Photo By Erin Thompson | Sgt. Thomas J. Tomczak with 400th ASA Special Operations Detachment (Airborne) unit...... read more read more
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by Erin E. Thompson, USAICoE Staff Historian
ACCIDENT CLAIMS LIFE OF SIGINTER IN VIETNAM
On 23 July 1968, Sgt. Thomas J. Tomczak, a highly skilled signals intelligence soldier serving in Vietnam, was killed when a mortar he was handling exploded. His sacrifice was one of many made by Army Security Agency (ASA) personnel throughout the war.
Thomas James Tomczak was born in New Berlin, Wisconsin, on 2 April 1948. He enlisted in the U.S. Army following his high school graduation and was selected to train as a 05H Morse intercept operator with the ASA. He attended basic and advanced training at Fort Devens, Massachusetts, and completed instruction for his airborne qualification and combat infantry badge. Tomczak demonstrated his talents by achieving a spot in the top five percent of enlisted soldiers assigned to the 400th ASA Special Operations Detachment (SOD), 1st Special Forces Group (Airborne), which handled classified and covert missions throughout the Vietnam War. Between 1962–1975, only 208 soldiers were selected to serve with this unit. According to authors Lonnie Long and Gary B. Blackburn, “The men of the SOD units were extraordinary soldiers who progressed to rate among the most highly trained and proficient men in the U.S. Army.”
In May 1968, Sergeant Tomczak deployed to Vietnam as an airborne direction-finding operator in support of the Green Berets of the 1st Special Forces Group. His role was to combine “highly skilled direction finding with the lethal firepower of mobile airborne warfare.” Tomczak would locate enemy radio signals and direct supporting fire towards them. He was stationed at Dak Pek, Kon Tum Province, a base housing Green Beret and Republic of Vietnam Special Forces units. These units monitored enemy movements near the Ho Chi Minh Trail, a high priority target of enemy probing and direct attacks.
On 23 July 1968, just three months into Tomczak’s deployment in Vietnam, the Dak Pek base was attacked by North Vietnamese forces. Twenty-year-old Tomczak was responsible for directing mortar rounds and was in the process of firing one of these mortars when it accidentally exploded as it left the tube. He was killed instantly.
Sergeant Tomczak’s body was returned to his family and buried at the Holy Sepulcher Cemetery in Cudahy, Wisconsin. His hard work, talent, and sacrifice were honored by his unit in Vietnam with the renaming of the 400th ASA SOD’s physical training field in Okinawa as the Tomczak Memorial Field. He is also honored on the National Security Agency’s Cryptologic Memorial Wall.
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| Date Taken: | 07.19.2024 |
| Date Posted: | 07.19.2024 16:10 |
| Story ID: | 476653 |
| Location: | US |
| Web Views: | 52 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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