time, May 26, 1975.

2. GAO report: 113, 117; Central Intelligence Agency, Post-Mortem Report: An Examination of the 

Intelligence Community’s Performance Before and During the Mayaguez Incident of May 1975, August 

1975 (declassified December 2010), 12 (hereafter CIA Post-Mortem Report).

3. Limited translation capability was available at Udorn, Thailand, and the resources were further 

drawn down by the Marines’ request to borrow six Khmer-speaking linguists. Thus, much intercepted 

material had to be sent to Fort Meade in Maryland for translation, and some reports, after evaluation, 

had to be corrected. It was not until 4:37 a.m. that a “flash” message from the signals collection station 

at Udorn reported “that Commander of the KC 3rd Division was to move the 42 Americans and 9 VNese 

to Koh tang Isle.” This information made it into DIA’s briefing for the chairman of the Joint Chiefs at 0830 

that morning. Cryptolog, no. 2 (1989), declassified (Fort Meade, MD: National Security Agency [NSA]): 23, 

https://www.nsa.gov/news-features/declassified-documents/cryptologs/assets/files/cryptolog_115.pdf.

4. Some of the confusion might have been the result of McFarlane trying to ascertain the location of 

the Mayaguez by monitoring radio reports from the pilots circling overhead and plotting the presumed 

location of the ship on his own map in his NSC cubbyhole office. Nessen, It Sure Looks Different: 121.

5. Ford, A Time to Heal, 276; Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 556; Head, Short, and McFarlane, 

Crisis Resolution: 112–13; and Memorandum of Conversation between General Scowcroft and the 

President, 2:23, May 13, 1975, box 1, folder “Cambodia-Mayaguez Seizure (1)” of NSA KissingerScowcroft West Wing Office Files, Ford Library.

6. Commander in Chief Pacific Command History, vol. 1, 1975, appendix VI—The SS Mayaguez

Incident (declassified December 31, 1985), 16 (hereafter CINCPAC Command History 1975). 

7. The president’s Daily Diary records an unusual hour-plus conversation, whereas Roy Rowan 

suggests there was a series of conversations. Perhaps the two men held a line open while the president’s 

orders were implemented because records indicate the execution message from the JCS with the rules 

of engagement went out thirteen minutes into their conversation.

8. CINCPAC Command History 1975, 16.

9. In a widely overlooked interview, Schlesinger says, “We received the order to sink all ships 

coming off the island at the [initial] NSC meeting, I believe. And I believe it was the President who 

said it. When I got [back] to the Pentagon, I gave the order that all ships would probably be sunk if they 

came off Koh Tang. But I said that before any ships are sunk, our pilots should fly low over the ships 

and see what they could see, particularly if there were any [Mayaguez] crew members aboard. If they 

did see them, they were to report back immediately before doing anything.” “James Schlesinger on The 

Mayaguez Rescue: Interview with Bill Triplett,” Veteran, February–March 1999 (hereafter Schlesinger 

Veteran interview). For one source that did take note of Schlesinger’s interview, see Christopher 

Hitchens, “The Kiss of Henry,” Nation, April 30, 2001, 9.

10. Wickham notebooks.

11. Ibid. The Pentagon did this, but not surreptitiously enough. Scowcroft called back at 9:15 a.m. 

to tell Wickham the press was reporting the movement of the Marines and that the Pentagon should say 

this information was “incorrect” and refuse to discuss the issue. 

12. Ibid.

13. Memorandum for the President from the Secretary of Defense, Subject: Seizure of the US MAYAGUEZ, Top Secret, Declassified by Executive Secretary, DoD [Department of Defense], Feb 16, 1999. 
Notes

224

This is the first of two Pentagon products detailing military options. The second paper was prepared in 

advance of the third NSC meeting and is the one most frequently referred to. See “Possible Scenarios 

for Recovery of Ship and Crew,” in box 28, Folder: Department of Defense—General, National Security 

Adviser, NSC East Asian and Pacific Affairs Staff: Files, (1969) 1973–1976, Ford Library. 

14. William Colby, Director, Central Intelligence Agency, Memorandum for the President, 

Subject: The Rescue of the S.S. Mayaguez and Its Crew, 23 May 1975, with attached Interagency Intelligence Memorandum, Subject: Chronological Listing of Intelligence Community Activities During 

the Mayaguez Affair (declassified December 2, 2010; hereafter Chronological Listing of Intelligence 

Community Activities).

15. Wickham notebooks. After returning to the Pentagon, Jones, in discussion with Schlesinger, 

expressed consternation about the president’s dissatisfaction with the timeliness of Pentagon information. He underscored the point that the president was demanding to be informed within ten minutes 

of activities taking place. 

16. NSC meeting minutes. The ultimatum language was even drafted. “Your operation order 

should include words saying that the helicopter with bullhorn should appear overhead coincidentally 

with the force intended to take Kas Tang (Koh Tang). The message from the helicopter should say words 

to this effect: ‘Produce all the Americans immediately or we will harm you.’” Memorandum for the 

Director, J-3, From G. E. Cooke, Brigadier General, USAF, Secretary, JCS, Subject: Words to be Included 

in Operation Order, 13 May 1975, top secret, declassified by Secretary, JCS on December 31, 1985.

17. The close relationship between Kissinger and Rockefeller is well known. In his memoirs 

Kissinger describes Rockefeller as “one of the seminal influences on my life.” They vacationed together 

in the Caribbean shortly after Rockefeller was confirmed as vice president. Although Rockefeller and 

Kissinger were known to be close and cooperative, and Rockefeller’s interventions in the NSC meetings 

supported Kissinger’s preferences, there is no evidence that they collaborated or coordinated their 

positions outside the NSC meetings. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 184.

18. NSC meeting minutes. 

19. In his memoirs Ford wrote about his apprehensions concerning the Cambodian boats, saying, 

“Once I’ve made a decision, I seldom fret about it, but this one caused me some anxiety. If the pilot 

had been right, crew members were on their way to the mainland where we would have a far more 

difficult time effecting their recovery. My concern increased [upon learning Cambodian patrol boats 

had been sunk]. Suppose those vessels had carried crew members from Mayaguez below their decks? 

There was no way to tell, and that possibility was awful to contemplate.” Cited in Lamb, Belief Systems 

and Decision Making, 178–79.

20. This tactical message was straightforward. See note 16 above. 

21. Roy Rowan, The Four Days of Mayaguez (New York: W. W. Norton, 1975).

22. Colonel Clinton Granger, a member of Kissinger’s NSC staff, prepared him for the third NSC 

meeting with a preview of Pentagon planning that he picked up from his contacts on the Joint Staff. He 

called the planning “limited and very conventional” but noted among the summary conclusions the 

recommendation to move a SEAL team into the area and to have psychological operations leaflets used 

on the island to state US demands. A handwritten notation at the top of the memorandum reads: “HAK 

has seen. Smyser concurred.” Document 290, Memorandum from Clinton Granger of the National Security Council Staff to Secretary of State Kissinger, Washington, May 13, 1975, in FRUS 1969–1976, vol. 10.

23. Wickham notebooks.

24. Rockefeller had an opportunity to kibbutz on this issue on the margin of his meeting with 

Ford and the Domestic Council from 12:19 to 1:10 that day (May 13). In a brief article, White House 

photographer David Kennerly asserts, “Ford, who had been president for nine months, waved off one 
Notes

225

of the Joint Chiefs’ recommendations, which involved a B-52 strike on Phnom Penh.” In reality, the 

recommendations to bomb Phnom Penh came from Rockefeller, Rumsfeld, and Kissinger, not the 

Joint Chiefs. In the fourth NSC meeting, Rumsfeld raises the question of bombing T-28 aircraft at 

Phnom Penh airport. A little later Kissinger said, “I could be talked into taking out the 100 aircraft at 

Phnom Penh.” NSC meeting minutes; and David Hume Kennerly, “Gerald Ford Becoming President,”

International Herald Tribune, December 29, 2006, 4.

25. Flash Message #1708 1332101; 132052Z May 75, From CINCPAC Honolulu HI and USSAG/7A/

CC/NKP APRT THAI, Subject: SS Mayaguez Surveillance Operation (declassified February 3, 2005), 

Ford Library.

26. Burns interview, 435.

27. Donald Rumsfeld says that during this call Ford and Schlesinger discussed destroying the 

gunboat and that “the order stood for our forces to look carefully to see if friendly personnel had been 

loaded onto any boats.” Wickham’s notes on the conversation do not mention looking for friendly 

personnel but do make it clear that Ford told Schlesinger to destroy any boats leaving the cove. Donald 

Rumsfeld, When the Center Held: Gerald Ford and the Rescue of the American Presidency (New York: 

Free Press, 2018), 173–74.

28. For background on the incident and the impact on USAF Security Police, see Senior Master 

Sergeant G. G. Browning, “Background Paper on The Mayaguez Incident: An Enlisted Perspective of 

a USAF Security Police Tragedy,” student paper, Air Force Senior Noncommissioned Officer Academy, 

April 15, 1992, AFEHRI File 100.072, Air Force Enlisted Heritage Research Institute.

29. Schlesinger told Ford about this contingency option in his 7 a.m. phone conversation that 

same day. Wickham notebooks.

30. This decision has been attributed to General Burns, the on-scene commander, but in his 

interview he says, “I was told to consider using the air police if necessary to recover the crew on the 

island.” Burns interview, 432.

31. Washington Post, May 14, 1975; cited in Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 88.

32. Secret cable without subject, date 132158Z, declassified via CIA letter April 13, 2011, photocopy obtained from the Ford Library.

33. Presumably Schlesinger left after ruling the boat should be sunk at 8:12 p.m. because no 

mention is made of a communication with Schlesinger in Wickham’s notebook until just before 10 

p.m., at which point Schlesinger would have been on the verge of traveling over to the White House 

for the scheduled 10:30 NSC meeting. It seems likely Schlesinger cleaned up for the meeting and then 

stopped in to see Wickham for the latest update before heading for the White House. 

34. Phone conversation between President Ford and General Scowcroft, 8:10 p.m., May 13, 1975; box 1, 

folder “Cambodia-Mayaguez Seizure (1)” of NSA Kissinger-Scowcroft West Wing Office Files, Ford Library.

35. Phone conversation between General Wickham and General Scowcroft, 8:15 p.m., May 13, 

1975; box 1, folder “Cambodia-Mayaguez Seizure (1)” of NSA Kissinger-Scowcroft West Wing Office 

Files, Ford Library.

36. General John A. Wickham, USA (Ret.), interview by the author by telephone from 12:46 to 

1:16 p.m. on May 26, 2015, hereafter Wickham interview.

37. CINCPAC Command History 1975, 17.

38. Burns interview.

39. Wickham interview.

40. This information may have reached Scowcroft directly from the NMCC because he called 

Ford at 9:41, and the two men had a ten-minute conversation.
Notes

226

41. Phone conversation between General Wickham and General Scowcroft, 9:48 p.m., May 13, 

1975; box 1, folder “Cambodia-Mayaguez Seizure (1)” of NSA Kissinger-Scowcroft West Wing Office 

Files, Ford Library.

42. Document 294, Transcript of Telephone Conversation between President Ford and the 

President’s Deputy Assistant for National Security Affairs (Scowcroft), Washington, May 13, 9:50 

p.m., in FRUS 1969–1976, vol. 10; Phone conversation between President Ford and General Scowcroft, 

9:50 p.m., May 13, 1975; box 1, folder “Cambodia-Mayaguez Seizure (1)” of NSA Kissinger-Scowcroft 

West Wing Office Files, Ford Library.

43. Phone conversation between General Wickham and General Scowcroft, 9:54 p.m., May 13, 

1975; box 1, folder “Cambodia-Mayaguez Seizure (1)” of NSA Kissinger-Scowcroft West Wing Office 

Files, Ford Library.

44. See note 33 on page 225. 

45. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 147.

46. Captain John B. Taylor, “Air Mission Mayaguez,” Airman Magazine, February 1976, 39–47. 

47. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 560. 

48. NSC meeting minutes.

Chapter 3

1. Chronological Listing of Intelligence Community Activities, p. INR-5. 

2. Department of State, US Embassy Tehran Cable 14MAY750856GMT: Chinese Embassy Tehran believes Mayaguez to be freed soon (Washington, DC: Digital National Security Archive, 1975).

3. A possible explanation for why China chose to pass this information through a Pakistani diplomat in Tehran is that Kissinger had used the Pakistanis as a conduit for communications to China 

when he and Nixon had opened relations with the Chinese a few years earlier. Also, the US ambassador 

to Tehran at the time was Richard M. Helms, the former director of the CIA. The Chinese might have 

assumed that he would quickly recognize the import of the information and get it to the right people 

in the White House. As it turned out, Helms had left Tehran to accompany the shah on his visit to 

Washington, so the deputy chief of mission, Jack C. Miklos, was in charge. 

4. Donald Rumsfeld, Known and Unknown: A Memoir (New York: Sentinel, 2013), 211.

5. Telephone conversation, Mr. Sisco/Secretary Kissinger, May 14, 1975, 9:55 AM, released in 

full, Ford Library. 

6. Wickham notebooks. 

7. Ibid. All quotes in this paragraph are from the Wickham notebooks.

8. Ibid.

9. Memorandum of Conversation, President Ford, Henry Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft, Wednesday, May 14, 1975, 11:45 a.m., Oval Office, declassified, Ford Library.

10. Telephone conversation, Secretary Kissinger/Joe Sisco, May 14, 1975, 12:12 p.m., released 

in full, Ford Library.

11. Ron Nessen News Conference at the White House, 11:50 a.m., May 14, 1975, Ron Nessen File 

at the Ford Library.

12. Headquarters, Pacific Air Force, “History of the Pacific Air Forces, 1 Jul 74–31 Dec 75,” vol. 1 

(Hickam Air Force Base, HI: Office of Pacific Air Forces History, 1976), 444n1.

13. It appears that the Pentagon was able to make copies of its options paper available before 

the NSC meeting. There is a short cover note in the Ford Library’s digitized files for box 1, folder 
Notes

227

“Cambodia-Mayaguez Seizure (1)” of NSA Kissinger-Scowcroft West Wing Office Files at the Ford 

Library that reads “Henry, The Defense Options paper” and is signed, “Brent.”

14. NSC meeting minutes. 

15. Vandenbroucke makes the noteworthy point that Pentagon leaks (presumably from 

Schlesinger via Laitin) ran operational risks by potentially alerting the enemy. Although how closely 

the Cambodians monitored ABC and NBC is questionable, Vandenbroucke notes journalists from 

these media outlets were well informed on the general timing of the operations. Perhaps those sharing 

the information thought it was too general to benefit an enemy already on the alert and consistent 

with their desire to build pressure to convince the Cambodians to release the crew before US forces 

struck. Even so, it seems an egregious lapse of operational security and inconsistent with the Pentagon’s explanation to President Ford that it kept the USS Wilson and USS Holt over the horizon to avoid 

tipping the Cambodians to the pending military operations. Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 101.

16. Holloway had been in Boston giving a speech when he was summoned back to Washington 

by Clements, who shared with him the general White House dissatisfaction with Jones’s performance 

to that point. Holloway later claimed Ford told Clements to have him (Holloway) take over as acting 

chairman during the crisis and describes himself as representing the Joint Chiefs and accompanying 

Schlesinger for the rest of the NSC meetings. It appears Holloway was exaggerating. The NSC minutes 

record Jones as the acting chairman in all four NSC meetings, and he assumed that role in all four 

meetings. Clements references Holloway once in the first NSC meeting, indicating he was in touch with 

him, but there is no mention of Holloway in the NSC minutes for the second and third NSC meetings, 

either as an attendee or speaker. However, Holloway did attend the fourth NSC meeting and was used 

to convey the president’s orders to the JCS, which might reflect Ford’s suspicion that his orders were 

not being transmitted by Jones quickly and accurately. During the fourth meeting Schlesinger asked 

Jones to present the Chiefs’ recommendations, and the general spoke throughout the deliberations 

(forty-three times). Holloway spoke twelve times during the first two-thirds of the meeting, particularly concerning details of naval activity. NSC meeting minutes; James L. Holloway, Aircraft Carriers at 

War: A Personal Retrospective of Korea, Vietnam, and the Soviet Confrontation (Annapolis, MD: Naval 

Institute Press, 2007), 397–402; and Puryear, George S. Brown, 259.

17. Schlesinger had given Jones verbal approval for the ultimatum at 4:54 p.m., and five minutes 

later that was communicated from the JCS down the chain of command with the caveat that the ultimatum should not be broadcast until the order was given. After the subsequent NSC conversation, 

the ultimatum broadcast was cancelled about two hours later. Department of Defense, After Action 

Report: US Military Operations SS Mayaguez/Kaoh Tang Island, 12–15 May 1975 (hereafter DoD After 

Action Report); and Chronological Listing of Intelligence Community Activities.

18. Targets of opportunity are often mobile. See Wetterhahn’s depiction of an armed reconnaissance mission he conducted shortly before the Mayaguez crisis. Ralph Wetterhahn, The Last Battle: 

The Mayaguez Incident and the End of the Vietnam War (New York: Carroll and Graf, 2001), 274–75.

19. It has been noted that a civilian, Robert Hartmann, was the first to ask about estimated casualties and that he did so late in the decision process. Carol Van Voorst, “Looking Ferocious: The Ford 

Administration’s Management of the Mayaguez Affair” (paper, National War College, Washington, 

DC, 1998), http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a441469.pdf. 

20. Telephone conversation, Mr. Sisco/Secretary Kissinger, May 14, 1975, 6:16 p.m., released in 

full, Ford Library.

21. As Kissinger noted in his memoirs, 

The congressional leaders were unenthusiastic, especially about attacks on the mainland. 

Senator Mike Mansfield wanted to know, “why are we again going into the mainland of Asia, 
Notes

228

especially at a time when we almost have the boat in our custody once again?” Even the 

usually stalwart Senator John McClellan expressed his uneasiness about the attack on the 

mainland. Speaker Thomas P. “Tip” O’Neill implied that the boat was a “Pentagon charter,” 

as if this changed the reality of its having been hijacked in international waters; he continued 

low-key grumbling even after Schlesinger assured him that his suspicion was unfounded. 

The day after the crisis in a conversation with Ford, Kissinger said, “I think Schlesinger, when he heard 

the Congressional attitudes, changed the orders [for ongoing airstrikes against the mainland].” See 

the discussion on page 149. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 565; Memorandum of Conversation, President 

Ford, Henry Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft, Friday, May 16, 1975, 9:25 a.m., Oval Office, declassified, 

Ford Library. 

22. Rowan, Four Days, 178.

23. Nessen, It Sure Looks Different, 124.

24. The depiction of military operations is an update of the account in Belief Systems and Decision 

Making in the Mayaguez Crisis, which was based on firsthand accounts available at the time. Since 

then many more participants in the operations have been interviewed or written about their experiences, and their insights were used to improve the overview of military operations provided here. In 

addition to Mahoney’s Mayaguez Incident and Guilmartin’s Very Short War, I also drew upon other 

recently published sources as indicated. 

25. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 131; and Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 11. See Mahoney for 

a good explanation of helicopter availability, and Guilmartin for expert insights on the differences 

between the two types of helicopters and their missions. Guilmartin, Very Short War, 9, 40–43.

26. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 144. See Mahoney for a good description of the planning and 

execution of the retaking of the ship.

27. R. W. Austin, 2nd Battalion, 9th Marines, Koh Tang/Mayaguez Historical Report, 9 December 

1975; declassified.

28. Urey W. Patrick, “The Mayaguez Operation,” (Arlington, VA: Center for Naval Analyses, 1977), 16. 

29. Guilmartin, Very Short War, 150.

30. Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 31.

31. Document 297, Telegram from the Mission to the United Nations to the Department of State; 

New York, May 14, 1975, 1817Z, in FRUS 1969–1976, vol. 10.

32. Cited in Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 125.

33. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 568.

34. This may be what Richard B. “Dick” Cheney was alluding to years later when he said that 

during the Mayaguez crisis Kissinger “became very nervous and upset” and “wanted to back off and 

reconsider,” but Ford said, “No, Henry, we’ve made the decision. It’s the right thing to do and we’re 

going to do it full speed ahead.” Kenneth W. Thompson, The Ford Presidency: Twenty-two Intimate 

Perspectives of Gerald R. Ford (Lanham MD: University Press of America, 1988), 81. If so, this corrects 

the author’s 1989 surmise that Kissinger encouraged Ford to persist with the punitive strikes after the 

news of the Cambodian broadcast. See Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 93.

35. Ford, A Time to Heal, 282.

36. Rowan, Four Days, 205. 

37. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 569; Schlesinger Veteran interview.

38. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 569.

39. William Lloyd Stearman, An American Adventure: From Early Aviation through Three Wars to the 

White House (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2012); and Interview with William Lloyd Stearman, 
Notes

229

Foreign Affairs Oral History Project, Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training, interviewed on 

April 15, 1992 (hereafter Stearman interview).

40. Stearman’s assertion that Kissinger liked the idea but NSA did not is possible but not probable. 

In his memoirs Kissinger does not claim NSA interfered with the plan. He merely says, “After toying 

with the idea of breaking into Cambodian communications, we decided that the most expeditious 

way would be to release a statement to the news services.” Also, at lower levels where concerns about 

protecting sources and methods also would have been acute, there was already a sustained pattern 

of cooperation between NSA and DoD personnel on broadcasting to the Cambodians through their 

own radio network. Wickham’s notes record a situation report at 8:38 p.m. on May 14 indicating that 

US forces had retaken the Mayaguez and that they were planning to deliver the ultimatum to the 

Khmer forces through their radio network. These plans were worked on until nearly midnight on the 

fourteenth, with Stearman advising General Lincoln D. Faurer of the DIA not to cancel the plan to 

broadcast directly to the Cambodians until the situation could be clarified. When IPAC asked NSA 

which authority cancelled the broadcast to the Cambodians, NSA responded, “The White House.” 

NSA had been leaning forward to execute the plan and actually had to query its local entity to see 

if the broadcast inadvertently had gone out to the Cambodians contrary to the White House’s final 

decision on the matter. Five minutes before midnight they were told the ultimatum had not been 

broadcast directly through the Cambodian network. Then, at 1:30 a.m. on the fifteenth, NSA inquired 

as to whether it could cancel all actions pertaining to broadcast of a message to the Khmer Rouge, 

and Scowcroft responded in the affirmative. NSA then passed this news to the NMCC. At 6:11 in the 

morning the NSA representative at the command center learned that Nessen had said the United States 

transmitted a message directly to the Cambodians on frequencies we knew they would be monitoring. 

NSA asked the NSA rep at the command center to provide a copy of this communication. Similarly, as 

noted earlier, President Ford told the shah of Iran the following day that “we put a message through 

their frequencies and over the AP that we would stop when the crew was released.” The president did 

not know the message was never broadcast over Cambodian frequencies, and Kissinger and Scowcroft 

apparently did not correct his misimpression. Nessen mentions the plan to broadcast the US reply 

over a radio frequency the Cambodians were known to be monitoring, but he did not know why the 

idea was rejected. Nessen, It Sure Looks Different, 126. 

41. GAO report, 67.

42. Memorandum of Conversation, President Ford, Mohamed Reza Pahlavi, Shah of Iran, Dr. 

Henry A. Kissinger, Secretary of State, and Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs 

Lt. General Brent Scowcroft, Deputy Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, Oval 

Office, Thursday, May 15, 1975, 11:00 a.m. National Security Adviser’s Memoranda of Conversation 

Collection, Gerald R. Ford Digital Library, http://www.fordlibrarymuseum.gov/library/document

/memcons/1553077.pdf.

43. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 569.

44. Telephone conversation, Joe Sisco with Secretary Kissinger, 9:15 PM, May 14, 1975; declassified and released in full, February 10, 2003, Ford Library. 

45. Robert C. McFarlane with Zofia Smardz, Special Trust (New York: Cadell and Davies, 1994), 163. 

46. Nessen, It Sure Looks Different: 127–28. Rumsfeld also cites the leaks as an irritant in Pentagon 

relations with President Ford. Rumsfeld, When the Center Held, 172.

47. Stearman interview.

48. Nessen, It Sure Looks Different: 129. In making this comment, Kissinger echoed his advice 

to Ford in an Oval Office meeting between the third and fourth NSC meetings, during which he told 

Ford, “The [political] price will be the same. If you use force it should be ferociously.” Memorandum of 
Notes

230

Conversation, President Ford, Henry Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft, Wednesday, May 14, 1975, 11:45 

a.m., Oval Office, declassified, Ford Library.

Chapter 4

1. Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 37 and 47.

2. Ibid., 43.

3. Guilmartin, Very Short War, 102.

4. The AC-130s had been maintaining nighttime vigils, but on the morning of the assault, Spectre61 left as the sun rose. Then, it was brought on station for support and was working feverishly to establish communications with the Marines and ascertain their positions so that it could safely direct its 

fires toward the enemy. Spectre-61 was returning to its base in Korat when it was redirected to Utapao 

Air Base to refuel. It relaunched at 0700 to Tang Island and was enlisted for close air support around 

0830. Patrick, “Mayaguez Operation,” 88; and Wetterhahn, Last Battle, 212. 

5. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 166.

6. Ibid., 166. Wise and Baron count 221 Marines on the western portion of the island at this time, 

14-Hour War, 47.

