VIETNAM WAR Mary Poppins Platoon HALO Combat Qualification parachutist badge RARE

Description

VIETNAM WAR Mary Poppins Platoon HALO (High Altitude Low Opening) Combat Qualification parachutist badge RARE
or
Mary Poppins Platoon MPP Combat Jump Qualification Certificate

Material: Steel
Reverse: original 2 pin fittings. please see photo
Fine original and very rare item!

Box: 235-275

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The story

Captain Nguyễn Văn Kozlowski, an officer in the Army of the Republic of Vietnam known by the nickname Stosh was born during the First Indochina War to a Polish soldier of the French Foreign Legion who was deployed to Vietnam , and a local Vietnamese woman.
Kozlowski, a Eurasian (mixed European and Asian descent)　born and raised in Vietnam , enlisted in the Army of the Republic of Vietnam as an adult, and used his physique to become a non-commissioned officer in the 32nd Ranger Battalion, 5th Ranger Group. Despite being a Vietnamese soldier, Kozlowski looked like a Caucasian and was an excellent soldier, earning him the respect of his MACV advisors.
Kozlowski 　also had a Polish-American cousin named Ziggy Jablonski , who coincidentally served as a corporal in the U.S. Marine Corps in Da Nang. Although they were cousins, the two were born and raised far apart , and it was during the Vietnam War that they first met in Vietnam .
In 1968, the US MACV-SOG planned a POW rescue mission to send in commandos from the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (NKT) to rescue US soldiers imprisoned at the Son Tay Vietnam. This mission involved a Vietnamese long-range reconnaissance team descending near the POW camp using HALO (High Altitude Drop, Low Altitude Opening), a new parachute technique that had not yet been used in combat at the time, making it an unprecedentedly dangerous mission.
At the same time, Sergeant Kozlowski , who had advanced from the Rangers to the Special Forces and graduated top of his class from the Dong Ba Thinh Special Forces Training Center (Nha Trang), was highly regarded by SOG advisors and was selected as a pathfinder (drop guide) to make a solo HALO landing near Son Tay Prison ahead of the rescue team and guide the main force to the landing point .
However, the night before the mission, Kozlowski and his cousin Ziggy had a Polish-style drinking session to pray for good fortune, resulting in a hangover. When Kozlowski’s transport plane reached 33,000 feet (approximately 10,000 meters) above Son Tay and he jumped, he panicked due to nervousness and poor health . In previous static-line jumps, Kozlowski’s parachute deployed immediately upon jumping , causing a strong shock to the shoulder harnesses . This was not the case with HALO. Kozlowski’s body instinctively reacted with fear that his parachute had not deployed, and he immediately pulled the main chute release handle after jumping. The deployed parachute caught on the transport plane’s fuselage, leaving Kozlowski suspended in mid-air at an altitude of 10,000 meters . The transport plane, however, remained unaware and continued on its planned course back to Bien Hoa Air Base.

At this point , Kozlowski realized that even if he had detached the main chute and used the spare parachute, it would be impossible for him to land at the planned DZ (drop zone) near the Son Tay prison camp, and that his mistake had caused the mission to fail. However, his consciousness gradually became hazy due to the low temperature, low oxygen levels, and a hangover, so he decided to take a moment to enjoy the magnificent natural beauty that unfolded below him. Then, half-desperate, Kozlowski decided that his sister lived in Bien Hoa, where the transport plane was headed, so he would detach the tangled parachute when they approached Bien Hoa and use the spare parachute to land at her house.

