THE MỸ LAI MASSACRE: HOW H. THOMPSON SAVED LIVES

Hugh Thompson Jr. was a US Army helicopter pilot who saved the lives of several civilians during the Mỹ Lai massacre.

The Mỹ Lai massacre took place on March 16, 1968 in Vietnam, when a group of US soldiers was ordered to take the village of Sơn Mỹ in Sơn Tịnh district, Quảng Ngãi province, and search it for Viet Cong.There were no Viet Cong fighters there. Instead, the American soldiers began raping women, murdering 504 civilians in all and killing every animal in the village. “A lot of the girls didn’t scream much either, because their tongues had already been cut out, and a bayonet can kill two of them very fast if they’re pregnant.” - Thompson said later.

Thompson was on a reconnaissance flight over the area at the time when he saw several dead civilians. At first the crew assumed they had been killed by artillery fire by mistake, then they watched a US soldier execute a girl at point-blank range. Thompson landed at once and confronted the soldiers, but he was outranked, got nowhere and was sent away. As he lifted off again, Thompson noticed a group of civilians fleeing in panic and hiding in a bunker. American soldiers were after them. Thompson set down between the pursuers and the pursued and ordered his door gunners to fire on the US soldiers if they attacked the civilians. He climbed out and told the platoon leader on the ground that he wanted to get the civilians out of the bunker. The platoon leader suggested throwing a hand grenade in there instead.

Thompson protested and managed to evacuate 11 Vietnamese in all, with the help of two Bell UH-1 helicopters flown by pilots he was friends with. On the way out the crew suddenly spotted movement in a ditch, so they landed again, were able to save a child from among the dead and took it to a hospital.

Back at base, Thompson reported immediately to the commander of the operation, who radioed his troops and ordered all action to stop at once.

The Mỹ Lai massacre was covered up successfully for 1 year before it became public. Thompson wanted to help hold those responsible to account and got death threats from many Americans for it. Only later was he able to speak freely about what had happened. The commanders who gave the order for the massacre did stand trial, but received little or no punishment. In 1998, exactly 30 years after the massacre, Thompson and his crew received the Soldier’s Medal for Heroism.

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