Vietnamese admit holding U.S. POWs
In early 1993, Professor Stephen Morris, a Harvard researcher, found in the former Soviet Union a translation of a presentation made to the North Vietnamese Politburo in September, 1972. GEN Tran Van Quang told his contemporaries, "The 1205 American POWs kept in the prisons of North Vietnam represent a large number. For now, we have officially published a list of only 368 POWs. The rest are not acknowledged. The US government is aware of this, but they do not know the exact number of POWs, or they perhaps only assume an approximate number based upon their losses... We are keeping the number of POWs secret..."
<--!HEAD1-->Attempting to work within the system, Morris first informed the government and White House of his findings. When months went by with no response, he made his find public. His finds have been attacked by government minions, but his scholarship is unquestioned. The message from the dark dusty confines of the former USSR and Vietnam is POWs were kept back. Morris needs no defense as to what and how he found. I will show what I have found to support the proposition that Hanoi not only kept men back, but bragged about it knowing we would probably do nothing to get these men back.
<--!HEAD1-->Is this account true? One theory, propounded on the net by a former government worker whose job was to find the men, is that someone planted the document in the Soviet Union hoping it would be found. Morris ably defended his research methods. Let's see what the U.S. intelligence community has to say. In 1997, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence was asked about the 1205 document and others. Incredibly, after four years of being publicly "interpreted" by many both pro and con, it was found that the 1205 document and the others "have not been the subject of a coordinated community-wide analysis... could not" be dismissed as "fabrications" and "attempts by the Intelligence Community to gain additional information on the documents appear to have been limited..." The "1205" was "dismissed" as "not accurate" despite the fact "we need more information to understand it's origin and meaning..." Now, you have an intelligence document that weighs heavily against actions that the Executive is attempting to accomplish, ie, expanding relations with a country that is accused of holding POWs after the end of the war. This is a war crime! Then, agencies actually say that the document is "dismissed" even though they don't "understand it's origin and meaning." Then, it is found out that the document has not "been the subect of a coordinated community-wide analysis." Added to this is the ridiculous theory about the document being planted, hoping it would be found! You talk about wild myths from the "debunk the live MIA cult." Those attempting to debunk this document have the wildest tales going. Without going into their "fantasy world," let's look at some real facts.
The 1205 document, by itself, is self authenticating. Look at the following facts: The document begins with the obvious statement about the "victories gained... from 30 March, 1972 to present..." The obvious rejoinder is the Vietnam Easter Offensive began on 30 March, 1972. Quang referred to secret meetings in Paris as "drawing up a solution to the Vietnam problem." Trung Nhu Tang, a former VC Justice Minister, wrote that Le Duc Tho used those meetings to spring a political trap for the Vietnamese side. The Vietnamese used POWs to exchange for keeping their troops in South Vietnam. Quang cited the need to get "neutralists" to their side. It is known from "uncorrelated" POW documents that the very ones he cites are cited by VC captured documents as necessary for the political war. It is not unprecedented for such political "strategy" to reach VC political cadre in the field. In fact, President Thieu knew about details of many negotiating tactics in Paris, not from Kissinger, but from captured VC documents. These 1205 details would be just one more item. The timing of the policy change, October 1972, is adequately reflected in the writings of Tang, Kissinger, and others. Only an informed Quang could know exactly what was going to happen in advance.
<--!HEAD1-->What about the "inaccuracies" cited by the intelligence community. One is held up by the "myth buster" who proudly proclaims his intelligence background. It deals with the "fact" that the Politburo did not meet at the time specified in the document. Well, let's see what the document actually says. One reading of the document is that the briefing was at a "Central Committee" meeting of the Politburo. If true, then let's look at the Vietnamese People's Revolutionary Party Bylaws. As Douglas Pike pointed out in VietCong, his classic work, Article 13 delegated day to day authority when the Party Congress was not in session, which, he stated, "it usually was not" to the Central Committee, the same principle applied to all levels of Commmunist organizations. It is not unique to Vietnam. In Russia, on September 27, 1971, Party Secretary Leonid Brezhnev, abruptly canceled a tour of Eastern Europe to meet with KGB Chief Yuri Andropov and "members of the Politburo" at the "airport" in Moscow because of a calamity in the making. As respected KGB authority John Barron reported, the occasion was the expulsion of 105 Soviet intelligence agents from Britain. In fact, one person helping Britain in the decision to expell the Soviets, was GEN MAJ Jan Sejna - who had earlier reported activities which, like his report on POWs being held and medically experimented on - was not believed because despite what he said in 1971 - one month before the expulsion - "Nothing he said was inconsistent with what Western Security Services aleady knew from other sources... his statements were difficult to accept... (because they) so contravened the spirit of detente that few Westerners wanted to accept it." Thus, the so-called objection, has no bearing since our side cannot know - and it admits so - why the meeting was called, other than the self stated reason - to report on the war effort and the number of POWs being held.
