USAF Air Commando Secret Wars from Laos to Latin America

About the Book

The Air Commando secret wars happened mostly during the Vietnam War time frame and was a global effort involving USAF volunteer personnel who were given official military orders that did not necessarily specify the country they served in, and civilian clothes were many times authorized. Later they had great difficulty proving that they served in many of these countries, which affected their future VA care. These operations were used to strengthen normally a poor country with little military resources and training with secret warriors frequently being there doing some of their legwork behind the scenes. All the operations were tight-lipped, frequently forbidden to tell families where you were and what you were doing. As an example; Capt. Bob Simpson’s death, the first fighter pilot KIA in Vietnam in August 1962, became a total fabrication of where, why, and how and took a number of years before the government came clean because of my efforts. Secret wars have a long history, and they will continue because of the interest of more-powerful nations with their less fortunate brethren.

About the Author

Lt Col Eugene D. Rossel USAF Ret was influenced early in his life by air power as he lived just outside Scott AFB, Illinois, where the military flight path flew right over the family farm and later in the family home in Mascoutah, Illinois. While in high school, he joined the USAF Reserves to fly and see the world. He was commissioned a second lieutenant when he graduated as an engineer from St. Louis University in 1959. He wanted to fly, and as his eyesight worsened, he went from pilot to navigator category to a nonrated officer though in his career he was put on a noncrew flight status and jump status in our secret wars. Early in his career he volunteered for a top secret organization that went from Jungle Jim to Special Operations and he was totally involved in secret wars, either in planning or involved, around the world to include Vietnam, Latin America, Laos, and Europe. After he received a MS in Logistic from AFIT he got into more mundane activity of space and missile engineering. He retired with thirty-four years of total service and worked in space and computer science companies. During this time he wrote for the Air Commando Association for about eighteen years and later the Forward Air Controller Newsletters. He helped Australian veterans, who fought with us in Vietnam, to get some 150 USAF Air Medals which were denied them in Vietnam. He continued work for Veterans on his website, www.specialoperations.net. Travel In the military I was stationed and lived in a number of garden spots in the world. I spent about thirteen years overseas to include Vietnam, Thailand, Panama, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Laos, Spain, and Germany. I have been to over fifty countries and have been involved in two wars in Southeast Asia and was in Panama in 1964 during the riots. Most memorably experience was Vietnam in 1962 as a young lieutenant and all the shock that comes with a war, the secret war in Laos working with the CIA as a civilian in mufti and attending Laotian functions with the Russians and Chinese in ’69–’70 (who at the time were not exactly friends and who were supporting the enemy who also were part of the three headed Laos Government) and attending the Special Forces Jump school for the Americas in Panama as well as being run out of Ciudad de Panama with Panamians screaming kill the Gringo (I was he).