by C. R. Ryder
“I heard that from some of the veterans I talked to as well.” Ellington said. “How many was it?”
“The rumor is that there were 13 French POWs captured at Dien Bien Phu in 1954 and they were not released until 16 years later. I cannot verify the source of this claim so it seems rather dubious.” I said.
“It is.” Dave Smith broke in. “I called the French Embassy. Their spokesman said that all French passengers were released in 1954 in an agreement with the North Vietnamese.”
“What about other POWs? The ones released during Operation Homecoming. What did they have to say on the subject?”
“I skimmed four biographies last night, no mentions of POWs left behind.”
“Shut up.”
Technical Sergeant Tony Luciano
Air Force Operations Intelligence Specialist
San Antonio, Texas
I interviewed retired Brigadier General Coker at Fort Sam Houston where he worked as a civilian. He was at MACV during the heydays of the Vietnam War. He was an advocate for searching for POWs in the late 1970’s after the fall of South Vietnam.
“You have to understand this POW/MIA issue is unique to the Vietnam War. Do you know how many American soldiers were unaccounted for after World War II?”
“More than in Vietnam?”
“A lot more. 78,751 American soldiers were missing or unaccounted for. That is 20,000 more than the total number of American servicemen killed in Vietnam. Same thing with the Korean War. Only four years but it resulted in 8,177 MIAs. Yet neither of these conflicts prompted widespread protests and demands for government inquiries.”
“Why is Vietnam unique?”
“Two possible explanations. Part of the problem is, of course, because we lost the war. We do not have immediate access to places where missing soldiers were last seen alive.”
“That’s one way of looking at it. What about the second explanation?”
“Well Operation Homecoming was used as a substitute for the victory parades that preceding wars had. Without victory America needed something to symbolize closure. After Operation Homecoming the MIA families felt that the country and the military in particular, were too quick to forget the war, and therefore also forgetting their sons and husbands. What's more, the MIAs have become a matter of American honor. Vietnam was the first war we lost. With it went a lot of our prestige. Their return would symbolize the restoration of that honor that was lost when we lost the war.”
He hesitated and made a funny face. I decided to dig a little further.
“You think there is more to it?”
“Turn off the recorder.”
I did.
“Now this is just between you and me. If you put it on paper I will deny it.”
“Understood sir.”
“Far from forgetting these sons and brothers, the government has used them for political use over successive administrations. Alternately suppressing the families' requests for information and helping them in publicizing their cause. The results have been cruelly misleading for the families and American people.”
“Initially, in 1966 President Johnson conducted secret negotiations regarding the POWs with the North Vietnamese government in Paris. They believed it would be detrimental to the talks, as well as to the prisoners, to publicize the problem. Administration officials told the families of POWs and MIAs to keep quiet."
“Then just a few years later President Nixon, aware of the families' growing frustration, decided to champion their cause. The administration went public with the POW issue in hopes it would force the Vietnamese to follow the rules of the Geneva Convention. POW and MIA families were featured at press conferences and demonstrations. Nixon was behind the formation of the national organization of POW and MIA families in 1969. Defense Secretary Melvin Laird announced on May 18, 1969, that the administration would "go public" with the POW issue in an effort to use public opinion to pressure the Vietcong into obeying the Geneva principles concerning POW rights. The campaign was waged through press conferences, speaking engagements by former POWs, and demonstrations by POW and MIA families.
In December 1969 Nixon met with 26 POW wives to suggest the formation of a national organization of MIA and POW families. The product of this was the National League of Families of Americans Missing in Southeast Asia. Spiro Agnew presented the League with their first check for $10,000. The group later splintered during the drawdown and Nixon’s Vietnamization initiative. The Nixon administration did not initially have any provisions to their exit from Vietnam regarding the release of the POWs or finding the MIAs.”
“What happened next?”
“The war ended. At least for America. South Vietnam lasted a few more years, but that country was a total disaster. 591 POWs were released following the Paris Peace Accords in January of 1973. According to the North Vietnamese government this was all the POWs they held.”
“What about the families of the others.”
“Naturally they were upset. The government is bound by the Missing Persons Act of 1942 and the Pentagon had to conduct a review of the status of everyone who had not returned. When that happened five families from the League filed a suit in U.S. District Court to try and stop them from declaring their men dead. In August of 1973 the court ruled that the reviews could only be conducted after the next of kin submitted a written request. Do you see the position that this move put the families in?”
“No I’m not quite following you.”
“The military forced the next of kin to basically ask that their missing family member be declared dead. Can you imagine a spouse writing a letter to the Pentagon asking for her husband to be officially dead? Parents writing for the sake of their son. The emotional turmoil that would create?”
“That’s rough.”
