[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 75 (Friday, May 24, 1996)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E899-E918]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
IN PURSUIT OF FULLEST POSSIBLE ACCOUNTING IN THE SOCIALIST REPUBLIC OF
VIETNAM, JUNE 1994-JUNE 1995
______
HON. DOUGLAS ``PETE'' PETERSON
of florida
in the house of representatives
Thursday, May 23, 1996
Mr. PETERSON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, today I want to enter into the
Record a very valuable, insightful personal experience monograph,
titled, ``In Pursuit of Fullest Possible Accounting in the Socialist
Republic of Vietnam, June 1994-June 1995,'' prepared by Lt. Col. Melvin
E. Richmond, Jr. This paper captures Colonel Richmond's unique
experience while assigned as commander of Detachment 2, Joint Task
Force--Full Accounting [JTF-FA], in Hanoi, Socialist Republic of
Vietnam.
Colonel Richmond's account of his year of duty in Vietnam not only
contains a factual record of the activities of his command, but also
takes the reader on a historical review of America's efforts to reach
fullest possible accounting of our missing servicemen in Vietnam. Woven
throughout his monograph is an authentic description of the level of
cooperation his unit experienced while working with the Vietnamese on a
daily basis.
A sensitive review of this impressive paper will help many to better
understand America's commitment to fullest possible accounting and to
see first hand the rigors associated with our efforts to reach that
goal.
Abstract
Author: Melvin E. Richmond, Jr. (LTC), USA
Title: In Pursuit of the Fullest Possible Accounting in the
Socialist Republic of Vietnam, June 1994-June 1995
Format: Personal Experience Monograph
Date: 5 April 1996
Pages: 118
Classification: Unclassified
Some 2,157 Americans remain unaccounted-for as a result of
the United States's involvement in the war in Indochina;
1,610 in Vietnam. In January 1992, the Department of Defense
organized Joint Task Force--Full Accounting and began an
intensive effort unprecedented in the history of warfare to
account for its missing warriors. I was privileged to
participate in this effort as the Commander of Detachment 2,
JTF-FA from 10 June 1994 until 28 June 1995. The purpose of
this paper is to describe the full accounting effort in
Vietnam and my experiences during my tenure as Commander. The
monograph provides sufficient background and historical
information to acquaint readers with the issue. Most
importantly though, it describes the progress the U.S.
Government made in resolving the issue while I was there.
Finally, I presented a number of lessons I learned as the
Commander of Detachment 2, especially regarding hosting high
level delegations, dealing with the media, cooperating with
U.S. veteran organizations, interacting with the Department
of State, and working with the Vietnamese Government and
people.
When a soldier was injured and could not get back to
safety, his buddy went out to get him, against his officer's
orders. He returned mortally wounded and his friend, who he
had carried back, was dead. The officer was angry. ``I told
you not to go,'' he said. ``Now I've lost both of you. It was
not worth it.'' The dying man replied, ``But it was, Sir,
because when I got to him he said, `Jim, I knew you'd come.'
'' \1\
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\1\ Footnotes at end.
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``I knew you'd come.'' If I were to summarize the efforts
of the United States to recover, identify and repatriate to
the United States its missing servicemen, these four words
describe them best. Today there remain more than 78,000
Americans still unaccounted-for from World War II and over
8,100 from the Korean War. As of February 27, 1996, there
were 2,157 Americans still unaccounted-for as a result of the
United States involvement in the war in Indochina. Quite
naturally, most of those losses are in the Socialist Republic
of Vietnam, but there are also Americans unaccounted-for in
the Lao Peoples Democratic Republic, the Kingdom of Cambodia,
and the People's Republic of China.\2\ \3\
In January 1992, the Department of Defense (DOD) organized
Joint Task Force--Full Accounting (JTF-FA) and assigned it
the mission to ``resolve the cases of Americans still
unaccounted-for as a result of the Southeast Asian conflict
through investigation, archival research and remains-recovery
operations.'' \4\ Thus began an intensive effort
unprecedented in the history of warfare to account for a
nation's unaccounted-for warriors.\5\
I was privileged to participate in this effort as the
Commander of Detachment 2, JTF-FA from June 10, 1994 until
June 28, 1995. The purpose of this paper is to describe the
full accounting effort in Vietnam during my tenure as
Commander. I have begun with a very brief history of the
United States Government's (USG) effort to resolve this issue
and a description of how the USG officially accounts for its
missing. I will then outline the preparations I undertook to
assume my duties, and describe the organization of JTF-FA in
general, and Detachment 2 in detail. The final two sections
of the body of the paper, contain an examination of the
aspects of progress we made in resolving the unaccounted-for
issue, and close with lessons I learned during my tenure that
may be of use to other military officers as they prepare for
duties in similar circumstances. The lessons concentrate on
issues involving hosting high level delegations, dealing with
the media, cooperating with U.S. veterans organizations,
interacting with the Department of State, and working with
the Vietnamese Government and people. For those who are
unfamiliar with this issue, the annexes and the glossary
contain information that explains the terminology associated
with this issue.
To set the stage for the remainder of this paper, it is
important to emphasize that as the Commander of Detachment 2,
I was an operator, not a policy-maker. President Clinton
``normalized'' diplomatic relations with Vietnam in July
1995, because Vietnam had cooperated sufficiently in
resolving the issue of Americans still missing in Vietnam.
There are still many steps yet to be taken, however, before
relations will be ``normal.'' These steps are contingent upon
continued progress by the Vietnamese toward resolving the
issue of unaccounted-for Americans. The President and
Congress will determine when the Vietnamese have progressed
sufficiently to continue to move forward in our relations
with Vietnam.
Any inferences you may draw regarding policy issues as you
read this monograph are your own. I will lay out the
developments as I saw them, but will try not to draw any
conclusions regarding the level of progress. Where I state
something as my opinion, it is exactly that. It does not
reflect the official or unofficial positions of the United
States Government, Joint Task Force--Full Accounting, the
Defense POW/MIA Office (DPMO), or any other agency or
individual.
Finally, participating in this effort is a tremendously
emotional experience. Never before have I had such a strong
sense of contributing to something so important. To a person,
every member of JTF-FA has a single-minded purpose; to get
the families the answers they so richly deserve. I cannot
even begin to describe the flood of emotion we felt whenever
we found a tooth during an excavation, because we knew that
it would, in all likelihood, lead to an identification. I
cannot explain the sense of satisfaction we got when we
unearthed two gold wedding bands and human remains when
excavating an aircraft crash site thought to be that of two
missing Americans.
I believe Leslie Weatherhead's passage at the opening of
this paper best describes why those of us in JTF-FA felt our
mission was so important. I normally recited her quote
privately to our participants before every repatriation
ceremony to remind everyone of why we were there. Being in
Hanoi and working this issue day in and day out, it was easy
to become somewhat hardened to the importance of our mission.
I believe the repatriation ceremonies were the heart and soul
of what we did, and thought it was a good time to reflect on
our mission. Each ceremony culminated years of work to find
and recover each set of remains. And now, more than 20 years
after making the ultimate sacrifice for their country, these
soldiers, airmen, marines, and sailors--some of God's noblest
people--were going home.
``War is always and will ever be obscene, but faced with a
greater obscenity--slavery, I would fight. While war is
obscene, those who go forward, who charge the machine guns,
who bleed, who go down to the aid stations and are put in
body bags--they are not obscene, their sacrifices have no
measure--theirs has a purity where mankind shines and is
beyond corruption. I am not blasphemous when I say that in
the brutality and evil of war, soldiers who have offered
themselves up so that their buddies may live, have in them
the likeness and image of God. And damn those who debunk
courage, valor, fidelity, love of country, love of home,
family, hopes and dreams for a better tomorrow. Our soldiers
give up much--that others
[[Page E900]]
may live, not only in freedom but even luxury. They deserve
our great, great gratitude and affection because they are
willing to serve. They are some of God's noblest people.''
--General Cavazos.
Evolution of Accounting Operations
The United States Government (USG) efforts to account for
Americans still missing as a result of its participation in
the conflict in Southeast Asia have changed dramatically
since initial operations began under the auspices of the
Joint Casualty Resolution Center (JCRC). JCRC and its
subsequent field activities came to being as a result of a
joint agreement between President Reagan's Presidential
Emissary for Humanitarian Affairs, General John Vessey (USA
Retired), and SRV Acting Foreign Minister Tran Quang Co.
General Vessey helped establish the ground rules for joint
investigations, surveys, and excavations with the Vietnamese.
Joint field activities (JFAs) began rather humbly.\6\ JFA 1
lasted ten days, from September 25, 1988 until October 4,
1988. The Vietnamese permitted only enough American personnel
in-country to man two very small teams and restricted the
duration of operations to only ten days. The team arrived at
Noi Bai Airfield outside Hanoi aboard a single USAF C-141 and
brought all their equipment with them, including four Jeep
Cherokees. The conditions were spartan to say the least. With
no helicopter support and only four Jeeps, travel overland
was agonizingly slow, and travel time was included in the
ten-day operations plan. The roads were poor, there were
virtually no telephones and the teams were not allowed to
bring radios into country. Each team included a Team Leader
(civilian linguist), a team analyst (Military Intelligence
specialist), and a Search and Rescue specialist. They had no
permanent base of operations in Vietnam, limited non-
temporary storage (one small room in the basement of the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs [MFA] Reception Hall), and they
carried everything with them. The first JFA required
approximately three days' travel just to reach the first
investigation sites north and northwest of Hanoi. The teams
had only about four days of intensive investigations for a
total of six cases. They then needed three days to return to
Hanoi where they prepared to redeploy on Day 10. Needless to
say, compared to today's JFAs, not much investigating took
place.
Gradually, JCRC expanded the amount and type of equipment
they maintained in Vietnam. On July 7, 1991, JCRC and the
Central Identification Laboratory, Hawaii (CILHI), opened
what was known as the U.S. MIA Office on the third floor of
the Boss Hotel in downtown Hanoi. After the 15th JFA in
January 1992, JCRC stood down. JTF-FA, the parent
organization of Detachment 2 in Hanoi, replaced it. JTF-FA,
under the direction of its initial commander, Major General
Thomas H. Needham, expanded investigative and recovery
operations exponentially.
By April 1993, teams were operating in numerous provinces
simultaneously with virtually unrestricted access to travel
between provinces as necessary. By the time of my arrival in
June 1994, we were deploying well over 100 personnel into the
country for each JFA using multiple military and civilian
aircraft sorties into three airports: Noi Bai International
Airport in Hanoi (northern operations), the Da Nang
International Airport in Da Nang (central operations), and
Tan Son Nhut in Ho Chi Minh City (southern operations). JTF-
FA had expanded operations from JCRC's initial two teams in
country for ten days, to up to eight teams in-country for 30
or more days. We had over 100 Mitsubishi Pajero 4-wheel-drive
vehicles pre-positioned throughout the country, three
helicopters (2 MI-8s and 1 MI-17) available for movement of
personnel and equipment to sites inaccessible by vehicle, and
had built three storage buildings in the Ranch for team
equipment.
During the period 1988-1991, both the U.S. and SRV sides
went through a mutual and rapid education on the capabilities
and intentions of the other. The ``learning curve'' was
steep. In the beginning, investigations and excavations
proceeded at a crawl. Today, Vietnamese team leaders are
active participants in planning and preparing for each JFA.
During my tenure, at the suggestion of the VNOSMP, my
specialists and Operations Officer met with the Vietnamese
team leaders prior to each JFA to fully coordinate every
aspect of the operation. Instead of halting operations in the
middle of a JFA because an unexpected problem arose, the
Vietnamese were now trying to anticipate problems and resolve
them prior to the onset of operations.
Some have been critical of the rapid tempo of operations of
JTF-FA, characterizing it as ``steam-rolling through
Vietnam.'' They described the investigations as rushed and
incomplete, with IEs concentrating on the number of cases
they could close rather than the quality of their
investigations. This is an unfair description of early JTF
operations and current operations verify this. During its
existence, JCRC-CILHI teams completed as few as 13 JFAs, 200
investigations, and 37 excavations. By the end of my tenure
as Commander, Detachment 2, in approximately the same amount
of time as JCRC had operated, JTF-FA had completed nearly
1,400 investigations and approximately 200 excavations. We
did find that some of the early investigations could have
been performed better, and we reinvestigated them; some
numerous times.
The fast pace in the early days of JTF-FA allowed
investigators and analysts to gather as much information as
possible, about as many cases as possible, as quickly as
possible. This is not testament to an ineffective JCRC.
Rather, it clearly demonstrates the increased priority this
issue had accrued with both the U.S. and SRV governments.
Time is one of the JTF-FA's greatest enemies; witnesses get
older and many pass away, and the effects of the environment
continue to degrade the evidence it possesses. The fast pace
allowed us to complete the less difficult cases, assess our
position, and then concentrate on other more difficult cases.
Accounting Procedures
The USG accounts for missing Americans in one of three
ways. The first, and most obvious method is to discover a
live American. A live unaccounted-for-American has surfaced
since Operations Homecoming in 1973.\7\ The second method is
through positive and legally sufficient identification of
remains. The last method of accounting for missing Americans
is by presenting compelling evidence that indicates the USG
will not be able to meet either of the first two criteria.
CILHI is responsible for identifying the remains returned
to its facility. Today, its primary means of identifying
remains is by matching dental remains to the dental records
of unaccounted-for Americans. CILHI also has the capability
to identify remains through DNA matching. It is currently
doing this through the Armed Forces DNA Identification
Laboratory in Maryland. DNA matching also has some practical
difficulties in that it usually requires a piece of bone
(approximately five grams) larger than the fragments teams
normally recover at the excavation sites.
The third means of accounting for missing Americans is much
less conclusive than the first two methods and to date, the
USG has not used it to account for unaccounted-for Americans.
Over-water losses are the classic example of cases that might
fall into this category. In Vietnam alone, there are 449
unaccounted-for Americans believed to be lost over-water. The
likelihood of finding a live American or identifiable remains
(or even aircraft wreckage for that matter) in these over-
water cases is extremely small. They would be prohibitively
expensive to pursue as a matter of policy.
There are also numerous cases where identifiable remains
are unlikely to be found. Today there are numerous sets of
remains stored at CILHI that are associated with specific
cases (i.e., teams excavated these remains from sites
positively correlated to a specific loss, or the remains came
to CILHI through unilateral refugee/turnovers that associated
them with a specific individual), but the remains are
insufficient for legal identification. At some point, the USG
must determine whether further efforts, either joint or
unilateral, to resolve the cases correlated to these sets of
remains are likely to bear fruit. If not, accounting for
these individuals using the third means of accounting may be
the only reasonable option.
On November 13, 1995, the Defense POW/MIA Office (DPMO)
published the results of its comprehensive review of cases.
The purpose of the study was to review all unresolved cases
so as to: ``(1) focus our (the USG) understanding on
individual cases, (2) provide the basis for a sound
investigations strategy, and (3) define next steps for
achieving the fullest possible accounting of Americans
missing in Southeast Asia.'' \8\ DPMO assessed ``each case,
weighing all related information, including data collected
through recent on-site American investigation and research in
Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. We (DPMO) found that for any
case it is exceedingly difficult to predict the extent to
which evidence of knowledgeability by Vietnam, Laos, or
Cambodia about some aspect of a U.S. loss could lead to an
accounting of the individual.'' \9\ The report recommends the
``next steps'' for the remaining cases as listed below.\10\
1. Further Pursuit--The review identified further leads
requiring investigation for 1,476 individuals still
unaccounted-for. 942 of these individuals were lost in
Vietnam.
2. Deferred--The review identified 159 individuals for whom
the USG has exhausted all investigative leads, ``and no
further avenues of pursuit can be identified. Although the
investigation of these cases is not complete; we (the USG)
require additional information to develop new leads.'' \11\
3. No Further Pursuit--The review identified 567
individuals still unaccounted-for whom, ``regardless of any
future effort by the U.S. Government and the governments of
Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, their cases cannot be resolved
through the repatriation of remains.'' \12\
Preparation for Assuming Command
At the time of my selection for JTF-FA, I was commanding
1st Battalion, 26th Infantry, a basic combat training
battalion at Fort Jackson, South Carolina. Detachment 2 had
two previous commanders prior to me, Jack Donovan and John
Cray. All three of us were coming out of battalion command at
the time of our selection. Additionally, each had been
selected to attend Senior Service College which we had to
defer for one year to command Detachment 2. I was not
scheduled to give up command of 1-26 Infantry until June 10,
1994, but because John had to return to CONUS to attend the
United States Army War College, I had my change of command on
May 10, 1994. Since command of the Detachment is like no
other job I had ever had,
[[Page E901]]
time was of essence to assure a good overlap between John and
me. I changed command at 0900 on May 10 and flew to
Washington, D.C. at 1900 that evening. Luckily, my wife and I
were able to spend some time together during two weeks of
leave a couple of weeks before my change of command.
In Washington, my orientations included briefings by the
Army Service Casualty Office,\13\ the Defense POW/MIA Office
(DPMO), and the Vietnam/Laos/Cambodia Office of the East Asia
Pacific Office at the Department of State. I also spent half
a day with a public affairs orientation team from the USAF at
the Pentagon. My time with the USAF and USA Casualty Offices
was extremely useful. The PAO orientation proved to be
invaluable to me throughout my tenure.\14\ The other offices
I visited appeared unprepared for my arrival and provided
very little information about the issue or my duties.
John Cray attended about six weeks of Vietnamese language
training in Washington prior to departing CONUS. Because of
the limited time available, however, I did not have the same
opportunity. It was not absolutely necessary that the
commander receive language training, but it would have been
useful. Once I had my feet on the ground in Vietnam and had
achieved a sufficient level of proficiency in my duties, I
hired a tutor to teach Vietnamese to me. I met with him about
twice a week for an hour and a half each day. It was amazing
how much my Vietnamese counterparts appreciated the fact that
I was trying to learn their language. Though I never became
very proficient, I believe the very fact that I tried meant a
lot to the Vietnamese.
After Washington, I flew to Honolulu, Hawaii for JTF-FA in-
processing at Camp Smith. This included briefings from the
PACOM staff and in-depth briefings by the JTF-FA staff. At
the time of my arrival, Major General Thomas H. Needham was
the Commander, JTF-FA. I had served as a company commander
for 30 months under then LTC Needham in the 1st Battalion
(Airborne), 509th Infantry in Vicenza, Italy, so we knew each
other well. His in-briefing to me was characteristically
brief and easy to remember. Despite the fact that General
Needham gave up command on July 27, 1994 to Brigadier General
Charles Viale, I found his guidance worthwhile to heed
throughout my tenure. His guidance included:
1. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
2. There can always be improvement in the quality of
reports.
3. Work on the quality of chow at the Ranch.
4. Know the helicopter contract. When and what triggers
increased costs?
5. Dealing with the press. Tone down the adjectives; i.e.
``Continue high level of support consistent with pre-embargo
lifting.''
6. Read SOPs and Policy Letters, Command Letters and Trip
Notes.
7. There is a folder for every past JFA--Read them.
8. Look at deficit repairs for the Ranch. See if they are
really necessary.
9. Keep the boss informed.
Though I worked on all of these, there were three I tried
to always keep uppermost in my mind and were instrumental in
whatever success I may have had; keep the boss informed,
watch my adjectives, and keep the boss informed.
After an intense schedule in Hawaii, I flew to Southeast
Asia. My first stop was Bangkok, Thailand. I checked into
what would become my ``home away from the Ranch,'' the
Imperial Hotel. The Imperial staff had hosted JTF-FA teams
for years and treated us all very well.
While in Bangkok, I had to in-process at the embassy and
then received the Detachment 1 in-briefing from LTC Dave
Geraldson (USAF), the Commander of Detachment 1. Because the
Detachment 1 position was a three-year assignment, Dave had
been with the JTF since its inception. He had a wealth of
knowledge about the issue and was a good friend throughout my
tour. While I was in Bangkok, the 29th JFA was redeploying
out of Vietnam into Thailand. JFA report writing always
occurred in Bangkok, so I was able to watch John go through
the entire report writing sequence.
From Bangkok, I accompanied General Needham to Phnom Penh,
Cambodia. We stayed there only three days (two nights), and
Major Tony Lowe (USAF), the Detachment 4 Commander, briefed
me on his operation. Things were pretty slow in Cambodia at
that time. Two of our helicopters had been shot at and hit
some months earlier (possibly by local bandits) and the Khmer
Rouge had been active, so the CJTF-FA had suspended field
operations in Cambodia out of security concerns. The last
thing any of us wanted to do was to hurt or kill an American
today while recovering the remains of an American who died
over 20 years ago. Field operations in Cambodia did not
resume until late-fall 1994.
With my in-briefings complete, I flew into Hanoi with
General Needham and began 10 days of overlap with John Gray.
I was able to do almost everything related to JFAs once with
John prior to having to do it on my own after his departure.
The only exception was deploying the teams into Vietnam from
Pattaya, Thailand. I attended a Technical Talk with the
VNOSMP, attended Provincial Coordination Conferences in Ho
Chi Minh City, Da Nang and Hanoi, observed a Joint Forensics
Review and a Repatriation Ceremony, and helped plan the next
JFA that I would implement. The time with John was extremely
valuable to me. Most importantly, John introduced me to most
of the Vietnamese I would work with during my tour. In
Vietnam, it is always better to have someone the Vietnamese
knew well available to introduce you.
