June 2002
Summary of news for the entire month.
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June 30, 2002 PGW - Senate Wants Progress Reports on Speicher
At the urging of Sen. Pat Roberts of Kansas and several colleagues, the Senate on Wednesday approved a measure forcing the government to report regularly on its investigation of a Gulf War pilot's fate. Roberts said the military never tried to rescue Speicher. Within hours of the reported shoot-down, then-Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney declared him to be dead, the war's first casualty. He was 33, with a wife and two young children.
June 30, 2002 SEA - Coming Home - 34 Years Later
Woodland resident David Evert is finally bringing his father home. In 1967 Evert's dad, Lt. Col. Lawrence Evert left his family's home in Arizona to fight in Vietnam. David finally got to bring his father's remains back home this weekend. His father's remains were recovered by teams from the Hawaii-based U.S. Army Central Identification Laboratory and Joint Task-Full Accounting in 2000.
June 29, 2002 PGW - Speicher - Senate Vote
The amendment to the Defense Authorization Bill is designed to hold the Pentagon accountable for "a probe that has languished," said Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla. "A schedule of accountability puts the Defense Department squarely and clearly within the view of Congress and America, so that we can take the measure of their efforts and progress," Nelson said. "Our goal with this measure is to force those responsible for finding our missing in action to leave no stone unturned."
June 28, 2002 New Book - Cmdr Speicher's Story by Amy Waters Yarsinke
A new book about Lt. Cmdr. Michael Scott Speicher, the former Kansas Citian and naval pilot reported killed in the early hours of the Persian Gulf War, contends that he is alive and being held prisoner in Iraq. And U.S. officials have known it, according to the book's author, Amy Waters Yarsinske, a former naval intelligence officer who spent eight years researching the Speicher story.
June 27, 2002 New Book - "Betrayed" by Joe Douglass
Thousands of men are missing. WHY? War crimes, atrocities, and human rights violations that rival those of Hitler's Germany, are involved. Excruciating details are provided by top-ranking Communist official, including the first ever description of Russia's MKULTRA program, in the interests of which thousands of servicemen were killed. "any soldier left in Vietnam, even inadvertently, was, in fact, abandoned years ago- the farce that is being played is no more than political legerdemain done with -smoke and mirrors,- to stall the issue until it dies a natural death."
June 26, 2002 SEA - DOD NEWS Release
The remains of two U.S. Air Force servicemen killed in action during the Vietnam War have been identified and are being returned home to their families. They are Master Sgt. Thomas E. Heideman and Capt. Craig B. Schiele, both of Chicago.
June 23, 2002 NAF Bits 'N' Pieces
Summary of News
June 21, 2002 SEA - Family Questions Identification
An S.C. family will bury the remains of a U.S. soldier killed in Vietnam that the Defense Department says are those of Air Force Master Sgt. Thomas Heideman. The family, which is going to participate in the military funeral at Arlington National Cemetery just outside Washington, D.C., isn't so sure. "They haven't been able to positively identify the remains as being him," said daughter Cathy Long of Sumter.
June 20, 2002 SEA - Searching
Members of an MIA recovery team discuss setting up camp near the site of a 1963 helicopter crash in a remote area of Vietnam¹s Central Highlands. Everything seems to be magnified: the oven-hot heat, the lush shades of green and the grinding hum of unseen insects. For this group of 13 Americans, many of us born after the Vietnam War, this is hallowed ground, a graveyard for lost Americans.
June 19, 2002 - The Sacrifice of POWs
For many years, Eugene Powell kept his experiences as a prisoner of war to himself. Powell was imprisoned in Germany for 106 days during World War II. When he came home, he weighed 70 pounds, about as much as a fourth-grader.
June 19, 2002 - The Vigil Continues
ears sometimes flowed as heavily as did the weekend rain that muddied the Milford Green during the 24-hour POW/MIA vigil. At least 100 people participated in the emotional event between 6 p.m. Friday and 6 p.m. Saturday, near the Vietnam and Korean War memorial. At the top of every hour, a volunteer was bound, blindfolded and secured inside a bamboo cage to represent one of the 34 Connecticut men still missing in action from the Vietnam War. Their names were listed on a wall of remembrance in the encampment.
