{{Short description|United States Army colonel (1925–2013)}} {{Infobox military person | name = Robert Bradley Rheault | birth_date = {{birth date|mf=yes|1925|10|31}} | death_date = {{death date and age|mf=yes|2013|10|16|1925|10|31}} | birth_place = [[Boston, Massachusetts]], U.S. | death_place = [[Owls Head, Maine]], U.S. | image = RobertBRheault-USMA, West Point-1946.jpg | caption = Robert B. Rheault in 1946 at the U.S. Military Academy | allegiance = United States of America | branch = [[File:United States Department of the Army Seal.svg|25px]] [[United States Army]] | service_years = 1946–1969 | rank = [[File:US-O6 insignia.svg|25px]] [[Colonel#United States|Colonel]] | commands = [[1st Special Forces Group (United States)|First Special Forces Group]]<br/>[[5th Special Forces Group (United States)|Fifth Special Forces Group]] | unit = [[Infantry Branch (United States)|Infantry Branch]]<br/>[[U.S. Army Special Forces]] | battles = [[Korean War]]<br/> [[Vietnam War]] | awards = [[File:Silver Star Medal ribbon.svg|25px]] [[Silver Star]] | other_work = Educator [[Outward Bound]] Program }}
'''Robert Bradley Rheault''' {{IPAc-en|r|oʊ}} (October 31, 1925 – October 16, 2013) was an American soldier in the [[U.S. Army Special Forces]] who served as commander of the [[1st Special Forces Group (United States)|First Special Forces Group]] in [[Okinawa Island|Okinawa]], and the [[5th Special Forces Group (United States)|Fifth Special Forces Group]] in [[Vietnam War|Vietnam]] from May to July 1969.
Rheault was best known for his role as a co-conspirator and commander of the unit responsible for the 20 June 1969 execution of [[South Vietnamese|South Vietnam]] double agent [[Thai Khac Chuyen]], who compromised intelligence agents involved in [[Project GAMMA]] operating in Vietnam and [[Cambodia]].<ref name= MilHist>{{cite web|url=http://www.militaryhistoryonline.com/20thCentury/articles/greenberets.aspx|title=The "Green Beret Affair": a brief introduction|publisher=Military History Online|accessdate=November 5, 2011|archive-date=May 9, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080509150017/http://www.militaryhistoryonline.com/20thCentury/articles/greenberets.aspx|url-status=dead}}</ref>
==Early life and education== Robert Rheault was born October 31, 1925, to Charles Auguste and Rosamond (née Bradley) Rheault in [[Westwood, Massachusetts|Westwood]], a suburb of [[Boston]]. Prior to immigrating to the United States in 1924, his father had served with the [[Royal Canadian Mounted Police]] and was stationed in [[Labrador]] where he met Rosamond Bradley, from a prominent Boston family, who had been working at the Grenfell Medical Mission.<ref name= SFA>{{cite web|url=http://sfachapterix.blogspot.com/2013/10/taps-colonel-robert-b-rheault.html|title=TAPS Colonel Robert B. Rheault|date=23 October 2013 |publisher=Special Forces Association, Chapter IX – Isaac Camacho Chapter|accessdate=August 26, 2014}}</ref><ref name=MilHist/><ref name=Life>Frank McCulloch, [https://books.google.com/books?id=4lAEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA36&lpg=PA36&dq "A believer in self-reliance and elitism"], ''Life Magazine'', November 14, 1969. pg. 36.</ref><ref>United States Census 1930; Westwood, Norfolk, Massachusetts; Roll: 937; Page: 6B; Enumeration District: 135; Image: 1066.0.</ref>
Rheault spoke French from an early age and attended [[Phillips Exeter Academy]], from which he graduated in 1943. He graduated in 1946 from the [[United States Military Academy]] at [[West Point, New York]]. He also completed graduate work at the [[University of Paris]] and received a master's degree in [[international relations]] from [[George Washington University]].<ref name=MilHist/><ref name= Stein>Jeff Stein (1992). ''Murder in Wartime: The Untold Spy Story that Changed the Course of the Vietnam War.'' (New York: St. Martin's Press) pp. 60-62; {{ISBN|0-312-07037-3}}</ref>
==Military service and post-military career== Rheault was awarded the [[Silver Star]] for his actions in combat in the Korean War, attaining the rank of captain. After Korea, Rheault taught French at the U.S. Military Academy for several years in the mid-1950s, attaining the rank of major. He attended the Special Forces Qualification course, the [[Q-Course]], in 1961, and his initial Special Forces assignment was with the [[10th Special Forces Group]] in Germany.