<--!HEAD1-->Before going directly into the POW aspect of the 1205 document, I want to cover one area that spills over to many others. President Thieu was threatened at this time with assassination if he did not accede to the Paris Peace Accords. On October 6, 1972, President Nixon sent a Top Secret/Sensitive memorandum to Thieu which implicitly stated the above. Thieu knew the history of the Diem overthrow and subsequent assassination. He participated in the overthrow. He knew he had been threatened by LBJ in 1968. In addition, he knew the CIA unlawfully participated from Vietnam in an effort to overthrow and assassinate President Norodom Sihanouk of neighboring Cambodia. He knew because the United States kept pressuring him to avoid contact with the very units that the CIA was using to facilitate the overthrow attempt. This attempt was probably part of another branch of a CIA operation known as MKULTRA (affectionately known in the CIA as Manufacturing Killers Utilizing Lethal Tradecraft Requiring Assassination - and to the founder of MKULTRA, Dr. Sidney Gottlieb, as Mind Kontrol - German spelling - of Kontrol Utililizing Lethal Tradecraft Requiring Assassination). When Nixon theatened him with things like what happened in 1963 and was threatened in 1968, Thieu knew exactly what that meant. When I say the CIA "unlawfully" participated in another assassination attempt, I am referring to Cherry. Utilizing sheep dipped Special Forces personnel, the CIA evaded and directly disobeyed a Presidential Directive to have no contact with the very people they were dealing with in this time frame and with whom they eventually used to overthrow Sihanouk in 1970. A CIA that will disobey a Presidential Order will also screw up in other areas, like a POW rescue mission in Laos in 1981 - once again disobeying an NSC directive from the National Security Advisor to the President. With this out of the way, let's see why the 1205 document is accurate about POWs being left behind.
Quang said that among the prisoners were "scientists in other technical areas...(previously identified) from our interrogations of American aviators... shot down over North Vietnam and American scientists captured in this war, particularly Air Force specialists..." Well, just this year (2000), former JCS Chief ADM Thomas Moorer testified, under oath, that Russians had in custody in Laos, Air Force electrical technicians, whom they were attempting to turn (ie cause to defect). We know that none of these POWs ever made it back home. In that same area of Laos, in 1969, Special Operations personnel took pictures, still classified today, of American POWs in captivity in caves. In that same area of Laos, in 1970, the CIA identified a Supreme Laotian Command Headquarters as holding upwards of 300 American POWs. From that same area, in 1981, American POWs were transferred from there to Muong Nhom Marrot, to work on road gangs. It is interesting that NSA specialist Jerry Mooney described the area from which they were transferred as being an area designated as a pick and shovel gang for US POWs. We know that only 10 POWs ever made it home alive from Laos. Quang said that only 47 POWs were transferred to North Vietnam from Laos. We know from CIA documents, believed by our Paris negotiating team, that at least 28 were moved from Laos to North Vietnam. This both corroborates Quang and verifies POWs being left behind.
What does this have to do with "scientists?" The Communists defined "scientists" in terms of dialectical materialism and included, according to the KGB Counterintelligence Manuals, people who worked, among others, on infrared devices, radio relay networks, radar stations, missile forces, etc. It is easy to see where Air Force Specialists, "scientists," fit into this definition. Quang specifically said, "We are continuing to collect and study materials from POW interrogations... to have a basis in specific circumstances to expose US designs... Collections and study of these materials has provided us great assistance in studying the scientific discoveries... in developing methods to counter contemporary weapons, including chemical..." The KGB Manual specifies that one way to gather the information is to conduct interrogation of specialists who use the equipment in order to help those specialists who battle the equipment. Once again, Quang is proved correct. Besides, Vietnamese Sr. Colonel Van Duy, commander of the B-22 intelligence camp was involved in the exploitation of U.S. POWs for aviation/avionics technology.
In 1979, Le Dinh, a former communist, stated that some 700 POWs were left behind. He gave details then that were remarkably similar to what was in the 1205 document. He was also described as being in a position to know and that he "demonstrated accurate knowledge of former US POW detention facilities, and events associated with the US POWs who were released from northern Vietnam" (A DIA evaluation)
POWs were released just days after the briefing, just as Quang said they were going to be. The communists changed political course in their negotiations, both in the past, and in the future, and those changes were accurately depicted. Henry Kissinger said that only those with an inside knowledge could have authentically written those events as accurately as they were portrayed in the documents. The events were spelled out in detail. Those spouting the government line will tell you that the number of prisons "decreased" after the Son Tay raid, while the document said they "increased," therefore the document is not legitimate. Well, those same so called "experts" will not tell you that DIA reported in 1972 that they had 18 "suspect" prisons in which they expected POWs to possibly emerge. Several of those 18 camps responded to the Son Tay raid in a manner consistent with some "known" POW locations. In intelligence terms, that means additional evidence that POWs were being held in those locations. In fact, one of those locations, Ba Vi, has the additional evidence of confirming the testimony of Sejna, a former Politburo member of Czechoslovakia, who testified about POWs being transferred to the former Soviet Union; POWs being exploited in scientific experimentation; along with POWs being held in a "Second Tier" of POW camps. Ba Vi, in one report, was called the "24th" US POW camp, significantly above the "13" POW camps we knew about.
