Dr. Preston Jones: Clarence Cooper, I’ve heard military veterans say that most people who are paying attention observe history happening, but if you serve in the military, you’re more likely to actually participate in history that’s happening and I think that’s certainly the case with you.
You have direct experience with two of the big events of that era, from the late 1960s to the late 1970s.
You’re a Vietnam veteran and we won’t focus on that. We’ll hopefully have another conversation about your time in Vietnam—a separate conversation about that. But you are not only a Vietnam
veteran, you were there during that critical turning point of the Tet Offensive. And not only the Tet Offensive, but you played a role in one of the most remembered battles of the Tet
Offensive, the Battle of Huế, and in a later conversation we’ll discuss that.
We fast-forward a mere ten years from the Tet Offensive, a bit over 10 years. We fast-forward to 1978, the latter part of 1978 and now we have the tragedy that unfolds in Guyana at Jonestown, where more than 900 people participated in the biggest mass suicide of modern times and you played a role in the immediate aftermath of that.
So to get us started, what was your job and when we get to the fall of 1978, what was your job at that time with the US Army?
Clarence Cooper: I was stationed at Fort Benning, Georgia. I was commanding the 498th Air Ambulance Company. We had the mission of providing air ambulance support to Fort Benning and the two Ranger camps that they were operating, one in North Georgia and one down at Eglin Air Force Base. We had 25 helicopters assigned to my company. One platoon was located at Fort Stewart, Georgia, and the other one at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, with 6 aircraft at each of those locations and the others at Fort Benning.
Jones: So when you were doing training missions, what sort of missions did you train for?
Cooper: Well, our primary mission is patient evacuation; we also have the mission of transporting medical personnel and medical supplies. We trained for all kinds of terrain and weather. Our helicopters had rescue hoists in them. That’s one of the main reasons that we were contacted for Jonestown, Guyana, surrounded by triple-canopy jungle; we had the capability of extracting patients from the jungle using our rescue hoists
Jones: You mentioned in something that you wrote that initially you thought your mission was going to be primarily or substantially about rescuing people from the jungle.
Cooper: we were told initially they thought that only about half the Jonestown residents had committed suicide and they thought that hundreds had fled into the jungle. Initially our mission was to do search and rescue for those who were around during Jonestown.
Of course, as time went on, I realized that all of the residents had committed suicide.
Jones: Yeah, I think but maybe the exception of five or something like that.1 We’ll come back to that and just sort of walk through it step by step. So your original idea is that you’re going to go down and do search and rescue, and that actually makes a lot of sense. I’ve watched news reports that are even three or four days after the event and the body count is still in the 500 range because folks didn’t realize, as horrible as it is, there are bodies under bodies and so it takes all this time.
Had you ever heard of Jonestown before the event itself? Had that ever registered?
Cooper: Never.
Jones: You’d never heard of it?
Cooper: No, probably the same as you and everyone else so the nature of Congressman Ryan and his entourage being attacked on the airstrip there at Kaituma. Then the next day they discovered the results of the mass suicide at Jonestown. But before that I never heard of Peoples Temple or Jonestown.
Jones: So I was in, I think, junior high school at the time so I didn’t have any idea of what was going on. But this might be an example of what we’re talking about: when you’re in the military, you’re not just observing history as it happens, but you actually participating because, if I understand correctly, you’re watching the news of what happened with Congressman Ryan and
the next day you get the call that you’re going.
Cooper: That’s exactly what happened. The next morning I was called to our battalion headquarters and told my unit is being alerted to deploy to Jonestown. So it was kind of exciting news.
Jones: Is there that sense of, “wow, I’m actually participating in something that’s in the—”
Cooper: Yes, and there was a lot of confusion about exactly what had happened down there.
What exactly our mission would be. When we deployed, we were issued live ammunition. They thought that they knew there were armed guards in Jonestown and as I say, it was unknown if just how many had committed suicide and if there were still armed guards down there, if we would encounter fire, we were prepared for that. As it turns out, we did not need it, of course.
Jones: So you were actually part of the planning, which I imagine is coming together very quickly. Part of the planning is possibly even small-scale combat of some kind?
Cooper: We were prepared for that if it had happened.
Jones: How much time was there in between getting the order and actually then being on the ground in Guyana?
