PRISONERS OF WAR: THE SEARCH FOR ANSWERS
By Travis Masters

 Many foreign policy issues are controversial among the American people. One such issue that has haunted the country since the end of the Vietnam War is the plight of American prisoners of war (POWs). The issue has been at the forefront of American politics since the ending of hostilities between the United States (U.S.) and the communist forces in Vietnam in 1973. Many people believe that the American government knowingly left men alive in the prisons of Southeast Asia. Many of these skeptics will stop at nothing to gain a full accounting of the men they believe could still be alive halfway around the world. On the other hand, there are those who say that the communist government released all the prisoners that it held, and attempted to assist in gathering all possible information about Americans listed as missing in action (MIA). After weighing the evidence given by supporters of both camps, an official decision was made in an attempt to solve the issue. In the early 1980s several U.S. government-sanctioned covert missions were launched into Southeast Asia, intending to find out if men were being held against their will in communist prisons. These missions proved to be inconclusive and only heightened the controversy surrounding this already heated topic.

After signing the Paris Peace accords in 1973, the American government found it difficult to get North Vietnam to comply with Article 8 of those accords.(1) This article gave the conditions for the release of all prisoners of war, and stated that both sides should assist in the search for those men listed as missing in action. After extensive negotiations, the North Vietnamese agreed to return what they claimed were all the prisoners they had held. When news of this release reached President Richard Nixon, he was quick to tell the American people that "all of our American POWs are on their way home."(2) Nixon later cautioned that "[t]here [would be] some, of course, who [would be] wounded and ill,"(3) and proper precautions should be taken to care for them upon their return. Between February 12 and March 29, 1973 five hundred ninety-one POWs were returned from Hanoi to the United States in what was named Operation Homecoming.(4) However, of those 591 returnees none were maimed, disfigured, or blind, and none were amputees or burn cases.(5) In spite of these unusual circumstances, the U.S. government stated that all POWs held in Southeast Asia had been returned.(6)

This strange situation, along with many other oddities, caused the American people to suspect that the communist forces in Southeast Asia were holding American prisoners after Operation Homecoming. POW/MIA activists centered their protests on the failure of the Laotian government to release imprisoned U.S. servicemen. It was known that during the war many American pilots were shot down over the Laotian border, and many of them were captured and placed in prison by the Pathet Lao (the Laotian communist army).(7) At the conclusion of the war, the Pathet Lao promised to give the United States a list of the POWs that they held. That list was never received. Moreover, a Pathet Lao spokesperson stated that his party was holding American POWs until after the cease-fire went into effect, and only then would they be released.(8) The Pathet Lao insisted that "prisoners captured in Laos would be returned [from] Laos."(9) However, no prisoners were ever released from Laos, and only nine of the POWs released from Hanoi were ever prisoners in Laotian prisons. This was a small number when compared to the four hundred fifty-five Americans who were missing in action in Laos after the war.(10) A 1973 news report stated, "U.S. sources believe that a substantial number of the missing [in Laos] - perhaps as many as 100--still may be alive. The conclusions are based on inspections of crash sights by search teams and on intelligence reports."(11) These facts were not unnoticed by the American public, and eventually became the basis for the push to gain a full account of the missing.

Many reliable sources brought evidence to the U.S. government in regard to POWs still being held in Southeast Asia. One such source was a former North Vietnamese doctor who told the Defense Department in 1971, prior to Operation Homecoming, that the Socialist Republic of Vietnam had been holding hundreds more prisoners than they admitted.(12) Moreover, in 1979, a Vietnamese defector named Le Dinh told the U.S. government that while he was working for Vietnamese intelligence he heard that the government of North Vietnam had more than seven hundred American prisoners to use as "bargaining chips" after the war.(13) This evidence was later confirmed by another former Vietnamese intelligence officer. These two reports were not the only ones brought before the U.S. government; there were many others, which similarly stated that Americans were being held by the communists in Southeast Asia after the war. Most of these reports, however, were dismissed by the U.S. government as fabrications and were never investigated.(14)

