Statistics provided by the Defense POW/MIA Office
Live Sightings: As of April 6, 2001, 1,910 first-hand live sighting reports in Indochina have been received since 1975; 1,896 (99.27%) have been resolved. 1,318 (69.01%) were equated to Americans now accounted for (i.e. returned POWs, missionaries or civilians detained for violating Vietnamese codes); 45 (2.36%) correlated to wartime sightings of military personnel or pre-1975 sightings of civilians still unaccounted for; 533 (27.91%) were determined to be fabrications. 14 (.72%) unresolved first-hand reports are the focus of current analytical and collection efforts: 13 (.68%) are reports of Americans sighted in a prisoner situation; 1 (.05%) are non-POW sightings.

The years in which these 14 first hand sightings occurred is listed below:

Year Pre-76 76-80 81-85 86-90 91-92 93-94 95-96 97-01 Total
13 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 14



Accountability: : At the end of the Vietnam War, there were 2,585 unaccounted for American prisoners, missing in action or killed in action/body not recovered. As of April 6, 2001, 1,992 Americans are still missing and unaccounted for, over 90% of them in Vietnam or in areas of Laos and Cambodia where Vietnamese forces operated during the war. A breakdown of the years during which the 603 Americans were accounted for follows:

1974-1975 Post war years: 28
1976-1978 US/SRV normalization negotiations: 47
1979-1980 US/SRV talks break down: 1
1981-1984 1st Reagan Administration 23
1985-1988 2nd Reagan Administration 154
1989-1992 Bush Administration 109
1993-1996 1st Clinton Administration 198
1997- 2nd Clinton Administration 43

Unilateral Vietnamese government repatriations of remains with scientific evidence of storage have accounted for only 169 of the 436 from Vietnam; all but 3 of the 149 Americans accounted for in Laos have been the result of joint excavations. The breakdown by country of the 603 Americans accounted for from the Vietnam War:

Vietnam 436* Laos 149*
China 2 Cambodia 16

*4 remains were recovered from indigenous personnel; 1 from North Vietnam and 3 from Laos; in addition, one person identified was actually recovered in Vietnam before the end of the war.

The National League of Families of American Prisoners and Missing in Southeast Asia
1001 Connecticut Avenue
Northwest, Suite 919
Washington, D.C. 20036-5504
(TEL) 202-223-6846

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