He would later command the 1st Special Forces Group on Okinawa before being assigned to Vietnam to take command of the 5th Special Forces Group. Colleagues said of Rheault that he was one of the most respected and beloved officers ever in Special Forces, a "must promote" to general officer rank if his command, and career, had not been ended prematurely by the [[Green Beret Affair]].<ref name=Stein/> [[Image:RobertRheault-Life-1969.jpg|thumb|left|150px|Life Magazine cover from November 14, 1969 with Robert Rheault shortly after resolution of the "Green Beret Affair"]] All U.S. Army Special Forces in 1969 operated under the control of 5th Special Forces Group, headquartered at [[Nha Trang]] on the southeast coast of [[South Vietnam]]. There was a close relationship with the [[United States Central Intelligence Agency|CIA]] that complicated the chain of command and philosophy of [[rules of engagement]].<ref>L. Fletcher Prouty (1969). [http://www.tnr.com/topics/robert-b.-rheault "Green Berets and the CIA: General Abrams strikes back"], ''The New Republic'', August 23, 1969.</ref>
Colonel Rheault took command of the 5th in May 1969 and his unit was charged with seeking out leaks in a CIA-directed espionage ring as part of [[Project GAMMA]]. Rheault, along with six of his Special Forces officers and a sergeant were arrested by the U.S. military under the orders of [[Creighton Abrams|General Creighton Abrams]] and threatened with charges of murder and conspiracy to commit murder, arising from the alleged [[extrajudicial killing]] of Thai Khac Chuyen, a Vietnamese [[double agent]] for the Americans and the North Vietnamese.<ref name=MilHist/><ref>''Rheault and the mysterious case of Thai Khac Chuyen'', ''Life Magazine'', November 14, 1969. p. 36.[https://books.google.com/books?id=4lAEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA36&lpg=PA36&dq online version]</ref>
The investigation and [[court-martial]], held by the U.S. Army in Vietnam, rapidly became engulfed in a firestorm of media publicity. Most of the American public and the Special Forces believed that Colonel Rheault and all involved had been made [[scapegoating|scapegoats]] for a matter that reflected poorly upon the Army.<ref name= Berry>John Stevens Berry (1984). ''Those Gallant Men: On Trial in Vietnam'', Presidio Press, Novato, CA. pp. 151-63; {{ISBN|0-89141-186-0}}</ref> The view that there was no wrongdoing by the soldiers was probably best stated by Rheault's 11-year-old son, Robert, Jr. who upon learning of his father's arrest said, "What is all the fuss about? I thought that was what dad was in Vietnam for ... to kill [[Viet Cong]]".<ref name=Life/>
However, the prosecution provided testimony showing that Chuyen was shot by Rheault's officers and his body dumped into the [[South China Sea]]. Further, they argued that Rheault was most certainly aware of the provisions of the [[Third Geneva Convention]] on the treatment of prisoners of war and Article 118 of the [[Uniform Code of Military Justice]]. He approved the execution of Chuyen, and also approved the cover story that Chuyen was lost on an undercover mission designed to prove his loyalty to [[South Vietnam]] and the United States.<ref name= MilHist/>
Judge Advocate General Captain John Stevens Berry called General Abrams and CIA officials to the witness stand, but both declined to testify. In September 1969 the Secretary of the Army [[Stanley Rogers Resor|Stanley Resor]] announced that all charges would be dropped against the soldiers since the CIA, in the interests of national security, had refused to make its personnel available as witnesses. On October 31, 1969, upon ascertaining that further military commands and promotions were not likely, Colonel Rheault requested immediate retirement from the Army. All others charged in the affair also had their careers effectively ended and left the service soon afterwards. The U.S. government later paid the widow of the Vietnamese agent a small pension, quelling her protests outside the [[Embassy of the United States, Saigon|American Embassy]] in [[Saigon]]. If there had been a trial, defense lawyer [[F. Lee Bailey]] said later, "the defendants would have become Abrams, [[Richard Helms |(CIA Director Richard) Helms]] and Nixon. The only winner would have been North Vietnam."<ref name=Life/><ref name=Berry/>