7. Nessen, It Sure Looks Different, 129.

8. All the Marine radio connectivity with Coral Sea aircraft had been lost when the first helicopter 

went down. Burns interview.

9. Generally speaking, once the second wave of Marines arrived and explained the crew had 

been recovered, the Marines on the ground stopped risking additional casualties in offensive actions. 

Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 167–68.

10. Schlesinger Veteran interview and Wickham interview. “Yes!” said General Wickham. “They 

wanted to take the island and not pull back. Schlesinger thought that was unnecessary and would 

just cost more lives.” 

11. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 173. Major Guilmartin, who later wrote a superb account of the 

military operations, flew Jolly-44. According to Guilmartin, the craft’s fuel line was hit by a .50-caliber 

round: “The flight mechanic, Technical Sergeant Billy D. Willingham, assisted the Navy maintenance 

personnel” who cut out the “damaged line (one and one-quarter inch aluminum standpipe) with a 

hacksaw and put in its place a section of hose held together with radiator hose clamps. Certainly, not 

by the book, but despite concerns about fuel contamination by the pilots, it worked.” Major George 

R. Dunham, USMC, and Colonel David A. Quinlan, Colonel, USMC, “Recovery of the SS Mayaguez,” 

chapter 13 in US Marines in Vietnam: The Bitter End, 1973–1975 (Washington, DC: History and Museums Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corp), 258n. 

12. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 167.

13. Ibid., 171. All told, the Wilson fired 157 5-inch rounds. Malcolm J. Muir, End of the Saga: The 

Maritime Evacuation of South Vietnam and Cambodia (Washington, DC: Naval History and Heritage 

Command, 2017), 54–55.

14. Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 48.

15. Ibid., 115, 199; and Wetterhahn, Last Battle, 231–32.

16. Commander J. A. Messegee, et al. “‘Mayday’ for the Mayaguez,” U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, November 1976, 258.

17. DoD After Action Report.

18. Gary Weikel, letter to the author, October 29, 1991.
Notes

231

19. Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 52.

20. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 174.

21. Greg Wilson, “Growth: Greg Wilson’s Account of The Mayaguez Incident,” Koh Tang/Mayaguez Veterans Organization, http://www.kohtang.com/kohtang-1975/growth-wilsons-account

/growth-wilsons-account.html. The flare almost hit the Wilson’s gig, which surprised and worried the 

crew since the boat’s deck was awash in ammunition. Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 253.

22. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 175.

23. Wilson, “Growth.” 

24. Davis had traded for the strobe light with a recon Marine back in Okinawa. Clayton K. S. 

Chun, The Last Boarding Party: The USMC and the SS Mayaguez 1975 (Oxford: Osprey, 2011), 70; and 

Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 168. 

25. Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 244.

26. DoD After Action Report.

27. Lance Corporal Loney was killed early in the operation but lost when several Marines carrying his body to a helicopter were hit by enemy fire. Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 231.

28. Ibid., 253.

29. Ibid., 57, 170–71.

30. The leaflets are available on the Koh Tang/Mayaguez Veterans Organization website. See Jim 

Butler, lithographer on board the USS Coral Sea, comments posted on Koh Tang/Mayaguez Veterans 

Organization website, http://www.kohtang.com/whats-new/whats-new.html.

31. Timothy L. Bosiljevac, “The Teams in ‘Nam: U.S. Navy UDT/SEAL Operations of the Vietnam 

Conflict,” (master’s thesis, Emporia State University, 1987). Bosiljevac interviewed the SEAL commander.

32. Wetterhahn explains the differences of opinion well in Last Battle, 254–55.

33. Wise and Baron summarize the status of the debate over the fate of the lost Marines, 

including testimony and radio communications, indicating it should have been evident that not all 

Marines were able to get off the island on the last helicopter. Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 55–56 

and 66–84 (see page 71 in particular). Over the years, thirteen Marines and airmen killed in the 

Mayaguez operations have been identified, recovered, and buried in Arlington National Cemetery. 

But to date, forensic analysis of remains has been inconclusive about the fate of Hall, Hargrove, and 

Marshall. Ralph Wetterhahn made a sustained, meticulous effort to determine the fate of those 

three lost Marines. Based on his interviews of Cambodian sources, he believes they were captured 

and executed. The credibility of Wetterhahn’s Cambodian sources—who seemingly have no reason 

to fabricate, other than perhaps to encourage more trips by Americans searching for their fallen 

comrades—needs to be balanced against the puzzling question of why the three Marines, if still 

alive, did not reveal themselves to the crew of the Wilson, which spent hours cruising the coast of 

Tang Island in hopes of seeing them. See also Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 238–41; Matthew Burke, 

“Fate of Marines left Behind in Cambodia in 1975 Haunts Comrades,” Stars and Stripes, April 4, 

2013; and Matthew M. Burke, “The Truth About the Lost Marines of The Vietnam War’s Last Battle,” 

Newsweek, January 24, 2017, http://www.newsweek.com/2017/02/03/us-marines-disappearedmayaguez-last-battle-vietnam-war-547106.html.

34. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 180; 199–200. Mahoney notes forty-nine were wounded in 

combat, and thirty more received wounds that were not the result of hostile fire.
Notes

232

Chapter 5

1. Rockefeller echoed Kissinger’s concerns and where he differed from Kissinger (for example, 

in being leery of attacking the island) he was ignored by Ford. A case could be made that Jones was a 

key decision maker, but more for what he did not do rather than what he did. If he had refused to pass 

the Joint Chiefs’ recommendation for going ahead with military operations and insisted on another 

twenty-four-hour delay until a larger number of Marines could make the assault on Tang Island, he 

would have had a major impact on the crisis outcomes. Colby also might be considered a key player 

if it could be shown that he intervened to ensure the NSC was operating on the basis of the smaller 

estimate of Khmer defenders on Tang Island, but there is no evidence of this. Rumsfeld weighed in 

with Ford on the B-52 issue, encouraging him to use the Coral Sea planes instead, but again, this just 

reinforced the advice Ford had already received from Kissinger. As for Scowcroft, it is true his views 

overlapped with Kissinger’s, and that Kissinger played an even larger role in influencing Ford than 

was assumed before the release of so much classified information on the decision-making process. 

Nevertheless, that same material makes it clear that Ford valued Scowcroft’s views independent of 

Kissinger. Also, Scowcroft played an important role at several key junctures during the crisis, especially 

when Kissinger was away from Washington. For a discussion of why Ford, Kissinger, Schlesinger, and 

Scowcroft were considered key decision makers and Jones, Rockefeller, and others were not, see Lamb, 

Belief Systems and Decision Making, 55−61. 

2. Brent Scowcroft, interview with author, Washington, DC, 1 February 1980, cited in Lamb, 

Belief Systems and Decision Making (hereafter Scowcroft interview).

3. Schlesinger Veteran interview. 

4. Scowcroft interview.

5. This information is new and based on the declassified NSC meeting minutes. See the discussion of Kissinger and the EC-121 and on historical analogies during the crisis in Lamb, Belief Systems 

and Decision Making, 72–73 and 198–203, respectively.

6. The NSA recently declassified its top secret account of the incident: “The National Security 

Agency and the EC-121 Shootdown,” National Security Agency, September 20, 2016, https://www.nsa

.gov/news-features/declassified-documents/cryptologic-histories/assets/files/EC-121.pdf. 

7. Bernd Schaefer, “North Korean ‘Adventurism’ and China’s Long Shadow, 1966–1972” (working 

paper 44, Cold War International History Project, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, 

Washington, DC, 2004), 24–25.

8. Van Jackson, “The EC-121 Shoot Down and North Korea’s Coercive Theory of Victory,” Sources 

and Methods (blog), Wilson Center, April 13, 2017, https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/the-ec

-121-shoot-down-and-north-koreas-coercive-theory-victory. 

9. Kissinger, White House Years, 316, 318, and 321, cited in Lamb, Belief System and Decision Making, 72.

10. Peter Goldman with Thomas M. De Frank, Henry W. Hubbard and Bruce Van Voorst, “Ford’s 

Rescue Operation,” Newsweek, May 26, 1975, 16.

11. Right after the first meeting, Ford surprised Nessen by asking him, among other things, 

whether he would “go in there and bomb the Cambodian boat and take a chance of the Americans 

being killed?” This implies it had been made clear to him that it might be difficult to use punitive force 

and still protect the crew. See pages 12 and 113–14 and note 19 on page 224. 

12. For example, General Burns refused to authorize an AC-130 gunship to fire back at Cambodian forces because he feared the crew, at least some of whom were believed to be on the island, might 

be hurt. Burns interview, 436. See also page 39 for his instructions that “all forces must be aware of the 

fact that the primary purpose for conducting ground operations is to secure the safe release of US/

third-country national prisoners.” 
Notes

233

13. NSC meeting minutes.

14. For example, in Ford’s memoirs he says that “punishing” Cambodia by airstrikes is “where 

Kissinger and I disagreed with Schlesinger.” Similarly, Kissinger says that “Schlesinger, so stern when it 

came to arms control issues, balked at military action.” Kissinger asserts this even though elsewhere he 

notes that Schlesinger and he were in agreement on basic philosophy. Mahoney accepts the depiction 

of Schlesinger by Ford and Kissinger, even though it does not reflect the record of the discussions in the 

NSC, as discussed here. Often histories of the Ford presidency, such as Douglas Brinkley’s Gerald R. Ford, 

repeat these assertions. In reality, Schlesinger was a staunch realist and believed in the efficacy of force. 

The day after the crisis in another NSC meeting on the Panama Canal treaties, Schlesinger declared himself an opponent of the treaty being negotiated. He explained the geostrategic need for sovereign bases 

around the world and concluded with a commentary on world opinion, saying, “Worldwide reactions 

are likely to be mixed. When the U. S. shows strength and determination, it receives respect. When it 

recedes from its position, it whets appetites.” NSC meeting minutes, May15, 1975. For an indication of 

how much this is true with regard to the significance of the fall of Southeast Asia to Communist forces, 

see the March 27 telephone conversation between Kissinger and Schlesinger in Henry Kissinger, Crisis: 

The Anatomy of Two Major Policy Crises (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2003), 428–29. Ford, A Time to 

Heal, 279; Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 177, 557; Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 110, 113; Douglas Brinkley, 

Gerald R. Ford (Waterville, ME: Thorndike Press, 2007), 105.

15. Enough so that observers like James Cannon, one of Ford’s presidential assistants who did 

not sit in on the NSC meetings, later related that from what he understood “Schlesinger contended 

that any military action should be limited to punishment of the Cambodian forces involved.” James 

Cannon, Time and Chance: Gerald Ford’s Appointment with History (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1998), 398.

16. Schlesinger Veteran interview.

17. John Osborne is one of the few commentators to get this point right. Presumably Schlesinger 

was his source. See White House Watch: The Ford Years (Washington, DC: New Republic Book Co., 

1977), 140

18. Many years later in an oral history interview General Jones recalled “there was great debate 

in the government between rescue and punitive action. There were some in the government, not 

the military, who wanted to bomb the airport at Phnom Penh with B-52s as punitive action.” See the 

discussion below on the timing of military operations, which was the one issue where General Jones’s 

military expertise might have been used to assess risk in a manner that would have complicated the 

punitive purposes of the key leaders. Jones interview.

19. Prados, Keepers of the Keys, 371.

20. Osborne, White House Watch, 139; Roger Morris, Uncertain Greatness: Henry Kissinger and 

American Foreign Policy (New York: Harper & Row, 1997), 288.

21. As the GAO report concludes, “The goal of safely landing the assault force on the island was 

in direct conflict with the goal of ensuring the safety of possible American prisoners.” The report 

goes on to explain why the assault and supporting fires invariably put the crew at risk. The report 

was finally declassified in its entirety on June 10, 2003. GAO report, 95.

22. Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 77.

23. Kissinger kept this kind of thinking and how he managed diplomacy secret as long as possible, 

insisting that the portions of the GAO report that related the contents of diplomatic communications 

remain classified even though the Department of State and Department of Defense had no issues with 

its declassification. GAO report, vi.

24. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 555.
Notes

234

25. This includes the author’s interviews with William Colby and Brent Scowcroft, who had 

no recollection of the cable ever being discussed, but also formal communications in response to 

congressional inquiries about diplomatic communications immediately following the crisis. For 

example, a May 30, chronology prepared in response to requests from Congress by George Springsteen, the NSC executive secretary, makes no mention of the Tehran cable. Similarly, a June 20, 

1975, letter prepared by DoD in response to congressional inquiries about “the exact sequence of 

communications, meetings, consultations, diplomatic initiatives, and military actions” makes no 

mention of the Tehran cable under its section that reviews diplomatic events. See Memorandum 

from George Springsteen, NSC Executive Secretary to Brent Scowcroft, Subject: Chronology of the 

Mayaguez Incident, dated May 30; and Letter to Honorable Melvin Price, Chairman, Committee 

on Armed Services, from Richard Fryklund, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (Legislative Affairs), June 20, 1975.

26. The cable went to diplomats in Beijing, Islamabad, and Bangkok and to CINCPAC. In Washington, however, distribution was limited to State and the NSC staff. Vandenbroucke agrees that “the 

White House disregarded evidence suggesting that the incident could be solved peacefully,” but he 

discounts the assertion that Kissinger kept the Tehran cable from the NSC. He assumes the cable would 

have been distributed widely in Washington, which is not correct. The “tags” added by the embassy 

in Tehran categorized the content of the cable as relevant to foreign policy and relations, China/

Mainland, Iran, and Pakistan. These tags automatically generated an office list and minimum distribution within the State Department, and then State’s operations center manually added additional 

offices to the distribution. From those distribution tags, it is clear that the Pentagon, CIA, and NSA did 

not receive either electronic or paper copies of the cable. All copies were distributed internal to the 

Department of State except for five paper copies that went to the NSC (i.e., Kissinger’s staff in the White 

House). Vandenbroucke also asserts that an unidentified NSC participant spontaneously mentioned 

the cable in a 1984 interview with him and said the NSC discounted its credence. The unidentified 

interviewee’s assessment is consistent with the Department of State response to GAO investigators 

after they revealed the existence of the cable. State representatives said the cable was “an unevaluated 

report of questionable validity.” However, that does not mean the cable was made known to the NSC at 

the time. If Kissinger had distributed the cable to other NSC members, it seems unlikely he (and other 

Department of State personnel) would have been willing to tell reporters and the GAO investigators 

that there were “no known diplomatic responses or initiatives carried out by Cambodia, the Chinese, 

or anyone else with regard to the seizure of the Mayaguez.” GAO report, 10–17; US Congress, Seizure 

of the Mayaguez, pt. 2, 246; Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 85 and 205n59. See also the discussion 

on Mahoney’s treatment of the Tehran cable in note 96 on page 240. 

27. Memorandum for the Director, J-3, From G. E. Cooke, Brigadier General, USAF, Secretary, JCS, 

Subject: Words to be Included in Operation Order, 13 May 1975, Top Secret, declassified by Secretary, 

JCS on December 31, 1985.

28. Rowan, Four Days; and “Text of Statement to be Read Over Cambodian Frequencies and via 

Loud Speaker to Inhabitants of the Island,” box 1, folder “Cambodia-Mayaguez Seizure (1)” of NSA 

Kissinger-Scowcroft West Wing Office Files, Ford Library. 

29. Wickham notebooks.

30. Much later Sisco commented that Kissinger routinely cut State out of the action and that 

he had to fight to keep the department involved. Certainly that proved true during the Mayaguez

crisis. See Joseph J. Sisco, Foreign Affairs Oral History Project, Association for Diplomatic Studies 

and Training, interviewed on March 19, 1990 (hereafter Sisco interview). See Nessen for his take on 

Kissinger’s treatment of his staff, Nessen, It Sure Looks Different, 137.

31. See the discussion in Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 213–15. 
Notes

235

32. Career diplomats at the Department of Defense did the same. Ambassador Abramowitz, then 

serving as deputy assistant secretary of defense for East Asian and Pacific affairs, advised Schlesinger 

to give diplomatic initiatives a chance to work before military operations or there would be “severe 

criticism.” Wickham notebooks. 

33. The ambassador’s “flash” cable begins, “As the department is aware, I had absolutely no 

advance word that military action was to be taken.” He argued, “Had I known what was contemplated I could have taken steps to contain the damage.” Sisco drafted a cable back to contain the 

ambassador’s ire and bring him into line. It stated, “We understand fully sensitivity of issue, but 

it is our judgment that if we begin to supply the Thais with advance information they would have 

no alternative but to pose strong objection. . . . You should understand that we will be required 

to utilize U-Tapao as may be necessary in order to secure promptly the release of the vessel and 

Americans. . . . You should not rpt not give any advance indication to the Thais. We realize that 

there may be costs with the Thais but the balance of interests requires that we be willing to take 

whatever risks may be involved in our relations with Thais.” Document 289, Telegram from the 

Embassy in Thailand to the Department of State; Bangkok, May 13, 1975, 1315, in FRUS 1969–1976, 

vol. 10. Sisco’s response is Document 292, Telegram from the Department of State to the Embassy in 

Thailand, Washington, May 13, 1975, 1754Z, in ibid.; and Ford Library, National Security Adviser, 

NSC East Asian and Pacific Affairs Staff Files, box 29, Department of State, Telegrams and Cables. 

Secret; Nodis; Flash. Drafted by Sisco; approved by Sisco, Johnson, and Eagleburger.

34. After the recovery of the ship and crew, Kissinger asked Sisco to add this information to the 

message going out to all overseas diplomatic posts, acknowledging he “hadn’t even looked at the three 

I’ve got here” (i.e., the drafts Sisco provided earlier). Sisco said, “As far as I’m concerned, that’s dead.” 

He did not see the point of informing posts about the operations after the fact, but a few moments later 

acceded to Kissinger’s point that they should emphasize the positive outcome. 

35. Document 289, FRUS 1969–1976, vol. 10. 

36. Document 400, Minutes of the Secretary of State’s Staff Meeting, Washington, May 16, 1975, 

8:08 a.m., in Foreign Relations of The United States, 1969–1976, vol. E-12, Documents on East and 

Southeast Asia (hereafter FRUS 1969–1976, vol. E-12). Ford adopted the same attitude in his memoirs, 

saying he “didn’t give a damn about offending [Thai] sensibilities.” Nevertheless, on May 19, Ambassador Masters delivered a note that the Thai government took as an apology. It stated, “The United 

States regrets the misunderstandings that have arisen between Thailand and the United States in 

regard to the temporary placement of Marines at Utapao to assist in the recovery of the SS Mayaguez.” 

Telegrams 115952 to Bangkok, May 18, and 4359 from Bangkok, May 19; ibid., Central Foreign Policy 

Files). Ford, A Time to Heal, 276. 

37. Mahoney overlooks Kissinger’s manipulation of diplomacy and asserts Kissinger gave it an 

honest effort. Somewhat strangely, he also asserts his account is “the first to show that, contrary to 

popular opinion, diplomatic efforts were taken in parallel to the military response.” Presumably he 

means the diplomatic efforts trickled out over the course of the crisis. The GAO report identified all the 

major diplomatic initiatives and when they occurred. What the delay in going to the United Nations, 

despite Sisco’s urging, actually demonstrates is Kissinger’s desire to avoid any untoward political 

developments that might have prevented the use of force. See Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, xxii, 107, 

and 216, and the discussion on the cable from Tehran in note 96 on page 240. In contrast, a Kissinger 

biographer and a Scowcroft biographer both conclude the quick resort to military force was matched 

by a lethargic diplomatic effort. Seymour M. Hersh, The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White 

House (New York: Summit Books, 1984), 639; and Sparrow, Strategist, 166.

38. Other members of the NSC were not necessarily interested in diplomacy either. In the first 

meeting when a public statement by the White House was being discussed, Colby said, “We may 
Notes

236

wish to point out that they released other ships. This gives them a way out.” Rumsfeld and Rockefeller 

objected, not wanting to identify an off-ramp for conflict or imply the United States was willing to 

discuss the issue.

39. Kissinger knew about the telegram from Tehran, but he also knew that Waldheim had promised to jump immediately into action. Kissinger approved Sisco’s outreach to the UN in a 12:12 p.m. 

phone conversation. The US ambassador to the UN delivered the request to Waldheim within the hour 

and then sent a cable to State at 2:17 p.m. saying that Waldheim “promised to contact Cambodian 

authorities immediately,” using China but also a channel to Phnom Penh, that “he used successfully 

to seek Cambodian help for first convoy of foreign evacuees.” The cable said Waldheim broke off a 

meeting with UN representatives forced to leave Cambodia to give the matter his priority attention. 

Document 297, Telegram from the Mission to the United Nations to the Department of State, New 

York, May 14, 1975, 1817Z; Subj: Amb. Scali’s Visit to Secretary General Kurt Waldheim Concerning 

US Vessel Mayaguez. Ref: State 112089, in FRUS 1969–1976, vol. 10. 

40. Ford’s lasting memory of the attempted diplomacy during the Mayaguez crisis was that it had 

been impossible to contact the Cambodians. He noted this months later when the subject of not being 

able to contact Cambodian authorities came up in another context. Document 85, Memorandum of 

Conversation, Washington, January 26, 1976, 4:43–5:30 p.m., in FRUS 1969–1976, vol. E-12.

41. The GAO report implies diplomacy was not aggressively pursued. Similarly, this author 

argued long ago “the popular perception that diplomacy had been tried and failed was not accurate,” 

and that “a diplomatic settlement rated a very poor second on the list of American priorities.” Some 

later accounts acknowledge this, while others continue to maintain diplomacy was tried and failed. 

Oddly, though, only I have made the case that Kissinger controlled the diplomatic bureaucracy as 

much as Schlesinger controlled the Pentagon in pursuit of his preferred approach to managing the 

crisis. This seems strange because of Kissinger’s much commented upon penchant for recognizing 

the power of bureaucracy and insisting it had to be tamed or worked around. For example, see Lloyd 

Jensen, Explaining Foreign Policy (Englewood Cliffs, N.J: Prentice-Hall, 1982), 126; and, for my original argument that Kissinger limited diplomatic initiatives, see Lamb, “Belief Systems and Decision 

Making,” 692–93; and Belief Systems and Decision Making, 213–15, 246–47. 

42. Memorandum of Conversation, General Scowcroft and the President, the Oval Office, 2:23 

a.m., May 14, 1975 (declassified January 24, 2000), Ford Library.

43. Wickham notebooks.

44. For example, Colonel Graves passed information to Scowcroft that provided an exact 

accounting of Cambodian boat sightings, length of the boats, the number sunk, and the location of 

surviving vessels. Note from “Irene” to General Scowcroft, May 14, 1975.

45. Memorandum of Conversation, President Ford, Dr. Kissinger, and General Scowcroft, 11:45 

a.m., May 14, 1975; box 1, folder “Cambodia-Mayaguez Seizure (1)” of NSA Kissinger-Scowcroft West 

Wing Office Files, Ford Library.

46. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 559.

47. DoD After Action Report. Schlesinger approved making the request for presidential 

approval, which was consistent with his standing guidance and preferences. However, for two 

reasons it seems he may have done so without being aware that Wickham ignored the previous 

presidential order. First, Wickham says he explained later to the secretary what he’d done and 

that Schlesinger “realized the wisdom of what happened.” Second, at the opening of the next NSC 

meeting, which was called to resolve the issue of what to do about the vessel with the Caucasians 

aboard, rather than justifying Pentagon lethargy by pointing to the possible presence of the crew, 

Schlesinger observed that the pilot “is not certain that there are Caucasians on board.” In other 
Notes

237

words, he undermined the best possible Pentagon defense for asking for presidential reconsideration 

of standing orders. Wickham interview; NSC meeting minutes.

48. All parties involved—Ford, Scowcroft, Kissinger, Schlesinger, and Wickham—agree it was 

crystal clear that Ford wanted all boats sunk as a matter of course. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 559–60; 

Wickham interview; Schlesinger Veteran interview.

49. Wickham interview.

50. Schlesinger Veteran interview. Wickham’s and Schlesinger’s memory of the exact sequence 

of events is slightly at odds. See page 28 and note 33 on page 225. 

51. NSC meeting minutes. 

52. Wickham notebooks and on the ten helicopters, see Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 215.

53. NSC meeting minutes.

54. “Possible Scenario for Recovery of Ship and Crew,” prepared by the Department of Defense, 

for the NSC meeting beginning at 10:40 p.m., May 13. Kissinger-Scowcroft West Wing Office Files, box 

1, Cambodia, Mayaguez Seizure; cited by the Office of the Historian, Department of State: https://

history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1969-76v10/d290. 

55. See pages 70–71 on EC-121.

56. NSC meeting minutes.

57. Clements baldly stated that he didn’t think any Americans were on Tang Island, causing 

Kissinger to respond, “They could be. We do not know.” That precipitated a discussion of how many 

Caucasians the pilots thought they saw, and it was agreed the pilots were not sure. Kissinger reasoned, 

“We do not know that they are not there [i.e., on Tang]” and “Taking the island if they are not there is 

easier to explain than failing to take it if they are.” Schlesinger agreed, saying, “We have an obligation 

to get the Americans or to see if they are there.”