On June 10, 1994, after a month of in-briefings and travel,
I assumed command of Detachment 2. The goodbyes were very
emotional for John. He had become very close to the members
of Detachment 2 during his tenure. I was extremely grateful
to John Cray for his kindness as I tried to learn the ropes.
In July 1995, during my out-briefing with Lieutenant
General David Bramlett, Deputy Commander in Chief, Pacific
Command (DCINC), I credited much of my success to my
predecessors; Jack Donovan and John Cray. I did not do that
out of false humility, but out of the reality that it was
their efforts that laid the groundwork for the progress we
made during my tenure. They built the organization and set
the systems in place. All I had to do was sustain their
systems, tweak them here and there, take care of the troops,
and continue to nurture our relationships with the
Vietnamese. It was primarily John Cray though who positioned
me well for success and I will always be grateful to him for
the unselfish manner in which he prepared me to assume my
duties.
Command and Control
The command and control scheme for JTF-FA is, by design,
very clean. There are very few intervening headquarters
between the troops in the field and the highest level of the
government. One very important ``agency'' not included in the
command and control structure is the families of the
unaccounted-for, but it is the families that are always
uppermost in the mind of every member of the JTF. Although
there is no direct contact between the families and the JTF
personnel in the field, everything we did, everything we
discovered, was shared with the families. The conduit between
the JTF and the families is the respective Service Casualty
Branches.
The CJTF-FA works directly for the CINCPAC. Despite having
a very close relationship with the Defense POW/MIA Office
(DPMO) and always being very conscious of their operations
and influence, we were not in their chain of command. The
CJTF seemed to take it as his and his staff's responsibility
to shield the Detachments in the field from inquiries and
directives from anyone except JTF-FA Headquarters and they
did this extremely well. I rarely spoke directly with anyone
involved with this issue who was not in my chain of command,
and when I did, I always cleared it with the CJTF or DCJTF
first.
Until about December 1994, our primary means of
communication with JTF-FA Headquarters was via telephone
conversations and fax. This was extremely expensive. In
December, JTF-FA established an E-mail network between it and
all the Detachments in the field. This cut costs dramatically
and also made it easier to send correspondence between
elements of the JTF.
As depicted in Figure 3, JTF-FA is organized into a
headquarters element stationed at United States Pacific
Command (USPACOM) Headquarters, Camp Smith, Hawaii, and
Detachments 1 through 4 posted in Bangkok, Thailand; Hanoi,
Vietnam; Vientianne, Laos; and Phnom Penh, Cambodia,
respectively. Deteachment 1 is the administrative and
logistical hub for the remaining three Detachments in
Southeast Asia. Because we did not have a U.S. embassy in
Vietnam, Detachment 1 was our link to the rest of the world.
They purchased many of our groceries from the U.S. embassy
commissary in Bangkok, and we flew them into Hanoi once or
twice a month on a space available basis. Detachment 1 was
also our postal connection. All mail for Detachment 2 went to
Detachment 1, and they held it until someone came to Hanoi.
Mail was extremely important to us, and the standing JTF rule
was that nobody left Bangkok for Detachment 2 without picking
up the mail. Even the CJTF helped us out in this regard by
always picking up the mail when he passed through Bangkok en
route to Hanoi. Likewise, nobody left Hanoi for Bangkok
without taking our mail out.
The only other Detachment I had regular contact with was
Detachment 3 in Laos. There was a lot of coordination
involved with trilateral operations, and LTC John Twohig (my
counterpart in Laos) and I spoke frequently to coordinate
them.
The mission of Detachment 2 is to ``coordinate all United
States Department of Defense efforts in Vietnam to achieve
the fullest possible accounting for Americans still
unaccounted-for as a result of the war in Indochina.'' The
USG knows that it will never resolve every case, thus the
requirement to provide the fullest rather than a full
accounting. Detachments 3 in Laos and 4 in Cambodia have
missions similar to Detachment 2 with the additional
requirement of supporting the Ambassador's country team.
During my tenure as Commander of Detachment 2, the United
States and Vietnam did not have diplomatic relations. As a
result, I did not have this requirement.
Work at Detachment 2 was essentially a seven-day-a-week
proposition, but I endeavored to be as flexible as possible
regarding individual schedules. Because the intensity of our
work varied from time to time and section to section, I
tried not to watch the clock. I expected Detachment
personnel to work when they needed to work, but to take
[[Page E902]]
some time off when their responsibilities allowed it. I
did require them, however, to inform their supervisor of
their whereabouts if they were not in their office in the
event an issue arose. The high quality personnel assigned
to the Detachment allowed me to exercise this level of
flexibility without worrying about the quality of work
degrading. As much as possible, I tried to give the
Detachment Sundays off, but there was always some work
members of the Detachment had to accomplish on Sunday,
especially during JFAs. Since Monday in Vietnam was Sunday
in Hawaii, we did not receive many calls from the
Headquarters on Monday. This enabled me to give the
Detachment Monday mornings off, thus giving them two
evenings a week when they knew they would not have to work
the next morning.
Much of our work schedule revolved around the time
difference between JTF-FA Headquarters in Hawaii and our
office in Vietnam. We were about 19 hours ahead of Hawaii.
The CJTF prohibited the JTF-FA staff from telephoning us
prior to 0730 Vietnam time unless it was an absolute
emergency. This precluded us from being hounded at all hours
of the very early morning about issues that were not urgent.
Our work day began between 0700 and 0730 Tuesday through
Saturday, and at 1130 on Mondays, and continued until our
work was complete. During a JFA., we normally worked until
about 2100 everyday.
Other than the normal day-to-day operation of the
Detachment, we undertook seven basic tasks: 1) investigate
live sighting reports, 2) conduct joint investigations and
recoveries, 3) conduct historical and archival research, 4)
interview witnesses and officials and analyze information and
``leads'' in the field, 5) coordinate and support teams in
the field, 6) participate in technical meetings, and 7)
represent the USG in repatriation ceremonies. To effectively
accomplish each of these tasks, we organized the Detachment.
Historically, the Commander of the Detachment has been a
combat arms lieutenant colonel who had successfully commanded
at the battalion level, and was either a Senior Service
College selectee or graduate. Some have argued that the
commander should be a foreign area or intelligence
specialist. The fact is, however, that the Commander is
primarily an ``operator.'' The skills normally associated
with a combat arms officer are the skills required of the
Detachment Commander; i.e., motivate personnel, deal
effectively with people, manage resources and people over
vast distances, coordinate aviation assets, and resupply
activities, etc.
The Commander serves in this position for 12-13 months.
Once again, some believe that the turbulence associated with
a one-year tour for the Commander is detrimental to the
effort. I believe maintaining it as a one year tour is one of
the keys to preserving the credibility of the organization.
The unaccounted-for issue is a very emotional one, not only
for the families, but also for those of us who worked so hard
to resolve it as fully as possible. As one works the issue,
it is very easy to develop strong personal opinions about it,
and those associated with it. It is also not difficult to
develop relationships, either positive or negative, with the
Vietnamese officials with whom you work and this could effect
negotiations. The bottom line is that individuals who work
this issue for an extended period of time begin to develop an
``agenda.'' As soon as this happens you are likely to lose
your credibility with the families.
One of the Commander's primary responsibilities is to
ensure that personal opinions and agendas do not develop to
such an extent that they cloud the facts. When a new officer
assumes duties as the Commander, he views the issue with a
new set of eyes, and this is desirable. For those who believe
that a one year tour for the Commander is detrimental in
terms of continuity, I must add that there are numerous
experts available to the Commander who provide advice and
expertise that more than compensate for this lack of
experience.
Besides the Commander, there were normally five other long-
term members of the Detachment (i.e., longer than one year).
The Air Force provides the Detachment's Executive Officer/
Operations Officer. This individual is normally a relatively
senior, experienced and successful Air Force Major who had
extensive experience in operational duties. I screened
numerous files to identify a successor for the incumbent
while I was there. When examining records, I focused on
several professional attributes. First, was he/she capable of
assuming full command of the Detachment? In the 13 months I
commanded, I went on TDY over 40 times. During my R&R period
at Christmas, I was away from the Detachment for two weeks.
The Deputy had to be fully capable of assuming command of the
Detachment in my absence. Second, I looked for operations
experience. Operations at the Detachment run at a fast pace
and the Deputy must be able to coordinate field activities,
manage aviation resources, and coordinate and execute
logistical resupply of the teams, with very little or no
supervision.
Several of the officers the Air Force nominated for the
Deputy position had intelligence backgrounds. I was very
leery of accepting an officer whose record reflected this, as
I was concerned that the Vietnamese might look at this
assignment suspiciously. We worked very hard to convince the
Vietnamese that our only purpose for being in Vietnam was to
resolve the unaccounted-for issue, and that we had no
interest in gathering other types of information. Mr. Le Mai,
the Vietnamese Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, remarked
to my Detachment Historian during a dinner toward the end of
my tenure, that they had initially thought we had ``other
purposes'' for being in Vietnam, but that now they knew that
we were there for only one purpose, to resolve the issue of
unaccounted-for Americans. I worked extremely hard not to
violate that trust as I thought it would be extremely
detrimental to the issue if the Vietnamese ever perceived
that I was violating that trust. Assigning an officer with an
intelligence background to the Detachment could have given
that perception to the Vietnamese.
The Detachment had the normal administration, operations
and logistic sections of any military organization. A long-
term member of the Detachment directed each; Administration--
an Army Staff Sergeant or Sergeant First Class, Logistics--a
DA civilian under a two-year renewable contract, and
Operations--an Air Force Major and Air Force Technical
Sergeant or Master Sergeant.
The final section organic to the Detachment was the
Casualty Resolution Section (CRS), Mr. Gary Flanagan, a
retired USAF linguist/analyst, directed the operations of the
CRS. Gary has been working this issue since October 1987,
initially with the Joint Casualty Resolution Center and then
with the JTF. Gary is one of those threads of continuity I
spoke of earlier. For a new commander coming into the
Detachment, much of what occurs doesn't always make sense,
and dealing with such a different culture is often
frustrating. Gary was extremely skillful in explaining the
historical basis for various methods, and often kept me out
of trouble by recommending techniques for getting things done
with the Vietnamese.
Gary directed the efforts of the Research & Investigation
Team (RIT). The RIT is a six-person team that deploys to
Vietnam for a period of four months. the JTF manned the RIT
with the most skillful Vietnamese linguists and analysts
assigned to the JTF, and the team works its most difficult
cases. It is responsible for archival research, oral history
interviews, special remains and priority case investigations,
and walk-in interviews.\15\ As we near the ``fullest possible
accounting'' and large-scale Joint Field Activities become
less productive, the RIT will provide the organizational and
operational design for continued efforts well into the
future.
Though he returned to Washington, D.C. toward the end of my
tour, Mr. Bob Destatte was an invaluable asset to me
throughout my tenure. He was the Detachment's Research
Historian, assigned to DPMO, but attached to Detachment 2 as
DPMO's in-country analyst. I don't think there are many who
are familiar with this issue who would argue against me when
I say Bob is the most knowledgeable individual involved with
this issue today. He is a fluent Vietnamese linguist and can
totally immerse himself in the Vietnamese culture as
required. He accompanied me to most meetings during
delegation visits as he was one of the few people who both
understood the issue and understood Vietnamese. He was able
to convey some of the nuances of what the Vietnamese said
during the meeting that others would miss. Bob was amongst
the first Americans in-country in the early 1960's and has
been in and out of Vietnam ever since. He was the single most
important person to me as I was beginning to learn the issue.
If Bob had a fault, it was that he is a perfectionist and
sometimes got mired in the details of a particular issue.
This said, his reports were always extremely detailed,
complete, and authoritative. Bob knew the background of every
aspect of this issue, and willingly shared it with anyone
interested. It was a great loss to the Detachment when he
returned to the United States. I always took great comfort in
being able to walk downstairs to his office whenever I needed
assistance.
At various times, additional personnel come under the
command and control of Detachment 2. Whenever there is a
live-sighting to investigate, Stony Beach, the Defense
Intelligence Agency office in Bangkok, Thailand, dispatches
an investigator to investigate the report. Though this
investigator works directly for DIA, as soon as he enters
Vietnam, he comes under Detachment 2 for the duration of
his investigation in Vietnam.
The largest group of ``temporary'' personnel directed by
Detachment 2 is the Investigation/Recovery Team (IRT) that
enters the country every other month for Joint Field
Activities. Each IRT consists of well over 100 specialists
who fan out across the country to investigate leads and
interview witnesses, and conduct recovery operations. For
most of my tenure, the IRT consisted of two Investigation
Elements (IE) and six Recovery Elements (RE).
The mix of IEs and REs varies depending upon constraints
the Vietnamese impose and the work-load we had to accomplish.
In the early days of the JTF, the Vietnamese limited the
number of personnel it permitted into the country, however,
they became much more flexible in adjusting these numbers to
the needs of the mission. The JTF has investigated every case
at least once, many numerous times. As such, in early 1994 it
changed the IE/RE mix from three IEs and five REs to the
current ration. The JTF has between 40 and 50 cases scheduled
for recovery in Vietnam, and on average, an RE can complete
two recoveries each JFA. To facilitate the backlog of
recoveries, JTF-FA increased the number of REs to six.
[[Page E903]]
During most JFAs, the IEs and REs were dispersed throughout
Vietnam. The primary means of contact with them was
telephone, if that was available, and HF radio when the teams
were operating in remote sites. The Detachments in Laos and
Cambodia communicated with their teams in the field via
SATCOM radio, which was much more reliable than the HF. This
was a major issue between the USG and the Vietnamese. We
requested permission to use SATCOM continuously. We felt it
was a safety issue with the teams (U.S. and Vietnamese) in
the field. There were times when I was out to touch with
teams by radio for up to four consecutive days.
Communications between the Detachment and two teams in the
field became so bad during one JFA that I had a helicopter
fly to the site every other day to check on the team. This
was a very expensive proposition, but work at remote sites
can be very hazardous and I could not risk not knowing their
situation. Every visiting delegation raised the SATCOM issue
at the highest levels of the Vietnamese Government, but they
never acceded to our request. Admiral Macke, CINCPAC, even
assured the Vietnamese that we would use only unencrypted
systems and went so far as to offer to provide the Vietnamese
a SATCOM station to enable them to monitor our
communications. We had nothing the hide. Their reasoning for
denying our requests was that they did not have the
regulations in place to control satellite communications.
They posited that granting us the authorization opened the
door for others to use it. While I never quite understood
their position, I never made any progress in changing it.
I had a very direct and close relationship with the
Vietnamese Government. Until the opening of the United States
Liaison Office (USLO) in Hanoi, I was the senior USG
representative in Vietnam. Even after it opened, I remained
the primary point of contact in Vietnam concerning the issue
of missing Americans. My direct counterpart in the Vietnamese
Government was the Director of the Vietnamese Office Seeking
Missing Persons (VNOSMP). During most of my tenure, this was
Mr. Vu Chi Cong. The VNOSMP contained representatives of the
Ministries of Foreign Affairs (MFA), National Defense (MND),
and Interior (MOI). The MFA coordinated the operation for the
Vietnamese as they are the ministry responsible for dealing
with officials from other countries. The MND and MOI had
representatives in the VNOSMP because they are the two
ministries who would have collected and stored information
during the war regarding U.S. service men; MND for obvious
reasons, and MOI because they were responsible for the
administration of POW camps and the prison system.
I found the VNOSMP to be very helpful and open to our
effort. I had easy access to the VNOSMP. Mr. Cong even gave
me his home telephone number in the event an emergency arose
after normal duty hours.
In sum, the organization and command and control structure
I worked under was very effective. I had one boss, the CJTF,
and he and his staff never hesitated to run interference for
me as necessary to keep other agencies from distracting our
efforts. The CJTF never micro-managed my operations and
allowed me great leverage in how I accomplished the
Detachment's mission. This flexibility was very important to
my credibility with the Vietnamese, as they knew that I was
entrusted to make decisions and to follow through on those
decisions. Despite the freedom of action he allowed us, the
CJTF was always there to support us when necessary. I was
well staffed with some of the best soldiers, sailors, airmen,
marines and civilians I have ever worked with. The Vietnamese
ensured that I had direct access to the necessary agencies in
their government whenever necessary. The command climate
truly provided an environment that ensured our success.
Progress Toward the Fullest Possible Accounting
In March 1992, President Clinton validated former President
Bush's four areas requiring tangible evidence of progress by
the Vietnamese as a precondition to normalizing relations:
(1) repatriation and identification of remains, (2) access to
documents, (3) trilateral cooperation, and (4) progress in
resolving priority cases and live sighting investigations,
and support for joint field activities (JFAs). The President
has continued to stress these areas even as the United States
begins to engage Vietnam in other issues of concern.
I considered sufficient progress in the President's four
areas our end state, despite the fact that tangible evidence
of progress is a difficult end state to define. Although as a
military officer I am much more comfortable when I have an
end state that I can clearly enunciate, I soon discovered
that when dealing with emotional that have great political
consequences at the highest levels of the government, clarity
of the ultimate objective is often difficult to define more
precisely.
The press often asked the question; ``When will all this
end?'' My answer to this was always that their question was
one for the policy-makers; i.e. President Clinton, members of
Congress, the Secretary of State, etc. I was merely an
operator in the field. It is, however, my opinion that the
effort will never end. ``End'' connotes finality, a ceasing
of all efforts. Today, we are still finding remains of
unaccounted-for-soldiers from World Wars I and II, and the
Cold War. Task Force--Russia is searching the archives and
records of the former Soviet Union in an effort to resolve
losses from the Cold War era. We have yet to search the areas
in North Korea where we lost America soldiers, and last year,
a group in Canada even unearthed the remains of an American
lost during the War of 1812. As long as we have Americans
unaccounted-for in Southeast Asia, I do not believe our
efforts will ever entirely cease. Rather, if at some point
our efforts become less productive (i.e., a significant
diminution in successful investigations and excavations) the
means by which we seek to achieve our ends, the fullest
possible accounting, may evolve.
By definition, JTFs are temporary. At some point in the
future, it is reasonable to envision an organization such as
CILHI controlling the entire accounting effort in Southeast
Asia. There might be a small team of investigators such as
the current RIT that remains in Vietnam to pursue leads as
they develop. As the small in-country team discovers likely
sites for excavation, an RE from CILHI could deploy to
Vietnam to excavate that location. Whenever we have
information that leads us toward resolving a case, I believe
we will follow it.
The USG hinges future relations with the Vietnamese on
progress toward the accounting effort. It is also critical to
understand how the Vietnamese view their assistance in this
endeavor. When negotiating with the Vietnamese and when
speaking with the press, it is important to keep in mind the
Vietnamese Government's official premise for cooperating.
Vietnamese officials repeatedly reminded visiting delegations
that they consider this issue a ``humanitarian'' issue and
that they cooperate because it is the right thing to do.
Their cooperation does not depend on closer relations,
financial assistance, etc. This seemed to me to be a very
important point with the Vietnamese. I felt it was the basis
for their position that their cooperation would continue
until we resolve the issue to the satisfaction of the USG.
As I said earlier, it was not my responsibility to assess
the amount of progress we made; those were policy decisions.
It was my job to identify means of effectiveness of joint and
unilateral efforts. I endeavored to provide relevant facts
pertinent to each of the President's four areas, and then
left the assessment to the policy-makers. The discussions
that follow are the elements of progress I deemed significant
during my tenure. This was the information I presented to
visiting USG officials.
recovery and repatriation of remains
Since the end of our involvement in the conflict in
Indochina in 1975, the remains of 428 individuals have been
repatriated to the United States and positively identified.
Recovery and repatriation of remains showed strong progress
during my tenure. On the surface, this indicator of progress
is relatively easy to measure. Ostensibly, all that should be
necessary is to count the numbers of remains we recover in
the field and subsequently repatriate to the United States.
Nevertheless in just about every aspect of this issue, you
can look at the results in two ways. Executives of the
National League of Families (NLF) \17\ contend that the only
meaningful way to measure progress in this area is by the
number of unaccounted-for Americans that have been identified
positively. Since January 1992 when the JTF began operations,
CILHI has identified 110 previously unaccounted-for
Americans. The NLF points to this relatively low figure when
compared with the total number of unaccounted-for as evidence
of slow progress in recovering and repatriating remains and a
lack of cooperation by the Vietnamese. On the other hand, you
can look at the number of remains that have been repatriated
in that same period, consider that more than 20 years have
passed the losses occurred, and develop entirely different
conclusions regarding the success of JTF operations. I
contend that the JTF and CILHI have been highly successful in
recovering and repatriating remains.
The difficulty of locating remains was clarified for me
when teams excavated the former Lang Vei Special Forces Camp
in Quang Tri Province to search for five unaccounted-for
Americans. The JTF had excavated this site twice previously
without success. IN February 1995, we brought Major (Retired)
Frank C. Willoughby to Vietnam to assist us in our efforts.
Mr. Willoughby had designed and built the camp, and commanded
it at the time of the incident in 1968. Upon his arrival at
the recovery site, MAJ Willoughby reconnoitered the area our
teams had excavated during previous JFAs as they tried to
find the camp's Tactical Operations Center (TOC). It was in
the TOC where one of the five missing Americans had been seen
last.
Mr. Willoughby thought that given the old maps and
descriptions of the area, the areas where we excavated were
reasonable locations to dig. However, after a couple of days
to orient himself on the ground, Mr. Willoughby suggested
excavating for the TOC some 50 yards from the previous
locations. He also confirmed the location of the camp's
Observation Post (OP) and a 4.2-inch mortar pit where the
four remaining service members were last known to be. After
several days of excavating, we found the remnants of the TOC,
one bone fragment and one possible bone fragment. Still
visible on the concrete floor of the TOC were the scars made
by hand grenades the attackers threw down the bunker's air
vents.
