House Resolution 111: Leave No Man Behind

(This article appeared in the July/August 2010 issue of The American Postal Worker magazine.)

Sue Carney, Director Human Relations Dept.

As of 2005, approximately 89,000 servicemen remain missing from all American wars since World War II. As unionists, we enforce contracts. It is time as citizens we mandate our government to honor the contract it signed with the courageous men and women who have worn our country’s uniform. This includes bringing them home.

I am calling upon each of you to take the necessary action to demonstrate our collective support. Contact your congressional leaders demanding they co-sponsor House Resolution 111 as introduced, which calls for the formation of a Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs. According to the legislation, “The select committee shall conduct a full investigation of all unresolved matters relating to any United States personnel unaccounted for from the Vietnam era, the Korean conflict, World War II, Cold War Missions, Persian Gulf War, Operation Iraqi Freedom, or Operation Enduring Freedom, including MIA’s and POW’s missing and captured.”

Past investigations and hearings conducted in both the House and Senate left many unresolved matters. Additionally, a lot of new information has surfaced since the Senate published its previous findings in January 1993. Some examples include:

A 1996 Background Paper prepared by the Defense POW/MIA Office (DPMO) proclaims, “There are too many live sighting reports by Romanians and the North Korean defectors to dismiss that there are no American POW’s in North Korea.” In its “185 Report,” the DPMO cited as many as 185 American POWs that were alive as late as 1976, and the Joint Casualty Resolution Center (JCRC) reported that the possibility existed that as many as 57 American servicemen might still be alive.

In February 2005, the Joint Commission Support Directorate, the investigative arm of the U.S./Russian Joint POW/MIA Commission, concluded, “Americans, including American Servicemen, were imprisoned in the Soviet Union.”

In March 2006, memos written by a former Defense Intelligence analyst while serving as an investigator with the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs were discovered. These memos detailed the Vietnamese admission that some 19 servicemen listed as dead were in fact captured and had survived for varying lengths of time. The committee never addressed this matter. A Vietnamese official acknowledged that 10 of the 19 that “survived into captivity” are among the 57 servicemen in the JCRC’s findings.

And perhaps the most compelling is a September 2008 memorandum written by Senate Committee investigators, which states, “Today, Defense Department files contain evidence that at least 59 Americans were — or may have been — taken prisoner and their precise fate is still unclear. This includes the 20-30 not officially acknowledged by Vietnam in 1973. This represents the minimum number of possible live POWs today. U.S. field teams in Vietnam since 1989 have uncovered evidence that more Americans were in fact taken captive than officially recorded.”

This is but the tip of the iceberg, and why it is time for Congress to address the volumes of new information available on POW/MIA matters.

Our legislators are not relieved of their obligations with the institution of a National POW/MIA Recognition Day, or by flying the POW/MIA flag over the White House on this day or continuously over the Capitol’s Rotunda. And we are not relieved of our obligations by wearing its symbol or flying this flag ourselves. Displaying the POW/MIA flag isn’t meant to make us feel better, nor is it intended to serve as a memoriam. It is a commitment to our service members that we haven’t left them behind — that we are doing everything in our power to bring the living and the dead home, and to give a full account to surviving family members (Public Law 101-355).

“Support is not a sentiment, it’s an action.” So take action. Contact your congressional leaders to request they co-sponsor H. Res. 111 and demand the resolution be brought to the floor. To learn more about POW/MIA issues, visit www.nationalalliance.org.