Those in opposition to the aforementioned ideas claimed that no one had been left in Vietnam, and any attempt to prove otherwise was futile. Leading this school of thought was H. Bruce Franklin. He asserted that anyone with common sense should know "what dozens of official investigations since 1975 have shown: That there are not now and have never been any postwar U.S. POWs in Vietnam."(15) Those who supported this argument believed that the POW/MIA activists lacked enough evidence to prove that anyone had been purposefully left behind, and by entertaining thoughts to the contrary, government officials were perpetuating a myth. Their argument was based on a U.S. government statement (1976) which said that no Americans were being held as a result of the war in Vietnam.(16)

Those who followed Franklin in believing that no one had been left alive in Southeast Asian prisons, said that the evidence received since the end of the war had been either vague or unsubstantiated. Moreover, they believed that the U.S. government pushed the issue to its height of popularity in order to gain political advantage in terms of voter support. They thought that politicians were playing on the emotions of the POW supporters. This argument was best summarized by Edward Doyle when he wrote, "it should be clear that when there are so many un-known soldiers, little hard evidence, and so much media attention, myth becomes not only believable, but preferable."(17) As a result of making the issue a myth, more than sixty-five percent of the American people believed that U.S. POWs were still being held captive in Southeast Asia as late as the 1980s.(18)Franklin believed that it was cruel for the government to play on the emotions of the people and that they should be told the truth. According to him all those missing were dead, and there was no hope of ever finding them.

When Ronald Reagan was elected President of the United States in 1980, he stated that he was going to make the return of all American POWs and MIAs from Southeast Asia the nation's "top priority." (19) As the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces he could have chosen to use military force to achieve this goal. However, due to the fragile diplomatic relationship between the United States and Vietnam following the war, any military action toward Southeast Asia would have been politically dangerous and militarily suspect. Therefore, the option that President Reagan chose to utilize, in an attempt to find solid answers to the question, was the use of American covert forces. This was possibly just as dangerous and suspect as using open military action. However, the very nature of covert operations allows them to stay out of public scrutiny, unless the mission fails and/or there is an information leak. No official diplomatic relationship existed between the United States and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam between 1975 and 1992, because the "POW/MIA issue still populat[ed] the old battlefield with skeletons."(20) For this reason, the Reagan administration decided that the use of covert military force was the best option.

The first person to come to the government with a plan to rescue the alleged POWs was retired Army Colonel James "Bo" Gritz. Gritz had spent many years planning a rescue operation into Laos, and when he heard that President-elect Reagan was going to make the return of those men the nations "top priority," he was elated. Gritz had a contact person in Washington that was keeping him briefed on what was being said about his proposed rescue plan.(21) This contact informed him that President-elect Reagan had been briefed on the proposed operation (to be named Operation Velvet Hammer) on January 15, 1980, and was "enthusiastic" about the prospect of a rescue mission.(22) Gritz's second-in-command, Charles J. Patterson, stated that "while unable to express an open commitment, Reagan promised support and no interference."(23) Although plans were made by the Reagan administration to support the Colonel's operation, the president decided to withdraw them and run an officially sanctioned rescue mission instead.(24) On March 26, 1980, the story of Operation Velvet Hammer appeared on the front page of the Orlando Sentinel Star, ending all hope of using those same plans in the future. Once this occurred, the U.S. government cut all funding to Gritz's operation. After losing the promise of government funding, Gritz decided that the only way the POWs were ever going to come home was if he rescued them himself.(25)

After cutting funds to Operation Velvet Hammer, President Reagan gave the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) the "go-ahead" to plan their own rescue mission. The CIA had numerous sources in Southeast Asia. One of their most reliable contacts was given the title of W/1. W/1 was an elderly lady with connections to the Communist leadership in the Laotian Capital.(26) On November 14, 1980, W/1 gave the CIA a report which stated that approximately thirty U.S. pilots were working on a road gang near a town located in central Laos. Due to the reliability of the source, the CIA decided to devise a plan to investigate the information they had received. National Security Advisor Richard Allen took the news to President Reagan, and the President was again "eager to try" a rescue attempt. Two months after receiving W/1's report official planning began for a covert operation into Laos. The operation was to be named Operation Pocket Change.(27)