Since the war, the local Vietnamese had used the site of
the camp as a ``quary'' for
[[Page E904]]
materials to build Highway 9, and dramatically changed the
nature of the terrain. Mr. Willoughby thought that the
remains of his soldiers had most likely been in the area of
where the Vietnamese had quarried, and were thus
irretrievably lost. I firmly believe that without Mr.
Willoughby's on-site knowledge we would not have found the
site.
During one of my visits to the site, Mr. Willoughby and I
sat on a hill in the middle of the old camp and he recounted
the day of the battle for me. As we looked west from the
hill, we could see Laos which the attacking Vietnamese had
used as a sanctuary. This battle was the first of the war
when the Vietnamese used tanks to attack the American
positions, and is the subject of a book by David Stockwell
entitled, Tanks in the Wire.\18\ We could probably see
about two miles distant, and he said that at the time of
the war, all that we were now surveying was triple canopy
jungle. Today, the view encompassed only rice paddies
between the camp and the Laotian mountains. He said that
the hill we were sitting on was a good ten to 12 feet
taller during the war, and that the bulldozing of the hill
for road materials had changed its appearance
dramatically.
This story clearly demonstrates the problems associated
with time. More than 20 years passed since the incident of
loss. Not only was it likely that the environment had eroded
whatever remains the ground held, but it was obvious that
``man'' had changed the terrain. The terrain changes and the
memories of witnesses fade. There is an element of luck
involved every time we find remains. To be able to then
identify the remains is even more fortuitous.
I need to digress from the subject of repatriation of
remains to further elaborate on Mr. Willoughby's trip. Though
I barely got to know him, Mr. Willoughby will always be one
of my heroes. It was a very emotional trip back for him, but
one which I think helped him close an open chapter in his
life. During one of my visits to Lang Vei, I brought a
television crew from KCRA television in Sacramento,
California. While interviewing Mr. Willoughby, the
commentator asked him why he returned to Vietnam to help us.
Although I do not remember the exact wording, Mr. Willoughby
replied by saying that he was the Commander at the time they
evacuated the camp, forced by enemy action to leave five of
his soldiers behind. During the war, he always felt it his
duty to do everything he could to bring his soldiers home.
The passage of time had not relieved him of his duty, for he
was still their commander. Over 25 years passed since the
incident, but duty to his soldiers still drove this great
American--one of God's noblest people.
I also had the opportunity during this visit to learn about
another aspect of this issue. After the television crew
interviewed Mr. Willoughby, they turned to one of my VNOSMP
counterparts, Senior Colonel Bien \19\ asking him for his
impressions of our efforts. SRCol Bien said that he had lost
four brothers during their ``war for independence,'' one of
whom was lost in the same area near Highway 9. Unfortunately,
this brother is still missing. SRCol Bien said that many
members of his family criticized his efforts to help the USG
account for its missing, when he cannot even account for his
own brother. The commentator then asked how he answered their
reproaches. SRCol Bien replied very curtly, ``I tell them
that I help because it is the right thing to do.''
Unilateral Activities by the Vietnamese to Recover Remains
During my tenure, delegations continually stressed that the
Vietnamese needed to work more unilaterally to resolve this
issue. Some stress unilateral action because they believe
that the Vietnamese Government is withholding remains and
information concerning missing Americans. Thus, they reason
that only the Vietnamese can resolve these cases and they
could do so by simply handing over the information or remains
they possess. I am not in a position to conclusively state
where the truth in this matter lies. I do know, however, that
unilateral operations are a poor substitute for joint
investigations and research. Unilateral operations do not
result in near the quality of work joint operations do.
Another aspect of our requests for more unilateral efforts
on the part of the Vietnamese that I felt was important was
the lack of credence we sometimes attached to their results.
Time and time again, I saw individuals both inside and
outside the USG criticize the results of Vietnamese
unilateral efforts simply (in my opinion) because their
results did not coincide with the results they expected. In
my opinion, if we ask the Vietnamese to investigate cases
unilaterally, then when they do we have a certain obligation
to accept the results of their efforts. I am not saying that
we should unconditionally accept every report just because
the Vietnamese say it is accurate. What I am saying is that
if we are unwilling to accept their results whatever they
might be, then maybe we should reconsider the value of
requesting the unilateral activity in the first place.
We should keep in mind that unilateral work by the
Vietnamese precedes everything we do. There is no way we
could find witnesses to interview, documents to analyze or
sites to excavate without prior work by the Vietnamese; never
have--never will. Approximately ten days before every JFA,
the Vietnamese team leaders begin to coordinate with
provincial officials, reconnoiter sites, search for
witnesses, and arrange for their presence. Thanks to their
preliminary efforts, when American team members arrive, we
can maximize the time in-country. Additionally, the
Vietnamese provide unilaterally almost half of all remains
that we obtain.
In June 1994, a Vietnamese citizen from Son La Province
contacted Detachment 2 officials stating someone he knew in
Son La had remains of an American service man. During the
interview, he produced a dog-tag impression correlating to
Case 0954 to the Casualty Resolution Section at Detachment 2.
We sent an official from our office and one from the VNOSMP
to Son La to meet the individual who allegedly had the
remains. Although the individual in Son La denied having any
remains, the witness who gave us the information in Hanoi
insisted that this was the correct individual. At that time,
we were unable to obtain the remains, but the Commander of
the local Border Defense Forces pledged that he would
continue to investigate this case and recover any available
remains. In January 1995, we received the remains from the
VNOSMP and in February 1995, we repatriated the remains to
the United States.
This was an important lesson for me in dealing with
Vietnamese authorities. When the Vietnamese citizen initially
refused to give us the remains, I felt that the SRV officials
should have searched his home and belongings and confiscated
the remains. After all, it is against the law in Vietnam to
hoard remains or demand compensation for them. I soon
learned, however, that the Vietnamese continually stress that
they prefer persuasion rather than force to entice Vietnamese
citizens to turn remains over to U.S. or Vietnamese
officials. They are concerned that force would discourage
other citizens from coming forth with remains or information.
Besides, the remains could have been anywhere, and if he had
hidden them, the likelihood of finding them would have been
very slim. Case 0954 is an example where the Vietnamese
process of patient persuasion seems to have worked.
Nevertheless, I did get the impression that when persuasion
failed, SRV officials were not hesitant to enforce the law.
During the 32d JFA, SRV officials confiscated remains from an
SRV citizen who demanded compensation for them. The officials
later provided them to our team members. Seeking compensation
for remains is not an uncommon occurrence. Vietnamese
citizens will often approach team members in the field, or
they will even come to ``The Ranch'' to offer remains or
information in exchange for money, gold, or a visa to the
United States for themselves or a relative. In all cases, our
answer was that under no circumstances would we compensate
them for remains or information. Rather, we encouraged them
to provide the remains for information as an ``act of
compassion to help resolve this humanitarian issue.'' In most
cases, the citizen, seeing he was not going to receive
anything in return, handed over the remains or provided the
information anyway.
Refusing to ``buy'' remains or information was an important
position for the Vietnamese Government as well as ours.
Vietnam is an extremely poor country. If word spread that the
USG was ``paying'' for remains, some Vietnamese, not
realizing that we can differentiate between remains belonging
to a Southeast Asian Mongoloid and an American, would begin
``robbing graves'' throughout Vietnam in hopes of earning
money. Rather than helping our efforts, this would likely
cause many Vietnamese to resent the results of our efforts.
During my tenure, there were several cases of individuals
absolutely refusing to hand over remains they had without
some type of reward. In some instances the Vietnamese were
able to document repeated attempts by the same individuals to
sell remains. I know of at least two successful prosecutions
of ``remains dealers'' while I was in Vietnam.
The Vietnamese also appeared to act unilaterally in cases
that might involve some sensitivity with the Vietnamese
populace. During the 34th JFA, Vietnamese authorities in Ben
Tre Province unilaterally excavated a site in a War Heroes
Cemetery. Past investigations of this case led us to believe
that the Vietnamese had buried an unaccounted-for American
in the cemetery inadvertently. Provincial officials were
very sensitive about the possibility of angering the
villagers if they saw Americans excavating in their War
Heroes Cemetery. The provincial officials disinterred
several graves during the evening when they would not be
observed by the villagers, and presented the remains to a
JTF-FA anthropologist waiting nearby for examination.
Unfortunately, he determined all the remains to be of
Southeast Asian origin. The importance of this episode,
however, is the level of cooperation it demonstrates.
Could this have occurred in Arlington National Cemetery,
the final resting place of many of our war heroes?
In another development regarding unilateral efforts by the
Vietnamese to develop ``leads'' concerning unaccounted-for
Americans, the Vietnamese government unilaterally tasked the
Ministry of War Invalids, Social Welfare and Labor
(responsible for accounting for the over 300,000 missing
Vietnamese from the war) to coordinate their efforts with
those of the VNOSMP. Now, before their investigators travel
to the various provinces, they take with them a list of
unaccounted-for Americans possibly lost in those areas. When
they interview witnesses regarding Vietnamese missing, they
also ask about our unaccounted-for individuals.
[[Page E905]]
Amnesty Program
The Vietnamese Government actively publicizes their remains
amnesty program \20\ and the U.S. MIA Office. They allowed
Detachment 2 to place an advertisement in the Hanoi Yellow
Pages inviting Vietnamese citizens who might have information
about unaccounted-for Americans to contact the VNOSMP or the
U.S. MIA office in Hanoi. They also televised advertisements
requesting information on specific cases and placed the U.S.
MIA Office on tourist maps. Additionally, many of the remains
we receive from Vietnamese citizens originate from remote
areas of the country, thus indicating widespread word of the
amnesty program.
One such case occurred during the 34th JFA. The VNOSMP
notified us that villagers in Quy Nhon Town had discovered
what they believed were remains of an American. A family in
Quy Nhon found these remains while looking for the remains of
one of their children in a local cemetery. When they removed
the bones from the ground, they realized that they were much
too large to be Vietnamese. They placed them back into the
grave and notified local officials of their discovery. The
local official called the VNOSMP offering to excavate the
site unilaterally, and the VNOSMP then called me to request
that I send an anthropologist to Quy Nhon Town to examine the
remains. On March 7 and 8, 1995, a JTF-FA anthropologist
reviewed the remains. The remains consisted of nearly three-
quarters of an entire skeleton and 21 (possibly 22) teeth,
five with restorations. The anthropologist determined the
remains to be from a large male, over 40 years old, over six
feet tall, and not Southeast Asian Mongoloid. We repatriated
these remains to the United States.
``Dog Tag'' Investigations
Since 1979, the USG has received literally thousands of
reports of remains associated with a set of ``dog tags'' in
the hands of private citizens. About 97% of the Americans
named in these reports were never unaccounted-for, while
somewhat more than 100 Americans named in the reports are
still missing. You must consider two facts regarding ``dog
tag'' cases. First, during the war, many Americans lost their
dog tags, gave them to their ``girl friends,'' traded them,
etc. Second, when we evacuated the embassy in 1975, the
machines used to manufacture dog tags remained behind.
Budding ``entrepreneurs'' have been cranking out
counterfeit tags ever since. The end result is that,
whether real or counterfeit, a glut of dog tags is
available throughout Vietnam, especially in stores and
street corners catering to tourists.
Shortly after my arrival in Vietnam, a U.S. citizen
visiting Vietnam contacted one of our EIs working in the
vicinity of Ho Chi Minh City to tell them that she had 1,444
dog tags of missing Americans and a set of remains. She said
that Vietnamese secret police and even the CIA were following
her, and she feared for her life. The IE team leader agreed
to meet with her and she related a fantastic story of
intrigue. She said that a very ``reliable'' Vietnamese man
had contacted her and offered to lead her to where he knew
there were a number of dog tags and remains of missing
Americans. She knew he was reliable because he did not ask
for any money for the items, only some compensation for the
time and travel. She recounted an escapade involving
nighttime motorcycle rides disguised as a Vietnamese peasant
to various locations. She further described crawling into a
``previously unknown'' tunnel in Marble Mountain, Da Nang
(one of the most famous tourist sites in all Vietnam), and
there, on top of the ground, lay 1,444 previously
undiscovered dog tags. Then he took her by motorcycle to a
cemetery where a small bag containing bones laid on top of
the ground.
She believed she had solved the entire issue of
unaccounted-for Americans, and told us that she planned to
call a press conference as soon as she landed in Los Angeles
(she claimed to be a journalist). Knowing that it is easier
to discredit an inaccurate story before it comes out than to
react to one after it hits the media, we thought it was
critical to determine the veracity of her claims. Our first
step was to send CILHI's best anthropologist to HCMC to
examine the remains. He found them to be from a Southeast
Asian Mongoloid. It was obvious to him that they were not
American. For two days, analysts in Detachment 2 searched our
database of missing Americans comparing it to the names on
the dog tags. Not a single one correlated to an unaccounted-
for American. As soon as we confirmed our findings, I
immediately called the JTF-FA Public Affairs Officer (PAO) in
Hawaii to inform him of the results of our investigation. I
never heard of any news report or press conferences regarding
this incident.
JTF-FA cannot afford to dismiss any of these claims without
fully investigating them. Though the odds are slim, the
possible benefit of discovering new leads far outweigh the
amount of work involved chasing dead-ends. The Archival
Research Team (ART) began investigating dog-tag leads during
my tenure and the RIT continues this effort today. In October
1994, the ART received partial human remains and a set of dog
tags that we tentatively correlated to two cases of
unaccounted-for Americans. One set of remains contained teeth
with restorations. A CILHI anthropologist confirmed that the
remains were likely to be those of an American, and we
repatriated these remains to the United States.
access to documents
The USG believes that museum artifacts and archives,
tradition houses (local museums), military historical files,
prison records, etc., might contain information pertaining to
Americans still unaccounted-for. Since its January 1992,
members of JTF-FA have examined over 30,000 items correlating
to over 820 unresolved cases. These include more than 2,000
photographs of former POWs, remains, crew gear, personal
identification items, aircraft wreckage, sketches, maps, etc.
During its existence, the ART had unrestricted access to
museums and tradition houses throughout Vietnam, and
interviewed many of the past museum curators. USG
investigators, including DIA analysts, have visited several
prisons throughout Vietnam and have discovered no evidence
that the Vietnamese held U.S. prisoners after 1973.
Additionally, the Vietnamese established the Joint Document
Center (JDC) in a wing of their Central Army Museum in Hanoi.
The JDC serves as a permanent location dedicated to the joint
review of any artifacts or documents researchers might
discover. Detachment 2 and VNOSMP analysts man the JDC on a
daily basis.
Providing archival information to the USG presents an
interesting dilemma to the Vietnamese. Prior to the arrival
of CODEL Bond in the Fall of 1994, I attended a
meeting between Mr. Jim Hall and Mr. Nguyen Xuan Phong,
Director of the Americas Department, Ministry of Foreign
Affairs.\21\ During the meeting, Mr. Hall encouraged Mr.
Phong to present any documents they may have uncovered
during their unilateral research to the visiting
delegation. Mr. Phong responded that they no longer
thought it wise to hold documents they find to present to
delegations. Rather, they preferred to hand them over to
the Detachment immediately upon discovering and reviewing
them. The Vietnamese were in an interesting Catch-22. If a
delegation visited and the Vietnamese did not give them a
document of some type, critics of their level of
cooperation quickly claimed that the Vietnamese were
withholding information. On the other hand, if they
provided documents to visiting delegations, these same
critics claimed that the Vietnamese had all the documents
we were looking for and provided tid-bits to visitors to
try to convince us of their cooperation. I could not argue
Mr. Phong's logic because I saw it happen.
Although the number of items investigators have examined is
large, access to documents and other items of archival
research was one of the toughest areas for us to note
significant and tangible progress during my tenure. Only late
in my tour did our efforts begin to show concrete headway.
One of our primary goals was to ``coach'' the Vietnamese to
report their activities more effectively. We stressed that it
was not good enough to simply perform research and then tell
us that they did not find anything. We suggested to them that
if they looked for documents in the archives of the Air
Defense units in Military Region 4, for example, they needed
to provide us the specifics of their efforts; what files did
they look at, what time period did the records cover, where
did they perform the research, when, who were the
investigators, etc.?
During one of our Technical Conferences, General Viale,
CJTF-FA, requested our counterparts improve the detail of
their reports. In response, Mr. Cong, Director of the VNOSMP,
tried to explain their problem. He said that when Vietnamese
investigate a case, and find nothing, no report is necessary.
Partly in jest, I told him that the American Government can
write reams about what we don't find. Nonetheless, on a more
serious note I explained that knowing the circumstances
around which investigators found nothing may often be as
valuable to an analyst as actually finding something. Mr.
Cong concluded by saying that it was taking a ``cultural
change'' for them to realize what we wanted, but pledged his
support to continue to try.
Ms. Virginia Foote, the President of the US/Vietnam Trade
Council and frequent visitor to Vietnam, offered another
consideration regarding the detail of Vietnamese reporting.
In mid-1995, the DASD for POW/MIA Affairs, General Wold,
asked Ms. Foote to intervene with the Vietnamese to encourage
them to improve the detail of their reporting. During a
meeting with the Ministry of Interior official in charge of
the U.S. MIA work by the MOI, Ms. Foote encouraged him to
improve their reporting procedures. She received a ``very
firm, and rather angry, answer that such reporting would
expose their military intelligence filing and personnel
system which they will not do.'' Ms. Foote advised General
Wold and Ambassador Winston Lord that ``they might have set
too high a reporting standard and that the Vietnamese are
never going to issue reports explaining in depth their
process for unilateral searches for the reasons given by MOI.
In my view (Ms. Foote's), it is not reasonable for the USG to
push this too far.''
At least annually, President Clinton sent a delegation
representing him to Vietnam to assess the level of progress
we were making and the level of Vietnamese cooperation. The
delegations normally thanked the Vietnamese for their past
cooperation and encouraged more effort in various areas. The
delegations often brought specific requests for information
regarding specific cases of particular interest to the USG,
and suggested ways of improving cooperation.
At the request of the July 1994 Presidential Delegation,
the MOI and MND each formed a
[[Page E906]]
small team to unilaterally research historical files and
interview Vietnamese officials who may have information
concerning missing Americans. They submitted an initial
``work-plan'' and asked for our ideas concerning the plan.
The VNOSMP provided the teams' initial report to us in March
1995, and on May 15, 1995, Mr. Phong gave additional reports
from the MOI and MND to me. On May 30, 1995, Mr. Tran Van
Tu, Acting Director, VNOSMP, provided a report from the
MOI to me detailing their research efforts in seven
northern provinces.
At the time of my departure, Detachment 2 was receiving on
a regular basis, reports from the VNOSMP and the special
teams formed by the MND and MOI for unilateral research. In
total, I received five written reports of progress from the
VNOSMP. Though I did not see the final assessments of these
reports prior to my departure, they did appear to have useful
and previously unavailable information.
Personal Dairies and Artifacts
Though we have not received a large number of personal
records, we did receive some, and it appeared that the
Vietnamese Veterans Association was encouraging its member to
provide more to us. Shortly after President Clinton lifted
the trade embargo, a retired PAVN \22\ Senior Colonel
voluntarily shared information about unaccounted-for
Americans that he had recorded in his personal wartime diary.
In one instance, his diary confirmed that one aircraft and a
crew of eight men who disappeared while on a mission in Laos
nearly 30 years ago, crashed more than 140 km (nearly 100
miles) from the last known location noted in U.S. records.
``The Vietnamese Veterans Association, headed by General
Quang, started an aggressive campaign to encourage Vietnamese
veterans to come forward with information that might help
account for Americans killed during the war. Materials have
been coming in greater quantity since diplomatic relations
were established.'' \23\
trilateral cooperation \24\
The most important aspect of Trilateral Field Activities is
that the Vietnamese Government considered this an issue
between the U.S., Laos and Cambodia, not Vietnam. This is
important because Vietnam continually stated that they would
support whatever requests the U.S. made regarding these
operations so long as they were able to locate the witnesses
and persuade them to participate. Their actions supported
their promises. On December 1, 1994, U.S., Vietnamese, and
Laotian officials met in Hanoi to lend structure to the way
we conducted trilateral operations. All participants agreed
that Vietnamese and JTF-FA investigators would continue to
identify and then interview Vietnamese citizens who might
possess information pertaining to unaccounted-for Americans
in Laos. If, after the interview, Vietnamese and U.S.
investigators concluded that the witness had pertinent
information, Laotian investigators would travel to Vietnam to
interview the witness. If, subsequent to their interview, the
Laotians agreed that the witness possessed reliable
information that could help resolve a case, they authorized
their travel to Laos and participation in a JFA in Laos.
From this conference forward, it was apparent that the
VNOSMP was working diligently to identify Vietnamese
witnesses who could assist in resolving cases in Laos. During
the first three JFAs following the trilateral agreement in
December, the VNOSMP provided eight Vietnamese witnesses to
assist investigations in Laos. The VNOSMP located all the
witnesses unilaterally, made them available for the Laotians
to interview, and escorted them to Laos. All this is in spite
of several witnesses living in remote locations, short
notices for passports and visas, and frequently difficult
transportation and communication problems with local
officials and witnesses. In one instance, the witnesses did
not want to travel to Laos citing health and business. They
did agree, however, to travel to Hanoi on short notice and
spent hours studying maps with our specialists and describing
their recollections of the incident.
