Operation Tailwind

On 08 June 1998 CNN and Time magazine published allegation that the services used sarin nerve agent in Laos in 1970 in Operation Tailwind, a special operations mission. Use of sarin would have been against U.S. policy at the time. According to the news reports, U.S. soldiers and Montagnard allies went into Laos to destroy an enemy enclave and kill US defectors believed to be hiding there. (Montagnards are a group of people who live in the mountainous regions of Laos and Vietnam.) The story claims sarin was used to eliminate resistance and later to defeat an enemy counterattack. DoD records say the only mission was to locate and destroy enemy caches of ammunition, weapons and supplies in Laos and to gather intelligence.

Sources and Resources

• Cohen Orders Army, Air Force to Check Sarin Allegations
• DefenseLINK News: DoD News Briefing, Thursday, June 18, 1998
• DefenseLINK News: DoD News Briefing, June 9, 1998 at 1:30 p.m.
• DefenseLINK News: DoD News Briefing, Thursday, June 11, 1998
• DefenseLINK News: DoD News Briefing, Tuesday, June 16, 1998
• CNN NERVE GAS
• DoD "Welcomes" CNN Retraction, Apology for
• CNN - NERVE GAS - PREVIEW
• DefenseLINK News: COHEN FINDS NO BASIS FOR CNN/TIME ALLEGATIONS ON "TAILWIND"
• DefenseLINK News: Secretary Cohen's Operation TAILWIND Press Conference
• Department of Defense Review of Allegations Concerning Operation Tailwind
• News from the USIA Washington File
• DefenseLINK News: DoD News Briefing - Thursday, July 2, 1998
• Operation TAILWIND Review Extract of U.S Air Force Report Dated: Jul 16, 1998
• OPERATION TAILWIND Voice of America 22 July 1998
• DefenseLINK News: DoD News Briefing, Operation TAILWIND, Tuesday, July 21, 1998