News-Info-Alerts

To: ALL

From: Andi Wolos & Bob Necci

(POW-MIA InterNetwork)

Re: Definitions & Explanations

Date: April 14, 1999

The following definitions and explanations were received from Robert L. Jones, Assistant Secretary of Defense for POW/Missing Personnel Affairs (DPMO), March 24, 1999, at DPMO.

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Last Known Alive

The definition of a Last-Known-Alive (LKA) case stipulates that the missing serviceman be in the proximity (not necessarily custody) of the enemy, not mortally wounded, and if an aviator, on the ground. The LKA cases were selected during a comprehensive sweep of all losses in the three countries of Indochina, some 2300 individuals. This analytic review selected a total of 196 individual Americans in Vietnam, 81 in Laos, and 19 in Cambodia as the best candidates who may have survived. In Vietnam and Cambodia all of these cases have been investigated in a priority manner. After some ten years of investigation, the cases of 48 individuals in Vietnam and 17 individuals in Cambodia remain compelling. In Laos an effective investigative format has not yet been found. Regular joint teams have investigated the 81 cases, and the cases of 76 individuals remain compelling.

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Further Pursuit

These are cases for which we can identify "specific 'next step' actions" that may lead us final. Generally, they do not represent an exhaustive array of all the to an accounting. In many cases, these next steps are precisely that: but not necessarily avenues of investigation that might be required to resolve a case, but the defined action necessary to move a case toward resolution. This process will be evolutionary. For some cases next steps have been identified, but implementation is contingent upon activity currently taking place. For others, we anticipate will develop out of ongoing investigations. The Department of Defense will continue to evaluate all new leads to insure those actions that can lead to the fullest possible accounting are pursued.

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DEFERRED CASES

Deferred

All investigative leads have been exhausted and, currently, no further avenues of pursuit can be identified. in priority discrepancy cases we do not have sufficient evidence to determine the fate of the individual. In all other cases, we cannot rule out the possibility that remains might be recoverable, although at present we cannot determine how or where. Although the investigation of these cases is not complete, we require additional information before we can investigate further.

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No Further Pursuit Cases

No Further Pursuit

Beginning in October 1994, DoD initiated a comprehensive review of all cases involving unaccounted for Americans in Southeast Asia. The mechanism imposed enables analysts to continuously weigh all available information and determine what next steps should be taken to maximize accounting. Cases that have been determined to offer no possibility for recovering remains are designated No-Further-Pursuit cases. To identify a case in such a manner is to indicate that everything to recover remains that could have been done has been done, There are currently 601 No-Further-Pursuit cases in Southeast Asia.

All available evidence demonstrates that the individual perished, and no future action can result in the recovery of his or her remains. In all instances, we can rule out the possibility that remains might be recovered in the future. We can also rule out the possibility that remains have already been recovered by agencies or persons, known or unknown. Examples include persons killed in explosions that destroyed their remains; aviators who ditched at sea far from land and who were not recovered; others who drowned in flooded rivers and were swept away; and individuals who were buried in areas where the topography has changed in such as way as to destroy their graves.

The Remains Study

Southeast Asia analysts have nearly completed a major study of Vietnam's wartime and postwar program to recover American remains in preparation for eventual repatriation to the US The question of how many remains Vietnam unilaterally recovered and held in storage, and whether all of these remains have been repatriated, is a matter of great interest to family members, concerned citizens, and US policy makers. It directly impacts on efforts to reach the fullest possible accounting and on assessments of Vietnamese cooperation on the POW/MIA issue.

Past studies, based chiefly on estimates provided by refugees and other sources and on scientific analysis of the repatriated remains themselves, concluded that there was a large shortfall between the numbers of remains estimated to have been recovered and stored by Vietnam and the numbers of repatriated remains that showed physical evidence of storage. Previously, analysts took this shortfall as representative of the number of remains still held in storage by Vietnam.

The current study considers all of the above information, as well as new data gleaned from ten years of on-the-ground investigations in Southeast Asia, many new witnesses, and a large number of contemporary Vietnamese documents. As part of this effort, analysts have undertaken a time consuming and labor intensive effort to map all losses in Vietnam in order to sort out all available reporting related to US casualties and graves. CILHI specialists have assisted to clarify issues related to remains that have already been repatriated.

Analysts also held four meetings with their Vietnamese counterparts to solicit additional information. At each meeting we submitted a number of questions to the Vietnamese. These chiefly focused on repatriated remains that CILHI cannot identify without additional information; requests for additional documents; reported US graves; and information on the organization and history of Vietnam's remains recovery program. Vietnam has responded by turning over additional records and conducting unilateral investigations into the origin of certain repatriated remains and a number of reported grave sites. Specialists have also shared insights into the organization and operation of the remains recovery program.

March 24, 1999

INFORMATION PAPER

SUBJECT: Status of Servicemembers Captured by Hostile Forces While Participating in the Kosovo Operation

I have been informed that the USG will claim Prisoner of War (POW) status under the Geneva Convention Relative to the Treatment of POWs (POW Convention), for servicemembers captured by hostile forces, while participating in the Kosovo operation. This status will entitle the POWs to all the protections under the POW Convention, which protections are the most favorable of all the Conventions. The overarching principle is that the POWs must be humanely treated. There are many enumerated protections, e.g., right to retain personnel effects, medical treatment, and provision of adequate food, shelter, and clothing.

One potential drawback to POW status is that Article 18 of the POW Convention provides in part that "[p]risoners of war shall be released and repatriated without delay after the cessation of active hostilities (emphasis added)." This allows for the capturing party to hold the POWs until they feel active hostilities are ended or an agreement is reached concerning release of the POWs, whichever comes first. I understand that we are going to demand immediate release of any POWs.

It should be noted that it doesn't require a declared war for the Conventions to apply. There need only be an international armed conflict.

I also was informed that at least one reason the expert on mission status was not chosen is because the UN resolution we are enforcing does not contain the clause, "use all necessary measures, including force."

COL Gravelle/DPMO/GC
602-2102, x 191