Scope and Contents

The collection consists of a Super 8mm film (including a digitized copy of the film) and a scrapbook documenting Colonel Richard Cassidy's U.S. Army service as an infantry company commander with 2nd Battalion, 502nd Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division, as Deputy District Senior Advisor at Dak To, and as Senior Advisor at Kontum from 1971-1972. Also included are a unit history, a province briefing folder (Kontum), holiday greeting cards, photographs, and clippings. The materials are dated 1971-1975.

Biographical / Historical

Colonel Richard P. Cassidy was born 26 May 1946 in Milwaukee, WI. He completed Army ROTC and was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in 1969. He served as S-3 Air, S-2, a LRRP commander, and a rifle company commander with the 2nd Battalion, 502nd Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division stationed at Camp Eagle and various firebases and forward operating bases in I Corps from July-December 1971. He then served first as Deputy District Senior Advisor for Dak To District and then as District Senior Advisor for Dak To and Kontum with MACV Team 41 from January-August 1972. He was involved in Lam Son 720 in the A Shau Valley in 1971 and the NVA Easter Offensive from April-July 1972. After Vietnam, he continued to serve with various U.S. Army units in Germany, Korea, Japan, and Thailand in such roles as military attache in Tokyo and security assistance in Thailand. He also continued his education and training at various schools including the Defense Language Institute (Japanese and Thai), the State Department Foreign Service Institute, and both DIA and CIA military attache schools. He retired from the U.S. Army in 1995. After his military service, he co-founded a consulting firm in Bangkok which he ran from 1995-2019.