Two cases exemplifying trilateral cooperation stand out
most. The first trilateral case we investigated under the new
guidelines involved the loss of 11 Americans at Phou Pha Thi
in northern Laos. Phou Pha Thi was a ``secret'' radar site
that vectored U.S. aircraft into targets over northern
Vietnam during the conflict. During the war, a PAVN sapper
unit scaled sheer cliffs in the middle of the night,
surprised the defenders, and overran the site. 11 Americans
remain unaccounted-for. After weeks of unilateral work, the
Vietnamese located the best witness for the Phou Pha Thi
site, Mr. Muc, a retired PAVN Colonel, who led the PAVN
attack on the site. Our most experienced linguist and
analyst, Mr. Bob Destatte, interviewed Mr. Muc and found that
his recollection of the events that transpired the night of
the attack confirmed that he had in fact led the attack. We
nominated Mr. Muc to travel to Laos to help with the
trilateral field activity.
In December 1994, Mr. Muc went to Phou Pha Thi and assisted
U.S. and Lao investigators on site. Though their efforts were
in vain, both the Vietnamese and Laotian governments had
cooperated fully on the agreed upon trilateral procedures,
and the process worked. We continued to use this model during
all future trilateral operations.
The second case occurred shortly after our first trilateral
operation. The Vietnamese unilaterally located a witness to a
C-47 crash in Laos. The Vietnamese made him available for a
joint interview on very short notice, and he provided three
sketches of the area surrounding the crash site. These
sketches included the relative locations of three mass graves
and a mass burial site of eight U.S. air crew members. We
nominated him to travel to Laos, and in January 1995 he and
two other Vietnamese witnesses whom the Vietnamese located
unilaterally traveled to Laos to help investigators on site.
Trilateral operations between the U.S., Vietnam and Laos
progressed from being something out of the ordinary to being
normal operations. Detachments 2 and 3, the Vietnamese
representatives, and Laotian specialists all appeared to
regard this as an integral aspect of operations in Laos and
treated it as such.
priority cases, live sighting investigations, joint field activities
Priority Cases
Priority ``Last Known Alive'' Cases.\25\ These cases
involve some of the USG's most sensitive cases in that they
include cases where the USG has been unable to conclusively
determine if the individual is dead or alive. Of the 196
individuals in this category, one is a foreign national, we
have completely resolved and identified the remains of 27
individuals, and determined the fate of all but 50 of the
individuals. Investigators have investigated each of the
remaining Priority Cases at least once, some as many as seven
or eight times.\26\
One priority case we investigated while I was in Vietnam
was Case 0644. The last known location for 0644 was in a
militarily sensitive area. The Vietnamese denied access to
the site to us because they claimed that no aircraft ever
crashed there. They would not allow our teams into that
sensitive area unless there was a reasonable expectation that
it would lead to success. We continued to request access to
the site. The Vietnamese sent LTC Pham Teo, one of their most
experienced investigators, to the site to unilaterally
investigate the case. He found several witnesses who
confirmed that the crash occurred outside the sensitive area
in a neighboring province. LTC Pham Teo traveled to the
location the witnesses identified to investigate their
claims. He recovered a small amount of remains and some
identification media. A joint U.S./SRV team investigated the
new crash site during the October-November 1994 JFA. They
found the crash site LTC Pham Teo identified and recovered
small pieces of wreckage. The Joint Forensics Review in
September 1994 accepted the remains LTC Pham Teo unilaterally
recovered and we repatriated them to the U.S. in September
1994 for further analysis. CILHI's forensic analysis
determined these remains were of an adult male, however,
the remains were insufficient to permit determination of
race. JIT-FA rescheduled this case for reinvestigation.
Special Remains Cases.\27\ During my tenure, the 30th
through 35th JFAs, we excavated sites associated with 13
special remains cases. We recovered remains from five sites
and CILHI was able to resolve two of the cases through
positive identification of remains (Cases 0951 and 1910).
Another case, Case 0037, was resolved after our
investigation led to confirmation that the remains had been
interred at Arlington Cemetery since the mid-1960s. This was
a ``remains reportedly recovered but not repatriated'' case
and proved very interesting. Case 0037 involves remains of an
American civilian who was killed in Vietnam during the war.
The Vietnamese claimed that they had recovered the remains
and returned them directly to the widow during the war. Our
government, however, did not have a record of the
repatriation. Despite a unilateral investigation by
Vietnamese authorities and two field investigations by US
investigators, both of whom concluded the remains had been
returned, our government continued to press the Vietnamese.
Finally, DOS contacted the widow who confirmed the Vietnamese
claims.
We have investigated every SRT case jointly with Vietnamese
specialists at least once. JTF-FA and CILHI have resolved
five cases fully. The field investigation teams have found no
evidence that could sustain the belief that Vietnamese
authorities have recovered remains for the Special Remains
Cases that they have not yet repatriated which is the basic
premise for the SRT list. Discussed below are a few cases we
investigated from each category of SRT cases. The point I am
trying to make by relating the circumstances of these
investigations is that the results of these investigations
led me to believe that our assumption that the Vietnamese
still control these remains is not entirely valid. Our
investigators determined through exhaustive investigations
that there are at least 30 cases for which the remains are
non-recoverable. There are another 14 cases for which we have
evidence to believe that remains we have recovered and
repatriated to CILHI are those of the unaccounted-for
individual, but have been unable to conclusively identify
them.
Case 0951 (Died in Captivity List). This case involved the
loss of one American who the Vietnamese reported as having
died on January 2, 1969 while in a jungle POW camp in what is
now Quang Nam Da Nang Province. Six prisoners died in the
camp. The Vietnamese claimed to have excavated and
repatriated five sets of remains from the camp location
following the war and that they were unable to find the
sixth. Joint teams
[[Page E907]]
investigating Case 0951 confirmed the Vietnamese claim. The
sixth remained unaccounted-for.
The VNOSMP helped us find the old camp site. There, we
found eight holes indicating that as the Vietnamese claimed,
they had successfully found five graves, and had tried three
times unsuccessfully to find the last American. In January
1994, CSM Davis, a former POW still on active duty in the
Army, accompanied a joint investigation element to the site.
He identified where he personally buried the unaccounted-for
American associated with this case. After excavating the site
for three weeks in August 1994, a joint team found a nearly
complete skeleton, including 31 teeth (10 with restorations)
at the site. CILHI confirmed the identification of this
individual in April 1995. This demonstrates, at least in this
case, that the Vietnamese never recovered this set of
remains--contrary to what some might claim.
Case 1910 (Graves Registry Case). A joint team excavated
the crash site on the side of a karst in October-November
1994.\28\ It recovered material evidence and remains,
including hundreds of possible human bone fragments, 16
teeth, eight with restorations, that led to a successful
identification for this case. It is puzzling as to why the
individual's name appeared on a graves registry unless
villagers had buried the remains they found and left the
majority at the crash site.
Case 0853 (Graves Registry Case). A joint team excavated
this site in January 1995. We recovered material evidence and
remains (including two teeth, one with restoration) that we
were hopeful would lead to a successful identification for
this case.
Case 0215 (Photo and Graves Register Case). Our
investigators found a photograph of the unaccounted-for
American, apparently severely injured, receiving medical care
at a hospital. Vietnamese authorities helped us locate and
interview the doctor and three of the four nurses in the
photograph. Their information led us to other witnesses who
confirmed the American died shortly after he arrived at the
Quang Ninh Province Hospital, and was buried in the public
cemetery behind the hospital. Notwithstanding that the only
known firsthand witness to the burial died several years ago,
Vietnamese authorities allowed us to excavate parts of that
public cemetery to search for the remains of this American
during the October-November 1994 JFA. Though the excavation
inadvertently disturbed a few graves of local residents,
local officials and citizens volunteered their support for
the team's work. The team did not find the remains, however,
local citizens volunteered new information that might lead us
to a person who left the area years ago, but who helped bury
this American.
Excavating this case also exemplified the compassion of our
team members. While excavating a site at the cemetery, the RE
unearthed the remains of a small child. Apparently, at the
time of the burial the family did not have enough money to
purchase a casket for the child. They simply wrapped the dead
child in cloth and interred the body. Our team members went
to the local village and purchased with their personal money
a small casket in which they placed the child's remains. The
RE then ceased their work and allowed the villagers time to
reinter the child with the appropriate ceremonies. Our
soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen are truly our best
ambassadors.
Live Sighting Investigations \29\
Since the commencement of JTF operations in January 1992,
the USG has investigated over 90 live-sighting reports. None
reflected the presence of live unaccounted-for Americans. The
USG has no evidence that live Americans are being held
against their will in Vietnam. Neither does the USG have any
evidence proving there are not--it is almost impossible to
prove a negative. As such, we always devoted the necessary
time, manpower, and resources to fully investigate each and
every live-sighting as completely as possible.
The Vietnamese have been very forthcoming in granting
access to sites we need to investigate as a part of an LSI.
Later in this paper (beginning on page 51), I explain the
manner in which we investigated normal cases in militarily
sensitive areas. These procedures did not, however, apply to
LSIs. Normal investigations during JFAs do not entail the
sense of urgency and immediacy that LSIs do. When we
investigate the incident site for an aircraft crash that
occurred 20 to 30 years ago, it is unlikely that the site
will change much more than it already has. However, the very
nature of an LSI demands that we receive immediate access or
the integrity of the investigation would be in jeopardy. The
Vietnamese understand this. To my knowledge, and to that of
the primary Stony Beach live sighting investigator, the
Vietnamese have never denied JTF-FA or Stony Beach personnel
access to any place we asked to enter as a part of an LSI.
The USG must take care not to endanger the unrestricted
access the Vietnamese have allowed for LSIs. Many live
sighting reports are credible, but some are not. The USG
should take care not to allow ridiculous live sighting
reports such as those by former Congressman Billy Hendon (see
Annex A) to jeopardize Vietnam's support for the serious work
U.S. and Vietnamese teams are conducting.
Joint Field Activities
JTF-FA has sent more than 11,700 notices of progress
regarding their cases to over 2,200 families.
I always tried to stress to visitors and journalists that
it is necessary to look beyond the ``statistics,'' and look
at the overall progress. It would be easy to look at the
number of provinces we operated in during the 35th JFA and
compare that to the number in any of the other JFAs. Or, you
could look at the number of cases we investigated and
excavated during the 35th JFA and compare those numbers to
the activities of the 28th JFA, immediately following
President Clinton's decision to lift the trade embargo. By
only looking at raw statistics, one could very easily
conclude that the Vietnamese felt they had achieved their
goal with the lifting of the embargo and that they now saw no
reason to continue to cooperate with our efforts. Simply
looking at the statistics could lead you to conclude there
had been a diminution of cooperation. Nothing could be
farther from the truth.
It is true we have operated in significantly fewer
provinces during recent JFAs, but we consciously decided to
concentrate our efforts in the central part of the country.
This allowed us to maximize work-time and minimize travel
time. In the early days, an IE could check into a hotel in Da
Nang and fully investigate all its cases from that single
location. Today, on the other hand, an IE may interview one
witness in Da Nang one day, drive for two days to another
province to interview another witness for the same case, and
continue in this manner for a number of days. Several cases
during my tenure involved treks by IEs through the jungle for
two to three days just to investigate a single ``last known
location.'' There was even a case in Song Be Province for
which we contracted elephants to transport the IE to and from
the site because the terrain was so treacherous and wild
animals (tigers and snakes) were so prevalent. In the end, we
were able to find a helicopter landing zone near the site,
and did not need to use the elephants.
Like the investigations, excavations have become much more
complex. Today, it is not unusual for a case to take two JFAs
to complete. Once again in Song Be Province, we had a case
that required three JFAs. During the 34th JFA, two cases,
Case 0927 and 0911, were extremely difficult to excavate
because of the clayey soil, mud and water. Though scheduled
to be completed during the JFA, the excavation teams could
not complete them in the allotted time. It was very important
to finish them as soon as possible since the approching
monsoons would likely destroy the work we had already
accomplished and preclude further excavations. At our
request, the Vietnamese extended the two excavation teams in-
country an extra two weeks. This was a significant decision,
and one that required approval from the highest level of the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
During the 35th JFA, local officials in two provinces
demanded exorbitant land compensation fees for alterations
our excavation teams made to the terrain around two of our
recovery sites. They made these demands after the recoveries
were complete, despite repeated requests by us that they
identify valid compensation fees prior to the start of the
operation.\30\ When Detachment personnel could not resolve
the issue satisfactorily with the local officials, the Acting
Director, VNOSMP, sent one of his most experienced
specialists to assist in negotiations with local officials.
Within one day, we had resolved the differing positions and
agreed on a suitable level of compensation. Provincial
officials also agreed to try to do better at identifying
costs up front in the future.
Investigations in Militarily Sensitive Areas
One requirement of JTF-FA is to visit the last known
location noted in U.S. records for each unaccounted-for
American. Occasionally, this site falls within a sensitive
military installation or area. Vietnamese authorities have
worked with us to develop a method of investigating these
cases that meets their security concerns and our need to try
to achieve the ``fullest possible'' accounting.
First, Vietnamese specialists unilaterally investigate the
case to try to confirm the facts of the case. If they find
that the incident occurred outside the sensitive area, we
follow with a joint investigation of the area outside the
militarily sensitive area. If the joint investigation
confirms the Vietnamese findings, there is no longer any need
for U.S. investigators to seek access to the area.
If the Vietnamese determine the incident did occur inside
the sensitive area, they unilaterally seek witnesses who can
clarify the facts of the case, and then arrange for U.S.
investigators to interview the witnesses outside the
sensitive area. If they are unable to resolve the case
through unilateral investigation, and if they confirm the
incident occurred in the militarily sensitive area,
Vietnamese authorities work with us to devise a ``case-
specific'' resolution that has sometimes included giving
American investigators access to the area. In short, the
Vietnamese required that we follow every lead possible before
requesting access to a militarily sensitive site. If the case
was still unresolved and the only viable leads led us back to
the restricted area, the Vietnamese were willing to
negotiate a suitable solution.
During the 30th JFA the Vietnamese granted us access to
three of five militarily sensitive areas vicinity the Cam
Ranh Bay naval facility for which they had previously denied
access. For the two remaining cases, they brought witnesses
outside the sensitive area for our investigators to
interview.
[[Page E908]]
One of the remaining cases involved a drowning. The missing
American had been on R&R and was swimming in the ocean.
Witness reports at the time of the incident indicate that the
individual was swept underwater and not seen again. As I said
earlier, JTF-FA procedures require that we visit the ``last
known location'' which, in this case, was within a secure
area vicinity Cam Ranh Bay. The Vietnamese denied our teams
access to the site, reasoning that we had controlled the
naval facility for some years after the incident--if we did
not find the body then, what made us think a visit to the
site today would result in finding the remains?
During the 34th JFA, joint teams investigated two cases
that occurred in militarily sensitive areas, Cases 0272 and
1895. Though the Vietnamese would not grant us access to the
last known location as it was in the sensitive areas, they
did investigate the case unilaterally and made several
witnesses available for our interview.
miscellaneous indicators of progress
Oral History Program (OHP)\31\
The OHP has been a very productive program for JTF-FA. It
amassed a large body of knowledge that helped us understand
many aspects of Vietnamese operations during the conflict,
most importantly the POW camp procedures. Numerous interviews
with present and former high ranking Vietnamese officials
have provided many insights into what might have happened to
some of our missing.
The MND OHP cell unilaterally researches the information we
provide to them for each OHP interview we request. Due to the
limited communications and transportation capabilities
throughout Vietnam, the VNOSMP two-man cell then travels to
each potential location nationwide to locate each witness.
Most witness searches require the VNOSMP members to
coordinate with the province, district, village, and hamlet
authorities consecutively. In some cases, when OHP leads are
unclear, the VNOSMP spends days and weeks tracking down
individuals. They might interview hundreds of people for
leads before ever finding the individual in question.
One such case involved our request to speak to a Mr. Phap.
Since May 1993, the MND cell of the VNOSMP has searched for
Mr. Phap, a possible witness for a priority case. This
continuing search spanned several provinces and included
searches of the PAVN officers' registry, visits to local
veterans groups, and queries with province officials. Despite
the negative results so far, the VNOSMP continues to search
for Mr. Phap even though the search is the equivalent of
searching for some named ``Bill'' in Texas while only knowing
that ``Bill'' served in a company during the war. This is
only one example of unilateral efforts to find witnesses when
the U.S. has very limited identification or location data for
a witness.
During more difficult searches, the VNOSMP members seek
members of local veterans groups, officials of the Ministry
of Labor, War Invalids, and Social Affairs, local family
registers, and public security agencies. Without these
efforts prior to each OHP interview, the joint OHP team could
spend several days on the road in order to conduct each
interview. Their preliminary efforts save the joint OHP team
a lot of time.
While I was in Vietnam, the VNOSMP produced two OHP
unilateral reports of interview. Although these reports
lacked the details we desired, they were full-page documents
with far more details than the standard VNOSMP reports of the
past. The VNOSMP has also produced reports on each round of
joint OHP activities. The latest reports included a section
on unilateral VNOSMP activities during the investigative
phase.
The Vietnamese have worked diligently to assist us in the
OHP. They dedicated some of their most experienced
investigators to the effort and participate in all joint
interviews with our analysts. They have also interviewed
numerous officials unilaterally.
On January 20, 1995, a joint U.S./Vietnam Oral History team
interviewed active duty PAVN Lieutenant General Tran Van Tra
at the Ho Chi Minh City Veterans Association Office in Ho Chi
Minh City. In addition to other duties, General Tra is the
director of the Vietnam Veterans Association, Ho Chi Minh
City Chapter. General Tra had refused several interview
requests previously. His only requirement in granting this
interview was for a ``high ranking American official to
attend the interview.'' As I was then the highest ranking
American in-country, I went to the interview along with
Detachment linguists and analysts.
The interview began as a lecture with General Tra telling
me that further progress in resolving this ``humanitarian'
issue rested with the will of the people. If the USG could
rally the Vietnamese people behind our effort, he said, we
could make great progress. ``After all,'' said General Tra,
``we know what great obstacles can be overcome when the
people are behind the effort.'' (I thought that was a fairly
obvious reference to the ``Vietnam War.'') General Tra
continued by emphasizing that we should show more compassion
for the Vietnamese people's loss of over one million killed
during their ``War for Independence,'' and the more than
300,000 Vietnamese still missing.
At this point, I spoke telling General Tra about the
Vietnam Veterans of American Veterans Initiative.\32\ I told
him that the VVA's information led Vietnamese investigators
to a mass grave containing the remains of approximately 95
missing Vietnamese. From this point forward, the entire tone
of our meeting changed. Rather than a one way lecture from
General Tra to me, the interview became a discussion of what
measures the Vietnamese veterans organization could take to
assist our work.
During the interview, General Tra also provided general
information on PAVN channels that managed U.S. POWs during
the war. He also stated his firm conviction that the
Provisional Revolutionary Government's (PRG) delegation to
the Four Party Joint Military Commission (FPJMC) ensured the
release of all U.S. prisoners held in the South during the
conflict. Pursuant to this interview, General Tra pledged
that his organization would unilaterally collect information
on unaccounted-for Americans.
As a result of our initial interview, General Tra's Chief
of Staff, Brigadier General Nguyen Van Si, met with our
VNOSMP counterpart Colonel Le Ky on January 22, 1995 to
discuss specifics of how the Ho Chi Minh City Veterans
Association Chapter could assist in the U.S. MIA effort. They
decided Vietnamese veterans might provide the following types
of information and he pledged his commitment to the effort:
personal accounts of wartime incidents involving U.S. losses,
POWs, and unaccounted-for personnel; personal wartime
journals with information on U.S. losses, POWs, and
unaccounted-for personnel; information on where POW/MIA
related archival documents might be today; and names of other
individuals with possible POW/MIA related information.
Technical Conferences
Prior to each JFA, we held joint meetings between JTF-FA
and VNOSMP to coordinate our operations. General Viale was
the senior U.S. representative and Mr. Vu Chi Cong, Director,
VNOSMP, was the senior SRV representative. During these
meetings, we assessed progress to date, reviewed the results
of the most recent JFA, discussed our requirements for the
upcoming JFA, and discussed any other issues pertinent to our
efforts. In 1990, these technical meetings routinely lasted
three or more days. The Vietnamese side deliberated and often
contested each talking point. Today, the meetings last only
two to three hours. The Vietnamese representatives come to
the meetings well prepared and work with us to ensure well
planned, efficient and effective JFAs.
Vietnamese Veterans Assistance
A Vietnam Veterans Organization delegation from Ho Chi Minh
City Chapter accompanied visiting American VVA members to Tay
Ninh in February 1995. In Tay Ninh, the Vietnamese host, BG
Nguyen Van Si, introduced a retired PAVN colonel to the VAA
group. The colonel gave his account of the 1972 shoot down of
a U.S. jet. We received this information on February 26,
1995, and confirmed that Brigadier General Si was the same
General Si who was General Tran Van Tra's chief of staff. We
felt that the fact that General Si attended our Oral History
interview in January and later introduced a retired officer
with specific case information was a very positive sign that
the Vietnamese veterans can locate witnesses for unresolved
cases, and that General Tra was sincere in his pledge to help
mobilize Vietnamese veterans to our aid.