“Yes. Financially it was ill advised as well. The benefits to a MIA family would be a continued paycheck while a KIA family would only get the insurance settlement. This continued for some families until 1978 when the Pentagon finally declared all MIAs “presumed dead” so this resulted in a status reclassification change from MIA to Killed in Action/Body Not Recovered. This undermined the Missing in Action designation that was invented just to prevent the presumed dead moniker.”
“So you believe that Vietnam turned over all of the POWs?”
“I don’t mean to give the North Vietnamese a clean bill of health here, far from it. They committed atrocious human rights abuses against our guys and their own people. They also complicated the whole process with demands. Article 21 of the Paris Peace Accords stated that the United States contribute to rebuilding their nation. When Congress would not grant the aid the Vietnamese refused to talk about the MIAs. A deadlock was created and neither side has blinked yet.”
“The first congressional committee on MIAs in Southeast Asia was organized in the mid-1970s. After hearing from 50 officials and reviewing classified information as well as the files of over 200 GIs, they determined that no Americans were still alive as prisoners of war. With that being said President Carter sent the former head of the United Auto Workers union to Hanoi with a team of experts. The Woodcock Commission was severely limited by the Vietnamese government. They didn’t even get out of Hanoi. They started warming to us though for the purposes of normalization, lifting the embargo that stands to this day, but that didn’t get far as we recognized China, Vietnam’s ancient enemy, in 1978. Carter’s attempt to settle the issue just pissed off all of the families that were holding onto the hope that their loved ones were still alive.”
“So where do we go from here?” I asked not knowing the answer.
Lieutenant Colonel William Carter
Air Force Intelligence Officer
The Pentagon
I interviewed Lieutenant Colonel Frank Kirby at his office at the Pentagon. He was doing a staff tour with combat plans working on a new concept called Air Land Battle.
“It was 1982 I think. Yeah it must have been.” He told me still looking unsure. “Who won t
he Superbowl that year? Anyway I flew MIA families to this annual convention in Washington. It was in the summer. I remember it was hot as hell, especially when we touched down in Tampa. We did it again, though I can’t remember if that was the next year or if there was a couple of years in between. They did it again when the year after I left the unit so I don’t know much about that one. It was all President Reagan. He thought the families didn’t get a good shake. That was 1984. The same year that the National POW/MIA Recognition Day started.”
“1984?”
“I think so.”
“You spent time with the families. Do you think that any of them could be in touch with any POWs?”
He did not answer.
“What in general is their attitude to the possibility their loved ones are still alive.”
He stared at me like I slapped him in the face.
“Check this out.” He said at last pointing to a flag that adorned the wall beside his desk. It was the POW/MIA Flag. The flag features a POW in a prison camp and bears the words "You Are Not Forgotten" on the bottom.
“Al Pacino was used as the model.” He told me. “Things went crazy on that forehead though so it doesn’t show.”
“When is he going to do another movie?”
“I know. He’s great. Anyway it has flown beneath the American flag at the White House, the Capitol, and the Pentagon every year on National POW/MIA Recognition Day. President Reagan’s gesture was touching; unfortunately it has an unintended dark side.”
“What is that?”
“It has led some families to believe they do not have to accept the loss of their loved ones. They don’t let go and neither does America. That gave birth to a lot of drama.”
“Hence the public outcry and the investigations.”
“The movies?”
“Yes the movies”
“President Reagan said he was holding out hope that ‘some may still be saved.’ Does this mean that our men have been tortured daily in a distant jungle for decades? Nobody wants to think of that.”
It was as close to a straight answer as I was going to get.
“Do you believe that Vietnam still has living POWs?”
“I don’t know, but I will tell you something: if they do we better tread lightly. I mean if the cavalry starts heading their way wouldn’t the easiest thing to do with twenty year old POWs is just kill them?”
Major Brad Johnson
Air Force Intelligence Officer
Thailand
In the days after the Thailand Box were found we were running down every lead no matter how inconsequential. Military and civilian national security agencies were interviewing former POWs, refugees, defectors and missionaries who had been into Vietnam since the war. When I flew to Thailand there were Army intelligence guys on the plane, a couple of State Department guys and one man who went by Smith that I swear was CIA. All of them were aimed at pinpointing if POWs were still alive and if so where.
I arrived in Songkhla, Thailand. I split a cab with the four Army intelligence officers and proceeded to get a few drinks at the hotel bar to fight the jet lag.
After a couple of rounds they showed me their interview questions. They were not that much different than ours. The next morning we went to the harbor together. There we were there to meet former United States Army Special Forces member Nick Quinlan.
The guy turned out to be a scam artist. He wanted money to talk to us. When we refused he warmed up a little. He handed us grainy photos and signed statements of dubious origin. He wanted money to tell us more. He wanted money to talk to his contacts. He wanted money to take us up river.
We bid him farewell and pressed on to meet two more of these characters. It was the same with all of them.
