KASTER, LEONARD LEE

Name: Leonard Lee Kaster
Rank/Branch: O2/US Air Force
Unit: 405th Fighter Wing
Date of Birth: 24 September 1938
Home City of Record: Holyoke MA
Date of Loss: 06 August 1964
Country of Loss: South Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 110953N 1070444E (YT270349)
Status (in 1973): Killed/Body Not Recovered
Category: 2
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: B57B
Refno: 0036

Other Personnel in Incident: Fred C. Cutrer Jr. (missing)

Source: Compiled by Homecoming II Project 01 September 1990 from one or more
of the following: raw data from U.S. Government agency sources,
correspondence with POW/MIA families, published sources, interviews. Updated
by the P.O.W. NETWORK 1998.

REMARKS: AC CRASH EXPLODE HVY VC - J

SYNOPSIS: The B57 Canberra was one of the aircraft used by the U.S. Air
Force to bomb the Ho Chi Minh Trail. The Canberra first came to the Vietnam
theater at the time of the Gulf of Tonkin incident in 1964. It proved too
vulnerable and difficult to repair for working targets over North Vietnam,
but proved effective in the armed reconnaissance Trail operations of
Operation Steel Tiger. The Canberra was sometimes used in conjunction with
other, more sophisticated aircraft, such as the C130, and was especially
effective on night missions.

Capt. Fred C. Cutrer Jr. was the pilot of a Canberra sent on an operational
mission over South Vietnam on August 6, 1964. The navigator onboard the
aircraft was 1Lt. Leonard L. Kaster. Aircraft control last heard from the
aircraft by radio when it was northeast of Tan Son Nhut.

The aircraft went down near the Sang Dong Nai River in Long Khan Province,
South Vietnam. According to Defense Intelligence data, it received heavy
fire from Viet Cong forces, crashed and exploded. Neither crewman was
believed to have survived. Both were classified Killed in Action, Body Not
Recovered.

Cutrer and Kaster are listed among the missing because their remains were
never recovered. Others who are missing do not have such clear-cut cases.
Some were known captives; some were photographed as they were led by their
guards. Some were in radio contact with search teams, while others simply
disappeared.

Well over 1000 first-hand, eye-witness reports of American prisoners still
alive in Southeast Asia have been received by 1990. Most of them are still
classified. If, as the U.S. seems to believe, the men are all dead, why the
secrecy after so many years? If the men are alive, why are they not home?

Fred C. Cutrer, Jr. was promoted to the rank of Major before a determination
of death was made.

---

Use your Browser's BACK function to return to the PREVIOUS page

---