Detachment 2 analysts tentatively correlated the veteran's
account with that of a still unaccounted-for American. A
joint team excavated a site they believed to be associated
with this case in May 1993. They recovered a small amount of
possible human remains, but CILHI was unable to identify
them.
On May 29, 1995, the VNOSMP provided Commander, Detachment
2, with three letters from Vietnamese veterans groups
providing information concerning cases within Laos. At the
time of my departure, analysts were reviewing these letters.
Lessons Learned
official visitors
Every Detachment Commander had to host numerous official
visitors from the USG and I was no exception. During my
predecessor's tour, the President considered lifting the U.S.
trade embargo against Vietnam. This resulted in innumerable
``fact-finding'' trips to Vietnam, especially by
representatives of Congress. During my tenure, President
Clinton considered normalizing relations with Vietnam, and
likewise numerous visits ensued.\33\ Many have asked me about
the utility of these visits expecting that their primary
purpose was as a boondoggle by the various visitors. I must
emphasize that it was my experience that virtually every
visit by a USG official was tightly scheduled with official
functions. Any sightseeing on the part of the visitors was
normally en route to another Ministry or while driving to and
from the airport. Meetings with Vietnamese Government
officials began early in the morning and lasted until late
afternoon. The only break they normally took was a working
lunch hosted by one of the Vietnamese ministries, usually the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs. An official reception or supper
normally ended each day and lasted until about 2130
(Vietnamese official dinners were very predictable in their
duration--two hours).
Throughout all the visits that occurred while I commanded
the Detachment, only one, the visit of Congressman Dana
Rohrabacher (R-CA) did not leave me with a thoroughly
positive impression of the purpose and accomplishments of the
trip. Mr.
[[Page E909]]
Rohrabacher is a member of the International Relations (Asian
& the Pacific) Committee and an outspoken critic of JTF-FA
operations in Vietnam and U.S. policy toward Vietnam. He
visited Vietnam at the same time as CODEL Spence, but did
not join them in any of their meetings except to arrive
uninvited at a working lunch at the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs. The only reason he joined CODEL Spence here was
that he needed a ride to the airport with the CODEL
immediately following the luncheon. Despite our mission
being the driving force behind relations between the U.S.
and Vietnam, and despite his criticisms of our operations,
I never met Mr. Rohrabacher. He refused our offer to
update him on our operations. Whether or not he agrees
with U.S. policy or JTF-FA operations, it seems to me he
would want to gather information from every source
possible in order to draw an informed conclusion.
Since the issue of unaccounted-for Americans was, and
remains, the most important issue between the U.S. and
Vietnam, official visitors normally began their visits with a
visit to the Ranch. Here, we updated them on our current
operations, and when asked, provided our assessment of
progress to date. When assessing progress, I cited
developments in each of the President's four areas requiring
progress. I tried not to draw conclusions from these
developments, but rather attempted to lay out the facts as I
saw them, and let them draw their own conclusions. However,
if asked point blank for my opinions, I was obligated to
answer with my opinion.
During the CODEL Bond visit in late 1994, Senator John
Kerry (D-Mass.) joined the CODEL for the Ranch briefing.
Senator Kerry has been a driving force behind normalizing
relations with Vietnam and he wanted to ensure the CODEL left
the briefing fully aware of our operations and the level of
Vietnamese cooperation. He asked me several questions during
the briefing to emphasize points he wanted the CODEL to take
away from the briefing. At one point, he asked for my opinion
of how normalizing relations with Vietnam would improve the
Vietnamese Government's cooperation in our efforts. I think
he expected me to say that it would greatly improve
cooperation.
I responded instead by saying that I did not believe it
would affect the Vietnamese Government's cooperation very
much, because I thought they were already cooperating at a
very high level and there was not much more they could do.
Where I thought the benefits of normalizing relations would
make their greatest mark was on the level of cooperation we
received from individual Vietnamese citizens. I thought this
would be of significant benefit to our efforts. I said that
as the U.S. and Vietnam increase contacts, and to the extent
those contacts were positive, we would progress more quickly
because we would receive even more grass-roots support. I am
a firm believer that Vietnamese veterans and average citizens
possess information that could be useful to us; they just
need some motivation to step forward.
I do not think Senator Kerry was entirely pleased with my
answer and would have preferred for me to say that
normalization would greatly increase Government cooperation.
I knew that was what he wanted me to say, but it was not what
I really believed.
Most delegations that visited Hanoi asked for issues we
would like to see them raise with the Vietnamese. They would
also tell us what they were going to discuss and asked for
our opinions on both the issue and the manner in which they
should approach the Vietnamese about the issue. They were
especially interested in Bob Destatte's and Gary Flanagan's
perspectives as they had worked with the Vietnamese the
longest.
I would only ask them to raise an issue with the Vietnamese
if both the CJTF-FA and I had been unsuccessful in resolving
it at our respective levels. I cleared all issues with the
CJTF-FA prior to recommending the delegation raise it to the
highest levels of government. In Vietnam, as in many other
countries, it is very dangerous to raise an issue above your
counterpart's head without first giving him the opportunity
to solve it. Then if it is still unresolved, telling your
counterpart that you are going to recommend a high-level
delegation raise the issue is normally a good idea. ``Face''
is very important to the Vietnamese and cooperation on
difficult issues that may arise in the future often depends
on how respectful you are of your counterpart's position. In
short, there is nothing new here. Attempt to solve problems
at the lowest possible level. Never ``back door'' your
counterpart.
Many visitors also asked us how best to discuss issues with
the Vietnamese. When Admiral Macke visited, I recommended
that he begin discussions with the MND by talking about his
experiences as a pilot during the war. I found that the
Vietnamese senior military officials seemed to enjoy
exchanging ``war stories'' with American veterans. This
``ice breaker'' often led to a cordial and informal
discussion of issues following the introductory
discussions. Admiral Macke began his discussions at the
MND by remarking how much more pleasant his flight over
Hanoi was that day than it had been some 25 years earlier.
This led to a very friendly exchange between him and the
Vice Minister of National Defense, General Bun.
We prepared visitors as best we could so that they would
not be surprised by events during their visit. We provided
each visitor with a folder containing the schedule of events,
a tourist map of Hanoi, biographies of the Vietnamese hosts,
as available, and sketches of meeting areas as best as we
could determine. Biographies were often very difficult to
get. We never wanted to give the Vietnamese the impression
that we were ``gathering intelligence,'' so trying to collect
biographical information about their government's leaders was
a very sensitive proposition. We depended on public
information and past encounters with the individuals to
orient the visitors to their hosts.
Each folder also contained our ``best guess'' \34\ of what
the physical layout of the meeting rooms would be, where to
sit, where the interpreters would be, etc. Because we could
not usually see the rooms prior to the actual meetings, we
based our sketches on what we had seen in the past. Providing
a sketch precluded awkward uncertainty in the beginning of
the meetings as delegates tried to figure out where to sit.
The beginnings of meetings were the times when photographers
and other members of the media were present, so we did not
want our representatives to appear hesitant or uncertain.
At the first meeting I attended with the July 1994
Presidential Delegation (my first high level visit), I
entered the room after the visiting U.S. delegation had taken
their seats. The only remaining seat at the table was on the
Vietnamese side. The Vietnamese, always very gracious hosts,
quickly ushered me to the empty seat. I soon learned that
this was not a very good idea. Had I been aware of the
protocol, I would have declined their offer and sat somewhere
else, however, nobody had told me what to expect. This was a
good lesson for me. We tried to prevent this kind of awkward
moment for visitors by briefing them ahead of time.
We endeavored to do the same for receptions, luncheons and
suppers. Most official dinners were held in the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs guest house, the Le Thach Government Guest
House, and they all followed a similar pattern. Items I
always tried to verify before the delegates arrived were;
which door should we enter through (there were two), the menu
(if possible), the seating arrangement, and the English
language proficiency of the host. If I could not determine
the seating arrangement prior to arrival, I tried to slip
into the dining area during the initial welcome at the door
to at least determine which side of the table the key
delegates would sit. I did not want them wandering around the
table searching for their name plate.
Many of the Vietnamese officials spoke English extremely
well, but would rarely speak anything except Vietnamese
during official meetings. During receptions, however, they
would often speak English. When Congressman Solomon Ortiz (D-
Texas) visited, we told him that many of the officials from
the MFA's America's Department spoke Spanish fluently. Within
minutes at the luncheon, Congressman Ortiz and the Director
of the Americas Department, Mr. Phong, were deeply engaged in
conversation using Spanish. Mr. Phong, who had graduated from
the University of La Havana and had been posted in Cuba in
the past, also speaks English fluently, but I think he really
enjoyed talking with Congressman Ortiz in Spanish.
At General Viale's direction, we also prepared folders that
we gave to the delegation's principal(s) en route to each
meeting location. This contained only information pertaining
to the next meeting. Though the initial folder at the hotel
was useful, we found the second folder ensured that the
pertinent information for the next meeting was fresh in the
visitor's mind and helped focus his thoughts.
Translator Support to Delegations
There were several linguists assigned to Detachment 2. We
did not possess any interpreters, and I quickly learned that
there is a huge difference between an interpreter and a
linguist. Interpreters undergo specific training to become
proficient in their skill and we simply did not have
personnel trained in that manner assigned to the Detachment.
TSgt Ron Ward, USAF, did, however, fill this void extremely
well. When visitors came to Vietnam, we always linked-up Ron
Ward and the visitors the evening before the initial meetings
so they could discuss issues the visitors planned to raise
during the meetings. If the visitors sent talking points to
us ahead of their visit or provided them upon their arrival,
Ron was always responsible for translating them to ensure he
understood not only the literal meaning, but also the intent.
Ron stayed ``glued'' to the visitors throughout their visit,
including riding with them between meetings to explain
nuances of discussions or to discuss any changes the visitor
wanted to make for the next meeting. If space in vehicles
when driving between visits was limited, I always deferred to
Ron to ensure the visitor was comfortable with the
translation.
Translating with the Vietnamese was not always an easy
task. I believe it was a cultural trait of the Vietnamese to
speak very softly. This made it very difficult at times for
the interpreter to hear the principal. The Vietnamese
officials always provided an interpreter, but we still tried
to have Vietnamese linguists in every meeting to ensure our
interpretation of the translation was the same as the
interpreters. If necessary, our interpreter would interrupt
the proceedings to either clarify a point or ask for an
explanation. The Vietnamese did the same to us.
One rather comical instance occurred during our Trilateral
Conference with Vietnamese and Laotian officials on December
1, 1994 in Hanoi. Vietnamese Vice Foreign Minister Binh was
the senior Vietnamese official
[[Page E910]]
present, and his interpreter was a Vietnamese VNOSMP team
leader who spoke English excellently.\35\ Vice Minister Binh
made some introductory welcoming remarks in Vietnamese to the
conference that lasted two to three minutes. The interpreter
translated in the following manner, ``I would like to welcome
the delegates to this very important conference, and all that
welcoming stuff.'' The point here is that there is a huge
difference between someone who fluently speaks another
language and one who is a trained interpreter. Understand the
difference, and accept the handicaps you bear when an
interpreter is unavailable. I was always very comfortable
with Ron Ward as an interpreter. He took his job seriously,
understood the ramifications of his duties, and studied hard.
He also understood the issue thereby ensuring the proper
translation of our positions.
interaction with the media
``Watch your adjectives!'' As I said earlier, the CJTF's
cautionary words stuck with me throughout my tenure. This
forewarning came to mind on numerous occasions as I operated
in what the media described as the ``center of a political
typhoon. On one side are Americans who believe the U.S.
government and military have been duped by the Vietnamese
into spending millions of dollars on a wild-goose chase for
remains that Hanoi already controls and cynically
manipulates. On the other side are compatriots who accuse the
first group of exploiting the families of MIAs by holding out
false hope of information, or even survival of their loved
ones in Southeast Asian jungles.'' \36\
Before even leaving CONUS, I quickly became aware of the
media challenges I would face as the Commander of Detachment
2. During my orientations at the Defense POW/MIA Office in
Arlington, Virginia, I had a chance meeting with Ms Ann
Mills Griffith \37\, the Executive Director of the
National League of Families, and a strident critic of U.S.
policy toward Vietnam. When I was introduced to her, her
only words were, ``Well, I hope we hear less from you in
the press than we have your predecessor. He's the most
quoted Army officer in the country. But * * * maybe we can
get together prior to your departure and talk about the
issue.'' I did not meet with her again until she came to
Vietnam as part of the July 1994 Presidential Delegation.
When the Commander of Detachment 2 assumes his duties, he
is immediately thrust into a position with great political
sensitivity and media interest. There was an interesting
discrepancy with the manner in which the Department of
Defense (DOD) handles media access versus the way the
Department of State (DOS) handles it. As I understood it, DOS
personnel were not authorized to ``go on the record'' with
the media unless they have prior DOS approval or have
achieved a certain level of responsibility in the Department.
When Mr. Jim Hall first arrived in Hanoi in January 1995 as
the Chief of the United States Liaison Office, he did not
have this authorization despite his years of experience in
Asian and Vietnamese issues. Conversely, from Day 1 as the
Commander, I was not only authorized, but encouraged to speak
to the media. During his in-briefing to me, General Viale
directed that I ``tell the JTF's story and include the media
where and when appropriate.''
President Clinton's apparent desire to normalize relations
with Vietnam was looming in the near future during most of my
tenure. His decision hinged on Vietnamese cooperation on the
issue I was responsible for coordinating in Vietnam, so the
media was always keenly interested in our activities.
Interaction seemed to run the gamut of media forums. The
print media was in Hanoi in force. Permanently posted in
Hanoi from the print and television media were John Rogers of
Reuters, George Esper, Bruce Stanley and Kathy Wilhelm of
Associated Press, Kristin Huckshorn of the San Jose Mercury
News, Adam Schwarz of Far Eastern Economic Review, Jason
Bleibtreu of Worldwide Television News, and Philippe Agret of
Agence France--Presse. Ron Moreau, Newsweek's Southeast Asia
correspondent, and Tom Mintier, Cable News Network's Bureau
Chief in Bangkok also visit Hanoi frequently. There were also
several foreign and American ``local'' television affiliates
who visited including ``Der Speigel'' who produced an
extensive documentary on Vietnam which included our efforts,
and KCRA television from Sacramento, California. Though they
never actually came in person, the British Broadcasting
System called me several times and interviewed me twice on
live radio while I was in Hanoi.
The 30th anniversary of the ``fall of Saigon'' also
precipitated numerous press visits to Vietnam. Neil Sheehan
\38\ came to Hanoi to research an article published in the
April 24, 1995 edition of The New Yorker magazine. Also from
the print media came Steven Butler, U.S. News and World
Report, and Frank Gibney of Time. From the television media
came Jim Vance of WRC-TV in Washington, DC, Robin Smith \39\
and her husband Bill Plant for a piece for ``Eye to Eye,''
and the crew of ``Larry King Live.''
The purpose of identifying all of these journalists and
correspondents in this paper is not to impress anyone with
our ``15 minutes of fame,'' but instead to display the
magnitude of the problem. My preparation for working with the
media consisted of one morning in the catacombs of the
Pentagon where Air Force Public Affairs officers ran me
through a number of scenarios I might face. These scenarios
included an interview with a print journalist, an on-camera
interview where the commentator was sitting in the room
with me, an on-camera interview where the interviewer was
in another location and I had only the camera to speak to,
and a chance interview by a ``mob'' of journalists, both
print and video. There was not a single scenario they
presented me that I did not face several times as the
Commander in Hanoi. Their preparations kept me out of
trouble on several occasions.
Thanks in large measure to their efforts and advice from
those at other agencies, to include the CJTF-FA, I deployed
to Vietnam with a few ``rules of thumb,'' for dealing with
the media:
Always tell the truth.
Watch the adjectives.
Talk only about what I know--don't speculate or guess.
Know the two or three most important things I want to get
across and keep coming back to them--no matter what the
question is; i.e., have an agenda--the press will.
Never assume video cameras or tape recorders are ``off.''
There is no such thing as a casual conversation with a
member of the press.
Invite the press along on visits to the field.
When dealing with complex emotional issues (such as this)
don't grant quick interviews with members of the press who I
was not confident fully understand the issue.
Whenever possible, lean heavily on the organization's
Public Affairs Officer.
Always tell the truth
Often, there were times when certain information was not
``releasable'' to the press, and I had to decline comment.
This always seemed a better option than trying to mislead the
press or give them an incomplete answer just to appease them.
I developed a rapport with the Hanoi press such that when I
declined comment, they understood that I would give them the
information as soon as possible. That did not, however,
always preclude them from continuing to press in hopes that I
might slip up and divulge the information. In my opinion,
George Esper and Bruce Stanley were the most skilled at
asking the same question several different ways. The press
always tried to get information concerning the success of our
JFAs prior to the end of the JFA. We never wanted to provide
that information until the Repatriation Ceremony, because it
was not until then that we were certain about the number of
remains our forensics specialists had agreed to repatriate.
We did not want to publicize inaccurate information. The
media also knew that I attended meetings between the
Vietnamese and all visiting U.S. delegations. They often
tried to get me to tell them what occurred during the
meeting, but I felt that was an issue the leader of the
delegation should provide, if he desired to do so. I always
declined comment.
Watch the adjectives
The political sensitivity of this issue meant that
individuals on all sides of the issue would likely dissect my
comments to try to find any ``hidden'' meaning. Calling
cooperation ``strong'' was much different than saying it was
``outstanding.'' I tried to measure my comments such that I
was presenting facts, not speculation or opinion.
Talk only about what I know
Although operations in Vietnam were the focus of media
coverage of the issue of unaccounted-for Americans, it was
only one facet of the entire operation. Often, the media
asked questions concerning operations in Laos or Cambodia and
I would fend these off by simply saying that I stayed too
busy in Vietnam to try to remain current with operations
elsewhere. I normally referred them to the Detachment
Commanders in those countries. Referring media to the JTF-PAO
was also a very effective means of ``staying in my lane,''
and not talking about something in somebody else's realm.
Know the two or three most important things you want to get
across and keep coming back to them
The first four issues listed below were recurrent themes
with the press throughout my tenure. For on-camera
interviews, the USAF PAO team at the Pentagon recommended a
``trick of the trade'' to get my themes across as forcefully
as possible. Normally, the start of the interview began with
the commentator welcoming me and saying hello. This proved to
be a great time to strike first, by acknowledging the
greeting and then beginning to hit at least the first two
themes listed below before even being asked a question.
The same technique worked at the close of most interviews,
where I had the opportunity to close with key words such
as ``highest national priority'' and ``committed to
finding answers for the families.'' The themes I tried to
emphasize were:
President Clinton made resolving this issue a matter of the
``highest national priority'' and was devoting the necessary
personnel, resources, and funding appropriate to that level
priority.
There were hundreds of dedicated young Americans working
arduously in the field with one objective in mind--to find
the answers the families of the unaccounted-for so richly
deserve.
We were enjoying the continued support of the Vietnamese
Government and people to resolve this issue.
Regarding what the U.S. policy toward Vietnam should be, I
always stressed that I
[[Page E911]]
was an ``operator'' in the field, not a policy-maker and was
not qualified to make policy recommendations or comments.
Regarding the issue of live Americans still being held
against their will in Vietnam, I continually emphasized that
the USG had no evidence to support the contention that live
Americans are being held against their will, however, we also
do not have any evidence to be sure there are not. Therefore,
we devote the necessary time, people and resources to fully
investigate each and every live-sighting report.
This last issue hit its apex when former Congressman Billy
Hendon visited Hanoi in May 1995.\40\ During his visit,
another ``media theme'' I continually emphasized was that
despite Mr. Hendon's claims, the Vietnamese had never denied
U.S. investigators access to any location it requested to
visit in conjunction with a live-sighting investigation.
Video cameras and tape recorders are never ``off''
One of the scenarios the USAF PAO instructional team
covered during my orientation at the Pentagon involved an on-
camera interview. At the conclusion of the interview, the
commentator made some closing remarks and thanked me for the
interview. The cameraman then walked away from the camera as
the commentator began idle chit-chat. Unknown to me, the
cameraman left the camera on and running. The commentator's
seemingly innocent conversation regarding the issue we had
been discussing on-camera was actually an attempt to draw me
into saying things I did not want to say on-camera. I never
noticed this occurring during my tenure in Hanoi, but I was
always cognizant of its possibility.
Invite the press along on visits to the field
One advantage I had with the media in Hanoi that others may
not enjoy in other assignments is that the media was very
dependent on me for access to sites and information. I
developed strong relationships with many of the
correspondents and when an investigation or excavation was
taking place that I thought might interest them, I invited
them to ``hitch a ride'' with me when I visited the site.
Many of our sites were inaccessible except by helicopter, so
if they did not go with me, they did not go at all. I never
used this advantage as a threat, but was able to pick and
choose who I would invite to go along with me.
No casual conversations with the media
Though I did develop an excellent rapport with most of the
Hanoi media representatives, I always kept in mind LTG
Bramlett's \41\ advice to me during a previous assignment
that there are ``no casual conversations with a general
officer,'' and applied that to the press. There were
occasions where I went ``off the record,'' but these
instances were only with journalists who I knew very well and
trusted. During my entire tenure, I cannot think of a single
instance where anyone in the media violated that trust,
but I must emphasize that going ``off the record'' can
entail great risk (and sometimes great stupidity).
