On this day in 1973, the last US combat soldier left Vietnam, making the official end to the Vietnam War. Master Sergeant Max Beilke departed Vietnam at the Tan Son Nhut Air Base to return home to Minnesota, and he was the last soldier to enter the aircraft to depart the country.
The conflict had lasted roughly nineteen years, and at its conclusion, approximately 2.7 million Americans had served in the conflict, including almost 60,000 killed, 150,000 wounded, and over a thousand missing in action.
Twenty-eight years later, on September 11, 2001, Beilke was killed when American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon.
Email to a Friend