58. According to Admiral Steele, “The sad part of the Mayaguez evolution is that we had sufficient 

force coming up with the Seventh Fleet, after it had been turned around from the evacuation of Vietnam stand down, to seize Southern Cambodia. I begged for another day or two, rather than commit 

forces piecemeal as we did.” Dunham and Quinlan, US Marines in Vietnam, 239.

59. Head, Short, and McFarlane, Crisis Resolution, 121–22, based on an interview with General 

Jones. With respect to “going on the fourteenth,” it should be noted that the issue was a twenty-four versus 

a forty-eight-hour delay, i.e., going on May 14 or 15 (Washington time) or May 15 or 16 (Cambodian time).

60. See Schlesinger Veteran interview. 

61. Jones interview, 202. Vandenbroucke, who interviewed several senior officers involved in 

the crisis, claims Jones was out of step with the other members of the Joint Chiefs who were “eager 

to proceed without delay.” This insight is consistent with a comment Scowcroft made to Wickham 

on the phone before the fourth and final NSC meeting before the military operations began. He told 

Wickham that there was considerable concern among the Joint Chiefs that General Jones was not 

being sufficiently inclusive of their views. Wickham notebooks.

62. NSC meeting minutes.

63. “What is harder for me to understand is why the fourth air strike—and I had specifically 

ordered four—was never carried out. I hadn’t told anyone to cancel that attack. Apparently someone 

had, and I was anxious to find out who had contravened my authority.” Ford, A Time to Heal, 284.

64. In that regard, the account provided here with the benefit of new sources helps correct the 

conclusions of this author’s 1989 work, which for Schlesinger’s views relied more heavily on leaked 

information to news media. See Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 104ff. and 208n67. 

65. “Possible Scenarios for Recovery of Ship and Crew,” in box 28, Folder: Department of 
Notes

238

Defense—General, National Security Adviser, NSC East Asian and Pacific Affairs Staff: Files, (1969) 

1973–1976, Ford Library.

66. Laitin was the source of most leaks according to Nessen. This greatly irritated Kissinger, who 

says in his memoirs that “Joseph Laitin, missed no opportunity to transform honest disagreements into 

aspects of a feud between the Secretaries of State and Defense. Newspaper columns kept describing 

our deliberations in terms of ‘Dr. Strangelove’ restrained by the humanistic Secretary of Defense. I 

was alleged to have advocated indiscriminate B-52 bombings in contrast to Schlesinger, who stood for 

a more precise ‘tit-for-tat’ retaliation.” Nessen, It Sure Looks Different, 128; and Lamb, Belief Systems 

and Decision Making: 210–11.

67. See Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 104–14; and Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 572. 

68. Head, Short, and McFarlane, Crisis Resolution, 303n30. 

69. Ford, A Time to Heal, 284.

70. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 571–72.

71. See the concept of operations as explained in the Pentagon’s after action report on the military 

operations. DoD After Action Report.

72. Ibid.; see section on verbal orders relating to rescue of the SS Mayaguez and crew.

73. Kissinger in his memoirs indicates that he understood there was little time left before the first 

wave struck: “Since there was little time left, I suggested that the planes from the Coral Sea proceed on 

course but drop no ordnance until the President had made his decision.” Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 568. 

74. Wickham notebooks.

75. Direct communications between the White House situation room and the NMCC began once 

McFarlane called Wickham prior to the fourth NSC meeting to say the White House wanted direct 

reports not delayed by intervening echelons of command authority. Wickham notebooks.

76. Lieutenant General, USAR, Ray B. Sitton, Director for Operations, Joint Chiefs of Staff, Memorandum for the Secretary of Defense, Subject: Mainland Air Strikes During the Mayaguez Operation, 

Undated, Air Force (hereafter Sitton to SECDEF memo). Also, at 8:37 the CIA operations center heard 

from the White House situation room “that at 2027 (i.e. 8:27 p.m.) President Ford ordered a stop in the 

action planned against mainland Cambodia,” which suggests that a general suspension of operations 

against the mainland was not just the Pentagon’s selective perception. Chronological Listing of Intelligence Community Activities, CIA-5.

77. Sitton to SECDEF memo. 

78. In his memoirs, Ford misremembers these conversations as being with Scowcroft rather than 

Kissinger, but Kissinger, Scowcroft, and Ford all agree on the timing and content of the communications. Ford, A Time to Heal, 282.

79. Kissinger in his memoirs notes Schlesinger wanted the controversial strikes to continue. It is 

notable, in light of Schlesinger’s disagreements with Kissinger and his being fired, that he did not take 

the opportunity to blackguard Kissinger for the punitive mainland strikes when speaking on the record 

about them. An interviewer pressed him to do so, asking him to confirm that Kissinger wanted more 

airstrikes even after it was known that the crew had been safely recovered. Schlesinger declined. What 

stood out in his mind was Kissinger’s reluctance to continue the strikes after the broadcast was received:

Interviewer: Is it true, as has been alleged, that even after you received word about the crew’s 

safe return, Kissinger still wanted to go ahead with the last air strike?

Schlesinger: I don’t think there’s any justification for that. Our purposes had been achieved, 

and there was no point in inflicting additional punishment.

Interviewer: You do not remember Kissinger saying anything like this?
Notes

239

Schlesinger: No, nothing of the sort. In fact, as I indicated earlier, after Radio Phnom Penh 

made that first broadcast, he was reluctant to inflict more damage. 

Schlesinger Veteran interview. 

80. Sitton to SECDEF memo. The first wave launched from the Coral Sea at 8:05 and were over 

their target area forty minutes later at 8:45. They made their shorter trip back to the Coral Sea, which 

continued to close the distance during their flight, by 9:30. If they were still on station above their targets at 8:58, that left only thirty-two minutes available for the flight back to the Coral Sea. Either they 

made their runs at the harbor targets very quickly or they had already observed the neutral shipping 

and decided not to risk expending ordnance. For reasons explained elsewhere, given the combat radius 

of the aircraft in question, the Pentagon’s later explanation of fuel complications seems unlikely. See 

Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 105ff.

81. Mahoney notes that “no bombs had been dropped on the first wave per Kissinger’s suggestion,” implying Kissinger’s intervention effectively ensured the first wave would not hit targets. 

Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 126.

82. Wickham notebooks.

83. This perceived failure to be straightforward was exacerbated by later Pentagon claims that 

the planes were low on fuel and had to turn back and is an explanation that some sources still cite 

despite being disproven long ago. See Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 110; and Herspring, 

Pentagon and the Presidency, 231.

84. Wickham notebooks.

85. In reviewing this decision for another mainland strike, Wetterhahn argues that no one 

considered the more important issue, which was whether another punitive strike made more sense 

than having “all available US forces . . . harnessed in getting the Marines safely off the island.” But 

Schlesinger tried to do precisely that. Wetterhahn, Last Battle, 206.

86. Senator John Stennis (D-MS) and Congressman Melvin Price (D-IL). Wickham notebooks.

87. Sitton to SECDEF memo.

88. See MH-53 pilot Gary Weikel’s account on landing on the Coral Sea in Orr Kelly, From a Dark 

Sky: The Story of US Air Force Special Operations (Novato, CA: Presidio, 1996), 229–31.

89. Sitton to SECDEF memo.

90. A few days after the crisis in an interview on ABC’s Issues and Answers television program, 

Schlesinger responded to a question about whether the mainland airstrikes were really necessary 

by noting candidly, among other things, that “we did terminate the fourth wave.” James Schlesinger 

interview, Issues and Answers, ABC, May 18, 1975.

91. Roy Rowan produced The Four Days of Mayaguez, a quick book on the event that contained 

much useful material. Hugh Sidey of Time magazine wrote an article titled “The Presidency: An 

Old-Fashioned Kind of Crisis,” May 16, 1975. The Sidey interview can be found in box 26, folder: May 

16, 1975 Time Magazine–Hugh Sidey, Ronald H. Nessen Files, Ford Library.

92. Mahoney notes Ford actually accused Schlesinger of being “downright insubordinate” in an 

interview he gave late in life. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 12; and Thomas M. DeFrank and Gerald 

R. Ford. Write It When I’m Gone: Remarkable Off-the-Record Conversations with Gerald R. Ford (New 

York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 2007), 92.

93. The minutes are not verbatim, having been “edited and transcribed” for administrative 

purposes, but they appear to be remarkably comprehensive. Participant accounts sometimes bring 

extra color or identify comments not recorded in the minutes. For example, see Robert T. Hartmann, 

Palace Politics: An Inside Account of the Ford Years (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1980), 326; and Sparrow, 

Strategist, 169.
Notes

240

94. Mahoney in particular notes this point. See Mayaguez Incident, 220.

95. Vandenbroucke is the first source to mention the Pentagon was resisting presidential orders, 

noting that one anonymous participant in a confidential interview said, “Officials reportedly withheld 

the order to shoot until it was too late for the planes to act.” Guilmartin, who interviewed Schlesinger, 

is more specific, saying Schlesinger “‘fluffed off’ the White House for three hours.” Vandenbroucke, 

Perilous Options, 81; Guilmartin, Very Short War, 55–56 and 148. Mahoney notes the White House’s 

willingness to sink the boats and frustration with the Pentagon’s reluctance to act, but not the Pentagon’s 

conscious decision to stonewall the White House. All these sources missed Schlesinger’s explicit explanation of Pentagon behavior in his interview with Veteran magazine. Schlesinger Veteran interview.

96. See the discussion of Vandenbroucke’s treatment of the Tehran cable in note 26 on page 234. 

Mahoney asserts diplomacy was not neglected, citing the threats delivered via China, the outreach to 

the UN, and the US response to the Cambodian broadcast (which he says was delivered via the Voice 

of America, which is not accurate, as he notes himself on p. 127, saying the US response was delivered 

via news media). He also disputes that Kissinger kept the Tehran cable from the NSC, saying that “the 

NSC did not ignore the report.” His source for this observation is Kissinger, who discusses the cable in 

his memoirs, saying the “information seemed to us too fragmentary to affect our decisions.” Kissinger 

does not specify who the “us” was; it might have been Scowcroft and him or another NSC staff member, but Mahoney assumes it was the NSC. For the reasons provided here, it seems clear Kissinger’s 

assertions during the crisis about fearing a diplomatic development should be given more weight than 

his vague explanation for discounting the Tehran cable in his memoirs. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 

103, 107, 212 and 216; Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 564. 

97. Mahoney discusses intelligence at length but focuses on why the higher estimates of enemy 

strength on Tang Island never reached the Marines. See Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 96 and 251–55.

Chapter 6

1. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making in the Mayaguez Crisis, 31.

2. With the twenty-three Americans who died in an accidental CH-53 helicopter crash in 

Thailand, forty-one lives were lost. Many observers noted this amounted to one more than the forty 

crewmen saved, which does not include the five Thai crewmen. 

3. Guilmartin, Very Short War, 150.

4. Ibid., 155.

5. Wetterhahn, Last Battle, 63.

6. Patrick, “Mayaguez Operation.” Many special operations forces have made this point as well. 

Gary Weikel, a HH-53 pilot, raised this issue in a National War College paper long ago, and other military students have done the same. According to Timothy Bosiljevac, “Delta platoon from SEAL Team 

One was available in Subic Bay for contingency operations. They were initially alerted and moved to 

Naval Air Station Cubi Point with ammunition and weaponry. Soon after, they were ordered to stand 

down.” Gary Weikel, letter to the author, October 29, 1991; Bosiljevac, “Teams In ‘Nam.” See also T. 

L. Bosiljevac, SEALs: UDT/SEAL Operations in Vietnam (New York: IVY Books, 1990), 178−179. For a 

fuller treatment of what the SEALS might have contributed, see Edward G. Winters and Kent A. Paro, 

“The Misuse of Special Operations Forces” (thesis, Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, CA, 1994). 

7. Guilmartin, Very Short War, 156.

8. Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 100.

9. Ibid. General Burns decided against pre-assault fires for fear of endangering the Mayaguez

crew. However, the Marines were not informed of this. The decision to forgo pre-assault fires made 
Notes

241

escort suppressive fire all the more important, and yet this operational detail was also overlooked. 

More helicopters were not available for that purpose, but an effort to have the Marines better linked 

up with AC-130s and OV-10s as they approached the island could have been made. See Patrick, “Mayaguez Operation”; and Glenn T. Starnes, “The Mayaguez Incident: A Failure in Operational Leadership” 

(Naval War College, June 16, 1995). 

10. Wetterhahn, Last Battle, 102, 112.

11. Guilmartin, Very Short War, 77. Head, an early student of the crisis, calls the underutilization 

of the AC-130s “puzzling.” William P. Head, “Mayaguez: The Final Tragedy of The U.S. Involvement in 

The Vietnam War,” Journal of Third World Studies 29, no.1 (Spring 2012): 63.

12. Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 101. Guilmartin asserts that Colonel Harry Goodall, the 

commander of the 56th Special Operations Wing, ordered the OV-10s launched on his own authority 

to help the Marines. Guilmartin, Very Short War, 112. See also OV-10 pilot Greg Wilson’s explanation 

for why OV-10s were committed to the fight late instead of early on. Wilson, “Growth.”

13. Guilmartin, Very Short War, 149.

14. According to Guilmartin, they were only dispatched in response to an order from the NMCC. 

Guilmartin, Very Short War, 153.

15. For example, Glen Starnes notes Marine Colonel John M. Johnson could not participate in 

the assault on Tang Island because of limited lift, so he and his staff remained at Utapao, thinking he 

would be able to communicate with the Marine assault force via the Airborne Command, Control, 

and Communication (ABCCC) aircraft. But, “for unknown reasons, the ABCCC never established the 

communications link to Utapao,” and Colonel Johnson was largely excluded from on-scene decision 

making. Starnes, “Mayaguez Incident.”

16. Lamb, “Belief Systems and Decision Making,” 695−96. Perhaps the first scholar to make a 

case for the punitive nature of the US response was J. K. Baral, who argued, “The primary motive of 

Washington apparently was to punish Cambodia and thereby send the necessary signals to other 

adversaries.” He weakened this conclusion a bit by identifying other possible motives, including Ford 

being “attuned to the requirements of the politics of the Presidential elections,” the possibility of US 

espionage, and “the lurking suspicion that the Mayaguez incident was provoked by the United States 

by sending its spy ship deliberately” into the area. J. K. Baral, “The Mayaguez Incident: a Study of Crisis 

Management,” International Studies 19, no. 1 (1980): 22, 39, 40.

17. Goldman et al., “Ford’s Rescue Operation.” 

18. Ibid.

19. See a list in Lamb, “Belief Systems and Decision Making,” 695–96.

20. The primary argument made by the author’s 1985 article was that the US response to the 

Mayaguez “was essentially a punitive action and not a rescue attempt.” See Lamb, “Belief Systems 

and Decision Making.”

21. This explanation for Ford’s behavior is widespread. See the discussion of Vandenbroucke 

below, but also Mattias Fibiger, “Redeeming the Ship of State: The Mayaguez Incident and the Legacies of the Nixon Administration” (Paper Prepared for the Student Research Conference, Richard M. 

Nixon Presidential Library, April 27, 2012), 20–22; and Greene, who asserts Ford launched “a punitive 

operation born of a political need.” John R. Greene, The Presidency of Gerald R. Ford (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1995), 150. Fibiger’s research is otherwise excellent and well worth reading.

22. Martin Thornton, Times of Heroism, Times of Terror: American Presidents and the Cold War

(Westport, CT: Praeger, 2005), 107.

23. The author originally made this case in Lamb, “Belief Systems and Decision Making,” 696. 
Notes

242

24. Although the senior members of Congress did not engage in any meaningful consultation in 

their short telephone conversations with the low-level aides who called them (sometimes only reaching them at home), their brief comments were taken down and passed along to the president. Cited 

in Fibiger, “Redeeming the Ship of State.” Congressional Contacts of May 13, 1975, Box 122, Folder: 

Mayaguez Seizure – 5/14/75 (2), John Marsh Files, 1974−1977, Ford Library.

25. Proponents of asymmetric force such as the vice president cited congressmen and public 

feedback they had received to encourage the president to use force. For example, Rockefeller told 

Ford that in New York “people expect you to be doing things” and a business group “applauded when 

I said that you would be firm.” He also noted that Congressman Clement Zablocki, a proponent of the 

War Powers Act (and a liberal Democrat), told the press that the United States “could bomb the hell 

out of them.”

26. Eastland’s behavior and comments were leaked to Newsweek (May 26, 1975 issue), which 

reported that he “sat slouched in his chair throughout the meeting, mumbling several times to himself, 

blow the hell out ‘em.” Mahoney provides a full description of the meeting with members of Congress 

and their mixed views, but titles the chapter on this topic “Congressional Leadership Approves,” which 

seems an overstatement. Kissinger’s review of the meeting, which notes “congressional leaders were 

unenthusiastic,” is more accurate. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 119−22; for Kissinger’s comment, 

see note 21 on page 227.

27. Even as the crisis was ongoing the White House received input from interested parties, many 

applauding a strong stance and others notably hostile to the use of force and conditioned by opposition to 

the Vietnam War. Early on folk singer Joan Baez sent Ford a telegram asking, “Re Sinking of Cambodian 

Gunboats. What in [the Lord’s] name do you think you’re doing?” Hester G. Stoll, vice president of the 

Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, also sent a telegram to Ford to “strongly recommend that you keep our merchant marine out of questionable waters. A great country like ours should 

depend on patient diplomacy rather than military threat and actions.” Even with the apparent success 

of the operations, many like the Steering Committee of the Joint Washington Office for Social Concern 

immediately contacted the White House to “strongly object to the hasty use of force in the Mayaguez

incident, before all recourse to diplomacy was exhausted” and to “the violation of the sovereignty of 

Thailand” and “to the continued resort by the leadership of this nation to the diplomacy of violence.” 

Joan Baez, Western Union Telegram to President Ford, May 14, 1975; 13:16 EST; Mrs. Hester G. Stoll, vice 

president of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, Western Union Telegram, to 

President Ford, May 14, 1975; 19:56 EST; Robert E. Jones, executive director, Joint Washington Office for 

Social Concern, letter to the president, May 16, 1975. 

28. “Most important” is Nessen’s depiction. Nessen, It Sure Looks Different, 124.

29. Ibid., 124.

30. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 103.

31. The day after the crisis in a conversation with Ford, Kissinger said, “I think Schlesinger, 

when he heard the Congressional attitudes, changed the orders [for ongoing airstrikes against the 

mainland].” See the discussion on page 149. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 565; Memorandum of Conversation, President Ford, Henry Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft, Friday, May 16, 1975, 9:25 a.m., Oval 

Office, declassified, Ford Library.

32. Robert Gates, in his first set of memoirs, claimed that “the first instinct of the Congress 

through the years was to be critical of any presidential use of force,” and he cites the Mayaguez as one 

example. Only when it became clear force was popular with the public did the congressional attitude 

change. Robert M. Gates, From the Shadows: The Ultimate Insider’s Story of Five Presidents and How 

They Won the Cold War (London: Pocket, 2008), 558.
Notes

243

33. Ford, A Time to Heal, 283.

34. The congressional hearings on May 15 focused in particular on whether any airstrikes had 

been “punitive” or not, which the administration witnesses testified was not the case. US Congress, 

House Subcommittee on International Political and Military Affairs, Seizure of the Mayaguez, 94th 

Cong., 1st sess. (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1975).

35. Ron Nessen News Conference at the White House, 11:50 a.m., May 14, 1975, Ron Nessen File, 

Ford Library.

36. Osborne describes how his positive assessment of Ford’s performance at the time elicited a 

ferocious backlash, including from readers. Osborne, White House Watch, 152, 155.

37. According to Nessen, as the 1976 election year began, Ford’s pollster, Robert Teeter, showed 

Ford and his political advisors the depressing results of a comprehensive survey of public attitudes 

toward Ford. In response to the question, “What has Ford done that particularly impresses you?” 

sixty-one percent replied, “Nothing.” The next-largest group was 4 percent, which liked the tax cut; 3 

percent praised Ford’s honesty and integrity; and 2 percent mentioned the rescue of the Mayaguez. 

As William Hyland recalls, “At home the administration earned no public or political credit for using 

force to rescue the ship and free the crew. There was bitterness; the mood was sour and turning worse.” 

William G. Hyland, Mortal Rivals: Understanding the Pattern of Soviet-American Conflict (New York: 

Simon & Schuster, 1988), 114.

38. Lamb, “Belief Systems and Decision Making,” 157ff.

39. Decision makers acknowledged this after the fact. Ford told the journalist Rowan he thought 

they would be lucky to get the crew back alive. Three days after the crisis, Schlesinger admitted on 

ABC’s Issues and Answers that there had been “an element of good fortune” in the outcome. Schlesinger 

also admitted, “The outcome was fortunate” in an interview with Time correspondent Joseph J Kane. 

Scowcroft’s biographer notes he thought the same: “In regard to the safety of the Mayaguez’s crew, the 

Ford administration got lucky. It’s easy to imagine one or more of the crewmembers being accidentally 

killed, whether by their captors or by US ordnance.” General Jones also concluded we “lucked out” 

and “were quite fortunate to get the crew members back.” The observation that Ron Nessen voiced 

the feeling of the administration when he told the press, “All’s well that ends well,” was not meant to 

communicate a callous disregard of the lives lost, but the great sense of relief that the return of the 

crew had been so fortunate. Ford in Rowan, Four Days, 140; Schlesinger interview, Issues and Answers; 

Scowcroft in Robert L. Pfaltzgraff and Jacquelyn K. Davis. National Security Decisions: The Participants 

Speak (Lexington: Lexington Books, 1990), 276; and Sparrow, Strategist: 165. Jones interview, 202; 

Nessen in Greene, Presidency of Gerald R. Ford, 24.

40. Deputy Secretary of Defense Clements made the observation in the fourth NSC meeting that 

the Air Force police fatalities would be linked with the crisis response “sooner or later.”

41. NSC meeting minutes. In his recent book, Rumsfeld agrees, citing his own notes from the 

period and asserting “the president decided to notify the appropriate members of Congress, on an 

‘advisory basis,’ rather than on a ‘consultation basis’” because he concluded the War Powers Act was 

not applicable “in this particular instance.” Rumsfeld, When the Center Held, 172. 

42. Newsweek, May 26, 1975, 16.

43. They repeatedly considered how their decisions would be interpreted by Congress, the media, 

and the public. For example, in debating the presence of Americans on Tang Island and noting the entire 

crew might have been on the fishing boat, Colby commented, “We need to be braced against that pilot” 

(that is, the pilot who observed what he thought were crew members on the boat). NSC meeting minutes.

44. Memorandum of Conversation, President Ford, Henry Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft, 

Wednesday, 14 May 1975, 11:45 a.m., Oval Office (declassified January 24, 2000), Ford Library. Kissinger 
Notes

244

reconsidered the B-52s and the continuation of the airstrikes, but, as others have noted, including 

Kissinger in his memoirs, Ford remained resolute. See Richard “Dick” Cheney’s remembrances in 

Thompson, Ford Presidency, 81; and Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 569.

45. They frequently discussed how to justify their decisions to the public. Ford also several times 

mentioned to passersby that he had a tough decision to make about the ship and crew. What made the 

decision tough for Ford was that using force risked the lives of the crew. 

46. For example, in the fourth NSC meeting when discussing a meeting with selected members of 

Congress to “consult” in accordance with the War Powers Act, Rockefeller asked what should be done 

if the group opposed the president’s plans. Kissinger quickly said “he would have to go ahead anyway,” 

which is what Ford had already said he would do in the first NSC meeting regardless of congressional 

preferences. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 565. 

47. Document 284, Minutes of the Secretary of State’s Regionals Staff Meeting; Washington, May 

12, 8-8:40 a.m., in FRUS 1969–1976, vol. 10.

48. It also is not clear that Rockefeller was particularly influential. Ford listened to everyone but 

acted upon what Kissinger and Scowcroft told him with great consistency, much more so than was 

the case with Schlesinger and Rockefeller.

49. I. F. Stone quoted in Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 276.

50. Over time, and with the release of the NSC minutes, researchers have moved away from the 

characterization of the decision-making process as highly emotional. For example, Scowcroft’s biographer says the “transcripts of the NSC meetings show that the . . . discussions were serious, intense, 

and candid,” and that decision makers were “trying to come up with sound decisions under conditions 

of immense pressure.” Sparrow, Strategist, 169.

51. The commentary came out the day following the Newsweek article that provided the wellrounded description of possible US motives. A 1991 history of the NSC makes the same point, saying, 

“Someday the documentary record may reveal whether the attacks during this incident were instrumental or punitive in nature.” See Godfrey Sperling Jr., “Manipulating Mayaguez News Coverage,” 

Christian Science Monitor, May 27, 1975; and Prados, Keepers of the Keys, 372.

52. One of the coauthors of Crisis Resolution, Robert McFarlane, who was on the NSC staff at the 

time, spent a year and a half at the National War College writing the book. McFarlane and Smardz, 

Special Trust, 166. 

53. The authors did not apply their stated approach consistently, however. At times they just 

described crisis behavior; sometimes they “suggested” relations between variables; and sometimes 

they asserted an intention to explain US behavior. For a longer critique of the study see Lamb, Belief 

Systems and Decision Making, 232−35.