Ensure the media member understands the issue
As is probably apparent by now, the unaccounted-for issue
is very complex and emotional. I tried never to grant an
interview with a new journalist/correspondent unless they
would take the time for me to brief them on the issue. As I
became more and more familiar with the issue, this became a
very arduous requirement, with discussions lasting as long as
three hours, but it paid off. To my knowledge, I was only
misquoted once during my tenure, and even that was not a very
serious case.
Lean heavily on the PAO
LTC Dave Fredrikson, the JTF-FA PAO was often the most
valuable JTF-FA staff member for me. He deployed to Vietnam
often, and whenever he did, he lifted a great load off my
shoulders. He had been assigned to the JTF since its
inception, and fully undertood the issue and its history. He
had developed a personal relationship with the Hanoi press
corps and understood their strengths and weaknesses. Often,
Often, however, there were times when the press wanted to
talk to the Commander, not a staff officer from Hawaii. In
those instances, Dave became a close listener to both the
press and me to ensure I did not inadvertently say something
incorrectly. Prior to events when we knew a lot of press
would be present, Dave also helped prepare and rehearse me
for their issues.
When Dave wasn't in Hanoi, I sent information regarding all
press contacts, no matter how insignificant, to him by fax or
E-mail. In that way, he knew which media to watch to ensure
they ``got the story right.'' The PAO cannot help unless he
is up to speed on the issues. To be effective, the PAO needed
to know everything that went on in the JTF, and the
Commanders in the field were his best source of information
for operations in their respective countries.
The only time I had difficulty with the press was when I
tried to handle a ``press pool'' rather than giving the
problem to the PAO and letting him handle it. This occurred
during Mr. Hendon's visit. Once it came time to visit the
``live-sighting'' location, the Vietnamese allowed us to take
along one member of the press. After consulting with Dave
Fredrikson, I informed the press that because we could only
take one member of the media with us, we would use the
``press pool'' technique, and that individual must agree to
share his/her report with the others. My mistake was in
designating the specific member that would accompany us. I
chose John Rogers of Reuters who was the senior member of the
Hanoi press corps. He was extremely knowledgeable of the
issue, but was also what I would best characterize as
``quietly competent.'' His familiarity with the subject was
the real selling point for me, but I also thought that John's
low-key approach with the Vietnamese would best serve
thorough and objective coverage of a very sensitive
investigation. The Vietnamese never before allowed a member
of the media to accompany an LSI. I did not want to betray
their trust.
To make a long story short, Kathy Wilhelm (AP) did not
agree with my decision, stating that it is the press who
should decide who would represent them in the pool. In the
end, and after much heated discussion and aggravation with
Kathy, I referred her to Dave Fredriskson. I told her that I
would defer to whatever he advised. After all was said and
done, Dave recommended that I allow the press corps to
decide. I did. Kathy Wilhelm represented the media, and she
did a good job of covering the investigation.
In retrospect, it would have been a lot easier if I had
deferred to the JTF-FA PAO from the outset. I was clearly
delving into an area where I was unfamiliar, I was extremely
tired (and short-tempered) after a week of responding to Mr.
Hendon's shenanigans, and I had lost patience with many in
the press corps who I felt were giving Mr. Hendon and his
ridiculous accusations much too much coverage. I was also
annoyed at their telephone calls at all hours of the day and
night for the latest information. I had lost my objectivity,
and hindsight has shown me that passing the ball to someone
separated from the difficulties in Hanoi, i.e. Dave
Fredrikson in Hawaii, would have relieved me of much needless
aggravation.
interaction with u.s. veterans groups
During my tenure as the Commander of Detachment 2,
delegations from several veterans groups visited Vietnam and
requested a briefing at the Ranch. We always granted their
requests as we felt strongly that their consitiuency needed
to understand the extent of our efforts. I must admit that I
was usually more nervous prior to briefing veterans groups
than I was prior to Congressional delegations. For some
reasons, I always expected a confrontation, but in fact,
never had one. I found every veterans group delegation that
visited us to be genuinely concerned about unraveling the
truth surrounding the issue, fully supportive of our efforts,
and absolutely devoted to taking home the facts to their
members. This is not to say that all veterans agreed with
U.S. policy decisions toward normalizing relations with
Vietnam. Most did not, but that was not an issue that was of
concern to me. My job was to convey to them the extent of
JTF-FA's efforts in Vietnam, our dedication to finding
answers for the families, and our commitment to achieving the
fullest possible accounting. In their dealings with those of
us in the field, my experience with the veterans
organizations was uniformly positive.
The U.S. veterans program that was of most help to us in
the field was the Vietnam Veterans of America (VVA) Veterans
Initiative. As I said earlier, the Vietnamese claim to have
over 300,000 of their own people still missing from their
``war for independence.'' The VVA has requested that their
membership forward to the VVA any war memorabilia, artifacts,
photographs, maps, etc.,that may help the Vietnamese resolve
instances of their missing. Semi-annually, officials from the
VVA travel to Vietnam to provide the items they receive to
the Vietnamese veterans organization. This is a veterans-to-
veterans program, not government-to-government, and the VVA
closely guard this relationship. We helped them on occasion,
but only by assisting them interpret maps or make sense of
one document or another.
In the summer of 1994, the VVA visited Vietnam and one of
the items they provided was a map indicating the location of
a mass grave of Vietnamese. The map indicated that
approximately 100 Vietnamese had been buried at the location
marked on the map. Gary Flanagan, our CRS, helped the VVA
officials refine the location on current maps, and the VVA
traveled with Vietnamese veterans to find the site. The
Vietnamese excavated the site and found the remains of
approximately 95 individuals.
This program encouraged Vietnamese veterans to provide the
same type of support to our operations. By us showing
compassion for their loss, I believe the Vietnamese veterans
who have diaries, photographs or other items in their private
possession will be more likely to provide those items to us.
interaction with department of state
The primary mission of the United States Liaison Office
(USLO) was to promote additional progress in securing the
fullest possible accounting on the issue of unaccounted-for
Americans. In addition to their primary mission, the USLO
performed several secondary tasks on behalf of the USG and
provided other services similar to those other liaison
offices, consular offices and embassies provide. These tasks
included: assuring the protection and welfare of U.S.
citizens, conducting human rights dialogue with the
Vietnamese Government, promoting increased bilateral and
multilateral ties with Vietnam, and promoting U.S. business
and economic interests.
Although during my tenure we never had an ``officially
sanctioned'' relationship, I clearly saw myself as part of
the USLO
[[Page E912]]
``Country Team,'' and, therefore, subordinate to the USLO
Chief. However, I was the senior DOD official in Vietnam
representing the Commander-in-Chief, Pacific Command
(CINCPAC), who was directly responsible to the President for
all matters pertaining to the issue of unaccounted-for
Americans. I was entirely responsible for coordinating the
full-accounting mission in Vietnam, and had only one boss,
the CJTF-FA. Whereas we recognized the DOS commitment to the
issue of accounting or missing American service-men as its
first priority, we insisted that the USLO and all Vietnamese
Government agencies coordinate all POW/MIA business,
correspondence, and reports with me as the Commander of
Detachment 2.
I always tried to keep the Chief, USLO, Mr. Jim Hall
appraised of all our official activities and provided him
copies of all requests, correspondence and reports. Mr. Hall
directed that his relationship with me be direct; I did not
have to work through his deputy or anyone else in the USLO. I
understood the importance of working with Mr. Hall to ensure
he was fully abreast of all matters pertaining to the issue.
Likewise, I always felt that Mr. Hall understood that CJTF-FA
and CINCPAC were totally responsible for all aspects of our
efforts, and that they held me responsible for in-country
activities. Mr. Hall went to great lengths to support and
facilitate our operations.
As a result of a statement by Secretary Christopher that
promised Congress that a member of the USLO would have full-
time responsibilities as the POW/MIA officer, my work was
made somewhat more difficult. I felt this was unnecessary and
counter-productive as the issue of accounting for missing
Americans was my primary job. I worked on it all day every
day. The DOS in Washington, D.C. insisted that Mr. Hall
assign this duty to one of his personnel as, in my opinion, a
political gesture--a decision somebody made without fully
understanding the role of the Detachment Commander. It was
not based on the realities in Vietnam. Albeit well
intentioned, there was simply no way that anyone in the USLO
would know as much about the issue as I did.
Because we worked in separate buildings, did not mean we
did not talk. Mr. Hall and I had a very close professional
relationship based on trust and mutual respect. He knew that
I worked this issue everyday, all day, and that if he needed
information on the issue, all he had to do was ask. Likewise,
I was fully aware that Washington expected him to be fully
knowledgeable of our issue, and I always tried to keep him
appraised of everything we did.
I tried to ameliorate this directive from Washington by
working mornings at the USLO and afternoons in my office, but
this did not work well. I found it very difficult to work in
two offices, especially when I had to carry my work from
office to office. I continued to check-in with Mr. Hall
daily, but gradually stopped going to the USLO in the
mornings to work. I don't think anyone really minded, and I
accomplished a lot more in my own office at the Ranch. Mr.
Hall was very understanding of my predicament and chose to
allow me to do what I thought best.
Overall, the establishment of the USLO was a very positive
step. It was especially helpful during VIP visits.
Previously, the entire Detachment's work would grind to a
halt as we supported the visits with baggage handlers,
escorts, etc. Now, the only one whose time is monopolized
during these visits is that of the Detachment Commander, and
there was no way to change that as I could not delegate that
responsibility.
As I said, prior to the arrival of the USLO we were
responsible for all aspects of VIP visits. Once the USLO
opened, it assumed the responsibility of coordinating
itineraries, providing transportation and lodging, customs/
immigration clearance, baggage handling, etc., for all non-
DOD officials visiting SRV. As previously, I continued to
attend all meetings and other activities involving the
visitors. I thought this was extremely important as the USG
began to engage the Vietnamese on issues other than the POW/
MIA issue. The Detachment Commander's presence in meetings
served as a reminder to the Vietnamese that though we were
talking about other issues, the issue of missing Americans
was still the number one priority of the USG. I also provided
all necessary briefings and reports concerning JTF-FA
opeations, as requested by Mr. Hall or the visiting
officials.
Regarding VIP schedules, I did not think some of the action
officers at the USLO were as aggressive with the Vietnamese
as experience had taught us we could be. When we coordinated
a schedule for visitors, we always fenced the time the
Detachment needed to brief the delegation (normally two
hours) as their first order of priority. This ensured that
they were as current as possible on our operations and
progress. We then provided the remaining time to the
Vietnamese for them to schedule the rest of the visit. It was
my impression that action officers at the USLO took the
opposite approach; give the Vietnamese the schedule, let them
fill it in with the requested meetings, and then fill in the
remaining time with our briefing. As a result, we never had
quite the time available to prebrief incoming delegations
that we had in the pre-USLO days.
I also learned that DOS and DOD cultures simply have
different briefing ``styles.'' Some months later, this
informal ``style'' was later confirmed to me as the normal
operating procedure for DOS during a lecture by Ambassador
Marc Baas to a War College seminar.\42\ Once the USLO was
established, we normally briefed visitors over lunch while we
all sat on couches in Mr. Hall's office. It was my experience
that DOS personnel rarely use briefing slides and brief in a
much more informal fashion than does the military. In my
opinion, nothing beat coming to the Ranch and sitting at the
table for a formal briefing, but I also have come to realize
that is very much a part of the military culture and not
necessarily characteristic of other agencies. In support of
that, I had several Congressional Staff delegations comment
to me that it is always refreshing to have an Army officer
brief them; they always get a hand-out, the briefing is
normally to the point and clear, and we don't tend to dodge
the tough issues. To this day, I believe it is much more
difficult to do this when everyone is sitting in easy chairs
eating sandwiches and drinking cokes.
My greatest concern about the USLO role in Vietnam came
when Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Counter-
Narcotics, Mr. Gelbard, visited Southeast Asia. A red flag
went up for me during his visit. I concluded from his visit
that with the opening of the USLO, other governmental
agencies were rushing to push their agenda with the
Vietnamese and either downplay, or pay lip-service to the
POW/MIA issue. I felt that these competing agendas would
confuse the Vietnamese, and that they might lose focus on the
issue. I must add that I was pleased that we were beginning
to engage the Vietnamese on issues other than the issue of
unaccounted-for Americans and knew that the Vietnamese also
felt it a refreshing development. My only concern was one of
emphasis and a fear that the our issue would lose its
priority with the Vietnamese before President Clinton had
determined that sufficient progress had been achieved to
warrant improved relations.\43\
impressions of vietnamese people and culture
Living in Vietnam was like nothing I ever expected. Prior
to arriving in Vietnam, my only experience in a ``communist''
led country was in then East Berlin in 1982. I will never
forget crossing from West to East Berlin. I can best
characterize it as going from color to black and white. To
me, East Berlin appeared cold, grey, and depressing. The
people did not appear happy, merchandise in stores was
shabby, and the store shelves were not well stocked. I
expected much the same atmosphere in Vietnam and was
therefore shocked by the environment I found. Hanoi, Ho Chi
Minh City, and Da Nang (the only major urban centers in
Vietnam) are vibrant cities. Construction is occurring
everywhere, store shelves are well stocked (new American
products were arriving on the shelves almost daily), the
people appeared happy, and color was everywhere. Not
everything is ``rosy'' in Vietnam, however. The people are
very poor, the infrastructure is almost non-existent, and it
is obvious that the country is struggling as it opens to the
international community and moves toward a market economy.
Through my readings and attendance at various meetings during
the visits of U.S. delegations, I know that the Vietnamese
have a long way to go to abide by United Nations standards
regarding human rights, but it is not evident on a daily
basis.
In short, I did not find the atmosphere oppressive as I did
in East Berlin 12 years earlier. Most significantly to me was
that the Vietnamese people appeared hopeful about the future
and that their quality of life was destined to improve. I
felt an atmosphere of optimism almost everywhere I went in
Vietnam.
The most surprising thing to me was the friendliness of the
Vietnamese, most especially toward Americans. Even in Hanoi,
the people seemed to thoroughly enjoy talking to Americans
and saw America as the land of everything good. My impression
was that given the opportunity to choose, Vietnamese would
much rather attend American universities, buy American goods,
and model their future after the United States. It was
interesting to find that if Vietnamese children called you a
Russian, they normally meant it as an insult, not a
compliment.
Vietnamese are probably the hardest working people I have
ever encountered. Most Vietnamese work at least six days a
week, many seven, with their only real vacation coming during
Tet.\44\ Our Vietnamese employees were extremely loyal,
rarely complained, and always willing to go the extra mile
for us.
The family appears to be the most significant aspect of
everyday Vietnamese life. As I tried to learn Vietnamese, I
found that the most valuable phrases to learn revolved around
being able to talk about your own family and ask about
theirs. Young unmarried Vietnamese usually still live with
their family, and once married, the children will also often
take in one or both parents. I found that beginning a
negotiation with my counterpart normally got off to a better
start if I began with small talk about his or my family.
I cannot remember a single instance of a Vietnamese talking
derisively to me about someone else. I do not believe it is
in their nature to talk badly about anyone else. Anyone
dealing with the Vietnamese, whether officially or
unofficially, should keep this in mind. I truly believe that
the Vietnamese do not trust someone who speaks badly of
others in public. It is probably a trait we could stand to
emulate.
It was also a rare event for a Vietnamese official to
flatly refuse a request of ours.
[[Page E913]]
Now, this by no means meant that we always got what we asked
for. Rather than saying ``No,'' I found that the Vietnamese
used phrases such as, ``That would be very difficult,'' or
``We will have to study that issue more,'' or ``We would like
to do that but we will have great difficulty getting the
other ministries to support it.'' I soon learned that these
phrases normally meant ``No.''
As I said earlier in this paper, ``Face,'' as some people
call it is very important in Vietnam as it is in most Asian
countries. I took every opportunity possible to publicly
praise my counterpart during visiting delegations, and always
tried to compliment lower level officials in the presence of
their superiors. Praise goes a long way in Vietnam, as it
does everywhere. Conversely, when I was having difficulty
with someone, I would never criticize them in public or speak
to their superior without first informing them of what I
would do if we were unable to progress at that level.
Vietnamese do not mind you going over their head, just don't
do it behind their backs.
One of my goals upon assuming command of Detachment 2 was
to improve the personal relationships between the Detachment
and our Vietnamese workers and counterparts. Since my days as
a lieutenant, I have always felt that it is helpful to
nurture relationships with those with whom you work. I have
found that it is much more difficult to decline a request
from a friend, than it is to refuse a casual acquaintance. I
have also found that subordinates work much harder for those
whom they respect and ``like'' than for those who just pay
their salary and do not care for them as an individual.
As I said earlier, we had several Vietnamese local hires
who worked at the Ranch. Whether these individuals were our
secretaries, our cook, our maids, drivers, guards or
gardeners, I tried to make them feel a part of the
Detachment. After all, without their efforts, we would not
have been able to concentrate on our own duties. I began
inviting them to Detachment social events such as
Thanksgiving supper and though very shy in the beginning,
they soon opened up to us and became lasting friends. We even
had a farewell of sorts for one of our retiring guards. This
elderly gentleman had guarded our compound since we first
leased it, so we had a luncheon on the Ranch for him and
presented him with a JTF-FA Certificate of Appreciation
signed by me. I can almost guarantee that he has that
certificate proudly displayed in his home. I am just as
certain that when he speaks to his Vietnamese friends and
family, his reflections on Americans will be positive.
We tried to do the same for our counterparts in the VNOSMP.
Not too long after my arrival, we hosted a small party at the
Ranch for Detachment 2 and the VNOSMP. It was a very relaxed
atmosphere that included American and Vietnamese food. I
believe this was the first time many of our VNOSMP
counterparts had even been on the Ranch other than at the
main office building.
I knew we had made great strides in developing trust and
friendship when the VNOSMP invited us to a Tet party at the
Le Tach Government Guest House. Like our invitation to them
earlier in my tour, they included the entire Detachment. This
was also a first in our relationship.
In the Spring of 1995, we decided to host a party at the
Ranch for our counterparts. I asked Mr. Hall if the USLO
would like to co-host it with us and he quickly agreed to
help us. We wanted to make this an American event complete
with hamburgers, hot dogs, potato salad, country music and
rock-and-roll. Guests at the party ran the gamut from our
guards and maids, to the Vietnamese Vice Minister of
Interior, the Director of the Vietnamese Veterans
Organization, senior officials in the Ministries of Foreign
Affairs and National Defense, the Hanoi press corps (on the
agreement that everything was ``off the record'' that
evening), and a couple of American businessmen. Vietnamese
officials rarely showed themselves to us in a casual
atmosphere, but everyone seemed to relax and enjoy
themselves. I think we spread a lot of good will during this
party and gained much more than we gave.
These few instances of shared camaraderie served a very
important purpose--they built trust between our organizations
and between individuals. Becoming friends did not mean that I
would always agree with my counterparts or them with me.
Neither did it mean that I would push any less vigorously for
issues I thought were important to achieving the fullest
possible accounting. What I do believe it meant was that I
understood the Vietnamese perspective and could usually find
a way to honor their position while still accomplishing the
mission I was bound to do. It meant that I was better able to
read body language and recognize intent versus literal
meanings of spoken words. It meant that I could better time
my requests or frame them in such a way as to maximize my
opportunities for success. In short, I think our friendships
developed trust. Trust led to greater access an enhanced
cooperation. And better cooperation led to progress.
conclusion
When Sergeant Major of the Army Richard Kidd visited our
troops in the field in Vietnam in January 1995, he asked me
what message I would like him to take back to the United
States. I wanted to repeat my reply to him here in my
concluding comments, because I hope you have come to the same
conclusions.
The President of the United States considers this issue one
of the highest national priority and is resourcing it
appropriately.
There are hundreds of great Americans working tirelessly
under arduous conditions with only one purpose in mind--to
provide the families the answers they so richly deserve.
There are hundreds of Vietnamese citizens working side-by-
side with our specialists to help us find the answers, and
the Vietnamese government is cooperating strongly in our
efforts.
We are finding many of the answers we are seeking. No, we
aren't finding all the answers, but we are making significant
progress toward the fullest possible accounting.
Finally, I asked him to tell all the soldiers, sailors,
airmen, and marines that he can that 20 years after the
conflict in Vietnam, the United States is still trying to
bring home its fallen warriors. Through all the reports of
the circumstances of loss I read, I did not see a single case
of our soldiers being ``abandoned'' on the battlefield. Our
service men and women should continue their Service, knowing
that we will come for them too.
One of the most important findings of DOD's ``Zero-Based
Comprehensive Review of Cases'' is that if found ``no
evidence that information is being deliberately withheld'' by
the governments of Vietnam, Laos or Cambodia.\46\ Could the
Vietnamese Government do more? In my opinion, they probably
could, but I also look at all the other difficulties they
face as they try to rebuild their country. I believe they are
providing a level of cooperation far exceeding what might be
reasonable to expect of them, and that the Vietnamese
Government is committed to continuing their current level
of cooperation indefinitely. During a visit by one of the
Congressional delegations to Vietnam, the Vice Foreign
Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Le Mai, said that he did
not expect the USG to stop pressuring Vietnam for
assistance in achieving the fullest possible accounting.
He simply hoped that it could soon become just one issue
of importance amongst many other issues discussed between
two countries with normal relations. Though the issue of
missing Americans is still one of America's ``highest
National priorities,'' and it correctly remains the
primary issue of discussion between Vietnam and the United
States, Mr. Le Mai's expectations are being realized today
albeit slowly.