Cooper: At first, when we found on the morning of November 20th that we were alerted, they wanted us to be prepared to deploy that evening. There was confusion about whether we would deploy on C-141 aircraft or C-5 aircraft. There’s a significant difference because if we had gotten C-5s—the large transport—a Huey helicopter could go intact into that. If it was 140s, we had to disassemble a helicopter: take off the rotor blades, take off the mast, the physical stabilizer, which is a big job.
It turns out we did have to go on 140s. We deployed with four Huey helicopters, UH-1s. It took a lot of work. We worked all that night, the night of the 20th, and we deployed the night of the 21st, the next evening.
Jones: I’m looking at one of your photos here and the helicopters being put into the back-up plane and as I look at it now, it doesn’t have the rotors on it, so it does happen to disassemble parts of it.
Cooper: It’s a big job. It would take six to eight hours dissembling and then reassembling each helicopter.
Jones: Now, when you arrived in Guyana, did you go first into Georgetown, the capital?
Cooper: Yes, that’s where we flew into. That’s, I think, the only airport in all of Guyana that could take a C-141.
Jones: And so the helicopters are reassembled there?
Cooper: Yes, we arrived there the night of the 21st. The 22nd, all day we were getting the helicopters reassembled. One problem we had was some torrential rainstorms. We were working; we didn’t have a hangar and we worked outside and the weather made it very difficult, but by that night of the 22nd—working into the night—we got all four helicopters ready to fly missions by the morning of the 23rd.
Jones: By this point now we’re four days.2 The event takes place on the 18th. Had you known if American forces preceded you already when you arrived, whether there were already American forces in Jonestown?
Cooper: Yes. An infantry unit from Panama was down at Jonestown. Those guys had the toughest job; they had the job of loading the bodies into body bags and then most of those bodies were flown back on Air Force CH-53 helicopters, the Jolly Green Giant. They could carry a lot of bodies.
Jones: So those bodies were carried back to Georgetown and then they’re put on helicopters then back to the States?
Cooper: Yes, by C-141 they were flown from Georgetown to Dover Air Force Base, where the military mortuary is located.
Jones: So you’re in Georgetown and now you’re on the helicopters and you’re making your way to Jonestown? What are the first things you remember about Jonestown?
Cooper: First we had a challenge. We did not have good maps. Jonestown is about 120 nautical miles from Georgetown. Navigation was very difficult because there’s just jungle without any landmarks. They told us the heading to fly, and we knew the distance, and we were able to find Jonestown. There was a little fear of the unknown as we were flying and we were flying and flying out there.
You’re probably seeing the photos. In the photos there is a picture of another helicopter that always flew with two or more helicopters. If a single helicopter were to have an engine failure over that jungle, there’s no way that would ever be found. If someone got in trouble, we wanted to have another aircraft there that could assist.
Jones: So you do find Jonestown. Are you able to find it pretty easily?
Cooper: Yes, we did. Let’s say as long as we flew the correct heading for the great distance, we found it. Further to the west, the terrain became a little bit hilly, so you could make out some land features better. For the first hundred miles, flat jungle without any landmarks to help us navigate.
Jones: What are your first memories, either from the air or on the ground? The first things you remember when you know, you actually coming into contact with Jonestown either visually or when you’re on the ground? What are some of the first things you remember?
Cooper: I remember that it stood out because of the large clearing in the jungle. Peoples Temple worked so hard clearing that jungle. I mean, it had taken a lot of work and they
planted crops. They were obviously very industrious. Then we circled the buildings, and you could make out the large central building where the meetings were held—all the colors around it. You can probably see it in the photos. When we got closer, we realized those were bodies.
Jones: So there are these powerful images, and you’ve got photos of it where you’re in the air and the pavilion is sort of, of course, the central site, and you see a lot of different colors around it, but at first you didn’t realize that those were bodies?
Cooper: No, until we got closer. But then even flying 500 feet above Jonestown, the smell. The smell of bodies in the tropical heat had been decomposing for four days when we got there.
Jones: What impact—it’s a long time ago, but you know what you’re heading into at this point. I mean, by this point I’m sure you’ve heard reports and you kind of know it’s coming but I imagine though it’s not really real and so you actually see it and then, as you say, there’s the smell as well.
How did that change your sense of things? I’m just wondering how that changes—what impact that had on you. Or were you very job-focused? I’m just interested in how that changes things for you once you actually see, wow, those colors are actually bodies, and we can smell it from here.