54. More recent studies also miss this element of the crisis. Scowcroft’s biographer misses all 

the tensions expressed in the NSC minutes, concluding they 

reveal no obvious rivalries or opposing coalitions. Although Schlesinger, Kissinger and 

Rumsfeld were known to oppose each other on various policy issues—SALT II for example—during the Mayaguez crisis they worked together effectively. . . . Only after the crisis 

had ended did the rivalry between State and Defense reemerge.

Sparrow argues the remarkable harmony was “largely because of Scowcroft” who was “at the center 

of it all” and “doing the little things that held the US government together.” While it is true that key 

decision makers agreed on their overall objectives, they struggled mightily over how to implement 

decisions made in NSC meetings. Sparrow, Strategist, 169−70. 

55. In one case the evidence even suggests that Ford bucked up Kissinger, who went wobbly after 

the news of the Cambodian broadcast. See note 44 on page 243. 
Notes

245

56. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 241–42.

57. Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 74–75

58. Ibid., 74, 86, and 92.

59. Ibid., 92–93.

60. Ibid., 75.

61. Ibid., 86–87.

62. See also Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 194.

63. Guilmartin, Very Short War, 149.

64. Ibid., 156.

65. He does not find other explanations for US behavior plausible, such as the assertion that Ford 

was trying to improve his domestic political standing.

66. Guilmartin, Very Short War, 38 and 148. 

67. The first book on the Mayaguez to use the NSC minutes is Wetterhahn’s The Last Battle. The 

book includes excellent research and great sympathy for the forces committed to combat but does not 

offer a balanced depiction of the NSC members and their decision making, which are presented in a 

uniformly and scathingly negative manner. The only other source more disparaging is a historical 

novel on the Mayaguez by Ejner Fulsang, A Knavish Piece of Work: A Novel of the Mayaguez Incident

(Belmont, CA: Aarhus Publishing), 2006.

68. On the lives of the crew being a lesser priority, see Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 68–69 and 

218–20; on Kissinger’s dissent, see p. 71. Mahoney’s work is packed with other useful descriptive details, 

including how Navy SEALs and others were not allowed to attempt a rescue of the three missing 

Marines, the impact of a malfunctioning propulsion screw on the USS Hancock, and more on Ford’s 

ire with Schlesinger for canceling the last airstrike. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 179, 37, and 185ff, 

respectively. Other notes highlight more new observations from Mahoney’s research.

69. Mahoney overlooks Kissinger’s manipulation of diplomacy (see note 96 on page 240) and 

gets some other descriptive details wrong. For instance, his account does not relate that Kissinger 

encouraged Ford to call the first NSC meeting, that it was Schlesinger’s strict rules of engagement and 

intervention by Pentagon generals that saved the fishing boat and not the pilot’s initiative, and that 

Schlesinger was not against punitive strikes. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 24; 62 and 103; 49 and 113, 

respectively. It is important to review and compare Mahoney’s multiple references to a subject because 

some of his conclusions run contrary to the descriptive evidence he provides. For example, he identifies 

Jones early in the book as someone who favored giving priority to rescuing the crew (p. 38, based on 

a much later interview with Jones), but he also relates Jones’s intervention in an NSC meeting when 

he said the solution for preventing the movement of the crew to the mainland was to sink all boats 

(p. 50)—a step that obviously risked the lives of the crew and subordinated them to other priorities.

70. For example, he cites Kissinger in his memoirs attributing great significance to the Pueblo

crisis as a key factor in Ford’s thinking. As we have shown, however, Scowcroft was more influenced by 

the Pueblo crisis, and Kissinger actually drew Ford’s attention to the EC-121 crisis to encourage him to 

act quickly. More generally, Mahoney cites the memoirs of Ford and Kissinger forty-five and fifty-eight 

times, respectively, for more than a tenth of his notes. Mahoney also uncritically takes Jones’s later 

interview as the definitive account of his views at the time. On Kissinger and the Pueblo, see Mahoney, 

Mayaguez Incident, 29; and Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 198−200; on Jones’s thinking, 

see Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 37–38 (and the previous note).

71. Mahoney comes closest to offering an explanation for US behavior in his analysis of strategic 

leadership where he makes seven observations, the sixth of which addresses US priorities in the crisis. 
Notes

246

72. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, xiv–xv; 217–18. 

73. Ibid., 218–22.

74. Ibid., 13.

75. For example, at one point early in the crisis he asserts (correctly) that “Kissinger had 

undoubtedly already decided that prompt military action was called for; his task now was to ensure 

it occurred.”

76. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 215, 221.

77. On the Pueblo and emotional catharsis, ibid., 215; on Ford and domestic politics, ibid., 259.

78. Ibid., 215. Even this conclusion is a bit confused, however, by Mahoney also asserting “the 

NSC’s overall decision-making process to a large degree acknowledged the emotional aspect of the 

situation,” and yet “set it aside.” 

79. This point was evident long ago. See Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 282. Mahoney 

does not describe the impact of the Pueblo analogy well and appears to take Kissinger’s memoirs 

at face value on the issue. Kissinger asserts Ford was powerfully impressed by the Pueblo analogy, 

and Mahoney repeats this, claiming that “the NSC pointed to this possibility on several occasions, 

including lengthy tangential discussions regarding the similarities between the Pueblo incident and 

the Mayaguez.” In reality, the Pueblo was only mentioned in the first of the four NSC meetings, and 

then only twice: once by the vice president and once by Schlesinger. The Pueblo analogy had the 

greatest impact on Scowcroft’s beliefs and behaviors, driving his determination to prevent the crew 

from reaching the mainland. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 551; and Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 29, 

215, 221; see also discussion on pages 70, 121–22, 156 and note 103 on page 248.

80. It also might be noted that these books do not adequately address previous scholarship. 

Vandenbroucke does not mention previous scholarly works in his index and has few citations of the 

same. Guilmartin has three index entries on the present author’s work but does not address why his 

findings differ. He also ignores Vandenbroucke’s work (perhaps because he had already submitted his 

manuscript to editors before it became available). Mahoney makes brief mention of previous scholarship in his introduction but does not address previous findings in the rest of his book. 

81. Christopher Lamb, “The Mayaguez Crisis: 30 Years of Scholarship,” Political Science Quarterly

(Spring 2018): 35−76.

82. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 551–52; 556. Many years later Scowcroft also said, “We had very 

inadequate intelligence.” Pfaltzgraff and Davis, National Security Decisions, 274. For a more recent 

source, see Rumsfeld, When the Center Held, 169, 170–71, 176. Rumsfeld complains about the tardy 

notification of senior leaders, not realizing Ford had been notified early on by Scowcroft and only 

interpreted the incident as a major provocation after speaking with Kissinger. Rumsfeld also argues 

that “there was no substantive analysis” of why “the Khmer Rouge [would] risk such a provocation” 

when in fact Colby laid out likely Cambodian motives right off the bat. Rumsfeld also claims the intelligence community’s “two dozen ragtag Cambodians turned out to be between 200 and 300 reasonably 

well-armed, battle-hardened Khmer Rouge troops in embedded positions.” He is apparently unaware 

that the NSC meeting minutes demonstrate the decision makers knew they were dealing with at least 

100 well-entrenched Khmer defenders.

83. Captain Miller lied and told the Cambodians his chart was in meters, not fathoms, and thus he 

could not risk moving beyond Tang Island to the mainland. Gerald Reminick, An Act of Piracy: The Seizure of the American-Flag Merchant Ship Mayaguez in 1975 (Palo Alto, CA: Glencannon Press, 2009), 25.

84. See page 77.

85. Mahoney explains well the thinking on the crew’s location. See his explanation for AC-130 

reports inclining decision makers to think the crew had been taken to Tang Island, and why they 
Notes

247

thought the crew had been split up. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 53, 66, 250. See also Captain Miller’s 

explanation for confusion on the crew’s whereabouts in Reminick, Act of Piracy, 73.

86. Telephone conversation, Mr. Joseph Kraft with Secretary Kissinger, 6:56 PM, May 15, 1975 

(declassified January 18, 2005).

87. Schlesinger interview, Issues and Answers; Jones interview.

88. In his memoirs Colby cited the fast-evolving nature of the crisis but admitted there was 

room for improvement in keeping his analysts abreast of developments. CIA Post-Mortem Report; 

William Colby and Peter Forbath, Honorable Men: My Life in the CIA (New York: Simon & Schuster, 

1978), 429. For an example of the extraordinary efforts made by the intelligence community on 

the spur of the moment, see David Mark, “The Mayaguez Rescue Operation Revisited,” Studies in 

Intelligence 23, no. 2 (Summer 1979). Declassified from Secret/NOFORN and approved for release 

March 5, 2008 by the CIA. 

89. Some sources, like Herspring, uncritically accept Kissinger’s assertion that intelligence was 

uniformly poor and deleterious to decision making. It is manifest that the intelligence could have 

been better, and some students of the crisis make the need for better intelligence a major finding 

from their research (Vandenbroucke being a case in point). This author concurs with Mahoney, 

who reviews the intelligence issues at length and offers a more balanced assessment. He believes 

the intelligence was good considering the circumstances, but there was a tendency to oversell the 

certainty of information provided. Interestingly, Ford agreed, saying years later it would have been 

better if Colby simply said, “We don’t know.” Of the five key insights Mahoney says flow from his 

analysis (p. xxiii), his assessment of intelligence is the most original and helpful, although he does 

overestimate the extent to which the Marines were ignorant of enemy strength. See Herspring, 

Pentagon and the Presidency, 224; and Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 39, for his assertion that the 

Marines had “no idea what they were in for,” and 47–48, 51, and 57 where he cites Jones for passing 

intelligence with more assurance than warranted, and also pages 345ff. For Ford’s comment on 

Colby, see Cannon, Honorable Life, 379.

90. Chun, Last Boarding Party, 22–23. “The AC-130 returned from its 13 May night reconnaissance with IR and TV film (available today) ‘showing in excess of fifty campfires on the island.’ As 

the AC-130 crew later remarked, ‘either the 13 bad guys were awfully afraid of the dark or there was a 

damn sight more than 13 bad guys.’” Gary Weikel, letter to the author, October 29, 1991. However, the 

AC-130 intelligence was factored in to the IPAC estimate of enemy strength on the island. See Pacific 

Air Force, “History,” 438.

91. CINCPAC Command History 1975, 18.

92. It boils down to speculation about why communications between people did not take place. 

I concluded that “numerous interviews with Air Force and Marine officers after the incident paint a 

general picture of how the IPAC intelligence estimate failed to reach the Marine commander in charge 

of the Tang invasion: the members of each service were absorbed in their own responsibilities; they 

had not worked with each other before; the chain of command was geographically dispersed and 

unclear, and thus the responsibility for disseminating Intelligence was not clear either; and, finally, 

time for detailed planning was severely limited.” Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 129–37. 

See also Mahoney’s review of these factors, Mayaguez Incident, 251–55; and the CINCPAC IG report: 

Memorandum from BGEN Johnson to Admiral Gayler, Subject: SS Mayaguez Seizure, 17 November 

1975; declassified 16 December, 1991 (hereafter CINCPAC IG report). 

93. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 131–32. More recently, Austin has said that he 

did not “put much credence” in the intelligence estimate of a small number of irregular forces, which 

“just didn’t jive with what we knew at the time.” As for the point of insertion, he said he chose “the 

north end of the island on both sides because these were the only already cleared areas,” and it was 
Notes

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in “this general area that we suspected the crew might be.” In addition, “a landing away from there 

could allow whoever was on the island to escape by boat from either of the coves.” Wise and Baron, 

14-Hour War, 93−96.

94. It has also been suggested that, in addition to the mission objective, Austin’s decision to 

land on the beach may have been influenced by Air Force preferences. See my discussion in Belief 

Systems and Decision Making (pp. 134−135), which focuses on Austin’s decision and explanations, 

and Vandenbroucke’s in Perilous Options (pp. 88−89), which takes into account more senior officer 

opinions up the chain of command. 

95. This author concluded “the decision makers’ haste was a more important factor than any 

intelligence [dissemination] failure in complicating military operations.” Vandenbroucke seems to 

agree, emphasizing the “senior decision makers . . . unbridled enthusiasm for a military response,” 

a category he construes to include the Joint Chiefs. However, he also cites Marines who insist they 

would have demanded preparatory fires if they had had the higher intelligence estimate of Cambodian 

forces. Burns precluded preparatory fires because of the potential danger to the crew members. See 

Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 134; Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 89−90 and 99−100.

96. Burns interview, 440.

97. Ibid., 442–43.

98. GAO report, 92. Also, as noted above, Wickham’s notebooks indicate that the Marine Corps 

Commandant Cushman “had no concern about securing the assault area.” Wickham notebooks.

99. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 570. Kissinger selectively cites NSC minutes in his memoirs, so 

presumably he knew that the actual estimate of Tang defenders used in the NSC deliberations was 

one-hundred personnel.

100. CIA Post-Mortem Report. See also Burns interview, 439–44; Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 

252–53; and CINCPAC IG report. 

101. The Defense Department told the GAO that DIA and IPAC spoke often and coordinated their 

respective intelligence estimates, but noted the conflicting estimates were never reconciled. GAO 

report, 91. Burns asserts the same in his interview, where he notes his command argued with IPAC 

over their lesser estimate but never really understood why they insisted on the one-hundred-defender 

figure or why the DIA figure did not prevail. Burns interview, 444–45.

102. US Congress, House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Subcommittee on International Political 

and Military Affairs and Committee on International Relations and Military Affairs, Seizure of the 

Mayaguez, pt. 1, 7. 

103. Thinking in Time is a case in point. The authors are careful to raise issues and not be 

definitive about the decision makers’ motives, but their argument is that an historical analogy, 

in this case with the USS Pueblo, can obscure as much as it illuminates. They assert the Pueblo

analogy “had a grip on the President’s mind, and this probably influenced both his definition of 

the primary objective and his preferences for action.” They seem to believe Ford and his advisors 

failed to consider differences between the Mayaguez and Pueblo, beginning with the fact that the 

Pueblo was a Navy ship with a crew that knew US secrets, whereas the Mayaguez was a merchant 

vessel. Ultimately, they ask, “Did the solution (i.e. use of force) precede, indeed, define, the problem?” 

Richard E. Neustadt and Ernest R. May, Thinking in Time: The Uses of History for Decision-Makers

(New York: Free Press, 1988), 61. 

104. Ford made no mention of Kennerly’s insight when he was interviewed by Rowan immediately following the crisis. However, his recounting of the moment in his memoirs is dramatic:

There was a lull in the discussion. Then, from the back of the room, a new voice spoke up. 

It was Kennerly, who had been taking pictures of us for the past hour or so. Never before 
Notes

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during a meeting of this kind had he entered the conversation; I knew he wouldn’t have 

done so now unless what he had to say was important. “Has anyone considered,” he asked, 

“that this might be the act of a local Cambodian commander who has just taken it into 

his own hands to halt any ship that comes by? Has anyone stopped to think that he might 

not have gotten his orders from Phnom Penh? If that’s what has happened, you know, you 

can blow the whole place away and it’s not gonna make any difference. Everyone here has 

been talking about Cambodia as if it were a traditional government. Like France. We have 

trouble with France, we just pick up the telephone, and call. We know who to talk to. But I 

was in Cambodia just two weeks ago, and it’s not that kind of government at all. We don’t 

even know who the leadership is. Has anyone considered that?” For several seconds there 

was silence in the Cabinet Room. Everyone seemed stunned that this brash photographer 

who was not yet thirty years old would have the guts to offer an unsolicited opinion to the 

President, the Vice President, the Secretaries of State and Defense, the Director of the 

CIA and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Yet I wasn’t surprised, and I was glad 

to hear his point of view. 

Ford, A Time to Heal, 279−80.

105. Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 75–76.

106. The Cambodians were right to be concerned because Vietnam later took the islands. Indeed, 

just a month after the Mayaguez crisis, US communication intercepts revealed that the Vietnamese 

stormed Poulo Wai island and wiped out its Cambodian garrison. Ironically, it seems Kissinger may 

have helped convince the Vietnamese to later return the island to Cambodia. See National Security 

Agency, “American Cryptology during the Cold War, 1945−1989,” top secret (declassified July 26, 2013; 

hereafter “American Cryptology during the Cold War).” For Kissinger’s role in the return of the island, 

see Luanne J. Smith, “An Analysis of Events Leading to the Chinese Invasion of Vietnam” (thesis, Naval 

Postgraduate School, September 1980), 11ff.

107. Memorandum of Conversation, President Ford, Henry Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft, 

Wednesday, May 14, 1975, 11:45 a.m., Oval Office, declassified, Ford Library.

108. DeFrank notes Kennerly was Ford’s “de facto fourth son.” And Kennerly himself notes he 

was often the last person to see the president each day—often over drinks—which made other White 

House officials nervous. DeFrank and Ford, Write It When I’m Gone; and David Kennerly, interview 

by Richard Norton Smith for the Gerald R. Ford Oral History Project, December 14, 2009. 

109. Vandenbroucke is a case in point, arguing it made no sense for the weak Cambodians to 

challenge the United States. Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 76–77

110. Cambodia’s deputy premier, Ieng Sary, acknowledged the central direction in an interview 

a few months later, saying the Cambodian government in Phnom Penh decided to release the crew 

after three hours of deliberation. But, he said, “We did not broadcast our decision until the following 

morning,” by which time US military operations had begun. Ieng Sary, interview by James Pringle, 

Lima, Peru, Newsweek, September 22, 1975, 39.

111. Henry A. Kissinger, Memorandum for the President, Subject: Debrief of the Mayaguez

Captain and Crew, May 19, 1975 (declassified 1999).

112. Before going to sleep on the night of the fourteenth, Captain Miller was informed that 

an answer from Phnom Penh on the outcome of his negotiations would be received at 6 o’clock the 

following morning. See “The Mayaguez Story, Sea-Land Service, Inc. Special Issue for Sea-Land 

Employees.” On the intercepts, see cable from DIRNSA to NSA/UNIFORM ECHO, 15 2131Z May 

1975, approved for release by NSA on 01-28-2004, FOIA Case #18289; cited in “American Cryptology 

during the Cold War.”
Notes

250

113. The US liaison office in China also suspected the Chinese and Cambodians had discussed 

the US threats and coordinated their nonresponse. The liaison office noted both the Chinese foreign 

ministry and Cambodian embassy had returned the US messages and commented: “Timing of the 

Cambodian Embassy’s return of US message, i.e. morning after PRC [People’s Republic of China] 

refusal to be of assistance, raises possibility that two actions were coordinated. Both rejections were 

predictable, but Chinese may in fact have discussed the matter with Cambodians here prior to the 

decisions being taken.” Telegram from the Liaison Office in China to the Department of State, Beijing, 

May 15, 1975, 0253Z; Subject: Cambodian Embassy Returns US Message; source: Ford Library, National 

Security Adviser, NSC East Asian and Pacific Affairs Staff Files, 1973–1976, box 29, Department of State, 

Telegrams and Cables (2). Secret; Niact; Immediate; Nodis.

114. Henry A. Kissinger, Memorandum for the President, Subject: Debrief of the Mayaguez

Captain and Crew, May 19, 1975; Ford Library. Oddly, Mahoney suggests it is a new finding to discover 

the Cambodians released the crew because of the US military buildup in the area and attacks on the 

gunboats and not because of the mainland strikes or assault on Tang Island. However, as Kissinger’s 

comments to Ford suggest, this conclusion about what prompted the Cambodians to release the crew 

has long been evident from the testimony of the captain of the Mayaguez and long noted by multiple 

observers. For example, see Hartmann, Palace Politics, 327; and Lamb, “Belief Systems and Decision 

Making,” 985, and Belief Systems and Decision Making, 189, 193, and 246. 

115. Schlesinger Veteran interview.

116. This is true of much scholarship that examines the Mayaguez crisis, but there are exceptions. 

See Andrew Gawthorpe, “The Ford Administration and Security Policy in the Asia-Pacific After the 

Fall of Saigon,” Historical Journal 52, no. 3 (2009): 709−10.

117. NSC meeting minutes.

118. Document 125, Memorandum of Conversation, Washington, May 15, 1975, 11 a.m., in Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, vol. 27, Iran; Iraq, 1973−1976.

119. Telephone conversation, Secretary Kissinger with Hugh Sidey, 11:15, May 15, 1975 (declassified 18 January 2005). General John Wickham noted there was always a concern with North Korea, 

“but yes, particularly at that time.” He also thought there was concern with restraining South Korea 

from going nuclear. He noted one of Schlesinger’s first trips as secretary of defense was to South 

Korea to convince them not to build a nuclear weapon and to assure them that our nuclear umbrella 

would suffice. Wickham said the South Koreans stuck to that agreement religiously. He mentioned 

that when he became the US commander in chief of UN Command and Combined Forces Command in July 1979 and first met with South Korean president Park Chung-hee, the president ordered 

everyone out of the room and in halting English, thanked Wickham for the United States allowing 

South Korea to find its own path to democracy. Wickham interview.

120. Goldman et al., “Ford’s Rescue Operation,” 16ff.

121. Ibid. 

122. Bernard Gwertzman, “US Sees Foray for Ship as Signal to Communists,” New York Times, 

May 16, 1975. See also Richard Halloran, “High South Korean Discounts Impact of Vietnam’s Collapse,” 

New York Times, May 1, 1975. The article describes South Korean officials expressing confidence in US 

security guarantees despite “fears expressed in Washington that the impact of the fall of Cambodia 

and Vietnam would be felt more in South Korea than anywhere else in Asia.” 

123. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 72.

124. Gwertzman, “US Sees Foray,” 14. The article elaborated on the administration’s geostrategic 

reasoning in terms that emphasized Kissinger’s known perspective. It explained the salutary effects 

of the Mayaguez for great power politics: “Mr. Kissinger and his aides have believed for some time that 
Notes

251

Peking was interested in ties with the United States only so long as China though Washington would 

stand up militarily to Moscow if necessary.” Thus, according to the article, the senior US official was 

confident that China would respect the response to the Mayaguez even though it might feel compelled 

to publicly criticize it.

125. Schlesinger interview, Issues and Answers.

126. Time magazine at the time reported that a “White House aide” bluntly explained “the aim 

was for our action to be read by North Korean President Kim Il Sung as well as by the Cambodians.” 

“A Strong but Risky Show of Force,” Time, May 26, 1975, 9. Mets cites three sources from 1975 and 1977 

that noted the emphasis on deterring North Korea, including the Roy Rowan book. David R. Mets, “Last 

Flight from Koh Tang: the Mayaguez Incident a Generation Later,” Joint Force Quarterly (2007): 115n4. 

Even severe critics of the Ford administration were aware of the focus on North Korea and grudgingly 

admitted it might have achieved its objectives. Shawcross says “the exhilaration which Ford derived 

(and the public support he received) from his handling of the Mayaguez incident . . . suggests that 

he would have full support for bombing North Korea if Kim ignored Chinese advice and crossed the 

demilitarized zone.” See William Shawcross, “Making the Most of Mayaguez,” Far Eastern Economic 

Review, May 30, 1975.

127. See page 70.

128. Wickham interview.

129. Head, Short, and McFarlane, Crisis Resolution: 301n25.

130. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 186; and on North Korea, 99, 184–87.

131. Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 74–75, 113.

132. Guilmartin makes no mention of North Korea aside from the connection to the Pueblo incident. Similarly, Mahoney ignores North Korea, which is not found in the index or called out for special 

attention in the text. Mahoney instead emphasizes Cambodia, saying, “The NSC’s first priority was to 

send a strong message to the Cambodian government, as well as the world writ large.” Later Mahoney 

offers a passing reference to North Korean when describing US leaders’ geostrategic concerns: “the 

United States was involved in the Cold War and had to maintain or improve its power relationships 

with China and the Soviet Union. American leaders were also concerned with North Korea and the 

Middle East, and a continued poor showing in Southeast Asia would further weaken the perception 

of American power in those areas.” Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 218 and 259.

133. Telephone Conversation, David Rockefeller/Secretary Kissinger, May 16, 1975; 2:35 p.m. 

(declassified February 10, 2003). Their exchange is cryptic, but Rockefeller told Kissinger: “I thought it 

was important for them to know . . . in the event that they took from what happened in Vietnam. . . . That 

there would be an immediate response along the lines you suggested.” A few months later Kissinger 

also sought a line of communication to Kim Il Sung through Nicolae Ceausescu, the Communist leader 

of Romania. See Memorandum of Conversation, Subject: US-North Korean Relations, August 3, 1975, 

lunch, Peles Castle, Sinaia (declassified December 2, 2003).

134. Habib prepared the May 8, 1975, briefing paper for Kissinger’s discussion with Huang Chen, 

chief of the PRC liaison office in Washington. Briefing Paper for Secretary Kissinger; re your meeting 

with Huang Chen, May 8, 1975 (declassified July 3, 2008); box 5, Folder “China, unnumbered items – 

(12), 5/8/75 – 5/9/75” of the Kissinger-Scowcroft West Wing Office Files, Ford Library.

135. Memorandum of Conversation, Subject: Tour d ’Horizon with Huang Chen, May 9, 1975, 

5:35−6:40 p.m., Department of State (declassified July 3, 2008).

136. Ibid., 72.

137. Stearman interview. This passage in Stearman’s interview is also noted by Fibiger, “Redeeming the Ship of State,” 11.
Notes

252

138. Document 60, Draft Memorandum from Secretary of State Kissinger to President Ford; 

Washington, July 18, 1975, in Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, vol. 38, pt. 1, Foundations of Foreign Policy, 1973−1976.