A few hours later, the transport plane reached Bien Hoa, more than 1,000 km south of Son Tay. Kozlowski did indeed release the main chute and safely landed in a backup parachute. However, he was in an unfamiliar location, several miles from his sister’s home . He was eventually found and rescued by the Nung ethnic microphone force stationed in Ho Ngoc Tau. Kozlowski told the local microphone force commander that he had flown more than 1,000 km from an airplane 10,000 meters above Hanoi and returned home. However, no one believed his absurd story. He was suspected of mental illness and was rushed by helicopter to a hospital in Saigon.
Kozlowski was ashamed of his actions and for security reasons never told his doctors how he had suffered hypothermia in tropical Vietnam and been rushed to hospital. Both Vietnamese and American military officials kept quiet about the operation, and the historically recorded Son Tay POW rescue and the first combat HALO drop did not occur until several years after Kozlowski ‘s participation.

Mary Poppins Platoon (MPP)

While hospitalized, Kozlowski was questioned by the Vietnam Army General Staff’s Office No. 2 (Intelligence and Security Department) and honestly reported the details of the incident. However, because this was the first HALO jump failure in the world, and because the assault team’s descent was canceled and no casualties occurred, Kozlowski was not held personally responsible.
Meanwhile, the US SOG frankly reflected on the recklessness of the operation, which had been carried out by the Vietnamese army alone based on a desk plan, and which even the US military had no combat experience of, and began to establish a new joint Vietnamese-US HALO infiltration operation team.
The Vietnamese army’s leading HALO expert was Lance Corporal Kozlowski, who had failed the landing at Son Tay. Although Kozlowski made a mistake during the actual landing, he had undergone thorough HALO training under the guidance of the SOG during the preparations, and was fully equipped. Kozlowski ‘s unprecedented failure and adventure earned him the affectionate nickname ” Stosh” ( a Polish name colloquially meaning “idiot”) from the SOG troopers . His comical heroic tale of flying 1,000 km and returning suspended in mid-air was likened to the character in the musical film Mary Poppins , and the Vietnamese-American joint HALO unit was named the “Mary Poppins Platoon.”

The Mary Poppins Platoon 　was thus formed and would be deployed in numerous cross-border infiltration operations over the next few years .
Shortly after its establishment, in late 1968, Mary Poppins, the only operational HAKO unit under U.S. command , was deployed to North Korea, far from Vietnam. The mission was to rescue the crew of the U.S. Navy intelligence-gathering ship Pueblo , which had been captured by the North Korean Navy in the Sea of Japan during the “Pueblo Incident” in January of that year . The transport plane carrying Mary Poppins departed from a U.S. airbase in South Korea, flew over the Sea of Japan, and arrived over Wonsan, Gangwon Province , North Korea, where a POW camp was located. The Mary Poppins then performed a HALO landing near Wonsan Port as planned. However, shortly after the unit’s infiltration into North Korean territory, the U.S. government, fearing a resurgence of the Korean War and Soviet intervention, made concessions to the North Korean side, allowing the POWs to be returned peacefully. Thus, the camp assault was canceled, and Mary Poppins escaped North Korea without being detected.
In another operation, Mary Poppins Platoon was urgently dispatched to the mountains of Burma to support General Vang Pao, a right-wing Hmong leader of the Royal Laotian Army, who was in a difficult position during a battle with the Communist forces in the Plain of Jars in Laos. An artillery position and a howitzer battery built by the Japanese army during World War II were left behind in this area, and the artillery was in operational condition under the control of the Burmese Communist Army. Mary Poppins Platoon stormed and captured this artillery position, and used the former Japanese howitzers they had seized from the Burmese Communist Party to provide supporting artillery fire toward Laos.

Kozlowski was a key figure in the Mary Poppins Platoon and was involved in all of these special operations with the SOG, eventually rising to the rank of Army Captain. Kozlowski played a major role in the early days of HALO operations , and much of the HALO technology researched and developed by the Mary
The Mary also created an unofficial Vietnamese combat parachute qualification badge for the US and Vietnamese special forces who participated in these special operations . The design was based on the Vietnamese Army’s airborne specialty insignia, but featured the ” Mary Poppins” umbrella, a symbol of Captain Kozlowski and the Polish airborne forces to which Kozlowski’s father once belonged.