Operation Just Cause ...for as long as it takes
POW/MIA - Last Month in Review
by Marilyn Grote
According to the Department of Defense, the number of Americans still missing and unaccounted for from the Vietnam War is 1,993.
2 October 2000- Last remains can go to final rest. On Oct. 27, Air Force helicopter pilot 2nd Lt. Richard Vandegeer – the last name on the Vietnam Memorial in Washington -- will be buried in a solemn, private ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery, capping a decade-long recovery and identification operation by the Army Central Identification Laboratory, based here. Vandegeer's helicopter crashed on May 15, 1975, in the last combat action of the Vietnam War. Mayaguez veteran, Howard "Al" Corson, will be escorting the body of his Knife 31 co-pilot, Richard Vandegeer to its final resting place at Arlington Cemetery.
3 October 2000 - Although it's been 57 years since his plane went down, a local search team is hopeful it can find the crash site on the island of Sicily where World War II pilot Lt. Theodore Thompson last was seen and, with luck, bring his remains home to Minnesota. At the request of Thompson's widow, local artist/explorer Bryan Moon and his team will fly this week to Sicily to try and find out what happened to Thompson.
5 October 2000- Doctors in Hungary said on Thursday the identity of a Hungarian POW who spent 53 years in a Russian psychiatric hospital has been confirmed, but the old man barely knows he will soon return to his family. "The world war has ended for Andras Toma and now he can start a quiet life within his family," Andras Veer, director of Hungary's National Psychiatry And Neurology Institute told a news conference.
6 October 2000- JAN SCRUGGS IS ATTACKING THE POW/MIA MOVEMENT AGAIN. According to Ted Sampley of the Last Firebase, this time Scruggs wants the Washington, D.C. POW/MIA vigils removed so he can build a so-called "education center" aimed at the tens of thousands of school kids that visit the Wall every year. “No doubt his pro-Hanoi views will be what the kids are taught and the 'live POW issue' will not be mentioned,” Sampley says.
9 October 2000- Clinton is good to go on trip to aid Vietnam image. President Bill Clinton will next month make a landmark visit to Vietnam, marking the end of 25 years of reconciliation efforts between the former foes. U.S. observers say the repatriation of MIA remains and the wartime use by U.S. forces of deadly Agent Orange defoliant are two topics that will likely be off limits during his high-profile visit, they add. It is a fair bet that unrepatriated live Americans will also be off limits. Interestingly, Clinton will visit Vietnam after the elections.
10 October 2000-Captain Richard Rich, USN, shot down 19 May 1967 over North Vietnam remains were officially identified by the Central Identification Laboratory today after being returned to US Control by JTF-FA on 26 April 2000. Capt. Rich's excavation site was the site that SecDef Cohen went to in March 2000; the first visit to Vietnam by a US Secretary of Defense in 32 years. Our thoughts and prayers are with Chris and Diane Rich, both OJC members, as well as with the rest of the Rich family.
10 October 2000-A Pennsylvania airman lost during the Vietnam War and identified after more than three decades will be laid to rest this week. Maj. Frank C. Parker III, USAF, of Quakertown, a navigator with the 15th Operations Squadron, disappeared over North Vietnam 29 December 1967, when he was only four months away from discharge. Parker will be buried tomorrow with full military honors, including a flyover by Air Force jets if weather permits, in Union Cemetery, Quakertown. A memorial service will be held at First United Church of Christ in Quakertown.
10 October 2000-In 1962, South Korean Chung Dae-young bid farewell to his wife and son in a military tent in Seoul, saying he was headed to North Korea as a spy. Chung's family never saw him again, and their efforts to find out what happened have been ignored for decades: first, by past military-backed administrations and now, the family says, by a democratic government intent on keeping the sensitive issue of spies under wraps while it pursues rapprochement with North Korea. "My father worked for the country. We deserve to know at least what happened to him," said Chung Hoon, Chung's 55-year-old son. In the long Cold War struggle on the Korean peninsula, the North relied heavily on spies who infiltrated the South by sea or across the Demilitarized Zone that separates the two countries. The South is believed to have stopped sending spies northward in the 1970s, aided by the ability of its ally, the United States, to spy on North Korea from satellites.
12 October 2000-mitochondrial DNA testing confirmed the remains returned to US control on 5 June 2000 as those of Major James Jefferson, USAF, shot down over North Vietnam on 12 May 1967. Major Jefferson's mother, Eleanor, passed away 13 August 2000 before the identification was made.
12 October 2000- Sen. Bob Smith (R-NH) has placed a hold on the ambassador nominee to Laos, complaining that the State Department has not done enough to determine the fate of two missing Hmong-Americans, the Lao royal family and POWs and MIAs in Laos. Smith has also put holds on the ambassador nominees to Haiti and the Marshall Islands over security violations, and a hold on acting State Department spokesman Richard Boucher to try to prompt action on Edmond Pope, an American jailed in Russia on spy charges. "The only leverage that you have around here is to hold somebody," Smith said in an interview. "If you put a hold on a nominee that somebody wants, you get attention and you start getting answers."
13 October 2000-Remains believed to be those of 15 Americans missing in action from the Korean War will be repatriated Saturday, Korea time, in a formal ceremony at Pyongyang, North Korea. This is the largest number of remains recovered in one operation since this joint recovery work began in North Korea in 1996, according to a news release by the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, Bob Jones. The remains will be flown on a U.S. Air Force aircraft from Pyongyang to Yokota Air Base, Japan, escorted by a uniformed U.S. honor guard. A United Nations Command (UNC) repatriation ceremony will be held in Yokota, then the remains will be flown to Hickam Air Force Base, Hawaii to the Central Identification Laboratory.
A joint U.S.-North Korean investigation team recovered the remains from former battlefields in the North Korean counties of Unsan and Kujang, approximately 60 miles north of Pyongyang. This recovery operation is the 16th in North Korea since 1996. One more is scheduled for this year, and is set to conclude on Veterans Day, Nov. 11, 2000. Joint U.S. - North Korean teams have recovered 50 sets of remains so far this year, and 92 since the joint operations began. Five of these have been positively identified, while many others are in the final stages of the forensic identification process. Of the 88,000 (official) U.S. service members missing in action from all conflicts, more than 8,100 are from the Korean War.
October 26,2000 - Eleven U.S. Air Force servicemen missing in action from the Vietnam War have been identified and are being returned to their families for burial. They are identified as Col. Charles P. Claxton, Chicago, Ill.; Col. Donald E. Fisher, Halfway, Ore.; Lt. Col. Edwin N. Osborne, Jr., Raiford, Fla.; Lt. Col. Gerald G. Van Buren, Toledo, Ohio; Lt. Col. Gordon J. Wenaas, Wayville, N.D.; Maj. Frank C. Parker III, Bridgeport, Pa.; Chief Master Sgt. Jack McCrary, Madison, Tenn.; Chief Master Sgt. Wayne A. Eckley, Enterprise, Ore.; Chief Master Sgt. Gean P. Clapper, Altoona, Pa.; and Chief Master Sgt. James R. Williams, Charlotte, N.C. The name of the eleventh crewmember is not being released at the request of his family.