June 19, 2002 SEA - NLF Update Line
Family Update
June 18, 2002 - Road Rally
Somewhere between 1,000 and 1,200 people showed up for the Road Dogs' 14th annual POW/MIA benefit, held in the fields of the Gin Mill Dance Club, said Pat McKeeth, vice president of the Road Dogs motorcycle club. The three-day event began Friday, attracting revelers from throughout the Wisconsin/Minnesota area.
June 17, 2002 WW II - POW War Crimes Charges Emerge
A witness testified Friday before a German court in Hamburg that a former Nazi SS officer on trial for World War II atrocities was in fact responsible for the killing of Italian POWs near Genoa in 1944.
June 16, 2002 SEA - New Names Added to Wall
With the three new inscriptions, the Memorial displays the names of 58,229 men and women who were killed in Vietnam or remain missing in action. James Cummings, AIA, Vietnam Veterans Memorial Architect of Record, and James Lee of Great Panes will provide brief remarks about the newest additions and the inscription process.
June 11, 2002 KCW - US-NK Agree on New Search
North Korean and U.S. negotiators have agreed on the specifics of a new round of joint searches for the remains of American soldiers missing in action from the Korean War. Under the agreement, reached in Bangkok after three days of talks, three 30-day searches will be undertaken in North Korea beginning July 20, said a U.S. government statement Tuesday.
June 10, 2002 KCW - DoD News Release
United States and North Korean negotiators agreed Sunday in Bangkok on a schedule of operations to recover remains of American soldiers missing in action from the Korean War. Three operations, by 28-person teams and lasting about 30 days each, are scheduled to begin on July 20. The final repatriation of recovered remains would occur about Oct. 29.
June 09, 2002 SEA - 32 Year Trip to Arlington
With full military honors, the remains of four soldiers were buried in a single coffin Friday at Arlington National Cemetery. The remains included those of two Chicagoans. The military funeral for Master Sgt. Thomas E. Heideman and Capt. Craig B. Schiele came nearly 32 years after their deaths, following a lengthy investigation into the fatal 1970 helicopter crash in Laos.
June 06, 2002 PGW - The Forgotten Flier - Scott Speicher
A tombstone honoring Speicher was placed at Arlington National Cemetery. A decade ago Lt. Cmdr. Michael Scott Speicher was the forgotten man. The 33-year-old U.S. Navy pilot, whose friends called him "Spike," was shot down in his F-18 Hornet over west-central Iraq on the first night of the Persian Gulf War on Jan. 17, 1991. No heroic search-and-rescue missions were launched. No one even asked what happened. Until now.
June 06, 2002 - Return the Flag
If this story is read by only one person, Dennis Haislip hopes that person is the one who can help him get his flag back. This past Saturday, Haislip filed a report with Nevada Police when he realized, upon returning home from work later in the day, that his American and POW-MIA flags had been stolen.
June 05, 2002 - Eagle Scout Builds POW-MIA Memorial
Two cobblestone pillars form the bases of two plaques that list the POWs and MIAs. Between them is the U.S. flag and the black-and-white POW-MIA flag. Marty Eddy, president of the Prisoner of War Committee of Michigan, said about 15 or 20 memorials similar to the one at Goodells County Park exist in the state.
June 04, 2002 - Rolling Thunder Rides
Their pony tails and beards are now mostly gray. Their faces are worn and grizzled. Yet, the Vietnam veterans who gather here each year on Memorial Day weekend remain determined. They will not let America forget that some of their brothers in arms never came home.
June 03, 2002 WW II - Former POWs Honored
Fifty-seven years ago a World War II soldier was imprisoned for 17 months. On Friday, he spoke at the dedication of a road marked to honor heroes like him.
June 02, 2002 WW II - Captivity Diary
James H. Watts didn't know what hunger was until he spent six anguished months in a Nazi prison camp during World War II. Confined to Oflag 64, a converted school in Szubin, Poland, the future colonel saw some fellow U.S. ground-force officers collapse from hunger during morning roll calls. Once, on the verge of starvation, he fainted while leaning over to tie a shoelace.
June 01, 2002 WW II - Former POW Wants Apology
Mel Rosen's introduction to being a prisoner of war came in the first hours after he and his troops surrendered to the Japanese in the Philippines in spring 1942. As they sat in a big field ringed by Japanese machine guns on the Bataan peninsula, a GI tried to use the latrine. A Japanese soldier thrust his bayonet through the American's chest, and when the blade did not come out cleanly, the Japanese soldier used his foot to push the dying GI into the latrine.
POW-MIA Issue Update July 2002