July 2001
Summary of news for the entire month.
For recent and daily news, please go to: InterNetwork
July 31, 2001 National POW-MIA Recognition Day 2001
July 30, 2001 CW: Former U-2 Shootdown Base Turns 45
Russia's military has feted the 45th anniversary of its most famous missile test site, a sun-scorched base on the Kazakh steppe which shot down American Gary Powers's U2 spy plane in 1960.
July 29, 2001 NAF Bits 'N' Pieces
Summary of News
July 28, 2001 NLF Update
Family Update July 27, 2001 North Korea - Possible Remains Returned
The decomposed remains of a man believed to be an American killed in the Korean War nearly fifty years ago have been sent to Hawaii for identification after being found on a South Korean beach.
July 27, 2001 North Korea - Recovery News
A 20-minute ceremony was held in Seoul's Yongsan Garrison before the metal coffin containing the remains was sent to the airport for a journey home, said Kim Yong-kyu, a U.S. military spokesman.
July 27, 2001 Museum Recives POW Transport Boxcar
The Air Force airlifted a World War II-era rail car, historically used as a prisoner-of-war troop train, to the Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, on July 25.
July 26, 2001 Powell Reflections
"All of my buddies came home, even those who died, we got the remains, but for those we didn't find, there's still a longing in the hearts of their family members and their fellow veterans."
July 26, 2001 Powell on Recovery Efforts
Secretary of State Colin Powell on Thursday hailed Americans still hunting in Vietnam for missing U.S. servicemen, three decades after a war in which he fought and lost more than 58,000 comrades.
July 25, 2001 Civil War Mystery Unfolds
Archeologists expect to recover personal belongings of crewmen from the H.L. Hunley, the Confederate Civil War vessel that became the first submarine to sink an enemy ship in battle, when excavation resumes in October, officials said on Thursday.
July 24, 2001 Peterson to Run
Former ambassador Douglas "Pete" Peterson filed papers Tuesday to run for governor, the most prominent Democrat yet to challenge Gov. Jeb Bush in 2002.
July 21, 2001 The Hawaii Clipper
In the typical fashion of Washington, DeCeit, the USG has evidence of US citizens who were captured, murdered and buried in the years immediately preceeding WW II, yet fails to act.
July 21, 2001 WW II - Ghost Soldiers Review
apan has an opportunity to dispel recent complaints that it has whitewashed accounts of atrocities committed by its troops during World War Two, this time by supporting the publication of a best-selling book about the savage treatment of U.S. prisoners.
July 20, 2001 NK - US Recovery Teams Begin Mission at Chosin
Pentagon investigators are beginning a search for the remains of hundreds of American servicemen killed in the Chosin Reservoir area of North Korea in 1950, officials said Friday.
July 19, 2001 NLF Update Line
Family Update
July 19, 2001 NLF Update
Update of SEA News
July 18, 2001 US Pilot Recovered - Safe
An F-16 Fighting Falcon crashed July 18 near Batman, Turkey.
July 18, 2001 US Aircraft Downed Over Iraq
A U.S. F-16 fighter jet crashed in southeastern Turkey on Wednesday as it was heading toward northern Iraq to patrol a no-fly zone, the U.S. military said. It is believed to be the first U.S. aircraft to have gone down in 10 years of patrols over the no-fly zones. The U.S. military has flown more than 200,000 sorties over the no-fly zones during that time.
July 16, 2001 USAF Building War-Era Clothing Collection to Assist in IDs
The items that are collected at Air Force bases will be compared with clothing and equipment found at aircraft crash sites in Vietnam and Korea to help in investigations of U.S. soldiers missing in action. Matches can help date a crash and determine if Americans were among the victims.
July 16, 2001 Heroes of Secret War Fly Home
Thirty-three years later, the crew is coming home. And the story of Observation Squadron 67, declassified in 1998, finally is being told.
July 16, 2001 VN Embassy Statement
Cooperation between Vietnam and the US regarding the MIA issue now enters the 14th year. Since 1988 when the first joint field activity was conducted, previous administrations as well as the present one, many Congressional members and others have expressed their high appreciation of Vietnam's full-faith cooperation. Many in the US Joint Task Force-Full Accounting (JTF-FA) describe Vietnam's cooperation is the MIA issue as "best example."
July 16, 2001 VN Announcement on Repatriation
The remains of five American servicemen listed as missing in action (MIA) were given to the U.S. Full Accounting Joint Task Force by representatives of the Viet Nam Office Seeking Missing Persons in Ha Noi on July 9.
July 16, 2001 Peterson & Politics
After serving for four years as America's first postwar ambassador to Vietnam, Douglas ``Pete'' Peterson is ready to focus on a different mission: the Florida race for governor.
July 16, 2001 Peterson Remarks in VN
Before ending his term of office in Viet Nam, the Ambassador thanked the Vietnamese Government and people for their active assistance in finding the remains of American servicemen missing in action from the war.