After the war, [[Francis Ford Coppola]], director of the 1979 film ''[[Apocalypse Now]]'' said that the character [[Colonel Kurtz|Colonel Walter Kurtz]] in the film was loosely based upon Rheault, of whom he had become aware through the 1969 news accounts of the Green Beret Affair.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.sfweekly.com/1999-11-17/news/agent-provocative/1|title=Agent Provocative |work=[[SF Weekly]]|accessdate=November 5, 2011|last=Isaacs|first=Matt|date=November 17, 1999}}</ref>
Upon retirement from the military, Rheault served as an instructor, program leader, and later, acting president of the Hurricane Island [[Outward Bound]] School in [[Rockland, Maine]]; retiring from the school in 2001 after 32 years of service. He also taught at the [[Northfield Mount Hermon School]] in Massachusetts. Rheault served on the board of directors of ''The Apprenticeshop'', a traditional boat building and maritime school in Rockland,<ref name=Board>{{cite web|url=http://www.apprenticeshop.org/who-we-are/board-of-directors|title=Board of Directors|publisher=The Apprenticeshop, Rockland, Maine|accessdate=November 5, 2011|archive-date=August 24, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110824062020/http://www.apprenticeshop.org/who-we-are/board-of-directors/|url-status=dead}}</ref> as well as on the board of directors of ''The Warrior Connection'', a [[501(c) organization#501.28c.29.283.29|501(c)(3) organization]] dedicated to the rehabilitation of military veterans suffering from [[posttraumatic stress disorder]] (PTSD).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://thewarriorconnection.web.officelive.com/boardofdirectors.aspx|title=Leadership Team|publisher=The Warrior Connection|accessdate=November 7, 2011|url-status=dead|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20111027233608/http://thewarriorconnection.web.officelive.com/boardofdirectors.aspx|archivedate=October 27, 2011}}</ref>
==Family life== In 1947 Rheault married Caroline Young (1927–2006), a [[Vassar College]] student from New York, and they had three children: Susanne; Michèle; and Robert B. Rheault Jr.<ref name= Life/> Like her husband, Caroline Young Rheault was fluent in French. She frequently traveled to and maintained a residence in France, and was an artist and book illustrator in [[Martha's Vineyard]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.mvgazette.com/article.php?13918|title=Obituary: Caroline Rheault as a Vivacious Artist|publisher=Vineyard Gazette|date=8 September 2006|accessdate=November 5, 2011}}</ref> Rheault resided in [[Owls Head, Maine]], with his second wife, Susan St. John, married in 1977, and the couple adopted two children, Nicholas St. John-Rheault and Alexis St. John-Rheault.<ref name=SFA/>
Rheault's son, Robert B. Rheault, Jr. (born 1958), is a marine biologist with a doctoral degree in [[biological oceanography]] from the [[University of Rhode Island]] who serves as the Executive Director of the East Coast Shellfish Growers Association.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://ecsga.org/rheaultbod/|title= Robert B. Rheault, Executive Director|publisher=East Coast Shellfish Growers Association|accessdate=November 5, 2011}}</ref>
==Death== Rheault died on October 16, 2013, at his home in Owls Head, Maine.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.latimes.com/obituaries/la-me-robert-rheault-20131103,0,3258465.story|title=Robert Rheault dies at 87; Green Beret commander accused of murder|author=Elaine Woo|work=Los Angeles Times|date=November 2, 2013|accessdate=November 6, 2013}}</ref>
Rheault was interviewed for [[Ken Burns]] and [[Lynn Novick]]'s [[Public Broadcasting System|PBS]] documentary series, ''[[The Vietnam War (TV series)|The Vietnam War]]'', which aired in September 2017, four years after his death.
==References== {{reflist|2}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Rheault, Robert B.}} [[Category:1925 births]] [[Category:2013 deaths]] [[Category:United States Army personnel of the Korean War]] [[Category:United States Army personnel of the Vietnam War]] [[Category:Military personnel from Boston]] [[Category:People from Rockland, Maine]] [[Category:Phillips Exeter Academy alumni]] [[Category:Recipients of the Silver Star]] [[Category:Members of the United States Army Special Forces]] [[Category:United States Military Academy alumni]] [[Category:United States Army colonels]] [[Category:United States Army personnel who were court-martialed]] [[Category:Elliott School of International Affairs alumni]] [[Category:People charged with murder]] [[Category:People indicted for war crimes]]