Cooper: I had been in Vietnam. I had seen a lot of death. A lot of human carnage, but when we landed at Jonestown I reported to the commander there and I walked among the dead. I walked up to the pavilion and I had never seen death on that scale. I’d seen a lot of bodies in Vietnam but nothing like that. What bothered me the most, though, was seeing the children and babies. They did not commit suicide.
I walked up to the vat of Kool-Aid, the cyanide in it. A lot of syringes around there—the syringes have been used to squirt it down the throats of the babies and children.
Jones: It must be—I guess I have no idea what my reaction would be—you must be almost speechless when you’re seeing this.
Cooper: I was. As I say, I thought I developed a callousness to death, having seen a lot in Vietnam. But the impact of—the enormity of the disaster took a while to sink in.
The other photos that I thought that Colonel Van Scranton. That someone else had walked among there and taken those.
Jones: You referred a minute ago to the vat. So far as you know, there was just one?
Cooper: That’s all I saw was one and I don’t believe there was another one.3 I believe there was just one that people lined up at. There may have been more.
Jones: This is for me. I mean, the whole thing is heartbreaking but one of the things that I really focus on is you’ve got more than 900 people, but just one vat and it would only take one person to kick that vat over, at least to slow things down.
It may seem like a dumb question but you know what I think about that you know there are over 900 people and it just takes one to take that vat over. It may seem like a dumb question but could you just tell me a little about the vat? How big was it? Was there still liquid in it?
Cooper: Yes. It was—you know what a 55-gallon drum is? Those had been cut, I believe. It looked like half of a 55 gallon gallon drum but I believe the people lined up and of course you know Jones had such powerful control over his people because I wondered how people could do that seeing what was happening to those ahead of them in the line. I think the cyanide took effect very, very quickly. I think Jones had them line up, take their drink, and go lay down in rows.
Jones: With their arms around each other, as you see in the photos?
Cooper: Yes.
Jones: How much time that must have taken? I mean, one vat, more than nine hundred people. That takes some time. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard it but there is actually a recording where you can sort of hear this catastrophe unfolding.
Cooper: Yes. You can hear Jim Jones in the background.
Jones: Now I’m guessing the answer’s no but you didn’t see the body of Jim Jones himself?
Cooper: I did not but his body was evacuated by one of my helicopters.
Jones: So there are only five survivors.4 I’m guessing you didn’t have any interaction with any of them?
Cooper: No
Jones: How about interaction with the Guyanese? Did the Guyanese just basically hand this operation over to the Americans or were they also involved?
Cooper: I don’t believe they were involved. I think it was just Americans. I had no interaction with any Guyanese while I was there.
Jones: Do you remember—I imagine there were probably a couple other Vietnam vets around. I know that one of the survivors, actually one of the five survivors, was a Vietnam vet.5 I think he joined Peoples Temple looking for peace. I’m just wondering, you’re doing this and you’re doing your work and you know we can talk about what your work actually involved but did you just work in silence or what sorts of things do you talk about in that kind of context?
Cooper: I think all of my flight crew members were Vietnam veterans. If we had all been in Vietnam, we had all seen a lot of human carnage, but we were all in shock to see death on that scale. The people that I really felt sorry for were those infantry soldiers that had the job of putting the bodies into body bags. I suspect that many of them had PTSD from that death experience.
Jones: Are we talking about a lot of E2s, E3s, and E4s doing this work?
Cooper: Yes.
Jones: I mean junior enlisted guys.
Cooper: Yes.
Jones: When you arrived on the ground at Jonestown, what was the nature of your particular work? How did you spend the day?
Cooper: As I say, our mission changed. When we first got there, they thought there still could be the initial—actually, this was before we left—they thought we would have loudspeakers in our helicopters and we would fly around the jungle around Jonestown telling the people we were there to help them to come out of the jungle into the clearing, that we would rescue them. But I think by the time we got there, they realized there were no survivors.
Instead, we did no search and rescue at all because, as you pointed out, they realized the bodies were stacked three and four high and in fact, there were over 913 fatalities.6 So, our mission, we had four helicopters, we transported key personnel back and forth, supplies, and then we carried bodies out. They did not allow us to stack any bodies; we would carry bodies in our litters. The Huey can take three litter patients and four ambulatory patients. Of course, there were ambulatory patients so we had three bodies at a time and flew them from Jonestown to Georgetown.
