Word: 52s
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Ever since the U.S. bombing halt went into effect on Aug. 15, the most ominous question about Cambodia's future has been: When would the Hanoi-backed Khmer insurgents make their big move? Despite several weeks of concentrated assaults by American B-52s, the rebel forces had been able to move to within ten miles of the capital of Phnom-Penh prior to the deadline. Those sweeping advances suggested that the troops of Cambodian President Lon Nol, once they were denied the support of U.S. warplanes, would be hard-pressed to stave off a major enemy attack...
...final moment, U.S. warplanes pummeled the area around Phnom-Penh, the Cambodian capital. It was the last day of more than six months of frantic U.S. air support of the Lon Nol regime, during which the U.S. flew 32,000 sorties (including 8,000 by B-52s) and dumped more than 245,000 tons of bombs on Cambodia. This deluge totaled 50% more than all the conventional bombs the U.S. rained upon Japan in World War II. Most of it, of course, was aimed at guerrillas hiding in heavy jungle. As a result, the bombing obviously did not inflict...
Dated Nov. 20, 1969, some seven months after the clandestine bombing began, the memorandum came from General Earle G. Wheeler, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and was initialed by Laird. It recommended that a 41-plane force of B-52s strike targets inside Cambodia while other B-52s bombed cover targets in South Viet Nam and Laos. The memorandum added: "Strikes on these latter targets will provide a resemblance to normal operations, thereby providing a credible story for replies to press inquiries." Despite the memorandum, Laird still insisted that he had not authorized any falsification-just...
...memorandum was the closest the committee has yet come during its month of hearings to pinning down who authorized the secret "double entry" reporting technique used by the Administration to hide the raids from the American people and Congress. Previous testimony established that B-52s had dropped more than 100,000 tons of bombs in 3,630 unreported missions onto suspected North Vietnamese sanctuaries in Cambodia during 14 months in 1969 and 1970. Last week, before adjourning until fall, the hearings turned up these other military activities in Southeast Asia, which hitherto had been kept secret...
...only B-52s but tactical fighter-bombers as well raided deep into Cambodia in 1970 and 1971. Former Air Force Captain George R. Moses testified that he was told to falsify tactical strikes by fighter-bombers inside Cambodia soon after the April 1970 incursion by U.S. and South Vietnamese forces. Previously, Wheeler had said that such attacks were limited to 30 miles from the border, but Moses told the committee that some strikes were as much as 100 miles inside Cambodia. He testified that the clandestine tactical strikes continued for eleven months after the U.S. invasion of Cambodia was supposed...