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Posted on 05/30/2007 5:12:16 AM PDT by kellynla
An Enormous Crime is nothing less than shocking. Based on thousands of pages of public and previously classified documents, it makes an utterly convincing case that when the American government withdrew its forces from Vietnam, it knowingly abandoned hundreds of POWs to their fate. The product of twenty-five years of research by former Congressman Bill Hendon and attorney Elizabeth A. Stewart, An Enormous Crime brilliantly exposes the reasons why these American soldiers and airmen were held back by the North Vietnamese at Operation Homecoming in 1973 and what these men have endured since.
Despite hundreds of postwar sightings and intelligence reports telling of Americans being held captive throughout Vietnam and Laos, Washington did nothing. And despite numerous secret military signals and codes sent from the desperate POWs themselves, the Pentagon did not act. Even in 1988, a U.S. spy satellite passing over Sam Neua Province, Laos, spotted the twelve-foot-tall letters “USA” and immediately beneath them a huge, highly classified Vietnam War-era USAF/USN Escape & Evasion code in a rice paddy in a narrow mountain valley. The letters “USA” appeared to have been dug out of the ground, while the code appeared to have been fashioned from rice straw.
Tragically, the brave men who constructed these codes have not yet come home. Nor have any of the other American POWs who the postwar intelligence shows have laid down similar codes, secret messages, and secret authenticators in rice paddies and fields and garden plots and along trails in both Laos and Vietnam.
An Enormous Crime is based on open-source documents and reports, and thousands of declassified intelligence reports and satellite imagery, as well as author interviews and personal experience. It is a singular work, telling a story unlike any other in our modern history: ugly, harrowing, and true.
From the Bay of Pigs, where John and Robert Kennedy struck a deal with Fidel Castro that led to freedom for the Bay of Pigs prisoners, to the Paris Peace Accords, in which the authors argue Kissinger and Nixon sold American soldiers down the river for political gain, to a continued reluctance to revisit the possibility of reclaiming any men who might still survive, we have a story untold for decades. And with An Enormous Crime we have for the first time a comprehensive history of America’s leaders in their worst hour; of life-and-death decision making based on politics, not intelligence; and of men lost to their families and the country they serve, betrayed by their own leaders.
ping
Former U.S. Rep. Billy Hendon,(R-NC), served two terms on the U.S. House POW/MIA Task Force (1981-1982, 1985-1986); as Consultant on POW/MIA Affairs with an office in the Pentagon (1983); and as a full time intelligence investigator assigned to the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs (1991-1992). He has traveled to South and Southeast Asia 33 times on behalf of America’s POWs and MIAs. Hendon is considered the nation's foremost authority on intelligence relating to American POWs held after Operation Homecoming and an expert on the Vietnamese and Laotian prison systems. He lives in Washington, DC.
Elizabeth Stewart's father, Col. Peter J. Stewart, (USAF), is missing in action in North Vietnam. His name appears on Panel 6E, Line 12 of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, DC. Ms. Stewart has spent over two decades researching intelligence relating to American POWs and MIAs. Her efforts have taken her from Capitol Hill to Cambodia, to the South China Sea, to the Presidential Palace in Hanoi and to the most remote regions of northern Vietnam. An attorney, she lives in central Florida.
It appears that our traitorous government has already forgotten them. Where would one start now?
Carolyn
“Where would one start now?”
By you & everyone contacting your congressmen/women, senators & POTUS and DEMANDING a full accounting.
The Vietnamese Commies are enjoying trade relations with us so there is your carrot.
Take away the carrot and see how fast the Commies come up with an accounting.
Semper Fi,
Kelly
Perhaps if they had spelled out “OIL” instead of “USA” we would have paid attention.
While I am no McCain fan, I dont think his stay in Viet Nam was preferential by any stretch of the imagination. Perhaps he got the best view in the Hilton, but I wouldnt call that “preferential.”
One of the finest men I have ever known is Harley Hall. He was the last Naval Aviator shot down in Viet Nam, on 1-27-1973, the day the Paris Peace Accords were signed. His back seater was released during Operation Homecomming but not Harley. He was left behind. Read the very sad truth:
http://www.tailhook.org/HallSu99.htm
Please, lets not take our eyes off the issue.
The issue is not about McCain or Kerry; it is about the approximately 700 POW’s who are unaccounted for as I have posted here; there is photographic evidence as late as 1988 that there is at least one who is still ALIVE!
We need to contact our congressmen/women, senators & POTUS and DEMAND a full accounting of ALL POW’s & MIA’s!
You need to read more about the record of Senator John McCain in pursuing the interests of the men left behind. He has been a real self-serving snake. There is hardly any plausible explanation for his actions and attitudes toward MIA/POWs, other than he is genuinely emotionally unstable or a Manchurian candidate with skeletons in his past POW closet to hide.
I agree totally. However, in reality -- as long as Dick Cheney is the Vice President, and John Kerry and John McCain are in office, this will continue to be swept under the rugs in Washington, D.C.
This scandal tracks back to the Nixon White House, when Watergate forced him to abandon the rescue and recovery of the POWs. It continued under Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan and the senior George Bush, with Dick Cheney as Secretary of Defense. If it is aired out now, what would it do to the stability of our own government?
please read my post 29
Yep and mccain and kerry think they are presidential material. Pfttt
I am dead serious when I say we should go after all of them, toss them all out of office and kick them to the curb. Start over with a clean slate of people who will at least represent the American people, not foreigners.
the Army had about 1700 men who deserted “in country”....it is believed that some made their way home thru Europe....it was also believed that many stayed, married Viet women and disappeared into the criminal underworld in Saigon....(think:Christopher Walken/Deer Hunter)...it is said that those elements were liquidated by the Communists after the fall of South V.N....
I don’t pretend to know all the answers but we sure as hell can start with the present representatives and maybe those running for office in 2008. Maybe Fred Thompson? I don’t know...Hey, Fred, are you paying attention to this?
But we sure as hell owe it to the families of those who are missing and/or unaccounted for!
Either that or we can just throw away the POW/MIA flags and the “Never Forget” bumper stickers, ‘cause they don’t mean squat!!!
Semper Fi,
Kelly
I agree with you. We cannot let this go unnoticed. It needs to be shouted from the rooftops. Since Republicans are responsible for much of this, you would think the MSM would be all over it.
Incidentally, President Bush was personally given a copy of this book on Sunday by a group of veterans during a Memorial Day ceremony. GWB promised them that he would read the book!
Kerry and McCain were instrumental in the POW coverup.
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