139. Yafeng Xia and Zhihua Shen, “China’s Last Ally: Beijing’s Policy toward North Korea 

during the US–China Rapprochement, 1970–1975,” Diplomatic History 38, no. 5: 1083–1113. Xia 

and Shen explain “why the PRC declined to support Kim Il-Sung’s proposal to attack the South in 

April 1975.” They note that “George H. W. Bush, who was then head of US Liaison Office in Beijing, 

recorded in his diary of April 24, ‘Kim Il-sung’s talking militantly about Korea, China apparently 

downplaying this.’” Charles Armstrong agrees, saying, “Kim Il Sung’s proposal to move aggressively toward the South in 1975 was rebuffed by China.” Armstrong’s source on this is East German 

documents reporting on Kim’s April 1975 trip to Beijing, which detail “Kim’s ambitions for a North 

Vietnam-style conquest of the South.” Interestingly, European Communist governments suspected 

China of helping the United States by restraining North Korea. Charles K. Armstrong, Tyranny of 

the Weak: North Korea and the World, 1950−1992 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2015), 139. 

See also James Hoare on China’s refusal to support Kim’s proposal for war in, “China’s Korean 

Dilemma: Influence and Power on the Korean Peninsula,” China Policy Institute, https://cpianalysis.org/2016/03/30/90512/.

140. Narushige Michishita, North Korea’s Military-Diplomatic Campaigns, 1966−2008 (London: 

Routledge, 2011), 83. Yafeng Xia and Zhihua Shen agree on this point, noting Kim promoted North 

Korea’s cause internationally by active involvement in the non-aligned movement,” which initially 

seemed like it might produce the UN General Assembly resolution Kim desired until the axe murders 

derailed North Korean diplomacy. Xia and Shen, “China’s Last Ally,” 1083−1113.

141. In a private conversation on September 15, 1976, National Security Advisor Brent Scowcroft 

and Ambassador Sneider (the US ambassador to South Korea) shared the view that the August 18 incident had “come out better than expected—and apparently to our net advantage.” Kissinger disagreed. 

He thought chopping down the tree made the United States “look ridiculous,” and he regretted the 

decision had not been made to destroy North Korean barracks. Kissinger was also consistent in relegating domestic political concerns to lower priority during this tree cutting crisis. When Kissinger 

first discussed the event in an interagency meeting, he was in favor of an aggressive response. The 

national intelligence officer at the time, Evelyn Colbert, asked, “How the media and the US people 

[would] react to that in this campaign year.” Kissinger responded, “That has nothing to do with it. The 

important thing is that they beat two Americans to death and must pay the price.” Interestingly, Colbert 

responded to that with a point similar to Schlesinger’s position during the Mayaguez crisis. She said 

the North Koreans were hoping to see signs of a “Vietnam type mentality” in the United States so it 

was “important to have the right kinds of expressions of support from the media and opinion makers.” 

Kissinger ignored the remark and asked about the possibility of “a B-52 exercise.” On Scowcroft and 

Sneider, see Michishita, North Korea’s Military-Diplomatic Campaigns, 85−90. For Kissinger’s views, 

see the record of his telephone call to National Security Advisor Scowcroft: Telephone conversation, 

General Scowcroft/Secretary Kissinger, August 20, 1976, 8:04 p.m. (declassified July 24, 2015); and 

Document 282, Minutes of Washington Special Actions Group Meeting, Washington, August 18, 1976, 

3:47−4:43 p.m., in FRUS 1969–1976, vol. E-12

142. Michishita, North Korea’s Military-Diplomatic Campaigns, 85−90. Michishita cites information from a senior North Korean defector who described the axe murders as a mistake, but 

acknowledged North Korea thought about going to war if the South made a strong response. The 

defector thought China was ultimately the deciding factor, as “Kim Il Sung knew very well that such 

an attempt would wind up in failure unless North Korea could get both material and moral support 

from China.”
Notes

253

143. Memo RE North Korea, Subject: Recent North Korean Military Developments, NSC File, 

6/5/2007 30 January 1976; declassified. 

Chapter 7

1. Graham T. Allison, Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis (Boston: Little, 

Brown), 1971.

2. In the case of the Soviet Union, Allison points out the difficulty of understanding why Soviet 

leaders took the risk they did in 1962 and notes that to obtain an answer, “it is necessary to open the 

black box and look within the state actor to its disaggregated moving parts.” Using competing models, Allison argues, can help “identify more fine-grained hypotheses, and ways to combine them in 

explanations and predictions.” Ibid., 404.

3. Ibid., 99. Allison makes the same points in his coauthored second edition of the book. See 

Graham T. Allison and Philip Zelikow, Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis (New 

York: Longman, 2010), 2–3, 4, 9, and 379.

4. Alexander L. George and Andrew Bennett, Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social 

Sciences (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2007), 75. George and Bennett are borrowing from Harry Eckstein’s long-standing distinctions in “Case Studies and Theory in Political Science,” in Handbook of 

Political Science, vol. 7, ed. Fred Greenstein and Nelson Polsby (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1975), 

118–20. George notes three prerequisites for disciplined-configurative case studies: the use of general 

variables for description and explanation, an adequate definition of the class of event being explained, 

and a selective investigation that focuses on one particular dependent variable.

5. Harry Eckstein, Regarding Politics: Essays on Political Theory, Stability, and Change (Berkeley: 

University of California Press, 1992), 136–37.

6. Ole Holsti, Making American Foreign Policy (New York: Routledge, 2006), 31.

7. Vandenbroucke’s Perilous Options is a case in point. His penchant for characterizing the 

response as a rescue may have been influenced by the fact that the purpose of his multicase analysis 

was to examine strategic special operations and included other historic rescue attempts like the 

Son Tay and Iranian hostage operations. Neustadt and May also characterize the US response in the 

Mayaguez crisis as a “rescue mission,” which may have been influenced by their focus on historical 

analogies. They argue the Pueblo analogy drove the US response during the crisis and incorrectly 

assert even Kissinger “seems to refer frequently to the Pueblo precedent.” See Neustadt and May, Thinking in Time.

8. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 38–39.

9. Lamb, “Belief Systems and Decision Making,” 699.

10. Ibid.

11. Ibid. 

12. “In retrospect, and using his own goals as a basis for analysis, it seems clear that Ford should 

have agreed to another delay since it would have reduced the risk of an embarrassing military failure 

without substantially reducing chances of accomplishing the decision makers’ goals.” It was further 

argued that “the import of this error, in terms of casualties, was reduced by having escaped from a 

near catastrophe with relatively low casualty figures (lower than originally estimated, in fact). The 

safe recovery of the crew also helped preserve the image of a successful military operation which US 

decision makers felt they needed.” Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 265.

13. In the third meeting, Ford said, “I think we have to assume that the Americans were taken 

from the island and that some were killed,” and the other NSC members agreed. In the fourth meeting 
Notes

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when Buchen worried mainland airstrikes might hit members of the crew, Schlesinger countered with 

the observation that he thought “they would have moved the Americans 20 miles inland as soon as 

possible.” If considering crew members lost once they were on the mainland seems overly pessimistic 

since they were later released unharmed, it must be remembered there was reason to be concerned. US 

leaders knew what the Khmer Rouge was doing to its own people, and already suspected the scale of 

the atrocities. They also knew the Khmer Rouge had executed seven members of a Vietnamese fishing 

boat they captured. Vietnamese sources claimed that in May 1975 the Khmer Rouge kidnapped 513 

Vietnamese civilians to do hard labor building fortifications and tunnels on Tang Island before killing 

them in a mass execution. Allegedly, the Khmer Rouge also executed the Marines left behind on Tang 

Island. Later it would become evident that being a Westerner or even a fervent supporter of Pol Pot’s 

regime were no guarantees of better treatment. In August 1978, Pol Pot’s regime killed a Canadian, 

Englishman, and New Zealander who were stranded on Tang Island by a storm; one was killed outright 

and the two others died after being tortured (one was burned alive) and forced to write confessions. A 

few months after that the regime killed British academic and avowed Marxist Malcolm Caldwell after 

a visit with Pol Pot. Caldwell was a consistent critic of American foreign policy and resolute defender 

of Pol Pot’s regime. For US suspicions about the scale of Khmer Rouge atrocities, see “American 

Cryptology during the Cold War”; for the massacre of the Vietnamese, see Tuoi Tre, “Evidence of Koh 

Tang Massacre by Khmer Rouge,” tuoitrenews: News Gateway of Vietnam, http://tuoitrenews.vn/

features/16933/evidence-of-koh-tang-massacre-by-khmer-rouge; for the murder of the others, see 

Susan Pepperell, “Brotherly Love: Rob Hamill Wants Justice for Brother Killed by Khmer Rouge,” Sunday Star Times, April 5, 2009; and Andrew Anthony, “Lost in Cambodia,” Guardian, January 10, 2010.

14. Some research indicates that “contrary to the notion that normative (rational) decisionmaking is more likely in less dramatic settings . . . elevated threat encourages rational decision processing, whereas heuristic processing was more prevalent in less threatening situations.” This finding 

is supported by behaviors during the Mayaguez crisis. See Allison Astorino-Courtois, “The Effects of 

Stakes and Threat on Foreign Policy Decision-Making,” Political Psychology 21, no. 3 (2000): 489–510.

15. Kissinger was erroneously depicted by Pentagon sources as a Dr. Strangelove character, 

whereas Ford and Kissinger in their memoirs mischaracterize Schlesinger as preferring not to use 

any force at all. See sources and discussion in Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 209–10, and 

for Ford and Kissinger, see discussion on page 124.

16. Greene offers the typical take on Ford’s demeanor: “Ford’s behavior was calm and rational 

throughout the crisis and his demeanor spread to the team.” Presidency of Gerald R. Ford, 145. Hartmann asserts the same, saying “the debates within the National Security Council in the Cabinet Room 

were never all that polarized.” Palace Politics, 326.

17. The Cambodian broadcast said the Cambodian government had “no precise idea of the extent 

of the damage, or the number killed among our patrolmen and the American crew,” which was not true 

and thus suggests the Cambodians might have been considering killing the crew and blaming it on US 

planes. The point was not lost on US decision makers according to Hartmann, who notes that in the 

broadcast “nothing about the Mayaguez crew was revealed except that some of them might have been 

killed by American bombs.” Palace Politics, 328. See Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 191–92. 

18. Using belief systems (also called cognitive maps, operational codes, evoked sets, and decisional 

premises) to explain decision making dates from the mid-1960s when Ole Holsti and other researchers 

began investigating the way senior leaders’ perceptions of the world varied from reality and the consequent impact on their decisions and foreign policy behaviors. I follow Holsti’s lead in using the term 

“belief system.” Holsti explains the evolution of thinking and research on belief systems in the introduction to his 2006 book on foreign policy: Ole R. Holsti, Making American Foreign Policy (New York: 

Routledge, 2006), 4–7. The citations are from the same source, pp. 327–28. 
Notes

255

19. See the discussion of the irony of Ford’s opprobrium in light of Schlesinger’s impact on the 

outcome of the crisis in Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 211–12.

20. Scowcroft was upset with the Pentagon during the Mayaguez crisis, but in general he was more 

collaborative than Kissinger. As he once remarked when asked to compare himself with Kissinger, “In 

general I was more solicitous of the need to try to co-opt people within the government in support of 

particular policies than Henry . . . who was more inclined to move and let the chips fall where they may, 

and rely on the president to back him up.” Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 145n82.

21. See the commentary on page 54 and the sidebar in Chapter 7. 

22. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 178–79. The conflict was long-standing from Schlesinger’s point 

of view as well. After Ford fired him, Schlesinger discovered Kissinger had interfered with his receiving 

formal invitations to visit China while he was the secretary of defense. He wrote a memo for the record 

documenting the fact, which is included in the papers he donated to the Library of Congress. James 

R. Schlesinger, memorandum for the record, Subject: Visit of AMB Han Hsu, Chinese Liaison Office, 

March 15, 1976, Schlesinger Papers, box 57, folder 8, Library of Congress. 

23. Most histories of the Ford presidency document Ford’s first act as asking Kissinger to stay 

on, promising he would work hard to get along with Kissinger, which prompted Kissinger to respond 

that it was his duty to get along with Ford, which he did.

24. Numerous sources make this point. Kennerly, for example, recalls Ford standing on his front 

lawn in Alexandria, Virginia, just before Nixon’s departure from the presidency, reassuring the world 

and the foreign leaders at some length that everything would be fine because Henry Kissinger would 

still be working in the White House. David Kennerly, interview by Richard Norton Smith, December 

14, 2009, Gerald R. Ford Oral History Project. 

25. Coincidentally, on the first meeting of the first day of the Mayaguez crisis, May 12, Ford asked 

Kissinger to be part of his informal White House team conducting election strategy, and Kissinger 

promised support, noting Reagan and any Democratic candidate would be disastrous. Memorandum 

of Conversation: Monday, May 12, 1975. 9:15 a.m. 

26. Mahoney notes the tension between Ford and Schlesinger was long-standing. Mahoney, 

Mayaguez Incident, 12–13.

27. A William Safire column in the New York Times headlined “Et Tu, Gerry?,” cited in DeFrank 

and Ford, Write It When I’m Gone.

28. Cannon notes Ford’s comment that “there are few people I can’t get along with. Schlesinger 

was one of them.” DeFrank quotes Ford as saying Schlesinger “was the one that I was not comfortable 

with.” Ford considered Schlesinger “a talented guy, but we just didn’t fit.” Kissinger said the same, noting 

Schlesinger addressed the presidents he served with a “professorial tone, verging on condescension.” 

According to Sisco, Kissinger thought that Ford “was a decent man, but he didn’t give him very high grades 

intellectually. That was very clear.” Cannon, Honorable Life, 380; Sisco is cited in Greene, Presidency of 

Gerald R. Ford, 119; DeFrank and Ford, Write It When I’m Gone, 179; Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 179–82.

29. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 181–82.

30. Ibid., 181; and Barry Werth, 31 Days: The Crisis That Gave Us the Government We Have Today

(New York: Nan A. Talese/Doubleday, 2006), 182–85.

31. Mark Perry, Four Stars: The Inside Story of the Forty-Year Battle between the Joint Chiefs of Staff 

and America’s Civilian Leaders (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1989), 258. Instead, with Clement’s help, 

the story spread that Schlesinger had fabricated the entire thing. See Robert Shrum, “The Most Hated 

Man in Washington,” New York Times, May 28, 1979.

32. The president’s directive to Schlesinger said, “Communications on issues involving national 

security or defense policy will be channeled to Schlesinger through my Assistant for National Security 
Notes

256

Affairs.” Less important matters would be “channeled to Schlesinger through my Military Assistant, 

who will maintain liaison with your Special Assistant.” Major General Richard L. Lawson, USAF, was 

military assistant to the president at the time, and Wickham was Schlesinger’s military assistant. President Gerald Ford, Memorandum for the Secretary of Defense, Subject: Liaison Procedures, October 

31, 1974, Schlesinger Papers, box 49, folder 4, Library of Congress.

33. In his memoirs, Ford describes how Deputy Secretary of Defense Clements was used to track 

down the truth about the incident. Clements discovered the armed forces were never put on “alert,” but 

that Schlesinger discussed the issue with the press. Ford said he thought what Schlesinger did “was to 

stab our armed forces in the back. And that, in my opinion, was inexcusable.” For an example of how 

Kissinger interacted with Clements, see their phone conversations recorded in Kissinger’s account 

of the evacuation crisis and their conversation on February 10, 1976. Ford, A Time to Heal, 322–23; 

Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 529–46; Kissinger, Crisis, 488–89; Werth, 31 Days, 182–85; and Secretary 

Kissinger to Bill Clements, TELCON, 3:20 p.m. 2/10/76, declassified by US Department of State Case 

No. F-2001-02979 Doc No. C18091241 Date: 07/24/2015. 

34. Werth, 31 Days, 185.

35. Schlesinger’s directive said, “On issues directly involving national security or defense policy, 

the only channels of communications with the White House will be through me, the Deputy Secretary 

of Defense, or my Military Assistant.” Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger, Memorandum, Subject: 

Liaison between the Department of Defense and the White House, November 29, 1974, Schlesinger 

Papers, box 49, folder 4, Library of Congress. 

36. Ford responded, “I was so ——damned mad when I read the Star article last night about 

the ‘unnamed Defense sources.’ I want Schlesinger to put it [i.e., his objections] down in writing.” 

Memorandum of Conversation, July 8, 1975, 10:15–10:55 a.m., Oval Office (declassified August 4, 

2006), Ford Library.

37. Kissinger provides an overview of State-DoD differences over how best to manage the 

evacuation and implies Ford sided with him and told Schlesinger he would personally accept the 

greater risk to Americans, implying the president lacked confidence in DoD compliance with his 

orders. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 529–37. See also Kissinger’s account of the evacuation crisis in 

Kissinger, Crisis.

38. For example, Schlesinger and his legislative affairs assistant took to writing memorandums 

for the record to document State Department (particularly Ambassador Graham A. Martin in South 

Vietnam) and White House (particularly Brent Scowcroft, who was overseeing the evacuation) lethargy 

in evacuating Americans who were increasingly at risk. They also documented what they considered 

to be White House misrepresentations to Congress, including false numbers of Americans still in 

South Vietnam. Memorandum of Conversation, Subject: Telephone Conversation during call from 

the President, 11:45 AM, April 1, 1975, Schlesinger Papers, box 57, folder 8, Library of Congress; and 

Memorandum for the Record from John Maury, Assistant Secretary of Defense, Legislative Affairs, 

Subject: Conversation with Jack Marsh re Vietnam Evacuation, May 1, 1975, Schlesinger Papers, box 

60, folder 10, Library of Congress. 

39. According to Kissinger, the Pentagon wanted to evacuate as fast as possible and Ambassador 

Graham Martin in Saigon wanted to space the American withdrawal over the longest period of time 

possible in order to leave enough of an American presence to justify rescuing the Vietnamese. Martin 

“flooded us with cables, the gist of which was that I would be the one held responsible if any potential 

refugees were needlessly left behind.” Kissinger, who noted his position on evacuation was “much 

closer to Martin’s than to the Pentagon’s,” nonetheless admits the Pentagon was willing to evacuate 

Vietnamese “so long as this did not slow down getting all Americans out at the fastest pace possible.” 

Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 529, 537.
Notes

257

40. Ibid.

41. DeFrank and Ford, Write It When I’m Gone, 92. 

42. The quick fall was anticipated by many. Colonel Clifton Granger wrote to Scowcroft on 

April 5 saying he did not think South Vietnam would survive to the end of the month. David Kennerly, Ford’s photographer, told him the same thing on April 4, saying “Mr. President, Vietnam has 

no more than a month left, and anyone who tells you different is bullshitting.” For the Kennerly 

quote, see Greene, Presidency of Gerald R. Ford: 137; for Granger, see Memorandum From Clinton 

Granger of the National Security Council Staff to the President’s Deputy Assistant for National Security Affairs (Scowcroft), Washington, April 5, 1975, http://www.mekong.net/cambodia/download

/foreign_relations_vietnam_73-75.pdf

43. Memorandum of Conversation, 1 April 1975, box 57, folder 8 SUBJECT: Telephone Conversation during call from the President 11:45 AM, 1 April 1975.

44. Hyland, Mortal Rivals, 112.

45. As Mahoney notes, it was Rockefeller who called out Schlesinger and the Pentagon in the 

second NSC meeting for faulty information, stoking distrust between the White House and Pentagon. 

Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 46–47.

46. NSC meeting minutes.

47. Memorandum of Conversation, President Ford, Henry Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft, 

Wednesday, May 14, 1975, 11:45 a.m., Oval Office, declassified, Ford Library.

48. Fred S. Hoffman, “Military Options: Two Takes,” Albuquerque Journal, Thursday, May 15, 1975, 2.

49. Telephone conversation, Secretary Kissinger to Secretary Schlesinger, 12:58 – 5/15/75; 

declassified by Department of State, Review Authority: Robert H. Miller, Date/Case ID: 10 Feb 2003 

200102979. Later Schlesinger took a pass on portraying Kissinger as the zealot for force (see note 79 on 

pages 238–39). When Kissinger wrote his memoirs he also refrained from blaming Schlesinger, and 

instead attributed the press leaks to Schlesinger’s spokesman, Joseph Laitin, who he says “missed 

no opportunity to transform honest disagreements into aspects of a feud between the Secretaries of 

State and Defense. Newspaper columns kept describing our deliberations in terms of ‘Dr. Strangelove’ 

restrained by the humanistic Secretary of Defense. I was alleged to have advocated indiscriminate B-52 

bombings in contrast to Schlesinger, who stood for a more precise ‘tit-for-tat’ retaliation.” Kissinger, 

Years of Renewal, 561.

50. NSC meeting minutes.

51. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 571.

52. A Rumsfeld observation suggests it might have been the former. He says Schlesinger called 

him on May 16 to complain “that the State Department was circulating stories that they had been leaning forward while the Defense Department had opposed the use of force.” That Schlesinger thought it 

wise to emphasize State’s exaggeration of the Pentagon’s opposition to force suggests he thought Ford 

might appreciate the truth—that he was in favor of discriminate, limited, punitive force. Rumsfeld, 

When the Center Held, 177.

53. Ibid.

54. The resultant investigation and products provide a bonanza of rich detail about the crisis 

for researchers. Pentagon staff put together a comprehensive chronology of the verbal and written 

orders issued in the fast-evolving crisis. Sitton to SECDEF memo. 

55. Memorandum of Conversation, President Ford, Henry Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft, 

Friday, May 16, 1975, 9:25 a.m., Oval Office, declassified, Ford Library (hereafter Memorandum of 

Conversation, May 16, 1975).
Notes

258

56. In his memoirs, Kissinger said “the friction was not between Schlesinger and me. It was 

President Ford, the commander-in-chief, who felt that he had not been kept adequately informed. He 

learned of some key decisions only at the final wrap-up NSC meetings and then only by accident.” 

Kissinger goes on, saying, “Only extreme frustration accounts for the usually so equable Ford lashing 

out at the military establishment, an institution he truly revered and in which he was so proud to have 

served as a naval officer.” Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 571.

57. Memorandum of Conversation, May 16, 1975.

58. Memorandum for the Secretary of Defense, from the President, Subject: the Rescue of the 

SS Mayaguez and its Crew, May 18, 1975; box 29, folder “Department of Defense – Joint Chiefs of StaffReport to the President, May 20, 1975 (1)” of the National Security Adviser, NSC East Asian and Pacific 

Affairs Staff: Files, Ford Library.

59. Schlesinger’s Office of the Secretary of Defense staff complained that reporting through 

Kissinger generated allegations of DoD foot-dragging and being uncooperative or bureaucratic, 

and they advised Schlesinger to revisit the issue with the president. His staff cited examples such 

as McFarlane issuing orders to the NMCC during the Mayaguez crisis and incidents from the evacuation of South Vietnam where Scowcroft issued orders directly to the Pentagon.

60. From Tom Wicker, “Raising Some Mayaguez Questions,” New York Times, May 16, 1975; cited 

in Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 152.

61. Apparently McFarlane pursued the issue. In his coauthored book Crisis Resolution, there is a 

footnote that describes the armed reconnaissance mission as the result of an inadvertent misunderstanding between the White House and Pentagon. The note also indicates the armed reconnaissance 

mission included the instruction to “not to expend ordnance unless attacked.” The inadvertent 

misunderstanding appears correct insofar as the Pentagon explained the first wave would be armed 

reconnaissance and the White House failed to understand this point. However, the assertion that 

aircraft were not to expend ordnance (never documented) raises questions about the purpose of the 

mission. Reconnaissance aircraft (RF-4s) already had photographed mainland targets. See Head, 

Short, and McFarlane, Crisis Resolution, 303n30; and Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 

105ff and 112.

62. R. C. McFarlane, Memorandum for General Scowcroft; Subject: Defense Report on Mayaguez

Operations, May 20, 1975 (declassified August 9, 2002).

63. This author asserted it was the primary reason Schesinger was fired, based on insights from 

a major source in the crisis. See Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 211.

64. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 573. 

65. DeFrank and Ford. Write It When I’m Gone, 92.

66. After the crisis both Scowcroft and Rumsfeld called to warn Schlesinger that the president 

was angry, but as several months passed he may have felt he was on safer ground. Wickham warned 

him otherwise just before his dismissal. He heard from someone that Schlesinger would be called 

in and offered a different job the next day, so he called Schlesinger and alerted him to the rumor. 

Schlesinger told Wickham that was interesting because he had just been told by the White House that 

the president wanted to see him the next day. Wickham interview; see also discussion on page 166.

67. This finding is important. One criticism of foreign policy analysis is that “foreign policy 

implementation . . . remains barely examined.” Although the general assumption that the “impact 

of the executive is . . . experienced most strongly in a crisis situation” probably holds true, the 

Mayaguez crisis supports the contention that it is nonetheless a challenge for chief executives to 

implement their decisions as they see fit. Chris Alden and Amnon Aran, Foreign Policy Analysis: 

New Approaches (New York: Routledge, 2012), 111. 
Notes

259

68. Lamb, “Belief Systems and Decision Making,” 698–99; and Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision 

Making, 211–26.

