0 - The Black Vault

THE BDM CORPORATION
Richard B. Clement and Jacob Van Staaveren, Number 501, US Air Force
Oral History Program (Declassified December 31, 1978), p, 4.
33, Details concerning the stay-behind cadres and their eventual augmentation
are provioed in Chapters 3 and 5 of Volume 1 of this study. One
of the opportunities seized on by the DIV was to send intelligence
personnel South in the guise of recovering remains of deceased Viet
,inh. These "grave teams" conducted agitprop activitie3 and gathered
intell gence. This situation was -eported by Anita Lauve, a foreign
service officer serving with the US Embassy in Saigon during that
period. Her comment aas made during an 8 Juie 1979 BOM interview with
former GVN Ambassador Bui Diem..
1. Mr.
V 34. Interview on 13 November 1979 with Colonel J.A. MacDonald, USMC (Ret)
who, in 1968-69 was Chief, US/SEATO Plans Division, J-52, USMACV. The
.1-52 Division was responsible for maintaining/updating the SEATO Plans
prepared for COMUSMACV who was also designed as Commander, Certral
Region, SEATO field forces for defense of Thailand and the protocol
states,
35. James H., Hanse:,, "Seven Points for Laos" research paper, 22 June 1968.
Hansen, now with BDM Corporation, monitored the Laotian political
scene before teaching an undergraduate course in international relations
at the University of Michigan. His research concluded that this
double standard on the "troops in Lacs" issue out US forces at a major
disadvantage throughout the war.
36, According to Ambassador U. Alexis Johnson, the PRC 5 road building in
northern Laos in 1960-61 was thought to threaten Thiland, but US
authorities fearcd that a US move into Laos (before such a move was
prohitited by the 1962 Geneva Accords) would bring the Chinese in and
force a US retreat to the Kra Dennisula and abandonment of Thailand.
US decision makers found they held no capability to intervene militarily
in Laos. Comments by Ambassador Johnson during the BDM Senior
Review Panel meeting on 13 February 1979.
37, Senior Review Panel meeting at BDM/Washington on 13 Pebruary 1979.
Ambassador Colby is one of the more Knowledgeable exnfficiails about
the "secret war" in Laos. General DePuy, fcrmer J-3 'IACV, and later
commander of the 1st Division commented that Ambassador Sullivan kept
the US military out of Laos and the CIA had a great time with their
little war there. BDM interview of General William DePuy, 24 Seotember
1978.
38. MG Oudone Sananikone, RLA, Th,, Royal Lao Army and US Army Advice and
Suport (McLean, VA: General.esearch Corporation), indochina Refugee
Authored Monograph Program, prepared for Department of the Army, Office
of Chief of Military History, pp. 74-7'* and 108-110, describes some of
the early White Star activities in Laos prior to the 1962 accords.
For a discussion of command relationships, see Chapter 11, Volume VI,
3-27