Robert Rheault, 87
COL Robert Rheault (Ret), US Army, passed away on 16 October 2013.
COL Rheault’s name may ring a bell. He was commander of the 5th Special Forces Group in Vietnam in 1969, and oversaw (among many other things) Project GAMMA – at the time of the “Green Beret Affair”. The resulting scandal ended his career.
I won’t comment further, except to say that – if reported accounts are accurate, as they seem almost certainly to be – I can’t condone what happened and Rheault’s apparent participation. I can certainly understand it, though.
No intent here to either lionize or criticize the man. I just thought his passing merited mention.
Category: Big Army, Historical
Col. Rheualt was in a terrible situation. The book “A Murder in Wartime” by Jeff Stein gives a fair account of what occurred and what he went through as the CO of 5th Group. RIP.
If his career was ruined for that, why is obama heralded when he orders an American traitor to be dispatched or any number of individuals who obama personally deems worthy of execution are likewise ‘droned’? Inquiring minds want to know.
Sad that this brief incident, literally a month out of his 26 year military career, should be what defines his life 40 years later. Why not focus on his work to treat PTSD, his 30 years at Hurricane Island Outward Bound, the many boards he sat on, the many philanthropic pursuits, his work civil and military work with the mountain tribes or his leadership skills.
@3 That incident doesn’t define him, but the resultant scandal ended his career. We’re seeing exactly the same kind of scandals now, that are ending careers also. The similarities are too strong to be ignored. Until we learn from history, we will continue to repeat it.
I am sorry for his family’s loss, I am not quite certain how I consider all of this because I am not quite certain that the truth sits there quite as reported.
The CIA gave some ambiguous orders and then after someone acted on those orders the CIA miraculously found a memo that was as clear as a fresh water stream advising against the previous ambiguous orders, which consequently led to others being charged with a crime. Then the CIA would not produce a single asset for trial resulting in the charges being dismissed…
That all smells normal and clean right?
I think the CIA ran an op that became compromised, the legality of the op and the use of the various units may also have been of questionable legality. I also believe the CIA is pretty damn good at making sure their off the book ops stay off the books, making bad guys disappear permanently is a simple solution to an often complex problem. This one may have been buggered up by one guy who was worried he was going to be popped next….
I did mean to end my post by saying I do not believe we know the complete truth of this incident, as a consequence I am not comfortable with the outcome. Rat bastards get killed all the time during war, especially double agent rat bastards.
I believe the charges were dropped because the CIA knew it was wrong and played the national security card to avoid being placed on the record.
As I’ve said before killing the enemy with a bomb or popping two behind his ear and dropping his body in the ocean aren’t all that different in my head…but maybe that’s what’s wrong with my head.
VOV: assuming what is reported to have happened did happen (and I’m reasonably convinced that it did), it was contrary to the UCMJ and/or the Laws of War.
However, as you point out death has been the historical fate of captured spies during wartime since roughly the dawn of warfare. IMO, that’s a just punishment.
Hence my statement that – while I can’t condone what Rheault apparently did in approving and/or covering this up – I can certainly understand the why. And I shed zero tears for the dead turncoat.
Hondo, I think good men violate the UCMJ during war time on a regular basis to get the job done. Especially in places where extreme violence is just another facet of daily life.
As long as the dark deeds stay dark nobody is too concerned with exposing them or creating issues out of whole cloth….it’s always when sh1t gets exposed or goes sour in a large way that this stuff gets addressed with general courts martial etc…
It all comes down to who is deciding what is legal or illegal…for some nations the Raufoss ammo was never to be used against personnel, for the US that is not the case.
I get why they were court martialed, I also believe I understand the outcome. Forced retirement, but charges dropped against everyone…
We ask an awful lot of these men, in conditions of great personal stress and often without perfect settings for decision making, throw in a few ambiguous rules and an enemy engaged in irregular warfare and this doesn’t get too hard to figure out the why as you stated, it’s the what’s next part that is cloudy for me sometimes.
We never know the truth, it seems. Some of you recall the 1968 photo of General Nguyen Ngoc Loan executing a VC prisoner on a Saigon street. The photo was blasted around the world and was used heavily by the anti-war types. The photographer knew the truth behind the photo. This was no indiscriminate shooting of a poor civilian suspect.
The photographer, E. Adams, later wrote in Time magazine, “The general killed the Viet Cong; I killed the general with my camera. Still photographs are the most powerful weapon in the world. People believe them, but photographs do lie, even without manipulation. They are only half-truths. What the photograph didn’t say was, “‘What would you do if you were the general at that time and place on that hot day, and you caught the so-called bad guy after he blew away one, two or three American soldiers?’”
Adams wrote those words in 1998, upon the death of the General.
I’ll stand with Rheault Jr. on this.
COL Rheault served with distinction in his career and was NOT convicted of the crime alleged. His obit should NOT focus on a charge for which he was not convicted, particularly when the author of that obit may “feel” certain but cannot be 100% of those convictions.
That does not mean that the author should avoid mention of allegations that ended the COL’s career, but that the unconvicted allegations should take up no greater amount of space in the obit, than they did in the COL’s life works.