During my tour in Vietnam, I received much more than I
gave. The men and women of Joint Task Force--Full Accounting
are an inspiration to us all as they endure the long hours,
the elements, the heat, the humidity, the snakes, the
unexploded ordnance, and numerous other hardships to do their
job--and do so happily. The leadership of JTF-FA, Generals
Needham and Viale and Colonel Frizell, provided the guidance
and resources I needed to accomplish the mission, but allowed
me the flexibility and authority I needed to operate
confidently and effectively. I had the best command
environment I could have possibly hoped for.
The JTF-FA staff worked tirelessly behind the scenes to
make those of us in the field successful, and they did so
without receiving many of the accolades and fanfare those of
us who were in the field received. I also must acknowledge
the efforts of those who went before me, Colonel Jack
Donovan, Colonel John Cray and all those who served with
them. It was their efforts that created the conditions under
which I was able to operate, and they set the stage well. If
at any point in this monograph I gave the impression that the
accomplishments I cited were mine, it was unintentional and
false. Progress on this issue was a team effort that included
the Detachments in the filed, the JTF-FA and PACOM
Headquarters and staffs, and the Defense POW/MIA Office. I
privileged to be a small part of a great team.
There are other groups contributing to the fullest possible
accounting that I believe also need a lot of the credit for
the success of the operators in the field. The Vietnam
Veterans of America, the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the
American Legion, the National League of Families and many
other groups are faithfully representing their constituency
to get the answers they deserve. They too contribute to the
overall effort. I also appreciated the open-minded approach
the Congressional and Congressional Staff delegations took
during their visits. Without the not always politically
popular efforts of Senators John McCain, John Kerry, Kit
Bond, and Sam Nunn, I do not believe we would be making the
progress we are today.
I always enjoy talking about our nation's efforts in
Vietnam, because I do not feel the American people or, more
importantly, the men and women of America's Armed Forces are
aware of the extent of our nation's commitment to resolving
the very emotional issue of Americans still missing in
Southeast Asia. This monograph has given me the opportunity
to reflect on the most rewarding year of my 22 year career,
and to offer some thoughts as to how we approached our
duties. I hope this paper will be of some use to those who
may follow in similar situations, and that it serves as a
record of the impression of just one member of a very large
team dedicated to pursuing and achieving the fullest possible
accounting for Americans still unaccounted-for in Indochina.
I opened this paper with a quote describing why I think
JTF-FA's mission is important. I will close with another
quote. How can the contributions of JTF-FA best be
summarized? I think Admiral Richard Macke, CINCPAC, said it
best on February 10, 1995
[[Page E914]]
when he presented the Joint Meritorious Unit Award to JTF-FA:
``What will be the legacy of Joint Task Force-Full
Accounting? It won't be the sites searched, the witnesses
interviewed, the tons of soil sifted. Your legacy will be the
relief of the families of those we are able to account for.
And your legacy will be the iron-clad faith that the men and
women of our armed services have in each other. When we are
next called upon to put ourselves in harms way, we can do so
without hesitation, because we know you'll come. I can think
of no greater legacy to leave to those who come after us.''
God's noblest people and their families must always know
that we'll come--no matter how long it takes.
Live-Sighting Report--Mr. Billy Hendon
One of the most difficult periods of my tenure occurred in
April 1995. Mr. Billy Hendon arrived in my office claiming to
have information concerning live Americans being held by the
Vietnamese.\47\ He said that he had ``irrefutable proof''
that the Vietnamese were holding Americans in an underground
facility beneath a mountain in a militarily sensitive area in
Vinh Phu Province (northwest of Hanoi). Furthermore, he
claimed that the Vietnamese had denied JTF-FA investigators
access to this sensitive area for the purpose of live-
sighting investigations.
I told him that if he would provide his ``intelligence'' to
me, I would forward it to the necessary agency immediately,
and we would investigate it. He said that he did not trust me
to investigate it without first ``tipping-off'' the
Vietnamese and would not give me the information. Rather, he
suggested we gather all the press we could and all go
investigate the case together.
While I was speaking with Mr. Hendon, I directed my
Detachment NCOIC to contact the United States Liaison Office
(USLO), as I thought they should be involved in this. The
Deputy Chief of the USLO and the Regional Security Officer
soon arrived at my office to assist me in my actions with Mr.
Hendon. Once they arrived, I excused myself so that I could
call JTF-FA Headquarters to inform them of the situation. I
spoke at length with Colonel Frizell, the Deputy Commander,
and received specific guidance regarding my interactions with
Mr. Hendon. After our discussions, I returned to convey
Colonel Frizell's guidance to Mr. Hendon. In Hawaii, Colonel
Frizell immediately notified the Deputy CINCPAC, DPMO and
other necessary agencies of our situation and actions.
Once back in my office, I told Mr. Hendon that I would not
make a ``media circus'' of any live-sighting investigation as
it would be inappropriate. Colonel Frizell also spoke to Mr.
Hendon telephonically twice. He explained our position to him
in what I am sure were much less politically correct terms
than I had used. A distinguished career in the United States
Marine Corps, which included his aircraft being shot down
over northern Vietnam during the conflict and three years as
the Deputy CJTF-FA, did not exactly endear the likes of Mr.
Hendon to Colonel Frizell.
Mr. Hendon responded that he would not give me the
information until his conditions were met. We reached an
impasse that neither of us was willing to skirt.
We concluded our meeting when Mr. Hendon asked if he could
stay on the Ranch as he feared for his life. He claimed that
Mr. Nguyen Xuan Phong (Director of the Americas Department)
and Mr. Vu Chi Cong (my counterpart in the VNOSMP) had
threatened his life. After speaking with Colonel Frizell, I
denied Mr. Hendon's request for the following reasons; the
Ranch was not U.S. property (as embassy property is) and
therefore cannot provide the protection to U.S. citizens that
embassies can, we did not have facilities to support such
requests, and finally, we were confident that his claims
regarding the threat to his life was baseless and ridiculous.
I did, however, make arrangements for him to stay in a room
in a small six-room hotel immediately adjacent to the Ranch.
Several of my personnel were also living in the hotel for a
short time, so I thought that would ease his concerns for his
safety (if he really had any). As I walked Mr. Hendon from my
office building, he asked what would happen if he refused to
leave. I did not directly answer his question, but made it
clear that I would not allow him to stay on the Ranch.
As Mr. Hendon left the Ranch, he locked himself to the
outside metal gate of our driveway with a set of handcuffs.
Since it was cloudy, beginning to sprinkle, and threatening
thunder and lightning, I got some bolt cutters to free Mr.
Hendon from his handcuffs. I also did not want the press to
arrive with Mr. Hendon chained to my gate. As I was cutting
the handcuffs (from the inside of the gate with Mr. Hendon on
the outside), Mr. Hendon was taking pictures of me. In any
event, Mr. Hendon had another pair of handcuffs and re-locked
himself to the gate a little later.
As we watched Mr. Hendon throughout the day, we found that
his efforts lacked a certain amount of integrity and
sincerity. Locked to the gate, he entertained members of the
press with his intent to remain locked to the gate until such
time as I was willing to investigate his claims of live
Americans. Yet, after the departure of the press, and as
necessary, he unlocked himself from the gate to return to his
hotel room to use the bathroom, or he would pay young
Vietnamese children to bring him food and sodas and even
managed to get a chair to sit on outside the gate. Needless
to say, however, in the heat and humidity of Vietnam, Mr.
Hendon soon decided that chaining himself to the gate would
not bring him much progress compared to the discomfort he was
experiencing. Soon he was only appealing at the gate during
selected press intervals.
Later, I called the DFCJTF to ask permission to call Stony
Beach in Bangkok and request they send a live-sighting
investigator to Hanoi. In this manner we would be immediately
ready to respond to any valid information we might receive
from Mr. Hendon. He agreed, and the Vietnamese approved his
visa within a few hours of our request. This quick approval
was extremely rare in Vietnam. It normally took ten days for
a routine request and two to three days for an emergency
request. This told me the Vietnamese understood the urgency
of our request.
I reviewed our actions with Mr. Jim Hall, the Chief, United
States Liaison Office, Hanoi, and the DCJTF in Hawaii several
times each day during this ordeal to: 1) keep them informed
of the situation, and 2) receive their guidance. I continued
to refuse to meet with Mr. Hendon again unless it was at the
USLO with Mr. Hall. I also continued to deny Mr. Hendon
further access to the Ranch. We remained willing to meet with
Mr. Hendon whenever he decided to provide his information to
us in the proper environment; i.e., in a relatively secure
environment on U.S. property such as the USLO and not in the
middle of a press conference.
As time went on, Mr. Hendon decided to hold a press
conference to give the press the details of his
``intelligence.'' During this conference he claimed that we
refused to meet with him (we did not--we only insisted that
we meet in the proper forum), that we refused to investigate
this case (we did not--we were awaiting his information) and
that the Vietnamese had denied us access to this site for
investigation. He said that I had lied when I said the
Vietnamese had never denied us access to any site for the
purpose of a LSI.
Mr. Hendon did a skillful job with the press of mixing
apples and oranges regarding access to the site. His claims
of being denied access to the Vinh Phu military reservation
implied that the Vietnamese had denied access to the site for
the purpose of investigating a live-sighting. We had not. As
I discussed earlier in this monograph, the Vietnamese did
deny us access to the reservation, but that was during our
investigation of Case 0644, not an LSI. It is important to
stress that to my knowledge, and to the knowledge of the
primary Stony Beach live sighting investigator, JTF-FA and
Stony Beach investigators have never been denied access to
any location anywhere in Vietnam as a part of a live sighting
investigation. I clarified this point with the press on
several occasions, but I do not think this was ever made
completely clear in the articles I saw.
For almost two weeks, Mr. Hendon lived in the hotel next
door to the Ranch, occasionally sending a fax to me imploring
me to meet his conditions so he could provide his
``intelligence'' to me. He was also in obvious contact with
his associates back in the United States. We soon became the
object of several ``National Vietnam P.O.W. Strike Force''
newsletters written by Mr. Joe L. Jordan, the Strike Force
Commander. Mr. Jordan is one of the more vocal critics of
U.S. policy in Vietnam regarding POW/MIA efforts. His
newsletters made statements about me such as:
``Not only does Richmond refuse to go, he demands that
Hendon give him the data so he can turn it over to the
communists.\48\
``Will some other U.S. Army scumbag like LTC Richmond help
the communists hide his [future U.S. POWs] whereabouts [sic]
30 years from now after he has been captured?\46\
``Your little panty-waisted, snot-nosed faggot commander of
the ranch, U.S. Army Lt Col Melvin Richmond whined, `We might
be out there for months looking in each and every little
cave.\50\' ''
But my favorite passage was when Mr. Jordan described Mr.
Hendon's situation:
``He [Mr. Hendon] was last seen running down a dark alley
in the red light and bar district near Le Nam De street with
the KGB in hot pursuit. A caucasion [sic] American of 6\1/2\
feet in height like Hendon will not go un-noticed for long
and he is believed to already be in secret captivity, his
exact whereabouts unknown.\51\''
Mr. Hendon was in a very comfortable, but conditioned hotel
room next door to the Ranch, meeting with the press everyday.
The only hardship I noticed with Mr. Hendon was that the top
of his head became very sunburned.
Finally, Mr. Hendon's visa expired and the Vietnamese
refused to renew it. Before leaving, Mr. Hendon gave is the
information he had via a fax, and we began the LSI process.
He left Vietnam proclaiming victory.
When we finally investigated Mr. Hendon's information, the
results were as we suspected they would be. The location he
provided was some 50 kilometers outside the Vinh Phu military
reservation. It was in the middle of expansive rice paddies--
not a mountain in view. And there was no evidence of live
Americans ever having been held in that area. As a matter of
fact, Mr. Hendon had been to that very location a couple of
years previous.
It is unfortunate that individuals such as Mr. Hendon are
able to manipulate the press and manipulate the hopes of
families the way he does. At one point I told Bruce Stanley
of AP that I thought they were giving Mr. Hendon entirely too
much attention. I said that they were allowing Mr. Hendon to
build a story where none exists. Bruce agreed
[[Page E915]]
with my assessment, but said that they had to follow him . .
. just in case he did something newsworthy.
There are hundreds of great Americans working tirelessly,
often in very inhospitable conditions, to try to resolve this
issue. There are other organizations such as the National
League of Families and U.S. veterans groups who disagree with
U.S. policies concerning Vietnam, but I always felt that
their motives were pure and their intentions the same as
ours--to find the truth for the families of the missing. I
strongly resented individuals such as Mr. Hendon and Mr.
Jordan who manipulated the press, manipulated the truth,
misrepresented me, and misrepresented those devoted to
finding the truth. I believe they cloud the issue, develop
distrust amongst the families of the missing, and Americans
in general, and do so for (in my opinion) personal gain.
Glossary
Americas Department: The department of the Vietnamese
Ministry of Foreign Affairs responsible for relations between
Vietnam and the Americas (including Cuba). During my tenure,
the Director of the Americas Department was Mr. Nguyen Xuan
Phong.
Amnesty Program: The Vietnamese established the Amnesty
Program to encourage Vietnamese citizens to provide any
remains and information they possess concerning unaccounted-
for Americas to the Central Government without fear of
punishment. My experience indicated that the Vietnamese
Government was genuine in this offer. The only instances I
knew of where the Government prosecuted Vietnamese citizens
regarding remains involved ``remains trading.''
Archival Research Team (ART): The Archival Research Team
worked with the VNOSMP to find SRV records containing
information about unaccounted-for Americans, and jointly
researched and investigated reports that private citizens had
remains of unaccounted-for Americans. SRV records included
war-time film footage, military and government records, and
national museum and library holdings. Established in October
1992, the ARTs had access to all civilian and military
museums, public security houses, tradition houses and
newspaper and magazine offices in Vietnam. In May 1993, the
VNOSMP and JTF-FA established the Joint Document Center (JDC)
in the Central Army Museum in Hanoi. The JDC served as a
repository for all documents, books, and reports that
Vietnamese and U.S. investigators uncovered. Three ARTs
deployed to Vietnam organizing their efforts along the lines
of already established Vietnamese Military Regions (MRs); ART
1 operated in MR1, MR2, and MR3, all in northern Vietnam. ART
2 operated in MR4 and MR5 in central Vietnam, and ART 3
operated in MR7 and MR9 in southern Vietnam. In February
1995, the RIT assumed the duties of the ART as it was no
longer necessary to have a single team dedicated entirely to
this effort.
Anthropologist/Archeologist: Each RE has an anthropologist
assigned to it. The anthropologist/archeologist provides the
scientific control for the recovery site and ensures that
every aspect of the recovery operation conforms with
scientific standards that can withstand the closest legal and
scientific scrutiny. Most anthropologists/archeologists
assigned to CILHI are under contract to the Army Corps of
Engineers. The anthropologists/archeologists working in the
field are highly respected and among the world's most
accomplished scientists of their fields. Within the elite
group, CILHI certifies certain anthropologists/archeologists
as being able to turn away remains. If a team recovers what
they suspect to be a bone at a recovery site they cannot
dispose of that piece of remains (even if it has a beak on it
or is an obvious animal bone) unless a certified
anthropologist/archeologist authorizes the team to do so.
Died-in-Captivity Cases (DIC): Of the 84 SRT cases, 27
cases representing 29 individuals are DIC cases. Since these
cases involve individuals who died while in Vietnamese
captivity, U.S. Government officials believed it reasonable
to assume that the Vietnamese should have control of the
individuals' remains or know of their whereabouts.
Discrepancy Cases: Another name for Priority Cases.
Dog Tag Reports: Since 1979, the United States Government
has received thousands of reports of remains associated with
dog tags in the hands of private citizens. About 97% of the
Americans named in these reports were never unaccounted for.
A little more than 100 Americans named in the reports are
still unaccounted-for. The Archival Research Team began
investigating these cases in July 1994.
Excavate: If an IE discovers credible information (i.e.;
witness testimony, wreckage, etc.) that allows it to narrow
the scope of work at a location to a reasonable size
location, it will recommend that an RE excavate the site to
try to find remains.
Explosive Ordnance Specialist: An EOD specialist is
assigned to each IE and RE. It is a common occurrence for our
teams to encounter live ordnance remaining from the conflict
in Vietnam. The EOD specialist ensures the safety of the team
during its operations.
Fate Determined: A normal IE team can make three
recommendations after investigating a case; reinvestigate,
excavate, or pending. In the case of Priority Case
Investigations, the team may make one other recommendation,
fate determined. This means that although the case is still
unresolved, the team did conclude that the unaccounted-for
American died, thus his ``fate has been determined.'' Further
investigations will continue as necessary or until the case
is resolved.
Graves Registry Cases: Of the 84 SRT cases, 39 cases
representing 46 individuals are SRV Graves Registry cases.
The names of these 46 individuals appeared on provincial
graves registries, therefore the USG position is that since
the registries reflect that the Vietnamese knew of the burial
location during the war, they should still know the
whereabouts of the remains.
Incident Location: Site where the unaccounted-for American
was last seen or thought to have been; e.g., crash site,
burial site, site of an ambush, etc.
Investigation Element (IE): Each IE is composed of a Team
Chief, an Assistant Team Chief, two analysts/linguists, two
Mortuary Affairs Specialists, a medic and an EOD Specialist.
Investigation/Recovery Team (IRT): The IRT includes all
members of IEs, REs and any other support personnel deployed
to Vietnam for approximately 30 days to conduct a single
Joint Field Activity.
Joint Document Center (JDC): The Vietnamese established the
JDC in a wing of their Central Army Museum in Hanoi. It
serves as a location for U.S. and Vietnamese specialists to
examine and store archival information such as films,
photographs, artifacts, documents, etc.
Joint Field Activity (JFA): JTF-FA conducts six JFAs
annually in Vietnam. Teams deploy by U.S. C-130 and
commercial aircraft into Vietnam from U'Tapao Air Base,
Thailand into Noi Bai International Airport, Hanoi (for teams
operating in northern Vietnam), Da Nang International
Airport, Da Nang (for teams operating in central Vietnam),
and Tan Son Nhat International Airport (for teams operating
in southern Vietnam). From these initial staging areas, IEs
and REs deploy by ground or helicopter to their initial
operating location. Each JFA lasts approximately 30 days.
Joint Forensics Review: At the close of each JFA Vietnamese
and U.S. forensics specialists examine all remains the joint
IRT obtained during the JFA and any Detachment 2 may have
obtained since the last review. They study the remains to
scientifically ensure they are likely to be remains of a
missing American.
Last Know Alive Cases: Another name for Priority Cases.
Last Known Location: The last known location is very
similar to the incident location; the site where the
unaccounted-for American was last seen or thought to have
been (e.g., crash site, burial site, site of an ambush,
etc.). IEs are always required to visit the last known
location (unless during the course of their investigation
they find evidence that categorically refutes the last known
location). Even for over-water cases, the IE will go up to
ten miles out to sea to investigate the last known location.
Life Support Technician (LST): An LST is assigned to every
RE. He has two primary missions; (1) confirm that the
aircraft wreckage at the site correlates to the aircraft of
loss, and (2) determine if the crew members were aboard the
aircraft at the time of impact. They did this by analyzing
the wreckage, identification media, crew member life support
equipment, etc.
Live Sighting: Contrary to popular opinion, this does not
always mean a current report of a live American either living
freely or being held against his will in Vietnam, though this
could be the case. Every day, analysts in Hawaii and
Washington, DC pore over historical documents and reports
searching for information pertaining to an unaccounted-for
American. Should they uncover a report of a live American
during their research (e.g., an analyst finds a previously
undiscovered notation indicating a captured live American was
being led through a village in South Vietnam in 1967), this
discovery could result in the initiation of a live sighting
investigation.
Live Sighting Investigation (LSI): These receive the
highest priority of any other operation involved with
resolving this issue. Investigators from the Defense
Intelligence Agency (DIA) office in Bangkok, Thailand, Stony
Beach, investigate all live sightings. JTF-FA, DPMO, JTF-FA
and the VNOSMP go to great lengths to assure the integrity of
each LSI. DPMO receives all live sighting reports either from
the field, their analysts, or any other source. They analyze
each report, and prepare draft requirements before tasking
Stony Beach to investigate the sighting. Though DPMO can
notify Stony Beach of the requirement via secure means of
communications, Detachment 2 has no such capability. To
minimize the opportunity for anyone to accuse the Vietnamese
of ``rigging'' the investigation or ``rehearse'' witnesses,
the only information that passes to the Detachment is that
DPMO has initiated an LSI and a Stony Beach investigator
needs an entry visa into Vietnam. It is not until the
investigator arrives in Vietnam and sits down with the
Commander of Detachment 2 and VNOSMP officials that anyone in
Vietnam knows the specifics of the case. There have been many
instances where immediately following the initial meeting
with his Vietnamese counterpart, the Stony Beach investigator
and his counterpart depart immediately for the site. The
Vietnamese have never denied access by the Stony Beach
investigator to any site involving an LSI. Once the
investigator completes his investigation, he debriefs the
Commander, Detachment 2 and returns to Bangkok, where
[[Page E916]]
he files his report with DIA. An interagency board in
Washington, DC reviews the report and votes to resolve,
reinvestigate, or develop additional information for the
case.
Mortuary Affairs Specialist: Specialists assigned to
USACILHI whose Military Occupational Skill (MOS) involves
proficiency and knowledge in wartime/combat burials.
