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COLUMBIA, S.C. – The movies notwithstanding, intelligence work has little to do with drinking shaken martinis while wearing a designer tuxedo. In the real world, in wartime, it’s about things like sweating in a hostile field in fatigues, monitoring radio signals to gather intelligence.
That was one of the two main things Ron Hagell did in Vietnam, as platoon leader of an Army Security Agency unit attached to the 1st Brigade of the Big Red One – the 1st Infantry Division. The other thing was to trying to keep our own guys from carelessly handing the same kind of vital information over to the enemy.
Hagell will explain it all in a free lecture at noon on Friday, Jan. 26, at the South Carolina Confederate Relic Room and Military Museum in Columbia. The program is open to the public, and is presented in connection with the museum’s sprawling, unique exhibit, “A War With No Front Lines: South Carolina and the Vietnam War, 1965-1973.” It is part of the museum’s regular Noon Debrief series. Hagell presented a previous program about his artwork inspired by his war experience.
Hagell, a newly minted 2nd lieutenant right out of OCS at Ft. Benning, was sent to Vietnam in April 1967 to replace a captain who had been killed in action. He caught up with the 1st Division when it was engaged in Operation Junction City – a massive effort to locate and eliminate enemy operations in an area of north of Saigon.
A part of his unit’s role was to operate listening stations to triangulate on enemy unit radio transmissions. It was less about what the enemy was saying, and more about where he was saying it from.
Enemy radio operators would go off to the east on one occasion, and hike out to the west the next, and so forth. But the ASA guys knew to listen over time. The question was, “Where does he never send from?” said Hagell. That’s where the Viet Cong unit was. “You can actually lock in, over the course of a few transmissions.”
That system improved over time, as the ASA was also collecting the signals from aircraft. Everything went faster with that system.
But there were problems. Keeping security tight meant that often field commanders didn’t understand the information and misused it. “When we’d go in and tell them, here’s the map, here they are,” says Hagell, “the ones who were not cleared would say, ‘How do you know?’”
Also, Hagell’s people had a terrible time convincing their own side to use secure communications themselves. The infantry guys didn’t believe how insecure their communications were and had to be shown that they were actually give away their location.
“In January 1968 I was shifted to do the same job with the 199th Light Infantry Division near Bien Hoa airbase during the Tet Offensive,” says Hagell. “That’s a whole other story.” Hagell headed home in late March, meaning he got back to the States “just before the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy.”
About the South Carolina Confederate Relic Room and Military Museum
Founded in 1896, the South Carolina Confederate Relic Room and Military Museum is an accredited museum focusing on South Carolina’s distinguished martial tradition through the Revolutionary War, Mexican War, Civil War, Spanish-American War, World Wars I and II, Vietnam, the War on Terror, and other American conflicts. It serves as the state’s military history museum by collecting, preserving, and exhibiting South Carolina’s military heritage from the colonial era to the present, and by providing superior educational experiences and programming. It recently opened a major new exhibit, “A War With No Front Lines: South Carolina and the Vietnam War, 1965-1973.” The museum is located at 301 Gervais St. in Columbia, sharing the Columbia Mills building with the State Museum. For more information, go to https://crr.sc.gov/.
COLUMBIA, SC – Burnette Shutt & McDaniel has received the 2024 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Distinguished Service Award from the University of South Carolina Joseph F. Rice School of Law.
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – Maynard Nexsen, a full-service law firm with 24 offices across the United States, is pleased to announce the addition of 20 new associates who recently graduated from law schools across the U.S. and have joined the Firm.
The Town of Chapin will officially have a new Pediatric and Teen Dentist as Chapin Pediatric & Teen Dentistry will host their Grand Opening on January 18, and is now accepting new patients!
Columbia, South Carolina – The Legal Marketing Association’s (LMA) Southeast Region is pleased to announce its South Carolina Local Steering Committee (LSC) leadership for 2024. The Southeast Region is one of the largest in the international organization of LMA, covering nine states throughout the region, serving more than 500 members. The South Carolina LSC is comprised of:
United Way of the Midlands is accepting applications for Blueprint for Leadership, a comprehensive leadership and board development training program, through January 19, 2024.
Columbia Pet Euthanasia & Cremation, a leading provider of compassionate pet aftercare services, proudly announces the initiation of a charitable contest aimed at fostering a spirit of giving within the community. The contest invites participants to share their favorite local animal charity and Columbia Pet Euthanasia & Cremation will contribute $500 to a worthy cause in the realm of animal welfare.
Columbia, South Carolina – Trinity Partners is pleased to announce the first tenant for the new Class A retail center on Spears Creek Church Road known as Spears Creek Plaza. Bruce Harper, SIOR and Rob Lapin of Trinity Partners facilitated the lease between ownership and Scoop of Heaven Homemade Ice Cream.