Jones: Three at a time and how many helicopters?
Cooper: Four.
Jones: So this was going to take a while.
Cooper: It would have. We did not carry that many bodies because it was so inefficient. Most of them went by the Jolly Green Giants. I don’t know how many the Air Force had, but they had quite a few.
Jones: How long were you on the ground there in Jonestown, Guyana, or in Georgetown, Jonestown—how long did this operation take for you?
Cooper: Three days. We flew on the 23rd, the 24th, and the 25th. By the afternoon of November 25th, all of the bodies had been removed.
Jones: So you’re home on the 26th?
Cooper: Yes.
Jones: Something I’ve talked to combat veterans about a lot—especially Vietnam guys—I talked to one last week; he was up on the DMZ seeing combat and literally a week later
he’s back in Arkansas, just looking for a job in Arkansas. You know, that kind of re-entry and I’m wondering if coming back from the Jonestown situation, if that re-entry back into life in Georgia was as strange as the re-entry from a combat zone in Vietnam coming back to the States. Do you know what I’m saying? Just that the awkwardness of that re-entry, like, were you really in Jonestown three days ago? That sort of thing. How did it go?
Cooper: Yes. It’s very similar. The impact of being there. I’m seeing and smelling. What sticks with you is the smell. A human body has a distinctive smell and Jonestown—900
bodies, four to six days old—and that tropical heat. They gave surgical masks with wintergreen oil on the inside but that did not totally stop it. There’s no way you could stop that
terrible smell.
The guys that I think had the most difficulty recovering from that experience were those infantry soldiers loading bodies into body bags, some of them for probably 4 days throughout the tropical heat and humidity. But the psychological impacts, I’m sure many of those young
young soldiers had real difficulty recovering from what they had seen.
Some of them, I think, had trouble when they got back. Some of them probably required some counseling.
Jones: In your case, did you at least need a day or two just to kind of decompress?
Cooper: Yes, I think so. It is hard to believe what we had seen.
Jones: I’m looking at other photos you had sent. In one of the photos, there are rows of small cottages.
Cooper: That is in Jonestown.
Jones: Yes. And in another photo you’ve got buildings sort of spread out. You mentioned that the people of Jonestown are obviously very industrious. What other impressions did you have? Obviously you not able to talk to anybody who lived there, but just from what you saw with how the place was set up, what was your—I guess it’s more like an archaeologist question—but you can get a sense of what the life was like just from their buildings and how they set things up. What was your sense of Jonestown?
Obviously, aside from the horrible thing, which I realize you can’t really separate it from. But if you just think about the buildings and how the place was laid out, what was your sense of the place?
Cooper: I walked through many of the buildings. Those larger buildings were like military barracks with stacked bunks—four high. Very little furniture in them. I think it was very austere for the people that were. I did some reading about Jonestown after that and saw some other features on it. I think Jones picked that location because it was so isolated. There was no radio or TV around there. He had total control over his people.
I think it was obvious to Congressman Ryan and some others that there was a lot of discontent in Jonestown. People realized it was not the tropical paradise that Jones had—the socialist paradise that Jones had promised his people. And they had to work very, very hard. I think it was more of a labor camp than a paradise. I admired the amount of work they accomplished clearing that jungle and planting crops in very adverse weather and climate conditions. It was very much like Vietnam, so hot and humid. Life was very, very difficult there.
Jones: Do you remember seeing the loudspeakers?
Cooper: Yes.
Jones: You saw that and so then there’s that little walkway that goes into the pavilion?
Cooper: Yes.
Jones: You saw the loudspeakers. There’s the sign that’s been photographed: “Those who don’t remember the past, they’re doomed to repeat it.”7 Did you see that sign?
Cooper: Yes.
Jones: Speaking to you personally now, you participated in two events about which a lot of books have been written. Just a couple of years ago a new thick book on the Battle of Huế came out. Of course, Vietnam memoirs are constantly being written. I think a new biography of Jones just came out a couple of years ago.
This is a personal question to you: how does that strike you when you realize that you personally participated in two of the biggest events of American history post-WWII? Vietnam, especially the Tet Offensive, the Battle of Huế, and then Jonestown? Has it occurred to you that this is pretty extraordinary, that you, just as an individual, participated in these two events?