Oral History Program (OHP): The Oral History Program began
in 1979, when analysts from the Defense Intelligence Agency
(DIA) began interviewing refugees from Vietnam to try to
uncover information regarding unaccounted-for Americans in
Vietnam. From 1988 to 1992, Vietnam allowed limited access to
Vietnam for OHP analysts. In May 1993, JTF-FA presented what
became known as the ``List of 83'' to the
Vietnamese Government. This list contained the names of 83
former and current PAVN officers and government officials
who the USB believed could have information regarding
unaccounted-for Americans. Between May and December 1993,
OHP team members from Detachment 2 interviewed 74 of the
individuals from the ``List of 83.'' This included 14 flag
officers and 36 field grade officers and led to the
accumulation of information concerning over 40 cases
involving 21 unaccounted-for Americans. Between January
and June 1994, JTF-FA continued to press the Vietnamese
for access to the remaining nine individuals, but for a
variety of reasons, could not gain access to them, and the
OHP essentially ground to a halt. Some inside and outside
the USG felt the program had failed because we were denied
access to the remaining nine individuals despite our
success in interviewing 89% of those we requested to
interview. In July 1994 we proposed to the VNOSMP that we
reinvigorate the OHP by approaching the program
differently. We recommended that we get away from
concentrating on a ``List of 83'' and instead concentrate
on the product we gain through the program's interviews.
The Vietnamese agreed and we began providing the
Vietnamese with a list of individuals we would like to
interview during a specified ``investigation period''
(normally concurrent with a JFA; 30 day period), and then
interviewed all they made available. For those who we felt
strongly that we needed to interview, but were not agreed
to by the Vietnamese, we continued to resubmit the names.
The bottom line is that in August 1994, we began a new
interview phase. In September 1994 we reinterviewed
Military Region 4 Graves Registry compilers and in October
1994 held a series of interviews in Quang Nam-Da Nang
Province. The OHP continues a strong program today.
Over-Water Case: 470 unaccounted-for Americans are known to
have been lost at sea. Most of these cases involve aircraft
that were hit and tried to escape to the relative safety of
the ocean before crashing. Other include losses of
individuals when their vessels sank, or who were swept
overboard. In Vietnam alone, over-water cases account for 449
of the more than 1600 unaccounted-for.
Pending: If an IE investigates a case and exhausts all
leads without finding enough information to recommend a site
to excavate, the team leader recommends placing the case in
the pending category. This does not mean the case is closed
as many contend. Instead, pending means that there are no
further leads to pursue, and until such time as someone
develops a credible lead, the JTF will not actively
investigate the case. However, should an analyst uncover new
information or questions regarding the pending case, JTF-FA
will reactivate the case and schedule it for reinvestigation.
This has occurred on several occasions.
Photo Cases: of the 84 SRT cases, 11 cases representing 12
individuals are Photo cases. In many instances, either for
historical or propaganda purposes, the Vietnamese
photographed bodies and body parts of dead Americans. We have
correlated several such photographs to 11 cases, 12
individuals who are still unaccounted-for. The USG position
is that since the Vietnamese photographed the bodies or
remains, they should still control or know the whereabouts of
these remains.
Priority Case: Also known as Discrepancy Cases, Last Known
Alive Cases, or even Priority Last Known Alive Discrepancy
Cases. When General Vessey became the President's Special
Envoy to resolve the issue of Americans still unaccounted-for
in Southeast Asia, one of his first steps was to direct
analysts to review all existing cases and determine the cases
where the individual is thought to have survived his incident
of loss and may still be alive. (Hypothetical Example: Two
aircraft were attacking a target and a surface-to-air missile
impacts one of the aircraft. That aircraft's wing man sees
the pilot eject, and descend to the ground under a good
parachute. The wing man might even have observed the pilot
being captured and led away. This is one type of Priority
Case. We know the individual survived his incident of
loss, he did not return to the United States during
Operation Homecoming, and it is possible that he is still
alive.) JTF-FA and the VNOSMP formed a joint Priority Case
Investigation Team to make a focused effort to determine
the fate of the Priority Cases in Vietnam. Operations
began on 11 June 1993 to determine the fate of 92
individuals associated with 73 cases. Eventually, this
list grew to 196 cases. To date, teams have investigated
every Priority Case at least once, some seven to eight
times. Of the 196 individuals, one is a foreign national,
and 27 have been resolved completely. There remain 50
individuals whose fate has not yet been determined.
Priority Case Investigation Team (PCIT): The U.S. and
Vietnamese governments deemed investigating the Priority
Cases to be so important that they formed a special team
dedicated solely to investigating these cases. The U.S.
manned the team with a DIA/Stony Beach investigator to ensure
the highest quality investigation.
``The Ranch'': The Ranch is the small compound located in
the northwestern corner of Hanoi that houses Detachment 2,
JTF-FA. It has three buildings, a team house, a TDY building,
and an office building. JTF-FA leases this facility from the
Vietnamese. The original Detachment 2 tenants named it the
Ranch as it was a truly American name.
Recovery Element (RE): Each RE is composed of a Team Chief,
a Non-Commissioned Officer in Charge (NCOIC), an
anthropologist or archeologist, a photographer, four Mortuary
Affairs Specialists, two analysts/linguists, an EOD
Specialist, a Life Support Technician (LST), and a medic. The
Team Chief is normally an Army Quartermaster Corps Captain.
Most of the RE comes from USACILHI. The analysts/linguists
and LST are assigned to JTF-FA. The EOD Specialist and medic
can come from any Service, normally from a unit assigned to
PACOM.
Reinvestigate: If, after the end of a JFA or investigation
period, the investigators have not completed investigating
the leads they were assigned or have developed new leads that
they were unable to pursue, they recommend a team
reinvestigate the case in the future.
Remains Not Recoverable: IE teams can recommend three
categories for cases they investigate, excavate,
reinvestigate, or pending. PCIT and SRT investigators can
also recommend ``Remains Not Recoverable.'' This
recommendation means that the investigator has fully
investigated the case and is confident that the remains of
the unaccounted-for American have either decayed beyond hope
for ever being found, been destroyed, or otherwise beyond the
capability of ever being recovered. Example--In one SRT case
we found a Vietnamese villager who had actually buried an
unaccounted-for American. When he led investigators to the
site, he saw that what had been a small stream during the
war, had swollen to be much wider. He pointed to where he had
buried the American in what he described as a shallow grave,
but it was now completely submerged. The investigators
classified this case as ``Remains Not Recoverable'' as the
remains had certainly washed away over time, and the
likelihood of recovering them was very remote.
Remains Obtained: Obtaining remains includes receiving and
recovering remains.
Remains Received: To receive remains means to gain
possession of them when a Vietnamese citizen or official
gives them to a U.S. official.
Remains Recovered: To recover remains means to gain
possession of them through an excavation.
Remains Recovered But Not Repatriated Cases: Of the 84 SRT
cases, seven cases representing 11 individuals are Remains
Recovered But Not Repatriated cases. IAW the terms of the
Paris Peace Accords ending our involvement in the conflict in
Vietnam, the Vietnamese provided a list of remains they had
recovered and were repatriating to the United States. These
11 individuals correlate to remains the Vietnamese reported
that they had recovered, but that the USG claims it did not
officially receive.
Remains Trading: Selling or trading remains or information.
We know that many Vietnamese citizens possess remains; every
JFA the IRT receives remains from Vietnamese citizens. It is
not uncommon for a Vietnamese to offer to provide the
information/remains in exchange for monetary compensation or
a visa to the United States. In a few cases, what we called
``remains dealers'' approached our investigators. These
``remains traders'' differed from the average citizen
requesting ``compensation'' in that they made their living
from this endeavor. Neither U.S. or Vietnamese officials will
pay for remains or information.
Repatriation: To return remains to the United States. In
the case of Vietnam, teams must provide all remains obtained
to their Vietnamese counterparts. At the end of the JFA,
Vietnamese and U.S. forensics specialists from USACILHI
examine all remains obtained to assure they are likely to be
those of an American. If they conclude they are not America,
the U.S. specialists do not accept them for repatriation to
the United States.
Repatriation Ceremony: Ceremony at Noi Bai International
Airport, Hanoi, SRV, where the Commander, Detachment 2, on
behalf of the United States Government officially accepts
remains from officials of the VNOSMP, and loads them on a
U.S. aircraft for return to the United States.
Research & Investigation Team (RIT): The RIT is a six-
person team that deploys to Vietnam for a period of four
months. It is manned with the most skillful Vietnamese
linguists and analysts assigned to the JTF and works its most
difficult cases. It is responsible for archival research,
oral history interviews, special remains and priority case
investigations, an walk-in interviews.
Resolved: To legally identify the remains as being those of
an unaccounted-for American.
Scope Loss (or Off-the-Scope Losses): In many instances
during the conflict, American aircraft simply disappeared
from the ``radar scopes'' of ground monitoring stations, or
the individuals were ``never heard
[[Page E917]]
from again after embarking on long-range ground or air
reconnaissance missions or after their aircraft were last
seen visually on radar heading toward a given target.'' In
these instances, IEs use the point at which the aircraft or
patrol went ``off the scope'' as the last known location, or
they will extrapolate from that point using the direction and
speed of travel to try to determine possible location of the
loss. Scope losses involve the loss of 308 individuals. DPMO
has determined that it cannot resolve the cases of 54 of
these individuals.\52\
Special Remains Case: Unlike the Priority Cases where the
USG believes the unaccounted-for individual might have
survived, we know that the individuals associated with
Special Remains Cases died. However, because of photographic
evidence, names appearing on graves registries, POW camp
records, or other Vietnamese records it is reasonable to
assume that at one point the Vietnamese had control of the
individual's remains, and should now be able to produce those
remains. There were originally 84 Special Remains cases.
Special Remains Case Team (SRT): This team's mission was to
work with the VNOSMP to resolve the 84 SRT cases for which
the United States Government had reason to believe the
Vietnamese should be able to provide a full accounting.
Stony Beach: Stony Beach is the Defense Intelligence Agency
(DIA) office in Bangkok, Thailand. Stony Beach analysts
investigate all live sightings and provided the primary
investigator on the PCIT.
Tri-Lateral Operations: During the war in Indochina, the
Vietnamese controlled major portions of Laos and Cambodia. As
such, when we investigate cases in Laos and Cambodia, it is
very likely that Vietnamese citizens (former PAVAN or VC)
would have more information concerning the incidents of loss
than any Laotian or Cambodian citizens. If we can identify a
Vietnamese citizen who possesses such information, we will
coordinate between Vietnam and the third country (Cambodia or
Laos) to bring that witness into their country to visit the
site during a JFA in that country. These are called Tri-
Lateral Operations as they are joint U.S./SRV/KOC or U.S./
SRV/Laos operations.
Unilateral Research & Investigations: Many people both
inside and outside the USG believe that the only way we can
resolve this issue fully and rapidly is for the Vietnamese
Government to increase their unilateral research and
investigations. It is my opinion that some emphasize
unilateral research because they believe the Vietnamese are
purposely withholding archival information and even remains.
They stress ``unilateral'' research in a round-about way of
demanding the Vietnamese release these items. My experience
does not lead me to believe the Vietnamese are withholding
anything, and that as they find documents and remains, they
are submitting them to Detachment 2. I believe our
investigations are most fruitful when performed jointly with
the Vietnamese; the investigations are always more thorough
and the reports of investigation are uniformly more detailed.
For those instances where the Vietnamese deny access to an
American, and unilateral research/investigation by Vietnamese
officials is the only other option, then, and only then,
should we accept unilateral research as a viable option.
United States Central Identification Laboratory, Hawaii
(USACILHI or more commonly CILHI): CILHI has a world-wide
mission to search for, recover and identify U.S. service men
missing from all conflicts.
Vietnamese Office Seeking Missing Persons (VNOSMP): The
VNOSMP is Detachment 2's counterpart organization in the
Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It is responsible for
coordinating Vietnamese efforts to resolve the issue of
unaccounted-for Americans. It is not involved with Vietnamese
efforts to seek its own missing from the war. My direct
counterpart during my tenure was Mr. Vu Chi Cong.
Walk-In Interviews: We always kept a skilled linguist at
the Ranch in case a Vietnamese citizen arrived offering to
provide some information, remains, artifacts, etc., to us. As
noted earlier, our office was depicted on tourist maps and an
advertisement for our office was in the Hanoi Yellow Pages.
We normally had a couple of walk-in interviews each week.
Abbreviations/Acronyms
AP: Associated Press.
ART: Archival Research Team.
CILHI: More common reference to the United States Army
Central Identification Laboratory, Hawaii than the more
accurate USACILHI.
CINCPAC: Commander-in-Chief, United States Pacific Command.
Admiral Macke was the CINCPAC during my tenure.
CJTF-FA: Commander, Joint Task Force-Full Accounting. Major
General Thomas H. Needham was the initial CJTF-FA. His
command extended into the first month of my command at which
time Brigadier General Charles Viale assumed command (27 July
1994).
CODEL: Congressional Delegation.
DIC: Died-in-Captivity.
DPMO: Defense POW/MIA Office.
EOD: Explosive Ordnance Disposal.
IE: Investigation Element.
IRT: Investigation & Recovery Team.
JCRC: Joint Casualty Resolution Center.
JDC: Joint Document Center.
JFA: Joint Field Activity.
JTF-FA Joint Task Force--Full Accounting.
KOC: Kingdom of Cambodia. Normally referred to only as
Cambodia.
LSI: Live Sighting Investigation.
LST: Life Support Technician.
MFA: Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
MND: Vietnamese Ministry of National Defense.
MOI: Vietnamese Ministry of the Interior.
OHP: Oral History Program.
PACOM: More common reference to the United States Pacific
Command than the more accurate USPACOM.
PCIT: Priority Case Investigation Team.
RE: Recovery Element.
SRT: Special Remains Team.
SRV: Socialist Republic of Vietnam.
STAFFDEL: Congressional Staff Delegation.
UPI: United Press International.
USACILHI: United States Army Central Identification
Laboratory, Hawaii.
USLO: United States Liaison Office.
USPACOM; United States Pacific Command.
VNOSMP: Vietnamese Office Seeking Missing Persons.
footnotes
\1\ Leslie Weatherhead, ``Comradeship,'' quoted by Admiral
Richard Macke, CINCPAC, in a speech awarding the Joint
Meritorious Unit Award to JTF-FA, February 10, 1995.
\2\ NOTE: Other names I will use for these countries
throughout the text are Vietnam or SRV, Laos, Cambodia or
KOC, and China or PRC, respectively.
\3\ Unless otherwise noted, statistics used throughout this
monograph are current as of February 27, 1996 and were
provided to the author by the Public Affairs Office, JTF-FA,
Camp Smith, Hawaii.
\4\ JTF-FA mission statement.
\5\ Unaccounted-for or missing are the correct terms when
referring to the individuals we were searching for. POW, MIA
and KIA are legal terms DOD uses to classify wartime losses
and help determine benefits for the next-of-kin and the
actual service member. There are no remaining POWs or MIAs
from the conflict in Southeast Asia. Colonel Charles Shelton
was the last service member carried as a POW. The USG
continued to carry him as POW after it had reclassified all
other missing service men so that he might serve as a
national symbol that the unaccounted-for ``would not be
forgotten.'' Colonel Shelton's family recently requested that
the USG change his status to killed in action, body not
recovered, and DOD concurred with their request.
\6\ See Glossary for a complete explanation of the nature of
today's Joint Field Activities.
\7\ Bobby Garwood's return does not count in this first
category as he was never ``unaccounted-for.''
\8\ Department of Defense, ``A Zero-Based Comprehensive
Review of Cases involving Unaccounted for Americans in
Southeast Asia,'' (November 13, 1995), p. 1.
\9\ Ibid.
\10\ Ibid, pp. 4-7.
\11\ Ibid, p. 6.
\12\ Ibid.
\13\ I met with the USAF Casualty Office in San Antonio,
Texas prior to changing command. I was scheduled to meet with
the USN Casualty Office, but nobody from their office showed
up for the appointment they scheduled with me.
\14\ See Interaction with the Media for a discussion of the
training I received.
\15\ See the Glossary for explanations of these terms.
\16\ Table 1 reflects the number of remains repatriated
during this period. Not all have been identified.
\17\ The National League of Families is very active in trying
to resolve this issue. Though I believe they, like all
members of JTF-FA, are committed to achieving the fullest
possible accouting, the NLF and its Executive Director are
often critical of USG policy toward Vietnam. The NLF did not
support either President Clinton's decision to lift the trade
embargo against Vietnam, or his decision to normalize
relations between the United States and Vietnam.
\18\ Just as a note of interest, Mr. Willoughby did not think
very highly of the accuracy of this book.
\19\ SRCol Bien was a 45 year PAVN veteran. He fought the
Japanese, the French, the Americans, and the Cambodians. He
is the MND representative to the VNOSMP.
\20\ See Glossary.
\21\ At the time, the USLO had not yet opened. Mr. Hall was
the Chief of the Vietnam/Laos/Cambodia desk, East Asian &
Pacific Affairs, DOS.
\22\ Peoples Army of Vietnam.
\23\ Virginia Foote, President, U.S./Vietnam Trade Council,
``Progress, Problems and Suggestions to MIA accounting,''
memorandum for the March 1996 Presidential Delegation to
Vietnam, 29 February 1996.
\24\ See Glossary for an explanation of trilateral
operations.
\25\ See Glossary.
\26\ See Glossary for an explanation of ``Fate Determined.''
\27\ See Glossary.
\28\ A karst is a relatively small peak jutting straight out
of the ground. They are extremely steep, sometimes with sheer
faces, and are normally a few hundred feet tall.
\29\ See Glossary.
\30\ We do not pay for remains or cooperation, however, we do
pay landowners for alterations we inflict on their property;
e.g. if we excavate a site in the middle of a farmer's rice
paddy, it is only right that we compensate him for his lost
crop.
\31\ See Glossary.
\32\ See page 72 for an explanation of this program.
\33\ From June 1994 until June 1995, the following
delegations visited Hanoi; two Presidential delegations
headed by Ambassador Winston Lord and DSD for Veteran Affairs
Herschel Gober, CODEL Bond (Senators Kit Bond, Sam Nunn, John
Glenn, David Pryor, William Cohen, and Barbara Mikulski),
CODEL Kerry (Senator John Kerry), CODEL Spence (Congressman
Floyd Spence), CODEL McCain (Senator John McCain), CODEL
Simon/Murkowski, STAFFDEL Record, STAFFDEL Stetson, CODEL
Rohrabacher, DASD for POW/MIA Affairs James Wold, DASS Peter
Tomsen (2), Admiral Zumwalt, and Sergeant Major of the Army
Richard Kidd.
\34\ We based our assumptions on what we had seen in the
past. Each ministry had a normal way of operating, and seldom
deviated from it.
\35\ He had worked with JTF-FA teams for several years,
understood American slang as well as most Americans, and was
very comfortable in the presence of Americans. He is
currently attending American University in Washington, DC on
a Ford Foundation grant.
\36\ Steven Butler, ``A painful search for the missing,''
U.S. News and World Report, 118, no. 17 (May 1, 1995); 62.
[[Page E918]]
\37\ Ms. Griffith's brother is still unaccounted-for as a
result of his aircraft crashing. In her role as the Executive
Director of the NLF, Ms. Griffith is an ardent supporter for
the families of the unaccounted-for. Her knowledge of the
totality of the issue is, in my opinion, second to none.
Though I strongly disagree with her on many of her
interpretations of the facts, I have never disputed her
strong desire to fully resolve this very difficult and
emotional issue.
\38\ Author of A Bright Shining Lie.
\39\ Ms. Smith is the daughter of a pilot still unaccounted-
for at the time of my departure. She came to Vietnam to try
to find the crash site of her father and to bring some type
of closure to her loss. Ms. Smith was able to visit the site
we had identified during past JFAs and seemed satisfied with
her findings. Shortly after her visit we excavated her
father's crash site (the excavation was scheduled prior to
her visit, and was not a result of her visit). Excavators
found what they believed to be her father's Naval Academy
ring in the excavation.
\40\ See Annex A for a complete explanation of the Mr. Hendon
live-sighting claims.
\41\ I had worked for then BG David Bramlett in the 25th
Infantry Division (Light). During most of my tenure in
Vietnam, LTG Bramlett was the DCINCPAC.
\42\ Discussion led by Ambassador Marc Baas to the Asia-
Pacific Regional Strategic Assessment class on 23 February
1996.
\43\ In his actual meetings with the Vietnamese, by the way,
Mr. Gelbard fully supported the issue of missing Americans as
the USG's highest priorities, so my concerns regarding that
particular visit were possibly somewhat unwarranted. Overall,
however, I think the concern was (and may still be) a valid
one.
\44\ Oriental New Year.
\46\ ``A Zero-Based Comprehensive Review of Cases Involving
Unaccounted for Americans in Southeast Asia.''
\47\ Personal Opinion--Mr. Hendon is a former Congressman
from North Carolina. I believe that he makes unsubstantiated
claims concerning the POW/MIA issue to fan the emotions of
families and veterans in America. It is my opinion that he
manipulates this issue to win support for election activities
and to earn a living.
\48\ Joe L. Jordan, ``National Vietnam P.O.W. Strike Force''
Newsletter. June 4, 1995.
\49\ Ibid.
\50\ Joe L. Jordan, ``National Vietnam P.O.W. Strike Force''
Newsletter. June 9, 1995.
\51\ Joe L. Jordan, ``National Vietnam P.O.W. Strike Force''
Newsletter. June 4, 1995.
\52\ ``A Zero-Based Comprehensive Review of Cases Involving
Unaccounted for Americans in Southeast Asia.'' p. 10.
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