On December 30, 1980, a Thai military unit told the CIA that they had intercepted a message from top Laotian military leaders. The transmission gave orders to move American POWs from prisons in southern Laos, to new prisons in central Laos.(28) However, this report was dismissed, because the CIA said that the Thai unit was poorly trained and therefore their information could not have been accurate. The operation proceeded under the assumption that the prisoners were still somewhere in southern Laos.

In January 1981, the Joint Chiefs of Staff told the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) to devise the specifics for a rescue operation.(29) Prior to any action being taken, the head of the JSOC wanted to run a reconnaissance mission in order to insure the safety and success of the mission. The CIA decided to use a team of Asians and a few Americans to run this mission in order to keep from being noticed.(30) They returned to the U.S. with information that stated that there were no Americans being held as prisoners in the camp that they observed. Therefore, they assumed that there were no Americans being held anywhere in Southeast Asia.

When the mission was later investigated by POW/MIA researchers, it was found that the reconnaissance team had performed very poorly. The team said that they had observed a prison camp for two days, when in reality they had only observed it for a total of two hours. They also said that they had not seen any Caucasians in the prison, but they had only seen the outer portion and not the inner sections of the camp.(31) Lastly, the pictures they took turned out blurry because of the distance they were from the camp, so they were also inconclusive.(32) Eventually, the Laotian government allowed a few American diplomats to walk through the suspected camp. When they reached the camp, they were rushed through and shown only selected areas.(33) However, no matter how little they were allowed to see, the only honest report they could give was that there were no signs of American prisoners. Operation Pocket Change was the only post war rescue the U.S. government admits to ever considering in Southeast Asia.(34) It was, at least, the only one about which they ever spoke publicly.

After Operation Pocket Change failed to find any POWs, the Reagan administration decided to take a different course of action. On November 27, 1982, Colonel James Gritz submitted an Intelligence Summary and Situation Report to the United States Senate. This report stated that he had not given up on his plans to rescue the alleged POWs in Laos, and also gave the Senate the new plans that he had devised. His new mission was named Operation Lazarus.(35)

Gritz's rationale for wanting to run this operation was the belief that he could prove there were live American POWs in Southeast Asia, thus giving the American government grounds to take open, official action.(36) Gritz had been planning the operation since 1981 and was hoping that the government would allow him the opportunity to follow through with it.(37) When he submitted his proposal to the Senate, he stated, "the risk [was] high, but if success was not equally high [he] would not risk [his] freedom and embarrassment to [his] country."(38) Therefore, it was clear that Gritz believed that the mission would be a success. The purpose for this mission, according to Colonel Gritz, was to liberate U.S. POWs, attempt to get Pathet Lao contacts to turn over Americans for sanctuary or rewards, and to seek identifiable U.S. MIA remains from all sources.(39)

The mission into Laos was launched on November 27, 1982.(40) While the mission was in progress, Gritz received confirmation from Laotian sources that American POWs were being held in Laos. He was also told that the camps he had targeted contained American POWs. His operation was moving along slowly, however, and the U.S. government was not pleased with his progress. On January 10, 1983, Gritz received another confirmation that one of his proposed target camps was holding American POWs. Directly following this news, the U.S. government cut all funding to his mission leaving him and his men with the responsibility of finding their own way out of Laos.(41) They were forced to use the remainder of their funds to get back to Thailand, causing the mission to fall short of its intended goals.(42)