July 16, 2001 POW Diary Inspires Book & Website
Let me say that you who have never been deprived of seeing Old Glory and all she stands for, for three long years, cannot understand what that sight would mean. We feel heavily indebted to our rescuers
July 16, 2001 USA CILHI Casualty Contacts For mtDNA
If you are a relative of an unaccounted-for servicemember have not already contacted the appropriate service casualty office regarding MtDNA information that can potentially assist with an identification, please do so as soon as possible. You can make a difference!
July 16, 2001 Repatriation Ceremony
Recently completed excavations by the Army's Central Identification Hawaii, in support of Joint Task Force-Full Accounting (JTF-FA) will result in 17 sets of remains to be honored at a joint arrival ceremony.
July 16, 2001 Looking For the Lost: Peterson InterviewLooking for Lost Soldiers - The U.S. ambassador to Vietnam, Pete Peterson, talks about why it's important to continue the hunt for MIAs in Southeast Asia.
July 15, 2001 Peterson Heads Home
The first post-war U.S. ambassador to Vietnam, hailed by Hanoi as a caring American, ended his term on Sunday after more than four years pushing reconciliation with a country he once fought and which held him prisoner of war.
July 15, 2001 Trotsky Held POW Camp During WW I
In April 1917, a ship carrying the Russian revolutionary to Russia from the United States docked in the Canadian port of Halifax. Trotsky was interned in a British prisoner-of-war camp - and then ordered released on the orders of Lt. Col. Claude Dansey, a British secret-service officer.
July 14, 2001 Better Late Than Never For WW II Ex-POW
Riley was a POW until the war's end. And because of his injuries, he spent the rest of the war in a body cast. The award to his heroism is late but not forgotten.
July 14, 2001 Andersonville Trial Opens
The theater has re-created the 1865 war crimes trial in Washington of Confederate Capt. Henry Wirz. Because the events discussed actually occurred and the issues raised by the trial are so profound and reverberate still, "The Andersonville Trial" is riveting.
July 14, 2001 Andersonville Trial Review
Realism is the name of the game in Jack Marshall's sturdy staging of "The Andersonville Trial," the Saul Levitt drama about the notorious Confederate prison camp where more than 13,000 Union soldiers perished.
July 13, 2001 NLF Update
Family Update
July 13, 2001 A Family's Answers
A repatriation ceremony Tuesday at Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii brought Olson a step closer to the ultimate goal of a proper military burial for the crew at Arlington National Cemetery near Washington.
July 13, 2001 Remains Returned - SEA
Newly declassified documents told him Navy Cmdr. Delbert Olson and his crew of eight were on a secret mission to drop eavesdropping devices, supposedly along the Ho Chi Minh Trail, when their Neptune OP-2E crashed 20 miles inside Laos.
July 12, 2001 JTF-FA Grounds Choppers - SEA
A task force searching for Americans missing in action from the Vietnam War will temporarily stop using helicopters because of the April crash that killed all 16 people on board, a U.S. military official said Tuesday.
July 12, 2001 Laos Returns Remains - SEA
Laos Has handed over remains believed to be those of three U.S. servicemen missing in action from the Vietnam War, the Lao state news agency reported Tuesday.
July 12, 2001 Vandals Desecrate POW Memorial - SEA
Vandals tore up dozens of cherry trees in a "peace garden" commemorating 48 Japanese prisoners of war shot dead by guards during a riot in 1943, police said.
July 11, 2001 North Korea Remains Recovered
The Department of Defense announced today that remains believed to be those of eight American soldiers missing in action from the Korean War were repatriated in formal ceremonies at Yokota Air Base, Japan, on Tuesday, July 10. The remains were flown on a U.S. Air Force aircraft from Pyongyang, North Korea, under the escort of a uniformed United Nations Command honor guard.
July 10, 2001 NLF Conference - Washington, DC
The annual league conference gives families of missing personnel a chance to hear directly from government officials about the status of efforts to account for missing service members.
July 10, 2001 Wolfowitz Speech at NLF Conference
It's been gratifying to be able to observe the progress made since that trip 15 years ago by those who have been faithful to the cause, by those who assisted painstakingly through recovery sites in the field, by those who have applied the marvels of science to identify those missing who have returned.
July 08, 2001 North Korea Admits Participation In Vietnam
After 30 years the adversary admits a truth long known... First the former Soviet Union admitted sending fighter pilots, now North Korea follows suit.
July 07, 2001 POW-MIA Recognition Day 2001 Poster
Veterans, ex-POWs, MIA family members and active duty military people have created a poster for National POW/MIA Recognition Day on Sept. 21, 2001, that officials tout as "bigger and better" than last year's.
July 06, 2001 NLF POW-MIA Statistics
Family Statistical Update
July 05, 2001 NLF Update News
Family News
July 03, 2001 NLF Update Line
Summary of News
July 02, 2001 Dog Tags Returned
Lance Cpl. Allan George Decker made the ultimate sacrifice during his 1968 tour of Vietnam, which is why two Florida businessmen were sickened earlier this year to find his Marine dog tags for sale in a back-alley market in Ho Chi Minh City.
POW-MIA Issue Update August 2001