Let's look at one of the most frequently cited errors in the 1205 document. Quang stated that three cosmonauts were held captive. DOD says no. Well, we know that Robert Shumaker finished his preliminary training and was so identified in Pylots in Pyjamas, a propaganda film. We know that MIAs Victor Apodaca finished NASA training. We know that returned POW John McCain said he wanted to be an astronaut and completed 4000 flying hours (also cited by Quang in the 1205 document). A look at other records will probably reveal even more potential fits. So, just because we don't know about a man does not make Quang a liar.
The letter from Senators Richard Shelby and John Kerry, Senate Intelligence Committee to Trent Lott, Senate Majority Leader on April 8, 1997 also contained more incredible information with wide ranging implications for the POW issue. The first is that the last Special National Intelligence Estimate (SNIE - and agency wide) assessment of the POW/MIA issue, and apparently the only one, came in 1987. It was then that the community made the claim that Hanoi could account for immediately 400 - 600 remains - based upon the testimony of Loc the mortician. That estimate remained intact until 1996 when several things happened. Congress passed legislation forcing the President to certify progress on the POW/MIA issue. The President determined that the laws were "unconstitutional" because they "purport to condition the execution of responsibilities -- the authority to recognize, and to maintain diplomatic relations with, a foreign government -- that the Consittution commits exclusively to the President." However, to provide cover for himself, he had to get around the 1987 SNIE on Loc's position which was "gospel" for everyone. So, a "critique" was made of the 1987 SNIE and the following was "discovered." In 1996, Congress asked also for a declassification of the SNIE. Richard Bush, the National Intelligence Officer for East Asia, initiated an Intelligence Community Assessment challenging the 1987 SNIE. Incredibly, one of the findings was that "subsequent evidence does not support the Estimate's hypothesis that Hanoi held 400 - 600 sets of remains" since it was based on "limited direct evidence whose reliability was open to question." DIA's assessment of the reliability of Loc went down the drain and Hanoi was judged once again to be able to only provide dribs and drabs of information - just enough so that a remain here and there would enable the Senate to allow the appointment of Pete Peterson to be Ambassador to Vietnam; in 1999 we could open a consulate in Saigon; and in 2000, our Secretary of Defense could say that the finding of 2 sets of remains during the festivities of the 25th Anniversary of what the Vietnamese called their win in the war against the American Imperialists, was wonderful news and indicative of the "progress" they are making on the issue.
<--!HEAD1-->Gone is the Loc rationale which was tested and retested by DIA and found to be reliable. Gone was the 1205 document which tells of 570+ POWs left behind. Gone was the 735 document from a Vietnamese defector showing that in 1971 we knew that "735" POWs were being held prisoner in North Vietnam. (We surfaced this defector, Dr. Dang Tan as being credible). What happened to his estimate? The above document said, the "735" document was "too fragmentary to permit detailed analysis" and "was dismissed" because "the numbers cited are inconsistent with our own accounting." Here, we said, we cannot make a mistake, therefore anything going against our own findings is "dismissed." Since when is our intelligence infallible? I know that our "myth buster" believes that he alone has the answers on POWs, but then, even he his human like everyone else. Gone also was the estimate of the Senate POW professional staff that between 100 - 850 American POWs were alive and captive through at least 1989 and probably the length of the POW hearings. This estimate, and the one of the late LTG Eugene Tighe, former DIA head, that between 900 - 1000 POWs should have come home - both made before the 1205 document was found, both help confirm the authenticity of the 1205 document and the admission of holding American POWs back. All these were gone without the benefit of an all intelligence estimate just so the old anti-war President could justify his positions from the war days. Lost on Congress was the implications that if the 1205 document was real, then as liberal Democrat Zbigniew Brzezinski said when it was found, leaving 670 POWs behind was war crimes. That is what the Executive, Intelligence, and Congressional bodies refuse to face. But then, they also overlook that since President Clinton took office, his administration has removed "collection requirements pertaining to the POW/MIA issue... in place during the 1980s and early 1990s... from the President's Decision Directive on the Intelligence Community's priority requirement list on the recommendation of the National Security Council in 1995." From the mouth of the Vietnamese, found in the musty vaults of their mentors, are admissions of war crimes. Not facing up to those implications, by way of an Appeals Court ruling on the law forcing the President into action - and by extension of their ruling - Congress - is complicity in those war crimes by abandonment of "subordinates" by the President and abandonment of men for whom Congress has the responsibility to pay, equip, and protect through the UCMJ.
The real tragedy of the 1205 admission is the fact that Quang also said that once his objectives (that also being of the Politburo) were met - ie Vietnam was conquered and the wounds of war (war reparations) were met - the POWs being held would be released because that was the "proper thing" to do. Our refusal to acknowledge what we knew - POWs were being held back - and our refusal to either buy them out, blast them out, and instead sell them out, caused the problem that the Vietnamese themselves - although they caused the problem - were willing to end the problem. Does this admission also hold the key to solving the POW dilemma? Perhaps - with a combination of threats of war crime trials - forgotten if we got our men back - Perhaps we can really end the problem immediately.
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