Many people questioned the legality of Operation Lazarus. In fact, even President Reagan's motives to make the POW issue a top priority were questioned. Most of the POW/MIA families, however, believed that the President's motives were pure and that he truly intended to find their loved ones and bring them home. Using a "super-secret" pentagon agency known as the Intelligence Support Activity (ISA), President Reagan was able to sanction the missions run by Colonel Gritz.(43) When questioned before a Senate Select Committee about the missions, Gritz stated that he knew that the President had been briefed on the operation and did nothing to stop it.(44) Therefore, Gritz believed that the government was going to "tacitly" allow the mission. He also assumed that if he could bring back proof that POWs were still being held in Southeast Asia, the government would do "whatever [was] required to return the POWs to U.S. control."(45) While he was explaining this to his second in command, Gritz had stated that he had been promised "quasi-government backing."(46) This meant that if the mission was a failure then the government would not recognize them, but if they succeeded then the government would take the appropriate action. Moreover, he also stated that "when [he was] questioned whether or not [he] had any official sponsorship in [his] POW pursuit, [he] responded in the affirmative, but would not identify the agency in open session."(47) The agency that he was referring to was the ISA.

American covert attempts to solve the issue of missing personnel in Southeast Asia, proved to only heighten the controversy surrounding the issue. The missions were poorly run and the government acted suspiciously in some instances. These facts, among many other things, caused POW/MIA activists to believe that the government purposefully sabotaged the missions to aid in some large-scale cover-up. Colonel Gritz, himself, felt that the government did not want his missions to succeed. He stated that there were too many people in Washington who did not want to see live Americans returned from Southeast Asia, for political reasons.(48) This added to the public anxiety surrounding the use of executive covert powers. People were already critical of the government before these missions were run, but when they found out the facts about the operations they became even more cynical.

Ann Martin stated, "The [POW/MIA] problem proved to be one of the most unique and controversial aspects of the war."(49) The issue contained aspects of the truth, and covert missions were run in attempts to solve puzzling questions surrounding those truths. Although those missions were run, the questions still remained. The American people were bombarded with so many sides of the story that they were not sure what to believe. The mythical side of the issue was perpetuated by the media, including Hollywood. Movies such as Rambo and Missing in Action helped build the myth. On the other hand, the facts led people to believe that the Communists were still holding American POWs as late as the 1980s. Robert Doyle stated, "[t]he truth of the POW/MIA dispute is [not very] lucid and may never have an ending, happy or sad."(50) The government attempted, under President Reagan, to solve the problem. Colonel James Gritz had volunteered to help the government find out the truth. His missions, however, turned out to be inconclusive. He believed that the reason he failed was because the government did not want him to succeed. Even though no solid evidence was ever found to prove that Americans were still being held in Southeast Asia, many people in America believed this to be true and wanted the government to bring them home. Colonel Gritz made this statement to the U.S. Senate that has become the battle cry of the POW/MIA cause:

I must conclude that while we have labored long and hard, the enormity of government opposition has taken its toll. I salute all those who have kept the faith with our missing in action. Our reward may not be now, but someday it will be noble. I pray for those who may remain in captivity that their hope might forever burn bright knowing that they will never be forgotten as long as Old Glory flies and even one true American lives -- that we will ever be in search of them until we all come home!(51)

ENDNOTES

1. George C. Herring, America's Longest War: The United States in Vietnam 1950-1975 (New York: Newberry Awards Records, Inc. 1986), 257.

2. Richard Nixon, Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States (Washington D.C.: Office of the Federal Register, National Archives and Records Service 1975), 235.

3. Ibid., 86.

4. U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations: Republican Staff, Senate Report: An Examination of U.S. Policy Toward POW/MIAs (Washington D.C.: GPO, 1991), 5-1.