Cooper: Yes. It gives me a greater appreciation for life, for my life. There was so much carnage in both of those in a way. So much death. The North Vietnamese went into Huế, 20
battalions, as I say, 8,000 or so North Vietnamese soldiers at the biggest—the biggest enemy force that we faced in the whole Vietnam War. Of course they killed many people in Huế. Many of them were killed, of course. Many North Vietnamese, South Vietnamese, and American military.
That so much waste of life. Then at Jonestown, so much needless waste of life. The thought has occurred to me as to you: what could motivate nine hundred people to line up and drink the Kool-Aid? I’d read that Jones had rehearsed this. He would have the White Nights. The people would line up thinking they were going to be committing suicide and drink the Kool-aid, and he would say oh this was just a rehearsal. I’m testing your loyalty to me. Obviously did the real thing just as they had been taught to.
Think of how one person could have such mind control over his people. He obviously was a very charismatic leader. What a tragic waste of life.
Jones: I hear that. There are two photos I’m looking at here as we begin to arrive. But one is of an airstrip and there are two planes on it. There are two small airplanes on this airstrip and it looks like the surface is dirt. Is that the airstrip where Congressman Ryan was?
Cooper: It is. That is the Kaituma Airport and the larger airplane is the one that was shot up. That’s the one that Congressman Ryan and his entourage were going to get on and fly back to Georgetown.
Jones: I see. It’s the one basically facing—going lengthwise with the airstrip? That’s the plane?
Cooper: Yes.
Jones: There’s this other photo here. I’m looking at it now; it looks like it’s the same plane and although it’s from behind, that’s actually the plane where Congressman Ryan—
Cooper: It was.
Jones: I’m imagining there were bullet holes in the plane itself?
Cooper: Yes. They couldn’t move it, it was pretty shot up. I don’t know what happened to it.
Jones: From the perspective of a history teacher, it’s extraordinary to talk to somebody who is there, because I show my students documentaries and you read the books but it seems like an abstraction. If you watch the documentaries and you read the books, you know that what happened was real, but it’s still kind of an abstraction. But to talk to somebody who actually saw the plane where Congressman Ryan and others were shot and killed, you saw the loudspeakers, you saw the bad. I think that’s probably the most poignant thing apart from the bodies themselves, you saw all of this. It’s really been a privilege to talk with you and to hear your memories.
One last question and this is a real general one. Let’s put you in front of a group of, say, 20 university students, and based on your experience in Vietnam and at Jonestown, and other things you’ve picked up in life—thinking about these these two really intense experiences—what do
you think is an important thing for young people to know just about life itself?
I realize it’s a very broad question but here’s your chance just to say something to these young people about something you’ve learned from these very intense experiences.
Cooper: That’s a tough one. Value every day we have on this earth. I’m fortunate to still be alive. I had many close calls in Vietnam. I lost many, many friends. I have witnessed how cruel people can be to each other. Always have hope for the future.
As far as Jonestown, that one is very, very difficult. Seeing what one man’s evil can do—the destruction and death that one man can cause is so depressing. I would say value life and do everything you can to make a life better for yourself, for your family, and for society.
Jones: Mr. Cooper, I really appreciate the time you spent talking with us. I appreciate that you made your photos from Jonestown available, and these photos will be available to others on this video but also they’ve been made available to the Jonestown Institute at San Diego State University as well. Your photos have become part of the historical record, which will
be useful for teaching other people, as will this conversation that you and I have.
I’m looking forward to a future conversation about your time focusing on your time in Vietnam. I really appreciate the time you spent. Thank you.
Cooper: Thank you for documenting the tragic events of Jonestown so that others can learn.
Contextual Notes
- There were seven survivors who were in Jonestown as the mass deaths occurred. ↩︎
- 5 days. ↩︎
- The exact number of vats used during the deaths is unknown. There was possibly up to 4 vats used for the cyanide poisoning. ↩︎
- There were seven survivors. ↩︎
- Two Jonestown survivors were Vietnam veterans: Tim Carter and Odell Rhodes. ↩︎
- 909 people died directly in Jonestown on November 18, 1978. There were 909 deaths in Jonestown, 5 killed at the Port Kaituma Airstrip, and the deaths of Sharon Amos and her 3 children in Georgetown, 918 died in total. ↩︎
- The sign actually read: “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it”—a misquotation of Spanish philosopher George Santayana. ↩︎