The thought of family members coming here and shilling out their hard earned money to guys like them made me sick.
I reported our findings over a secure phone to Carol the next day at the embassy. She was not surprised by my findings at all which in turn surprised me. Before my meeting I had no idea POWs were a cottage industry in Indochina. A number of former military and other slimy entrepreneurs had made a living fleecing families, friends and concerned citizens of their hard earned money. The slime balls all promised that their loved ones were still alive and they could provide evidence. Like any other scheme once you paid money they hit them up for more. Eventually the poor families were dumping more and more money into the scheme all the while the con men said they were just on the edge of a breakthrough. If the families got anything at all it was a grainy photograph that could have been anyone.
It was sad.
An army officer stopped me in the hallway. He started chatting me up. I was in civilian clothes and he probably thought I was one of his guys.
“These guys are a bunch of snake oil salesmen.” I told him when he asked.
“A dead end then?”
“No. I think there is something here. Something I can’t get at.”
“What are you suggesting?” He said with a raised eyebrow.
“I think we need our own people in the jungle. Someone who can hunt these clues down.”
“I know just the men for the job.”
My commander figured this was a wild goose chase. I had taken a long plane ride for nothing. Well I hope I helped this army guy out.
I put the grainy photos and the statements the Quinlan guy gave me in an evidence bag. It was the only thing close to proof right now. The forensic guys back home could at least take a look at it.
Technical Sergeant Tony Luciano
Air Force Operations Intelligence Specialist
Guthrie, Oklahoma
When I arrived at the Pham family house I was received by Captain Kien Pham, his wife and three daughters. His wife and eldest daughter spoke broken English in a thick Vietnamese accent. His two youngest daughters spoke perfect English with deep Oklahoma accents.
“I am RVN. I will always be RVN.” Pham explained to me over coffee. “Every Veteran's Day I drive down to Oklahoma City with three other Viet Kieu. There is a mass color guard there with honor guards from all over the state participating. The army, navy and air force are there. Others too dressed in old clothing from the revolutionary war. Then there is us. The RVN.”
He points to an old flight suit in the closet.
“I flew F-5s in the war. Shot down a Mig once. Splashed that mother fucker.” He pointed to a grainy picture on the wall that looked like a smudge in a snow storm. It was the wreckage of the fighter.
“I honestly do not know anything about your countrymen. After the communist came they captured me along with the rest of my squadron. They put us in prison. I thought we were brothers. I thought we were strong. They turned on me. It is hard to be strong when there is no hope. I did not turn. They beat me.”
“You escaped?” I asked.
“No.” Pham shook his head. “I went to many prisons. I never saw any of your brothers there. Only my brothers and they were not my brothers anymore.”
“When they released me from prison I was put into a forced labor camp.” He continued. “We would travel by truck, train and sometimes by foot from place to place around the country. We filled in holes from your B-52 strikes. You were lucky to get a shovel. Most of us moved dirt with our hands, carrying it against our stomachs from before dawn until after dusk filling the bomb craters.”
“I will never go back to Vietnam. I am an American and this is my home now. We send money back to family there, but that is all. You should not go there either. It is a bad place.”
“I may not have a choice.” I admitted.
“If they say go you say hell no.” He smiled.
“I can’t do that.”
He nodded.
“I was a soldier once.” He pointed at the flight suit. “I know.”
Major Brad Johnson
Air Force Intelligence Officer
Site Two Refugee Camp, Thailand
These refugee camps were full of hunger and desp
eration. They provided a fertile ground for phony MIA stories. US government interviewers from other agencies were there collecting information from refugees regarding the missing American servicemen.
The refugee claims were varied.
“A lot of the mythology was born in the Thai camps.” A missionary named Bobby Campaign explained to me. “You see in east and northeast Thailand there are thousands of refugees from Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia locked into these refugee camps. These poor people don’t have much of a future. In fact the majority have no hope of being moved to another country so they wait sometimes for years to be sent back to the countries they escaped from.”
Bobby gave me the best stuff he had collected for the two and a half years he was in the camp. I mailed it all via embassy to Carol. That way it would get home before I did.
It consisted of:
Possible locations of crash sites or gravesites
Possible hidden POWs at Yen Bai re-education camp system in northern Vietnam, a place called Kilo Site, a rumored prison surrounded by a lake.
Others were letters from former Communist soldiers who shared the policies and procedures for the handling of captured Americans.
Some were made up stories from refugees hoping that they would get a ticket to the US. They concocted every phony story you could imagine from POWs being shipped to China and Russia to some underground prison in Hanoi.
Some might have been for real.
I could not see how we were going to run them all down without having a presence in the country of Vietnam.
That was my last contribution to the investigation. I got on a plane and headed home the next day.
Major Benjamin James
Air Force Intelligence Officer
Albany, New York