And saying that one “has no intent to criticize” a man while using 80% of his ink to do exactly that, demonstrates that actions speak louder than words. If the author were as objective as he portends, that 1% of the COL’s life would be balanced against the 99% of good deeds he did.
@5 VOV
Indeed, SGT Smith appears to have been the weak link. How could an American soldier come to think that he would be murdered by other American soldiers, unless maybe he was dirty himself?
I agree with the statement comparing the bomb and the two to the head… I think in some ways killing has become too easy, especially for the civilians at home – as I have only heard and read, the news can’t accurately describe what it’s like – so civilians tend to believe what they see in Film or video games…
@11 Old Soldier
Not sure what motivated him really, I am hoping it was more a matter of thinking the prisoner had value as a trade item as opposed to being concerned about shooting a traitorous rat bastard spy…
It doesn’t really make sense though when you think about them shooting a traitor versus shooting a legitimate team member over a disagreement about executing a kill order on a traitor. I think there is room for some “squidge” factor if you will, and the idea that the CIA would then use national security to pull a no show at trial forcing the charges to drop leaves a lot of room for discussion about everyone’s level of propriety and guilt…
I tend to believe the government will f#ck people at the drop of a hat if it suits their purposes, consequently when they don’t f#ck someone when they could have I draw the conclusion there was a benefit to putting the whip away…
This incident and some others have always fascinated me, as to how they play out and who has paid for what and who has walked for what….and so on and so forth.
VOV: frankly, I can understand Smith’s concern even if I find it misplaced. He’d just seen the group execute a former colleague sans trial because it was “the most efficient way” to solve a problem. It’s not that great a stretch for him to assume that they might do the same to him as well if he became a “problem”.
Don’t think it couldn’t happen. There were numerous instances of exactly that in Vietnam involving incompetent or seriously disliked NCOs and officers. It was called “fragging”. I’m guessing Smith was aware of that, too – the practice didn’t start in June 1969.
Well, scandal aside, I had the pleasure of knowing COL Rheault. I think we should take a moment to remember him as a professional soldier and genuinely good man (who may or may not have made mistakes).
His work for us (Veterans) after his career is worthy of praise and even a bit of humility for most of us. He was a tireless advocate for veterans and accomplished a lot.
RIP Colonel, you will be missed.
VOV: I agree that it doesn’t make sense. I considered the fragging issue while reading the article at Hondo’s link. It just doesn’t seem to fit in this case, but I wasn’t there and only learned about fragging peripherally, so I could be wrong.
It would appear that Chuyen had a history of troubles following him around. He was from the North, and had family there. To me, that whole intel nets and assets were disappearing without trace, directly after having a banner year, is a textbook example of the old military proverb: “Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, but three times is enemy action.”
Looking back 54 years later, it’s pretty much impossible for me to make any kind of accurate evaluation of Smith’s actions, but the only thing that makes sense to me is either he himself was dirty or he was a weak minded individual who had no business in a black ops support team to begin with.
Chuyen got folks killed, butchered probably, as that’s how they operate in that part of the world. Smith had to have known that.
Amen, COB6.
That this man never wrote a biography is a crying shame
A more professional post would have ended after “I won’t comment further”, or concluded with Rest in Peace, Colonel Rheault.
I’ll add an excerpt from the Washington Post:
“…announced on Sept. 29, 1969, that all charges against Col. Rheault and his officers were dismissed. When the news was announced on the floor of the House, the chamber broke into applause and cheers that went on for minutes.
“If there had been a trial,” Bailey told Time magazine in 1969, “the defendants would have become Abrams, [CIA director Richard] Helms and Nixon. The only winner would have been North Vietnam.”
Col. Rheault was offered other jobs in the Army, but the only one he wanted was the one he couldn’t have: command of the Green Berets. He retired from the Army on his 44th birthday, Oct. 31, 1969. Two weeks later, he was featured on the cover of Life magazine, in a sympathetic story.
“The biggest loss was that he left the service,” Martin Linsky, one of his Army lawyers, said last week. “He was a crackerjack officer.”
Rest in Peace.
@ #19-RPR: And now we know? Theeee rest of the story! Thanks.
RIP COL. Rheault
Now that most of you fellows have expressed how you fell about Col Rheualt, both good and bad, why don’t we just split the line and call it a draw. I am also a 87 year old veteran, but I guess I’ve grown to learn to live and let live in my old age. I have read the book from front to back by Jeff Stein,”A Murder In Wartime”, and there’s much that was left out that many of you fellows are not aware of, this is why I say, lets just call it a draw and everybody wins.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING
Sam Naomi
I think in the referenced book, GEN Abrams is quoted on why he chose to go for a court martial. It wasn’t the murder/execution itself, but the fact that COL Rheault lied about it when he was called in on the carpet.
Of course COL Rheault probably figured he was doing the right thing by sticking to the cover story. Which is very relevant to the reckoning I see starting even now.
In the coming decade or so, there will be an accounting for a lot of things that have happened since the GWOT started, and black units have proliferated like mushrooms after a spring rain. For one, was what was done actually legal, or was it done in excess of enthusiasm? Where DID all that money go, and WHAT did we get for it?