5. John Corry, "The MIA Cover-up," The American Spectator (February 1994): 27.

6. James Rosenthal, "The Myth of the Lost POWs," New Republic (1 July 1985), 100.

7. Roger Hall, "Abandoned in Laos," Conservative Review, 7(November/ December 1996): 11.

8. Senate Report: An Examination of U.S. Policy Toward POW/MIAs, 5-3.

9. Hall, "Abandoned in Laos," 7:12.

10. Patrick McDowell, "Search Continues for American MIAs in Laos," American Business Review (13 July 1997), 14.

11. Senate Report: An Examination of U.S. Policy Toward POW/MIAs , 5-2.

12. Corry, "The MIA Cover-Up," 29.

13. Peter Cary and Fred Coleman, "Troubling Evidence on Vietnam POW's," U.S. News and World Report (22 November 1993), 27-28.

14. Corry, "The MIA Cover-up," 26-34.

15. H. Bruce Franklin, "Just a Mythtake," Review of Prisoners of Hope: Exploiting the POW/MIA Myth in America, by Susan Katz, The Nation (17 October 1995): 23.

16. Rosenthal, "The Myth of the Lost POWs," 100.

17. Edward Doyle, Terrence Mitland and Editors of the Boston Publishing Company, The Vietnam Experience: The Aftermath (Boston: Boston Publishing Company, 1985), 280.

18. Franklin, "Just a Mythtake," 22.

19. Ann Martin, "Families of Vietnam War POWs and MIAs: The Ordeal Continues," USA Today (May 1984). 91.

20. Robert C. Doyle, Voices From Captivity: Interpreting the American POW Narrative (Lawrence, Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 1994), 268.

21. Charles J. Patterson and G. Lee Tippin, The Heroes Who Fell From Grace (Canton, Ohio: Daring, 1985), 58.

23. Ibid., 60.

23. Ibid.

24. Ibid.

25. Ibid., 80-81.

26. "The Americans Left Behind," Time (1 July 1985), 50.

27. Ibid., 51.

28. Ibid.

29. Ibid., 52.

30. Ibid., 53.

31. Ibid.

32. Hall, "Abandoned in Laos," 12-13.

33. "The Americans Left Behind," 50.

34. Ibid., 51.

35. James Gritz, "Intelligence Summary and Situation Report: Operation Lazarus," available from http://www.aiipowmia.com/reports/lazarus.html:Internet; accessed 10 October 1997.

36. Patterson and Tippin, The Heroes Who Fell From Grace, 142.

37. Doyle, et. al., The Vietnam Experience: The Aftermath, 139.

38. Gritz, "Intelligence Summary and Situation Report, 9.

39. Ibid., 1.

40. Doyle, Voices From Captivity: Interpreting the American POW Narrative, 277.

41. Congress, Senate, Senate Select Committee, "James Bo Gritz: Testimony," 23 November 1992, typewritten.

42. Gritz "Intelligence Summary and Situation Report," 4

43. Franklin, "Just a Mythtake," 24.

44. Gritz, "Testimony," 4.

45. Gritz, "Intelligence Summary and Situation Report," 1-2.

46. Patterson and Tippin, The Heroes Who Fell From Grace, 43.

47. Gritz, "Testimony," 14.

48. Ibid., 13.

49. Martin, "Families of Vietnam War POWs and MIAs: The Ordeal Continues," 79.

50. Doyle, Voices From Captivity: Interpreting the American POW Narrative, 280.

51. Gritz, "Testimony," 14.

Travis Masters is a 1998 graduate of Cumberland College with a major in Political Science and a minor in Business Administration. He is a native of Miamisburg, Ohio where he graduated from Middletown Christian High School. His paper was originally written for the Issues in History course at Cumberland College. He is currently in the MA program at Ohio State University.

Reprinted with the kind permission of Cumberland College, Williamsburg, KY. Please visit - http://www.cumber.edu/acad/original/Vol.X.htm
and http://www.cumber.edu/

Referenced works available in our Archives -

An Examination of U.S. Policy Toward POW/MIAs

Testimony of James "Bo" Gritz

Abandoned in Laos, by Roger Hall

Operation Lazarus Report, by James "Bo" Gritz

The MIA Cover-Up, by John Corry

Main Page InterNetwork Archives Site Search E-Mail AII