37. Hasty Operations

As April 1975 unfolded, South Vietnamese troops fought to delay the inevitable while the US orchestrated a fraught evacuation from Saigon. The chaos within the city was palpable, with civilians desperate to flee the advancing North Vietnamese Army.

With damaged runways, the US resorted to helicopter evacuations, where the sheer number of evacuees forced sailors to push aircraft overboard to make room. The South Vietnamese government fled to Taiwan on April 25, and Saigon fell five days later. The Seventh Fleet stayed to rescue boat refugees, marking the war’s tragic conclusion.