69. It might be argued that the Pentagon has an institutional preference for proportional and 

discriminate force rather than asymmetric and indiscriminate force, and thus Schlesinger was 

“captured” by his institution. But the key point is that these predilections were not inconsistent with 

Schlesinger’s beliefs, and he made sure those beliefs guided Pentagon orders. 

70. Here the author must diverge from Baral’s conclusion that “Kissinger and Schlesinger 

reflected by and large the views of their respective agencies.” That is particularly not true in the case 

of Kissinger. J. K. Baral, “The Mayaguez Incident: a Study of Crisis Management,” International Studies

19 no. 1 (1980): 34.

71. Lamb, “Belief Systems and Decision Making,” 699.

72. Cited in Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 43.

73. See for example, J. Philipp Rosenberg, “The Belief System of Harry S. Truman and Its Effect 

on Foreign Policy Decision-Making during His Administration,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 12, 

no. 2 (Spring 1982).

74. Derek Beach, Analyzing Foreign Policy (Basingstoke, Hampshire [U.K.]: Palgrave Macmillan, 

2012), 115.

75. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 47–50; 52–61.

76. The schism was apparent among congressional leaders as well. During their meeting with 

Ford some members of Congress worried about the undue haste to use military force while others 

fully supported it. For example, when Senator McClellan asked, “Can’t we wait,” Senator Eastland 

jumped in and answered for the administration, saying, “No, we can’t.” For the general argument on 

the schism, see Ole R. Holsti and James N. Rosenau, “Vietnam, Consensus, and the Belief Systems of 

American Leaders,” World Politics 32 (October 1979).

77. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 247–55. David Houghton makes the same point:

Different occupants of the White House have viewed such situations differently and have 

been motivated by noticeably different policy considerations in dealing with them. To take 

one particularly striking example, President Gerald Ford reacted in a manner radically 

different to Carter when faced with the seizure of American hostages during the 1975 

Mayaguez episode. While one president viewed the situation primarily as a threat to US 

credibility and “face” in the world, the other saw it primarily as a threat to human life; while 

one resorted almost immediately to the use of military force, the other tried negotiation 

for several months before selecting a military option that was probably the least forcible of 

the available alternatives. Ford’s actions and reasoning were also markedly different from 

Lyndon Johnson’s during the Pueblo crisis. 

David P. Houghton, US Foreign Policy and the Iran Hostage Crisis (Cambridge: Cambridge University 

Press, 2001), 167.

78. Document 280, Memorandum from the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs 

(Kissinger) to President Ford, May 12, 1975, in FRUS 1969–1976, vol. 10, 956, cited in Fibiger, “Redeeming,” 8.

79. Memorandum of Conversation, President Ford, Mohamed Reza Pahlavi, Shah of Iran, Dr. Henry 

A. Kissinger, Secretary of State, and Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs Lt. General 

Brent Scowcroft, Deputy Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, Oval Office, Thursday, 

May 15, 1975, 11:00 a.m. National Security Adviser’s Memoranda of Conversation Collection, Gerald R. 

Ford Digital Library, http://www.fordlibrarymuseum.gov/library/document/memcons/1553077.pdf.

80. For example, on May 12, the first day of the crisis, Kissinger was asked in a news conference 

whether US “prestige has suffered” as a result of the loss of Indochina and the Cambodian seizure 
Notes

260

of the Mayaguez. He responded in the affirmative, saying that “our credibility has declined” and 

that “one of the most important challenges to our foreign policy is to restore it.” Cited in Lieutenant 

Colonel Donald E. Carlile, “The Mayaguez Incident: Crisis Management,” Military Review (October 

1976), 6.

81. Ford believed the United States did not prevail in Vietnam because it did not use its full military 

powers, including strategic bombing. Cannon, Honorable Life, 374. See also Fibiger, “Redeeming,” 5.

82. See the extended discussion of key leader belief systems in chapter 5, “Pre-Crisis Beliefs,” in 

Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making: 62–78.

83. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 62–78. 

84. Baral, “Mayaguez Incident,” 21.

85. Scowcroft interview, cited in Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 76−77.

86. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 74−75.

87. Baral, “Mayaguez Incident,” 21. Also cited in Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 74.

88. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 49.

89. Cited in ibid., 72.

90. Cited in ibid., 72−73.

91. Ibid., 150.

92. Ibid., 176.

93. For a longer discussion of Scowcroft’s focus on the Pueblo analogy see ibid., 176–77, as well 

as Pfaltzgraff and Davis, National Security Decisions, 274–75.

94. In his memoirs Kissinger says Schlesinger underestimated Ford’s pique at his behaviors and 

overestimated Kissinger’s interference in the relationship. In retrospect, it is not hard to see why on 

either account. In virtually all the meetings and phone calls during the Mayaguez crisis, Ford treated 

Schlesinger respectfully, and in the end, he congratulations him on a fine job. By all accounts, this 

was Ford’s general demeanor with all his subordinates: calm, polite, and respectful. Apparently, 

this lulled Schlesinger into the false belief that he was on acceptable terms with Ford, and not even 

warnings from Scowcroft and Rumsfeld that the president was angry seemed to register with him. 

It is equally evident why Schlesinger thought Kissinger was using his inside position with President 

Ford to complicate Schlesinger’s relations with the president—because he was. 

95. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 176.

96. Ibid., 180–83.

97. Immediately following the crisis Ford told a journalist that initially he was “hoping that the 

best would take place, and not the worst . . . that the Cambodian government would, after they got the 

ship, release it.” But by the time he wrote his memoirs there is no mention of this, and he says he was 

from the beginning determined to protect US interests and so called an NSC meeting. Rowan, Four 

Days, 66–67. See also the discussion in Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 79–80.

98. At times Ford seemed deferential to Kissinger. For example, in one NSC meeting after 

Kissinger expresses his strong objection to a recommendation just made by Philip Buchen, Ford almost 

apologies, saying, “Phil and I have argued for years.” NSC meeting minutes.

99. Hartmann observed: “The demonstration that we witnessed every day, of Kissinger disappearing into the oval office, [with] everybody else waiting patiently while their appointment times 

came and went—stacking everybody else in the government four or five deep—till he finished his 

long monologue instructing his new pupil in the Byzantine intricacies of the world, was not a happy 

example.” Ford’s advisers worried about the president’s personal credibility in light of his reliance on 

Kissinger and resented Kissinger’s habit of “putting the President of the United States in a pupil’s role.” 
Notes

261

Rumsfeld and other presidential advisors were recommending to Ford that he seek a wider range of 

advice on foreign policy matters than just Kissinger. Ford’s reliance on Kissinger was also substantiated later by inside sources. Sisco, for example, notes, “Ford was not inclined toward perceiving a lot 

of the complexities of foreign policy issues,” so he “relied heavily on Henry” “when dealing with global 

affairs.” Hartmann quoted in Michael Turner, The Vice President as Policy Maker: Rockefeller in the 

Ford White House (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1982), 160; Sisco interview; see also Hartmann, 

Palace Politics, 329; and Nessen, It Sure Looks Different, 132. 

100. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 144–45. 

101. Informal Briefing by Ron Nessen, 11:33 a.m., May 16, 1975; box 14, folder “Mayaguez - Press 

Releases and Press Briefings,” Ron Nessen Papers, Ford Library.

102. This includes Scowcroft, who did not typically speak to the press. In a June 18, 1975 memorandum from Scowcroft to George Springsteen, executive secretary for the Department of State, 

Scowcroft told Springsteen to answer an inquiry from a senator by saying, “I am sure you are aware 

that the Administration’s principal concern was to react swiftly and responsibly in order to save the 

lives of the crew and to recover the vessel.” Then, as all the decision makers did, he elaborated on 

the basic explanation, saying, “The Administration acted to prevent that crew from being interned 

and their lives jeopardized, as the crew of the USS Pueblo was, and to make clear to the Cambodian 

Government and to all other governments that the safety of its sailors and the freedom of the seas 

for its vessels were matters of great concern to the American Government and people.” Lamb, Belief 

Systems and Decision Making, 1; 17n7.

103. Secretary Kissinger’s Press Conference, May 16. Kissinger added, “That is to say, we never 

received a communication, proposition that would have enabled us to explore a diplomatic solution.” 

The Department of State response to the GAO report that suggested some diplomatic possibilities were 

overlooked was quite hostile. Lawrence Eagleburger responded on behalf of State on March 15, 1976, 

saying the GAO report was “by the most generous interpretation I can muster, an exercise in ex post 

facto diplomacy by amateurs.” GAO report, 108.

104. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 553; 561. In point of fact, Kissinger’s closing comments in the 

first NSC meeting included the observation that “we can bomb from Guam with B-52s or from the 

carriers,” and both options were debated until the end of the fourth NSC meeting.

105. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 569. Kissinger was not averse to making it up on the fly, as John 

Prados has documented: “Shooting from the hip, Kissinger replied that a routine notification had gone 

to the insurance companies that insured ships like the Mayaguez. In the court case that flowed from 

the incident, however, the State Department was forced into an official admission that no records could 

be found anywhere which supported this contention.” Joseph Sisco has also noted blatant inaccuracies 

in Kissinger’s memoirs. Prados, Keeper of the Keys, 371; Sisco interview, 10.

106. See the discussion of “communication strategies” in Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision 

Making, 52–55, 66n12, and 144–52.

107. Baral, “Mayaguez Incident,” 21.

108. See the discussion in Lamb, “Belief Systems and Decision Making” 694−95; and Belief Systems and Decision Making, 144–52.

109. It is also possible the issue was not explored in greater depth because Colby was not treated 

as an insider with important information. The CIA history notes, “On most issues Colby had to deal 

with Kissinger’s deputy, Brent Scowcroft, and NSC staffers and was shut out from any meaningful, 

continuing access to the major policy players.” Harold P. Ford, CIA History Staff, “William E. Colby as 

Director of Central Intelligence, 1973−76” (declassified and approved for release, August 10, 2011), 40.

110. Burns interview.
Notes

262

111. This point about violating Marine Corps doctrine was made by the GAO report and this 

author earlier, but Mahoney, drawing on Patrick, makes the case better and in much greater depth, 

demonstrating numerous conflicts with existing doctrine. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 242–43; 

Patrick, “Mayaguez Operation”; GAO report, 95; Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 32.

Chapter 8

1. Stephen Randolph, “Uncovering the Lessons of Vietnam,” Foreign Service Journal, July–August 

2015, 52–60.

2. Sparrow, Strategist, 171.

3. Nessen, It Sure Looks Different, 130.

4. Wickham notebooks.

5. Cannon, Honorable Life, 384; Dick Cheney with Liz Cheney, In My Time: A Personal and Political Memoir (New York: Threshold Editions, 2011), 91.

6. Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger, Letter to the President, 3 November 1975, Schlesinger 

Papers, box 49, folder 4, Library of Congress.

7. Wickham interview.

8. Ford said his performance amounted to “high level bumbling.” Ford, A Time to Heal, 284.

9. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 558–59.

10. Steven L. Rearden, Council of War: A History of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1942–1991 (Washington, 

DC: NDU Press, 2012), 384. 

11. From Kissinger’s memoirs, one wonders whether Kissinger came to rue his part in diminishing Ford’s opinion of Schlesinger. It is interesting to note that during the first meeting of Ford, Kissinger, 

Rumsfeld, and Scowcroft, the president quickly revised the special reporting instructions that had 

disadvantaged Schlesinger, offering Rumsfeld more direct access to the president. Kissinger, Years of 

Renewal, 177–78, 559; and Memorandum of Conversation, Oval Office, Thursday, November 13, 1975, 

9:40 a.m. (declassified June 4, 2004); and Memorandum of Conversation, Oval Office, Wednesday, 

November 26, 1975, 9:20 a.m. (declassified automatically, date not recorded).

12. Robert K. Yin, Case Study Research: Design and Methods, 4th ed. (Los Angeles: Sage, 2009), 141. 

13. Objections that the case did not constitute a crisis because of the relative disparity between 

the protagonists and that it cannot contribute to generalized knowledge are addressed at length elsewhere. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 1–4; and Yin, Case Study Research, 14–16.

14. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 245–46.

15. For example, Richard Pious notes the argument that “the president did not act with regard 

to his personal political fortunes,” but claims “the evidence points in the other direction.” However, 

he offers no evidence to substantiate his assertion. Instead, he switches the topic to Kissinger’s belief 

that the United States needed an opportunity to demonstrate its resolve, and then he lampoons the 

idea that the Mayaguez accomplished any such thing. Ford’s motives and the outcomes his decisions 

generated are two different things. Pious is hardly the first to criticize Ford’s decisions, but it is difficult 

to offer useful criticisms without understanding what actually happened and why. Absent evidence, a 

criticism is just a prejudice, perhaps useful for punditry but not for political science. Richard M. Pious, 

Why Presidents Fail (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2008), 86.

16. Robert Jervis, System Effects: Complexity in Political and Social Life (Princeton: Princeton 

University Press, 1999), 266–69; cited in David P. Houghton, US Foreign Policy and the Iran Hostage 

Crisis (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 171.
Notes

263

17. Brian Ripley, “Cognition, Culture and Bureaucratic Politics,” in Laura Neack, Jeanne A. K. 

Hey, and Patrick J. Haney, Foreign Policy Analysis: Continuity and Change in Its Second Generation

(Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1995), 88; and Chris Alden and Amnon Aran. Foreign Policy 

Analysis: New Approaches (New York: Routledge, 2012), 44, 119.

18. Neack, Hey, and Haney. Foreign Policy Analysis, 23.

19. This observation is ascribed to Dick Cheney in Thompson, Ford Presidency, 72. Cheney 

ascribes greater significance to the Mayaguez in his memoirs: Cheney, In My Time, 83.

20. Pious, Why Presidents Fail, 87.

21. Ibid. Not all sources quickly dismiss the efficacy of force. Wetterhahn, for example, judiciously 

and accurately assesses both Cambodian behaviors, which were centrally directed and hostile to US 

interests, and the impact of the US military operations. Wetterhahn, Last Battle, 258–59. 

22. Telegram from the Department of State to the Embassy in Thailand; Washington, May 13, 

1975, 1754Z; FRUS. Source: Ford Library, National Security Adviser, NSC East Asian and Pacific Affairs 

Staff Files, box 29, Department of State, Telegrams and Cables. Secret; Nodis; Flash. Drafted by Sisco; 

approved by Sisco, Johnson, and Eagleburger.

23. Document 119, Memorandum of Conversation, New York City, September 28, 1975, 8:10–11:55 

p.m., in Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, vol. 18, China, 1973–1976 (hereafter FRUS 

1969–1976, vol. 18).

24. Ford, A Time to Heal, 281.

25. “National Intelligence Bulletin” news story concerning world reaction to US action to recover 

the MAYAGUEZ from the Cambodian Khmer Rouge. United States: Central Intelligence Agency, 

16 May 1975. US Declassified Documents Online, October 5, 2016, http://tinyurl.galegroup.com

/tinyurl/3nUcTX.

26. Document 183, Memorandum of Conversation, Washington, June 11, 1975, 10 a.m.–noon, in 

Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, vol. 26, Arab-Israeli Dispute, 1974–1976.

27. Scholars have argued that after the fall of South Vietnam it was apparent to many South 

Koreans that the threat of invasion from the North, even if it has in the past been used indiscriminately by Park as an excuse to consolidate his dictatorship, was nonetheless real. Donald S. Zagoria 

and Young Kun Kim, “North Korea and the Major Powers,” Asian Survey 15, no. 12 (December 

1975), 1017–35.

28. “South Korean Report on Kim Il Sung’s Attempt to Visit the USSR in 1975,” April 1975, History 

and Public Policy Program Digital Archive, South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs Archives, http://

digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/114588. 

29. Cable from US Mission Geneva to SECSTATE, 15 May 1975 1835Z; Subject: NPT Revcon: Mayaguez: Korean Ambassador’s Reaction; Margaret P. Grafeld Declassified/Released US Department of 

State EO Systematic Review, July 5, 2006.

30. Memorandum of Conversation, Subject: Japan’s Security: Korea and Taiwan, May 23, 1975, 

declassified December 31, 1981. The participants were the US ambassador, deputy chief of mission, and 

two first secretaries and five senior Japanese political leaders. The US ambassador told his Japanese 

interlocutors he had duly reported Japanese concern over Korea and then tried to reassure them war 

was not imminent and that US resolve was firm.

31. Cable from American Embassy Tokyo, subject: Japanese reaction to Mayaguez, May 15, 1975, 

0917Z, Declassified/Released US Department of State EO Systematic Review, July 5, 2006.

32. Cable from American Embassy Tokyo, subject: Japan’s national interest in foreign policy in 

northeast Asia, June 4, 1975, 0857Z. 
Notes

264

33. Takashi Oka, Tokyo, “Keeping A Wary Eye on Korean Affairs,” Daily Messenger, Canandaigua, 

New York, July 3, 1975.

34. Cited in Fibiger, “Redeeming”: Telegram from Secretary of State Kissinger to Delegate Secretaries, May 19, 1975, box 3, folder: Cambodia – Seizing of the Mayaguez, May 1975 (4), National Security 

Adviser Presidential Country Files for East Asia and the Pacific: Cambodia, Ford Library.

35. “Information on the Talks between Kim Il Sung and Todor Zhivkov,” June 18, 1975, History 

and Public Policy Program Digital Archive, Political Archive of the Federal Foreign Office, Berlin (PolA 

AA), MfAA, C 294/78. Obtained and Translated by for NKIDP by Bernd Schaefer, http://digitalarchive

.wilsoncenter.org/document/114282

36. Cable from SECSTATE WASHDC, subject: PRC comment on Mayaguez operation, 22 May 

1975, 0032Z, Declassified/Released US Department of State EO Systematic Review, July 5, 2006.

37. Cable from SECSTATE WASHDC, subject: PRC comment on Mayaguez operation, 22 May 1975, 

0155Z, Declassified/Released US Department of State EO Systematic Review, July 5, 2006. This cable 

followed the earlier one at 0032Z in order to provide the full text of the article by “NCNA Correspondent.” 

38. Cable from USLO Peking, subject: Call by AMB Bush on Princess Ashraf, 22 May 1975, 0300Z, 

Declassified/Released US Department of State EO Systematic Review, July 5, 2006.

39. Cable from SECSTATE WASHDC, subject: PRC comment on Mayaguez operation, 22 May 

1975, 0032Z, Declassified/Released US Department of State EO Systematic Review, July 5, 2006. 

40. Document 136, Memorandum of Conversation, Beijing, December 3, 1975, 9:25–11:55 a.m., 

in FRUS 1969–1976, vol. 18.

41. Ibid.

42. Cable from AMEMBASSY Moscow, subject: Soviet reaction to Mayaguez, 24 May 1975, 1103Z, 

Declassified/Released US Department of State EO Systematic Review, July 5, 2006.

43. Head, Short, and McFarlane, Crisis Resolution, 227. For more on this incident, see chapter 

6, note 129.

44. “JCS Assessment,” Box 10, folder “Korea - North Korean Tree Incident, 8/18/76 (1)” of the Presidential Country Files for East Asia and the Pacific, 1974–77 at the Ford Library.

45. TELCON, General Scowcroft/Secretary Kissinger, August 20, 1976, 8:04 p.m. UNCLASSIFIED 

US Department of State Case No. F-200V02979 Doc No. C l8093011 Date: 07/24/2015.

46. Brzezinski argued that Carter’s foreign policy was too contractual (based on negotiated 

agreements) and that “in some cases, what is needed is a demonstration of force, to establish 

credibility and determination and even to infuse fear.” Carter underlined “demonstration of force” 

and “to infuse fear” and then wrote in the margin “Like Mayaguez?” Document 76, Memorandum 

from the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs (Brzezinski) to President Carter; Washington, April 21, 1978, in Foreign Relations of The United States, 1977–1980, vol. 1, Foundations of 

Foreign Policy.

47. David Patrick Houghton, “The Role of Analogical Reasoning in Novel Foreign-Policy Situations,” British Journal of Political Science 26, no. 4 (1996), 523–52; and Houghton, US Foreign Policy. 

48. Anthony C. King, “Mission Command 2.0: From an Individualist to a Collectivist Model,” 

Parameters 47, no. 1 (2017), 7.

49. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joint Operations, Joint Publication 3-0 (Washington, DC: Joint Chiefs 

of Staff, 11 August 2011), cited in Mission Command White Paper, April 3, 2012, 1.

50. Mission Command White Paper, 7.

51. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joint Operations, Joint Publication 3-0 (Washington, DC: Joint Chiefs of 

Staff, 17 January 2017), xi.
Notes

265

52. Andrew Hill and Heath Niemi, “The Trouble with Mission Command: Flexive Command and 

the Future of Command and Control, Joint Force Quarterly 86 (3rd Quarter/July 2017), 94.

53. A major spokesman for this point of view is retired General Stanley McChrystal. See General Stanley McChrystal with Tantum Collins, David Silverman, and Chris Fussell, Team of Teams: 

New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World (London: Portfolio/Penguin, 2015), 217–18; 221–23; 

and 232.

54. Dunham and Quinlan, US Marines in Vietnam, 265.

55. Of the major authors on the Mayaguez incident, Chun, Guilmartin, Mahoney, Vandenbroucke, and Wetterhahn all charge the Ford administration with micromanagement. Baron and 

Wise are an exception. They speak vaguely of “the perils of directing a war halfway around the world” 

but otherwise reserve comment. Baron and Wise, 14-Hour War, x. 

56. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, xiv–xv.

57. Chun, Last Boarding Party, 71. Similarly, another source emphasizes that “Washington frequently 

intervened directly in the ongoing operation” and, as an example, cites the calls to the USS Holt directly 

from the NMCC and even Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Holloway. Muir, End of the Saga, 54–55. 

58. Guilmartin, Very Short War, 156.

59. Walter S. Poole, The Decline of Détente: Elliot Richardson, James Schlesinger, and Donald 

Rumsfeld, 1973–1977 (Washington, DC: Historical Office, Office of the Secretary of Defense, 2015), 14.

60. “There was unfortunate micromanagement and interference from the upper echelons in 

Washington, District of Columbia. At one point in the heat of battle, Marines had to respond to an 

information request from Washington: did they have a Khmer interpreter with them?” Marius S. 

Vassiliou and David S. Alberts, C2 Failures: A Taxonomy and Analysis (Alexandria, VA: Institute for 

Defense Analyses, 2013). Vassiliou and Alberts cite Major Mark J. Toal, “The Mayaguez Incident: Near 

Disaster at Koh Tang” (thesis, Marine Corps War College, 1998).

61. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 213–14.

62. Dan Caldwell, The Cuban Missile Affair and the American Style of Crisis Management, Rand 

Note (Santa Monica, CA: Rand Corporation, 1989), 5.

63. Edward N. Luttwak, The Pentagon and the Art of War: The Question of Military Reform (New 

York: Simon and Schuster, 1986), 86. Others have uncritically accepted Luttwak’s assertion. See 

Houghton, US Foreign Policy.

64. John K. Singlaub with Malcolm McConnell, Hazardous Duty: An American Soldier in the 

Twentieth Century (New York: Summit Books, 1991), 376; cited in Lloyd J. Matthews, The PoliticalMilitary Rivalry for Operational Control in U.S. Military Actions: A Soldier’s Perspective (Carlisle Barracks, PA: U.S. Army War College, 1998), 12. 

65. Matthews, Political-Military Rivalry, 12. See also Matthews, 39n32. Nevertheless, the thought 

that Kissinger was running military operations has taken hold in some circles.

66. On responsibility for the BLU-82, see Christopher Hitchens, “The Kiss of Henry,” Nation, April 

30, 2001, 9; and for ordering the assault on Tang, see Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War, 223.

67. See Edward J. Lengel, Charles R. Rambo, Shelley A. Rodriguez, and Michael D. Tyynismaa, 

“The Mayaguez Incident: An Organizational Theory Analysis” (thesis, Naval Postgraduate School, 

2006). These authors assert that “through the radio connection established in the NMCC (National 

Military Command Center), he [Ford] spoke directly several times to fighter pilots and the Airborne 

Command and Control Center during the strafing of the Cambodian waters.” The source for the 

assertion is Seized at Sea: Situation Critical: The Story of the Mayaguez Crisis, directed by Brian Kelly 

(Alexandria, VA: Henninger Productions, 2000), DVD.
Notes

266

68. Starnes, “Mayaguez Incident.” 

69. Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 95.

70. Ibid., 168.

71. Ibid., 96.

72. Ibid., 7.

73. Lieutenant General Burns later commented, “Gayler had now gotten back to Hawaii. I could 

tell the minute he walked in the command center. Admiral Gayler is a very courageous, very brilliant, 

take-charge sort of fellow who finds great difficulty in getting off the bridge. Sometimes that is not 

helpful.” Burns interview.

74. Vandenbroucke, 97. 

75. Ibid., 97.

76. Wetterhahn, Last Battle, 62–63.

77. Dunham and Quinlan, US Marines in Vietnam, 243.

78. Herspring, Pentagon and the Presidency, 230, 235. Herspring relies on Wetterhahn for 

this argument.

79. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 224.

