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Southeast Asia
ST Idaho: The special Forces team that vanished
2021-05-29
[Sandboxx] A special operations team inserted into Laos for a covert operation.

The men of ST Idaho, two Americans and four South Vietnamese indigenous troops, were tasked with locating enemy forces and activity in the A Shau Valley, close to the Ho Chi Minh Trail. The Tet Offensive earlier that year had caught U.S. forces by surprise, and commanders were constantly anxious to know the location of large enemy formations and their intentions.

A snake-like tunnel and trail system that passed through nominally neutral Cambodia and Laos, the Ho Chi Minh Trail furnished North Vietnamese troops and Vietcong guerillas with materiel and supplies as they took the war to the South. The Trail was also ideal to move divisions of troops closer to the targets.

ST Idaho was comprised of One-Zero, or team leader, Glen Oliver Lane, One-One, or assistant team leader Robert Duval Owen, and four skilled South Vietnamese indigenous troops.

The highly experienced ST Idaho inserted on the morning hours of May 20, 1968. They sent the standard "Team Okay," over the net. That was the last time anyone heard or saw them.
Posted by:M. Murcek

#2  Can someone recommend a study of the Australian trail watchers who did the same sort of workand operated out of Danang?
Posted by: Gerthudion Whomoper3485   2021-05-29 09:54  

#1  Related reading available at Amazon.

Secret War in Laos: Green Berets, CIA, and the Hmong Kindle Edition
by Steven Schofield
Posted by: Besoeker   2021-05-29 02:01  

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