80. Ibid., 253.

81. Ibid., 214, 224. Vandenbroucke offers a detailed account of this incident. He notes the Marines 

were anxious for reinforcements, but somehow CinCPac had received information that the Marines 

were “in no imminent danger,” with “the opposition forced back.” Instructed by Washington to concentrate on withdrawing, Gayler ordered USSAG to recall the second helicopter wave. General Burns 

realized, however, how badly the Marines needed reinforcements and pressed Gayler to change his 

order. Colonel Johnson, who was monitoring communications, also protested, as did a Marine Corps 

general in Hawaii. Gayler reversed the order. Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 108.

82. Wetterhahn, Last Battle, 45–46. This charge is repeated by Herspring, Pentagon and the 

Presidency, 226.

83. Wetterhahn, Last Battle, 260, 262. Wetterhahn’s biting conclusion is that Ford and Kissinger 

“improvised tactics, confusing political experience with military reality during a black-tie dinner” 

while “Americans lay bleeding and dying needlessly on a distant spit of sand” (314).

84. Pfaltzgraff and Davis, National Security Decisions, 276–77.

85. For a sustained argument on this point, see David Tucker and Christopher Lamb, “Peacetime 

Engagements,” in America’s Armed Forces: A Handbook of Current and Future Capabilities, ed. Sam 

Sarkesian (Greenwood: Westport, CT, 1996), 306–7.

86. Patrick, “Mayaguez Operation.”

87. Burns interview.

88. According to one source, “Although CinCPac had authorized such fires and LtCol Austin 

had requested them, LtGen Burns decided against pre-assault fires, fearing endangerment of the 

Mayaguez crew. Neither he nor his staff informed the assault forces of his decision.” Starnes, “Mayaguez Incident,” 6.

89. In prepping Ford for a meeting with the shah of Iran the day after the crisis, Kissinger said, 

“Tell him you used more force than necessary.” Memorandum of Conversation, President Ford, 

Henry Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft, Thursday, May 15, 1975, 9:45 a.m., Oval Office (declassified), 

Ford Library.

90. Jones interview, 204; Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 37; GAO report, 95.
Notes

267

91. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 132; Guilmartin, Very Short War, 151. Also, within that 175-

person first wave of Marines there were linguists, explosive ordnance disposal personnel, and a 

medic because, as Austin later wrote in his unit history, “it seemed logical that if the Mayaguez crew 

was found on the island, the assault force should be prepared to free/assist/treat them.” R. W. Austin, 

2nd Battalion, 9th Marines, Koh Tang/Mayaguez Historical Report, 9 December 1975, 2; declassified.

92. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 229.

93. Houghton, US Foreign Policy, 88.

94. Vandenbroucke does a good job of examining anticipatory compliance as subordinates tried 

to meld with what they assumed were senior leader preferences. His account indicates the Marines 

would launch their assault irrespective of conditions because of their assumptions about senior leader 

preferences. Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 162.

95. Both Austin and his S-3 understood enemy strength was greater than twenty or so irregular forces. Lieutenant Colonel Austin “anticipated a tough time” (see note 93 on page 248), and 

according to Major John Hendricks, Austin’s S-3, it was understood that enemy forces would be as 

high as 100 to 150: 

After our return [from the U-21 recon flight] to Utapao we met with members of the Air 

Force at Utapao, coordinators for fixed wing, a brigadier general from General Burns’ staff 

at Nakhon Phenom, air intelligence, and the crew of a C-130 air rescue aircraft. The task 

force colonel and Lieutenant Colonel Austin took the lead in questions designed to elicit 

the most information about the circumstances of the seizure of the SS Mayaguez and the 

situation on the island. No maps and only a few localized photos taken by aircraft were 

available. Initial estimates were that about 60 to 70 former Royal Khmer Navy personnel 

from the sunken gunboats and a very few soldiers, believed to be Khmer Rouge, were on 

the island. All in all, less than 100 effectives were present on the island. This was based on 

information given by a Royal Khmer officer who had fled to Thailand. Aerial observation 

seem to confirm this.

After we had almost finished with this coordination process, the major operations officer 

from the task force stopped me in a passageway and let me know that he had received more 

information about the Khmer on the island. He said that, rather than the “less than 100” 

originally briefed, there appeared to be at least 150. He had no further information about 

the makeup of the force. I relayed this information to Lieutenant Colonel Austin and our 

intelligence officer. After the exchange of information about the opposing forces and the 

assets available to rescue the crew, we returned to our hanger. Once there we set up a briefing 

board and got down to drafting options and began to develop an assault plan.

A platoon leader, Lieutenant Richard H. Zales, recalls a last second meeting with Captain Davis 

on the tarmac, who explained the revised intelligence estimate indicated the Marines would face 

“at least a reinforced company on the island equipped with heavy machine guns and mortars.” In 

contrast, Gunny Sergeant Francis McGowin, Austin’s S-2, only knew that “the last intelligence we 

received was that there were sixty to eighty militia troops occupying Koh Tang.” Wise and Baron, 

14-Hour War, 95, 187, 234, 265. 

96. Austin simply notes his requests for prep fires were not approved. Burns notes, “I told them, 

‘We can’t afford preparatory fire’ but I did say, ‘We can use 20-millimeter or gas.’” Wise and Baron, 

14-Hour War, 95, 96; Burns interview, 440.

97. Mission Command White Paper, 7.

98. Richard A. Mobley, “Revisiting the Korean Tree-Trimming Incident,” Joint Force Quarterly

35 (October 2004), 108, 112, 115.
Notes

268

99. Hill and Niemi, “Trouble with Mission Command,” 94.

100. For example, the current Army chief of staff, General Mark A. Milley, sees micromanagement 

as a major concern despite official emphasis on the mission command approach:

What we do, in practice, is we micromanage and overly specify everything the subordinate 

has to do, all the time. . . .It might be an effective way to do certain things. It is not an effective 

way to fight. . . . You will lose battles and wars if you approach warfare like that. . . . So we 

have to practice what we preach. We preach “mission command” but we don’t necessarily 

practice it on a day to day basis in everything we do.

Sydney J. Freedberg Jr., “Let Leaders off The Electronic Leash: CSA Milley” Breaking Defense, May 

5, 2017, https://breakingdefense.com/2017/05/let-leaders-off-the-electronic-leash-csa-milley/. The 

author is indebted to Colonel Robert M. Klein for this reference. See also note 53 above for retired 

General Stanley McChrystal’s discussion of delegation of authority and his concept of “Eyes On, Hands 

Off,” which emphasizes the dangers of micromanagement. 

101. Commenting on information sharing in the Pentagon, two former officials observe: 

There is a fear among some at the Department of Defense that this type of data would facilitate micromanagement from leadership or—worse—from Congress. This is anathema to 

all in an organization that valorizes mission command. Yes, no one wants the secretary of 

defense to call up a battalion commander demanding better outcomes on measures only 

partly within that unit’s control. But mission command—empowering lower echelons—

does not mean that senior leaders should be kept in the dark. Mission command may be 

about “hands off,” but it must be, as a corollary, “eyes on.” Having better data (and the 

systems to use it) would allow the department to tailor interventions, share successes, and 

demonstrate what works and what doesn’t.

Brad Carson and Morgan Plummer, “Defense Reform in the Next Administration,” War on the Rocks, 

September 12, 2016, https://warontherocks.com/2016/09/defense-reform-in-the-next-administration/.

102. See the discussion of micromanagement and war planning in Christopher Lamb with 

Megan Franco, “National-Level Coordination and Implementation: How System Attributes Trumped 

Leadership,” in Lessons Encountered: Learning from the Long War, ed. Richard D. Hooker Jr. and Joseph 

J. Collins (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 2015), 197–201; 214–16.

103. McChrystal is an interesting case in this regard. He emphasizes the importance of senior 

leaders being aware of subordinate activities: 

I told subordinates that if they provided me with sufficient, clear information about their 

operations, I would be content to watch from a distance. If they did not, I would describe 

in graphic terms the “exploratory surgery” necessary to gain the situational awareness I 

needed. They were free to make all the decisions they wanted—as long as they provided the 

visibility that, under shared consciousness, had become the standard.

This was the “Eyes On” part of McChrystal’s dictum, but the “Hands Off” component of his injunction 

implies no interference with subordinate decisions. However, the importance of shared situational 

awareness suggests well-informed senior leaders occasionally will need to intervene and provide 

guidance to subordinates. McChrystal, Team of Teams, 217.

104. James R. Locher, Victory on the Potomac: The Goldwater-Nichols Act Unifies the Pentagon

(College Station: Texas A & M University Press, 2004), 279. See all of chapter 14: “McFarlane Outflanks 

the Pentagon,” 277–98.

105. Rearden, Council of War, 384.

106. Gary Weikel, letter to the author, October 29, 1991. At the time, military officers on the NSC 

staff noted how “conventional” the Pentagon military options were. See note 22 on page 224.
Notes

269

107. Richard Green, “Ted Lunger and the Creation of USSOCOM,” Tip of the Spear, April 2014. 

Green works in US Special Operations Command’s History and Research Office, and Tip of the Spear

is the command’s publication.

108. Holloway, Aircraft Carriers at War, 427.

109. Ibid., 402, 426.

110. James R. Locher, the lead SASC staffer for the legislation makes this point often in presentations. James R. Locher III, telephone conversation with the author, May 18, 2017; and James R. Locher 

III, email to the author, May 18, 2017.

111. Jones interview, 202.

112. General Joseph F. Dunford, USMC, Remarks in Q&A at the Center for a New American 

Security Next Defense Forum, Washington, DC, December 16, 2015.

113. Scowcroft has made this point. Pfaltzgraff and Davis, National Security Decisions, 273–74. It 

is often forgotten that Kennedy used the Executive Committee during the Cuban Missile Crisis rather 

than managing it directly through his NSC.

114. For Kissinger’s negative take on Ford’s use of the NSC as his decision making mechanism, 

see Years of Renewal, 572–73.

115. Rearden, Council of War, 389n66.

116. Mahoney cites and approves of Kissinger’s observation that it was dangerous to have 

the NSC exercise oversight, thinking Kissinger was taking a stand against micromanagement. 

This is not the case, as Kissinger’s subsequent argument for a subgroup exercising the requisite 

control indicates. Mahoney, Mayaguez Incident, 214.

117. See the discussion in Project on National Security Reform, Forging a New Shield (Washington, DC: Project on National Security Reform, 2008), which cites John P. Leacacos, “Kissinger‘s 

Apparat,” in Fateful Decisions: Inside the National Security Council, Karl F. Inderfurth and Loch K. 

Johnson, eds., (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 86; Kissinger, White House Years, 28–29, 48, 

805–806; Henry M. Kissinger, Years of Upheaval (Boston: Little, Brown, 1982), 435; and comments to 

Richard Holbrooke in To End a War, rev. ed. (New York: Modern Library, 1999), 117.

118. Kissinger once observed that “personality clashes are reduced; too much is usually at stake 

for normal jealousies to operate. In a crisis only the strongest strive for responsibility; many hide 

behind a line of consensus that they will be reluctant to shape; others concentrate on registering 

objections that will provide alibis after the event. The few prepared to grapple with circumstances 

are usually undisturbed in the eye of the hurricane.” This was not true of the Mayaguez crisis, where 

Schlesinger had a strong influence on outcomes. Robert Shrum, “The Most Hated Man,” Time, October 

15, 1979, 44, cited in Major Ken Robinson, USA, “Mayaguez and National Security Decision Making in 

Crisis” (student paper, Command and Staff College, Marine Corps University, 1997). 

119. DeFrank, Write it When I’m Gone, 91.

120. Alexander George, “The case for Multiple Advocacy in Making Foreign Policy,” American 

Political Science Review 66, no. 3 (September 1972): 751–85.

121. Rearden, Council of War, 384.

122. For example, in his memoirs Kissinger describes the orders Ford issued in the first NSC 

meeting as “crisp” and quotes the first such order: “First, we use the aircraft to stop any boats leaving 

the island. You do not sink them, necessarily, but can you take some preventive action?” “Some preventative action” falls far short of automatically sinking the vessels and gave the Pentagon a significant 

degree of latitude. See also the discussion on pages 83–84. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 558.

123. Locher, Victory on the Potomac, 38.
Notes

270

124. Project on National Security Reform, Forging a New Shield, 222.

125. Ibid., 587.

126. Ibid.; and Christopher Lamb, “National Security Reform,” in Charting a Course: Strategic 

Choices for a New Administration, ed. Richard Hooker (Washington, DC: National Defense University 

Press, 2016). 

127. Some sense of the remorse involved in the loss of the three missing Marines can be gathered from the interviews in Wise and Baron, 14-Hour War. As for a “cover up,” many recall being 

told not to discuss the fate of the Marines with the press, but Lieutenant Colonel Austin argues an 

extensive investigation was mounted and “nothing was covered up.” See Wise and Baron, 14-Hour 

War, 104, 111, 116, 144, 200, 254–56, 268.

128. Karl Marlantes, “Vietnam: The War That Killed Trust,” New York Times, January 7, 2017.

129. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 558.

130. Davidson does a good job of documenting this and other civil-military tensions that arise 

in civilian review of military plans. Janine Davidson, “Civil-Military Friction and Presidential Decision Making: Explaining the Broken Dialogue,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 43, no.1 (2013): 129–45.

131. For an argument to this effect, see Christopher J. Lamb and Joseph C. Bond, “National 

Security Reform and the 2016 Election,” Strategic Forum 293 (April 2016).

132. Cited in Vandenbroucke, Perilous Options, 113.

133. Schlesinger Veteran interview.

134. Hartmann, Palace Politics, 327.

135. Cheney, In My Time, 83.

136. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 575.

137. Schlesinger Veteran interview.

138. That has always been this author’s view. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 262–65.

139. Ford made this point in an NSC meeting when he said if the boat got to the mainland, “and 

we have done the other things we are contemplating, there will not be much opportunity for them 

anyway.” He also said it two days later when Hugh Sidey of Time magazine interviewed him, asking 

why he had not tried to negotiate for the crew after they were taken. Ford said that had not worked in 

the case of the Pueblo and that “we were dealing with a government that, by its recent actions, had 

shown a very abnormal attitude toward its own people and I could imagine how they might treat 

Americans.” Thornton, Times of Heroism, 107.

140. Schlesinger Veteran interview.

141. See Ephron’s reporting on how Israel now deals with citizens taken hostage. Dan Ephron, 

“Israel: Better Hostages Dead than Alive: Operation Hannibal,” Politico, July–August 2015, http://

www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/06/operation-hannibal-119209_Page2.html#.WSR6FaqwefA.

142. Wetterhahn, Last Battle, 103.

143. Stars and Stripes, May 17, 1975, 2.

144. Swift also recalled the impact of Reagan’s pronouncements, stating that “one of these Iranian 

guys came in and said, ‘you all better hope you get out before Ronald Reagan comes in because he will 

take military measures, and all of us will die.’ And I think that was quite possible too. They just figured 

that when Reagan came in that they believed his rhetoric, that indeed he would take action.” Elizabeth 

Ann Swift, interviewed by Charles Stuart Kennedy, December 16, 1992, Association for Diplomatic 

Studies and Training, Foreign Affairs Oral History Project, 42.

145. Ibid., 44.
Notes

271

146. Ibid.

147. Barak Barfi, “How the White House Abandoned American Hostages,” Foreign Policy, June 

23, 2015, http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/06/23/how-the-white-house-abandoned-american-hostages

-foley-sotloff-mueller/. 

Conclusion 

1. For example, Marine General James L. Jones, former Supreme Allied Commander, Europe, 

reiterated the micromanagement charge on the occasion of President Ford’s funeral in 2007. Jones, 

who later would become national security advisor, commented on the Mayaguez crisis, saying: “One 

of the mistakes that was made in the senior echelons was that once the crew was released, the politicians wanted to stop the landing. So you had half the troops on the ground, another half waiting to go 

in; it was chaos.” In 1975 Jones was a member of the Marines’ 3rd Battalion, 9th Marines, but did not 

participate in the Mayaguez operations because he was on leave at the time. John J. Kruzel, “Mayaguez

Incident Tested President Ford’s Mettle,” American Forces Press Service, January 3, 2007.

2. Lamb, “Mayaguez Crisis: Correcting 30 Years.” 

3. Patricia Cohen, “Field Study: Just How Relevant Is Political Science?” New York Times, October 

19, 2009. 

4. “Does the Academy Matter?,” Foreign Policy, March 14, 2014, http://foreignpolicy

.com/2014/03/15/does-the-academy-matter/. 

5. Nicholas Kristof, “Professors, We Need You!,” New York Times, February 15, 2014.

6. Lamb, “Mayaguez Crisis: Correcting 30 Years,” 69.

7. See Forging a New Shield, 222, and particularly the 107 case studies that report draws upon.

8. For a quick survey of nine such studies, see the chart in Lamb and Joseph Bond, “National 

Security Reform and the 2016 Election,” 4.

9. Lamb, “National Security Reform.”

10. Wetterhahn’s account, The Last Battle, is particularly good in this respect, as are the personal 

testimonies of participants in Wise and Baron’s The 14-Hour War.

11. Lamb, Belief Systems and Decision Making, 279.

12. The vast majority of the literature on the Mayaguez is highly critical of the Ford administration. However, it should be noted that the most recent book on the crisis, Mahoney’s The Mayaguez

Incident, is on the whole sympathetic to the difficult decisions US leaders faced. More generally, many 

senior leaders have expressed concern about the quality of the national debate over security issues 

following the terror attacks on September 11, 2001. See Lamb with Franco, “National-Level Coordination and Implementation,” 238–40.

273

Map Credits

Introduction

Mainland Southeast Asia

Marine Corps History Division

Chapter 1 

Local Area Map

Adapted from The Four Days of Mayaguez by Roy Rowan (W. W. Norton, 1975)

Chapter 2

Locations of US Air Bases in Thailand

Map by the author

Chapter 3

Command and Control Communications, May 14–15, 1975

Adapted from The Last Battle: The Mayaguez Incident and the End of the Vietnam War by Ralph 

F. Wetterhahn

Planned Tang Island and Mayaguez Actions: 0600 hrs, May 15, 1975

Adapted from The Last Boarding Party: The USMC and the SS Mayaguez 1975 by Clayton K. S. 

Chun, © Osprey Publishing, part of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.

Tang Island: Khmer Rouge Defensive Positions, 6:20 a.m., May 15, 1975

Adapted from The Last Battle: The Mayaguez Incident and the End of the Vietnam War by Ralph 

F. Wetterhahn

Tang Island: Situation 7:00 a.m., May 15, 1975

Adapted from The Last Battle: The Mayaguez Incident and the End of the Vietnam War by Ralph 

F. Wetterhahn

Chapter 4

Marine Forces on Tang Island after First Wave

Adapted from The Last Boarding Party: The USMC and the SS Mayaguez 1975 by Clayton K. S. 

Chun, © Osprey Publishing, part of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.
274

Map Credits

Tang Island: Situation 4:00 p.m., May 15, 1975

Adapted from The Last Battle: The Mayaguez Incident and the End of the Vietnam War by Ralph 

F. Wetterhahn

Chapter 5

Operations against SS Mayaguez and Koh Tang

Adapted from The Last Boarding Party: The USMC and the SS Mayaguez 1975 by Clayton K. S. 

Chun, © Osprey Publishing, part of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.
275

Abramowitz, Morton I., 106, 127

Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Service, 106

affective concepts, 154

Air Force, US (USAF)

40th Aerospace Rescue and Recover y 

Squadron, 43

56th Security Police Squadron, 27

locations US air bases in Thailand, 20

operations planning, 38–39

See also Commander of US Support Activities Group and Seventh Air Force

Airborne Command Post, 94

aircraft, fixed-wing

A-6 Intruder, 54, 55

A-7 Corsair, 28, 31, 54, 55, 59, 61

AC-130 Spectre gunship, 31, 46, 48, 59, 61

OV-10 Bronco forward air control aircraft, 

60–61, 106

B-52 Stratofortress

considerations of mainland strikes, 

91–92

debate concerning use of, 14, 15, 33, 

36–37, 73

opposition to use of, 15, 33, 36, 165

C-130 Hercules, 62

EC-130 airborne command and control aircraft, 38

F-4 Phantom, 19, 21, 30, 59, 61

U-21 Ute, 45, 124

airstrikes

first wave, 51

second wave, 54

third wave, 55, 57

armed reconnaissance mission, 93

cancellation of, 50–51, 60, 94

Coral Sea TACAIR assignments, 51, 54–55, 57

debate concerning use of, 14, 15, 33, 36, 73

Ford’s reaction to cancellation

planning of, 38–39, 41

resumption of, 51, 54

use of riot control agents, 31

Albert, Congressman Carl B., 43

Allison, Graham T., 137

armed reconnaissance

definition of, 93

Army, US (USA)

and Mayaguez operations, 43, 45

Austin, Lieutenant Colonel Randall W., USMC, 

45–48, 57–59, 61–65, 124–25

Bay of Pigs, 105–6

belief system model, 116–17, 151–60

belief systems, decision makers’

as guide to evaluating decision makers’ 

postcrisis explanations, 116–19, 

134–35

major themes of, 151–60

Ford

concern with US prestige, 118

on use of force, 153

Kissinger

concern with American prestige, 155, 

259–60n80

concern with North Korea, 178–79

on lessons of Vietnam, 152, 155

on use of force, 154–55

view of EC-121 crisis, 154–55

Schlesinger

on American credibility, 155

on disproportionate force, 72, 143, 155, 

157–58

Index
Index

276

belief systems, decision makers’ (continued)

Scowcroft

on Pueblo analogy, 156

similarities with Kissinger, 153–54

BLU-82 bomb, 39, 62–63

Brown, General George S., USAF, 95, 98–100

Brzezinski, Zbigniew, 179, 200, 264n46

Buchen, Philip W., 33, 40–41, 93, 144, 209

Bucher, Captain Lloyd M., 14, 209, 211

Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), 11, 

22, 35, 52

bureaucratic politics model, 142–51

Burns, Lieutenant General John L., USAF

authorization requirements, 26

communication to resume airstrikes, 51, 96

impact of faulty intelligence, 125–26

operations planning, 38–39

orders to isolate Tang Island, 20–21

use of BLU-82, 39, 62

Bush, George H. W., 175, 222n14, 252n139

Byrd, Senator Robert C., 24

Cambodia

attacks by, 23, 43, 45–48

broadcast announcing release of Mayaguez, 

48–49

communication with China, 15, 27

communication with United States, 48

considerations of mainland strikes, 91–101

defense of Tang Island, 45–48

estimates of defenders on Tang Island, 32, 41

indications of possible diplomatic resolution to crisis, 22–23, 35

NSC members’ opinion on motivation for 

behavior, 12–13

opinions on ultimatum to, 23, 24–25, 40–41, 

74–80

overview of crisis, 1–7

resistance to Marine withdrawal

See also Khmer Rouge

Carter, Jimmy, 179

case studies

configurative-idiosyncratic, 137–38

disciplined-configurative, 137, 138

Cassidy, Captain Barry, 59

casualties

expectations of, 41

number of, 27, 48, 65, 240n2

prevention of higher numbers of, 105, 106

Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)

Colby’s opinion on motivation for Cambodian behavior, 12

Foreign Broadcast Information Service, 49, 

51, 96

chain of command, 199

Chen, Huang, 134, 175

China, People’s Republic of (PRC)

communication with Cambodia, 15, 27

communication with United States, 48, 

226n3

Ingersoll’s communication from, 15

reaction to US behavior in crisis, 174–76

report of use of influence in crisis, 35

CIA. See Central Intelligence Agency

Cicere, Second Lieutenant Michael A., USMC, 

48, 59, 61

CINCPAC. See commander in chief, Pacific 

Command

civil-military relations, 1–7, 203–6

Clements, William P., Jr., 13, 33, 41, 72, 144–45, 

227n16, 243n40, 256n33

Clifford, Clark M., 14

Colby, William E.

briefing to NSC meeting, 23, 39

considerations of mainland strikes, 91

estimate of Cambodian strength, 41

impact of faulty intelligence, 123, 127

misperception of crisis, 129

on motivation for Cambodian behavior, 12

North Korean concern, 133

on timing of military operations, 32

com ma nder i n ch ief, Pac i f ic Com ma nd 

(CINCPAC)

chain of command, 199

military operations planning, 15–16

Commander of US Support Activities Group and 

Seventh Air Force, 26

communications map, 38

COMUSSAG/7AF. See Com ma nder of US 

Support Activities Group and 

Seventh Air Force

configurative-ideographic approach, 137–38

configurative-idiosyncratic approach, 137

Congress

Ford’s briefing to, 42–43
Index

277

investigation of Mayaguez crisis, 111–12

reaction to handling of crisis, 110–12

Coogan, Rear Admiral R. P., 64–65

Coral Sea, USS

cancellation of airstrikes, 50–51, 60, 94

debate concerning use of aircraft, 33, 36

opinions on redirecting carrier, 13–14

redirection of, 15

resumption of airstrikes, 51, 54–55, 57

Coulter, Lieutenant (junior grade) R. T., 64–65

Cuban missile crisis, 137

Cushman, General Robert E., Jr., USMC, 37

Daniel, Congressman Dan, 195

Davis, Captain James H., 63–65

decision-making models

belief system model, 116–17, 151–60

bureaucratic politics model, 142–51

information requirements, 160–62

rational actor model, 139–42

Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA)

draft ultimatum to Cambodia, 24–25, 77

estimate of Cambodian strength on Tang 

Island, 32

impact of faulty intelligence, 124, 127, 162–63

indications of possible diplomatic resolution to crisis, 22–23

defense reform, 195–97

Deng Xiaoping, 27, 175–76

Department of Defense (DoD)

ultimatum consideration, 76

on use of force, 22

Department of State

Bureau of Intelligence and Research, 11, 22, 

35, 52

Kissinger’s control of staff, 77–78

DIA. See Defense Intelligence Agency

diplomacy

communication efforts with China and 

Cambodia, 48

efforts of, 42–43

Kissinger’s reluctance to seek diplomatic 

resolution, 36, 74–79

disciplined-configurative approach, 137, 138

DoD. See Department of Defense

domestic politics, 34, 108, 109, 110–14, 122, 168, 213

domino theory, 153

Dunford, General Joseph F., USMC, 196–97

Eagleton, Senator Thomas F., 111–12

Eastland, Senator James O., 110

EC-121 crisis, 70, 71, 87, 154–55

FBIS. See Foreign Broadcast Information Service

fishing boat

decisions concerning use of riot control 

agents, 30–32

release of Mayaguez crew to, 53

sighted, 28, 53

Fisk, Technical Sergeant Wayne L., USAF, 64, 

219n3

Ford, President Gerald R.

adjustments to the description of crisis 

behaviors, 101–3

anger toward Schlesinger, 144–50, 166–67

announcement of recovery of ship and 

crew, 59

belief system, 156–59

briefing to Congress, 42–43

communication with Schlesinger, 19–20, 

21, 27, 54–55

communication with Scowcroft, 19, 27–28

concerns regarding inaccurate information, 23

considerations of mainland strikes, 91–101

decision-making process, 115–22

decision to resume airstrikes, 51

declaration of incident as act of piracy, 15

desire to handle crisis, 11

domestic political concerns, 110–14

firing of Schlesinger, 166–67

on Khmer Rouge, 30, 129

misperception of crisis, 128–31

on operating US forces out of Thailand, 

21–22

order to sink patrol boats, 32

overview of handling of crisis, 1–7

on Pueblo crisis, 14

quarantine of Tang Island, 24

questions concerning US motivation and 

behaviors, 1–7

reaction to Cambodian broadcast, 50–51

reaction to news of crisis, 11
Index

278

Ford, President Gerald R. (continued)

reaction to news t hat crew had been 

released, 54

response to Cambodian broadcast, 51

on timing of military operations, 25–26, 33, 

86–89

on ultimatum to Cambodia, 24–25

on use of force, 73, 80–82, 153

on use of riot control agents, 31

on War Powers Act, 111

Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS), 

49, 51, 96

Gallup poll, 14

GAO. See US General Accounting Office

Gayler, Admiral Noel A. M., 15–16, 50, 55, 62, 

94–99

General Accounting Office. See US General 

Accounting Office

Gleysteen, William H., Jr., 174

Goldwater-Nichols Act, 195–96

Guilmartin, John F., 105–6, 107, 119–20, 133, 181

Habib, Philip C., 1, 49

Hall, Gary L., 64

Hancock, USS, 69, 79, 85

Hargrove, Joseph N., 64

Harold E. Holt, USS, 39, 44–45, 63, 85, 86, 147

Hartmann, Robert T., 59, 207

helicopters

CH-53 Sea Stallion, 43, 106

HH-53 “Super Jolly Green Giant,” 43, 106

Henry B. Wilson, USS, 39, 48, 53, 61, 64, 97

Holloway, Admiral James L., III, 40, 41, 93, 95, 

99, 195–96

Holsti, Ole, 137–38

Holtzman, Congresswoman Elizabeth, 111

Houghton, David P., 168

Hunt, Major General Ira A. “Jim,” 126

Hutto, Representative Earl D., 195

Hyland, William G., 11, 114

Ingersoll, Robert S., 15, 49, 79

INR. See Bureau of Intelligence and Research

intelligence estimates

impact of faulty intelligence, 122–28, 162–63

IPAC. See Pacific Command’s intelligence center

Japan, 172–73

JCS. See Joint Chiefs of Staff

Jervis, Robert, 168–69

Johnson, Colonel John M., USMC, 183, 241n15, 

266n81

Johnson, Lyndon B., 112

Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS)

chain of command, 199

draft ultimatum to Cambodia, 24–25

and Mayaguez operations, 50, 55, 119

Jones, General David C., USAF

considerations of mainland strikes, 93, 96

defense reform and, 196

impact of faulty intelligence, 124, 126–27

military operations planning, 15–16

opinion of mainland bombings, 39–40, 41

on quarantine orders, 23

on timing of military operations, 33, 86–90

on ultimatum to Cambodia, 40, 77

on use of airstrikes, 36

on use of force, 73, 80–82, 146

Keith, First Lieutenant James D., “Dick,” USMC, 

47, 48, 59

Kennerly, David H., 54, 128, 129

Khmer Rouge

China influence in crisis, 35

defensive positions on Tang Island, 45

reports of attacks, 23

Kim Il Sung, 133, 135, 172–74. See also North Korea

Kissinger, Henry A.

actions following Cambodian broadcast, 

49–51

belief system, 157–60

communication with Scowcroft, 178–79

communication with Sisco, 36, 49, 52–53, 

78–79

concerns related to EC-121 crisis, 70, 71, 

154–55

considerations of mainland strikes, 91–101

d isc ussion of m i l ita r y opt ions w it h 

Schlesinger, 14–15
Index

279

on domino theory, 153

impact of faulty intelligence, 123, 126

misperception of crisis, 130

on National Security Council micromanagement, 198–200

North Korean concern, 132, 134, 178–79

notification of US allies, 42

on operating US forces out of Thailand, 

21–22, 25, 78–79

overview of handling of crisis, 1–7

on priorities during crisis, 70, 74

reaction to news of crisis, 11, 114

reaction to news t hat crew had been 

released, 54

relationship with Schlesinger, 143–51

reluctance to seek diplomatic resolution to 

crisis, 36, 74–79

response to Cambodian broadcast, 51–53

State Department staff control, 77–78

on timing of military operations, 32–33, 

86–89

on ultimatum to Cambodia, 24–25, 40–41, 77

on use of force, 13–14, 32–34, 37–39, 55, 

72–73, 83, 154–55

on use of riot control agents, 30–31

on withdrawal from Vietnam, 152–53, 155

Koh Tang. See Tang Island

Kompong Som (Sihanoukville), 13, 14, 16, 19, 21, 

26, 29, 38, 39, 40 43, 50, 55, 80, 83, 

87, 91, 93, 94, 99

Korea. See North Korea; South Korea

Kraft, Joseph, 123

Laird, Melvin R., 200

Laitin, Joseph, 38, 145

Lucas, First Lieutenant John P., USAF, 61

M-60 machine gun, 61, 64

Mahoney, Robert J., 120–22, 133

Mansfield, Senator Michael J., 111

maps

command and control communications, 38

Khmer Rouge defensive positions on Tang 

Island, 45

local area, 12

locations US air bases in Thailand, 20

mainland Southeast Asia, 3

Marine forces on Tang Island after first 

wave, 58

operations against SS Mayaguez and Tang 

Island, 81

planned Tang Island and Mayag uez 

actions, 44

Tang Island assault, 47

Tang Island evacuation efforts, 62

Marine Corps, US (USMC)

assault on Tang Island, 2, 22, 45–48

boarding of Mayaguez, 43–45

close air support of, 39, 59, 60–61, 95, 96

commandant of, 37

evacuation efforts, 60–65

forces on Tang Island after first wave, 58

improvised radio relay system, 59

missing Marines on Tang Island, 64–65

moved from Okinawa to Thailand, 25, 26

operations planning, 38–39

orders to deploy, 26

personnel left on Tang Island, 64–65

reaction to BLU-82, 62–63

reaction to cessation of operations, 60

second wave sent to Tang Island, 57

transport of forces, 43

units

1st Battalion, 4th Marines, 43

1st Battalion, 9th Marines, 107, 185

2nd Battalion, 9th Marines, 43

withdrawal order, 60

Marlantes, Karl, 203

Marsh, John O., Jr., 32, 74

Marshall, Danny G., 64

Mayaguez, SS

operations against, 81

quarantine of, 19–20, 80–85

release of crew, 53

Mayaguez crisis

adjustments to description of crisis behaviors, 101–3

day one of debate and decision making, 

11–17

day two of debate and decision making, 

19–34

day three of debate and decision making, 

35–55

day four of debate and decision making, 57–65
Index

280

Mayaguez crisis (continued)

diplomacy efforts, 42–43, 74–80

efficacy of force, 169–79

evacuation efforts, 60–65

execution of critical decisions, 74–101

Ford’s declaration as act of piracy, 15

impact of faulty intelligence, 122–28

international implications of, 26, 171–79

key events and decisions, 75

leaflets drop consideration, 65

micromanagement, 179–95

misperception of, 128–31

mission command, 179–95

morality of force, 206–11

motives for US response, 108–36, 213–17

operational and tactical issues, 106–8

overview of handling of crisis, 1–7

priorities of critical decision-makers, 69–74

questions concerning US motivation and 

behaviors, 1–7

as rescue operation, 138

riot control gas use, 30–32, 44

timing of operations, 25–26, 85–91

The Mayaguez Incident (Mahoney), 120–22, 133

McDaniel, Second Lieutenant James, USMC, 47

McFarlane, Major Robert C. “Bud,” USMC

communication to resume airstrikes, 51

communication with Scowcroft, 16

considerations of mainland strike, 95

informing Ford and aides on return of crew, 54

on need for situation reports, 36

McGovern, Senator George S., 111

McNemar, Gunnery Sergeant Lester, USMC, 65

micromanagement concept, 179–95

military chain of command, 199

military operations, US

adjustments to description of crisis behaviors, 101–3

assault on Tang Island, 43–45

beginning of crisis, 11–17

chain of command, 199

confusion concerning, 38–39

considerations of mainland strikes, 91–101

Coral Sea TACAIR assignments, 51, 54–55, 57

efficacy of force, 169–79

execution of critical decisions, 74–101

international implications of, 26

key events and decisions, 75

loss of helicopters, 46–48

micromanagement, 179–95

mission command, 179–95

misunderstandings between Pentagon and 

the White House, 16

morality of force, 206–11

operational and tactical issues, 106–8

options for, 14–15

overview of handling of crisis, 1–7

planning of, 15–16, 39–40

priorities of critical decision-makers, 69–74

questions concerning US motivation and 

behaviors, 1–7

riot control gas use, 30–32, 44

timing of, 25–26, 85–91

transport of forces, 43

withdrawal order, 60

Miller, Captain Charles T.

description of US pilots’ efforts to turn 

around fishing boat, 31

stalling tactics, 19

on use of riot control gas, 31

mission command concept, 179–95

morality of force, 206–11

Nakhon Phanom, 20

National Military Command Center (NMCC), 11, 

26, 36, 51, 54

National Security Agency (NSA), 23, 51–52

National Security Council (NSC)

first meeting, 12–14, 113

second meeting, 23–24, 75, 76, 80

third meeting, 30–34, 72, 75, 78, 86

fourth meeting, 39–42, 77, 79, 113, 147

fifth meeting, 147–48

indications of possible diplomatic resolution to crisis, 35

reform, 197–203

Navy, US (USN)

cancellation of TACAIR strikes, 50

EC-121 crisis, 70, 71

operations planning, 38–39

use of SEALs, 64–65

See also Coral Sea, USS; Hancock, USS; Harold E. Holt, USS; Henry B. Wilson, 

USS; Okinawa, USS

Nelson, Senator Gaylord A., III, 111
Index

281

Nessen, Ronald H. “Ron”

Ford’s informing of crisis, 12

news media questioning on crisis, 37–38

on response to Cambodian broadcast, 52

White House photo with Ford and celebratory advisors, 54

news media

explanations for US response to crisis, 108–

9, 115–22

questioning of military operations during 

crisis, 112

reports on crisis, 37

Newsweek, 109, 131–32

Nixon, Richard M., 109, 144

NMCC. See National Military Command Center

North Korea

EC-121 crisis, 70, 71

Pueblo crisis, 14

US decision maker’s concern with, 108–9, 

131–36

NSA. See National Security Agency

NSC. See National Security Council

Okinawa, USS, 79

O’Neill, Congressman Thomas P., 43, 110

Operation Eagle Claw, 195

Osborne, John F., 112

Pacific Command’s intelligence center (IPAC)

considerations of mainland strike, 94–95

estimates of Cambodian strength, 32

impact of faulty intelligence, 124, 127, 

162–63

Pahlavi, Ashraf, 175

Pahlavi, Mohammad Reza, shah of Iran, 52, 131, 

152, 172, 226n3, 229n40, 229n42

Park Chung Hee, 133, 178

Pauly, Lieutenant General John W., USAF, 27, 

28–30, 84

Perilous Options (Vandenbroucke), 118–19, 133

Phnom Penh, 55, 129–30

Pol Pot, 253–54n13

Poulo Wai, island of, 12, 16, 22, 81, 130

Powell, Colin L., 200

Pramoj, Kukrit, 25

public opinion

and decision makers’ concern over strategic 

bombings, 114

divided by Vietnam War, 112

expectations in hostage crises, 115

likely reaction to failure in crisis, 72

and Mayaguez crisis, 36, 136

monitored by White House, 110

and Pueblo crisis, 70

sensitivity to public opinion on use of 

B-52s, 114

Pueblo analogy

different interpretations of explanatory 

importance possible, 246n9

Ford’s concern with, 246n79, 248n103

and Kissinger, 156, 246n79, 253n7

military’s concern with, 70

Scowcroft’s concern with, 156, 246n79

significance of, 246n79, 248n103

Pueblo crisis, 13, 14, 70, 128, 156

Qiao Guanhua, 175

Rabin, Yitzhak, 171–72

Radio Phnom Penh, 51, 96

rational actor model, 139–42

Reagan, Ronald W., 168

Ream, 39, 54, 55, 83, 140

riot control agents

airstrikes, 31–32

discussion on use of, 30–31

use on Mayaguez, 44

Rockefeller, David, 134

Rockefeller, Vice President Nelson A.

concerns regarding inaccurate information, 23

opinion on redirecting USS Coral Sea, 14

on priorities during crisis, 70

reaction to news of crisis, 114–15

on risks of island assault, 23–24

on significance of Mayaguez crisis handling, 13

on timing of military action, 85–86

on use of force, 33, 80

Rumsfeld, Donald H.

impact of faulty intelligence, 123
Index

282

Rumsfeld, Donald H. (continued)

reaction to news t hat crew had been 

released, 54

on timing of military operations, 88–89

on ultimatum to Cambodia, 77

on use of airstrikes, 33, 35–36

Scali, John A., 37, 53, 78

Schlesinger, James R.

cancellation of fourth airstrike, 60

communication with Ford, 19–20, 21, 54–55

concern of collateral damage, 37

considerations of mainland strikes, 91–93, 

96–97, 100

d isc ussion of m i l ita r y opt ions w it h 

Kissinger, 14–15

on domino theory, 154

estimates of Cambodian strength, 32, 41

firing of, 166–67

impact of faulty intelligence, 123–24, 127

misperception of crisis, 130

on motivation for Cambodian behavior, 

12–13

North Korean concern, 132

on operating US forces out of Thailand, 

21–22

opposition to B-52 use, 15, 33, 36, 165

orders to Burns to isolate Tang Island, 20–21

outline of military options for president, 13

on priorities during crisis, 70

reaction to Cambodian broadcast, 51

relationship with Ford, 144–50, 166–67

relationship with Kissinger, 143–51

on risks of island assault, 24

sensitivity to public opinion on use of B-52s, 73

on timing of military operations, 33, 86–87, 

89–90

on ultimatum to Cambodia, 23, 40, 77

on use of force, 22, 72–73, 80–85, 206–7

on use of riot control agents, 30–31

view on operations in Vietnam, 155–56

Scowcroft, Lieutenant General Brent, USAF

actions following Cambodian broadcast, 

49–51

on advisability of bombings, 36

on attempt to disable fishing boat, 27–30

belief system, 157–59

communication with Ford, 19, 27–28

communication with Kissinger, 178–79

communication with McFarlane, 16

communication with Wickham, 16–17, 19, 

27–30

considerations of mainland strikes, 91–101

on domino theory, 153–54

misunderstandings with Pentagon on military options planning, 16

North Korean concern, 133

orders to sink patrol boats, 32

on priorities during crisis, 69–70

Pueblo crisis views, 156

reaction to news of crisis, 11

reaction to news t hat crew had been 

released, 54

on risks of island assault, 24

on timing of military operations, 25–26, 86

on use of force, 73, 80–82

on use of riot control agents, 30–31

SEALs, 64–65

Senate Foreign Relations Committee, 38

Seventh Air Force. See Commander of US 

Support Activities Group and 

Seventh Air Force

Shultz, George P., 200

Singlaub, Major General John K., USA, 182–83, 194

Sisco, Joseph J.

communication with Kissinger, 36, 49, 

52–53, 78–79

diplomatic initiatives of, 36, 37, 49

interruption of NSC meeting for guidance, 42

on Kissinger’s relationship with Ford, 

261n99

notification of US allies, 42

role in NSC meeting, 75

Sitton, Lieutenant General Ray B., USAF, 222n15

South Korea, 108, 132–36

Southeast Asia

map of, 3

Special Operations Command reforms, 196

Special Operations Squadron, 21st, 43

Spectre-61, 31, 46, 48, 59, 61

State Department. See Department of State

Stearman, William Lloyd, 51, 55, 94, 134–35

Steele, Vice Admiral George P., 89

Swift, Elizabeth Ann, 210
Index

283

Ta Mok, 130

TACAIR. See tactical air

tactical air

armed reconnaissance mission, 93

cancellation of use, 50–51, 60, 94

debate concerning use of, 14, 15, 33, 36, 73

planning of use, 38–39, 41

resumption of strikes, 51, 54–55, 57

use of riot control agents, 31

Talbott, Strobe, 25

Tang Island

assault of, 43–48

Cambodian defense of, 45–48

evacuation efforts, 60–65

insertion of Marines, 43–48

Khmer Rouge defensive positions, 45

map of, 12

Marine forces on island after first wave, 58

Marines left on, 64–65

operations against, 81

quarantine of, 24

tear gas. See riot control agents

Thailand

anger concerning US forces operating out of 

Thailand, 25

captive fishermen, 31

locations of US air bases, 20

opinions concerning operating US forces 

out of Thailand, 21–22, 79

Tonkin Gulf Resolution, 112

UN. See United Nations

Undorf, Major Robert W., USAF, 60–61

United Nations (UN), 37, 48, 78, 136

United States

communication with Cambodia, 48

communication with People’s Republic of 

China, 48

efficacy of use of force, 25, 93, 99, 148

Ford administration’s threat against Korea, 

108–9, 131–32, 134

Kissinger on use of force, 13–14, 32–34, 

37–39, 55, 72–73, 83

location of military forces, 20, 81

military forces due on scene, 14, 37, 74, 77, 

79, 123, 128, 191

military objective of ship and crew recovery, 

99, 117

proportionate versus disproportionate 

use of force, 33, 72, 114, 139, 143, 

155–58, 193

Schlesinger on use of force, 22, 72–73, 80–85, 

206–7

US military on proportionate and discriminate use of force, 73, 100, 150, 155, 

157, 205, 259n69

use of force in hostage incidents, 13, 23

warnings to international shipping, 25, 93, 

99, 148

See also Austin, Lieutenant Colonel Randall W., USMC; Brown, General 

George S., USAF; Joint Chiefs of 

Staff; Military operations, US; US 

Support Activities Group

US General Accounting Office (GAO), 111–12, 116

US Support Activities Group (USSAG)

chain of command, 199

Nakhon Phanom location of, 20

USSAG. See US Support Activities Group

Uyl, Johannes del, 37, 49, 53

Vance, Cyrus R., 200

Vandegeer, Second Lieutenant Richard, USMC, 

46

Vandenbroucke, Lucien S., 118–19, 133, 184

A Very Short War (Guilmartin), 119–20, 133

Vietnam

dispute with Cambodia over islands, 12–13, 

128–29, 221n6

fall of Saigon, 1, 168, 173

Ford’s willingness to bomb, 260n81

impact on US behavior in crisis, 121, 152

Kissinger on US involvement in, 152–53, 155

lessons of, 112, 132–33, 152, 188

Schlesinger on aid to, 154

Scowcroft on US withdrawal from, 145

Vietnam War, 1, 112, 152, 204, 216, 220n1

Waggoner, Joseph D. “Joe,” 24

Waldheim, Kurt J.

communication with China, 48

contact with Cambodians, 48
Index

284

Waldheim, Kurt J. (continued)

US communications with, 37

War Powers Act, 6, 22, 43, 111, 113

Watergate, 112

Weikel, First Lieutenant Gary L., USAF, 195, 196

Weinberger, Caspar W., 200

Wetterhahn, Ralph, 187–88

Whitehead, Clay T., 144

Wickham, Major General John A., Jr., USA

on attempt to disable fishing boat, 28–30

communication on timing of military operations, 25–26

communication to resume airstrikes, 51

communication with Scowcroft, 16–17, 19, 27–30

relationship with Schlesinger, 167

on use of military force, 36–37, 83–84

Wilson, Captain Gregory, 63

Word, Brigadier General Charles E., USAF, 94–96

Wyatt, Staff Sergeant J., USMC, 61

Xiannian, Li, 174

Ybarra, Lance Corporal A. Louis, USMC, 61
Dr. Christopher J. Lamb 

fellow in the Center for 

Institute for National St

Defense University. H

national security strateg

reform, defense strategy

programs, and special o

ous positions include de

defense for resources an

Secretary of Defense; st

on National Security Re

a New Shield; deputy dir

ment on the State Depa

Force for Military Stabil

director of policy planni

tant Secretary of Defense 

Low-Intensity Conflict. 

ment as a foreign service 

the Ivory Coast, and Ben

the Pentagon. He is the 

monographs, and article

he has testified to Congr

ation, special operations 

and defense reform. He 

international relations fr

after successfully defend

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished re

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at N

Defense University. He conducts resea

national security strategy and policy, organiz

reform, defense strategy, requirements, pla

programs, and special operations forces. Hi

ous positions include deputy assistant secre

defense for resources and plans in the Offic

Secretary of Defense; study director for the 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, F

a New Shield; deputy director for military de

ment on the State Department’s Interagenc

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balka

director of policy planning in the Office of th

tant Secretary of Defense for Special Operatio

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered g

ment as a foreign service officer with stints i

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assig

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous 

monographs, and articles on national secur

he has testified to Congress on interagency c

ation, special operations forces, acquisition 

and defense reform. He received his docto

international relations from Georgetown Un

after successfully defending his dissertation 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished researc

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at th

Institute for National Strategic Studies at Nationa

Defense University. He conducts research o

national security strategy and policy, organizationa

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans an

programs, and special operations forces. His prev

ous positions include deputy assistant secretary o

defense for resources and plans in the Office of th

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Projec

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forgin

a New Shield; deputy director for military develop

ment on the State Department’s Interagency Tas

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; an

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assis

tant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations an

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered govern

ment as a foreign service officer with stints in Hait

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned t

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous book

monographs, and articles on national security, an

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooper

ation, special operations forces, acquisition reform

and defense reform. He received his doctorate i

international relations from Georgetown Universit

after successfully defending his dissertation on th

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished researc

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at th

Institute for National Strategic Studies at Nationa

Defense University. He conducts research o

national security strategy and policy, organizationa

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans an

programs, and special operations forces. His prev

ous positions include deputy assistant secretary o

defense for resources and plans in the Office of th

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Projec

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forgin

a New Shield; deputy director for military develop

ment on the State Department’s Interagency Tas

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; an

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assis

tant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations an

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered govern

ment as a foreign service officer with stints in Hait

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned t

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous book

monographs, and articles on national security, an

he has testified to Congress on interagency coope

ation, special operations forces, acquisition reform

and defense reform. He received his doctorate i

international relations from Georgetown Universit

after successfully defending his dissertation on th

Mayaguez crisis. 
Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis. 

Dr. Christopher J. Lamb is a distinguished research 

fellow in the Center for Strategic Research at the 

Institute for National Strategic Studies at National 

Defense University. He conducts research on 

national security strategy and policy, organizational 

reform, defense strategy, requirements, plans and 

programs, and special operations forces. His previous positions include deputy assistant secretary of 

defense for resources and plans in the Office of the 

Secretary of Defense; study director for the Project 

on National Security Reform’s 2008 report, Forging 

a New Shield; deputy director for military development on the State Department’s Interagency Task 

Force for Military Stabilization in the Balkans; and 

director of policy planning in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and 

Low-Intensity Conflict. Dr. Lamb entered government as a foreign service officer with stints in Haiti, 

the Ivory Coast, and Benin before being assigned to 

the Pentagon. He is the author of numerous books, 

monographs, and articles on national security, and 

he has testified to Congress on interagency cooperation, special operations forces, acquisition reform, 

and defense reform. He received his doctorate in 

international relations from Georgetown University 

after successfully defending his dissertation on the 

Mayaguez crisis.