Sydney Schanberg: McCain and the POW Cover-up

Source: The Nation

John McCain, who has risen to political prominence on his image as a Vietnam POW war hero, has, inexplicably, worked very hard to hide from the public stunning information about American prisoners in Vietnam who, unlike him, didn't return home. Throughout his Senate career, McCain has quietly sponsored and pushed into federal law a set of prohibitions that keep the most revealing information about these men buried as classified documents. Thus the war hero people would logically imagine to be a determined crusader for the interests of POWs and their families became instead the strange champion of hiding the evidence and closing the books.

Almost as striking is the manner in which the mainstream press has shied from reporting the POW story and McCain's role in it, even as McCain has made his military service and POW history the focus of his presidential campaign. Reporters who had covered the Vietnam War have also turned their heads and walked in other directions. McCain doesn't talk about the missing men, and the press never asks him about them.

Read more: http://www.thenation.com/doc/20081006/schanberg

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I'm not expecting the GOP/Neocon-controlled... ahem, mainstream media to pick this one up. Which means that Netizens have to grab the ball and run with this (talk it up on talk radio, blast-mail it to progressives and even conservative mailing lists).

You know what to do...

K&R

:kick:

This is just such a hot-button issue for so many people. You'd have a hard time breaking through the shell of "John McCain is a hero, blah, blah, blah."

It's better to focus on things people can accept and relate to -- like he's a fucking senile old man. Used to be sharp, but now he's lost it.

People experience that all the time and they're more prepared to accept it.

I want to know what he is hiding. It must have been something big for him to get them buried.

People need to know about this.

were left over there. The problem is that it can't just be McCain, even though he knows the truth and should be deeply ashamed for going along with this ruse.
I went through losing a brother in that war BUT at least my family knows what happened to him. I really feel for all those families who never got resolution on their loved ones fates and those left behind. This is nothing short of a monumental crime.

What else would you expect?

I don't know what they had in 1991. I think it'd be important to see his abuse of a POW family member in action. His voice exudes "emotional batterer"--the barely controlled rage underneath a highly contrived syrupy, self-consciously paced delivery. Unfortunately, I've been around enough of those types to know one when I see one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CazKanlYDg

I'm sure there's more.

Also, if you dare, go to www.vietnamveteransagainstjohnmccain.com

thank you so much for the link. I'm disgusted. He's a bully, and he chose Palin because she's a bully too but knows when to suck up to someone like that and give them the narcissistic strokes they crave (and she's half his age and a "babe" in the process.) Disgusting.

Houston we have a problem. Either the longer video has been professionally cleansed or the shorter one has been creatively defiled. I link, you decide.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HwTKM_u-7j4&feature=related

:kick:

Lewis Carroll couldn't have written it better.

... he was ratting out his brother soldiers to the VC. Some war hero.

the details of how he squealed like a pig and revealed lots of information that resulted in the deaths of other pilots/troops. Classifying documents only to cover his own ass. Is this correct?

Why would a "hero" Vietnam war prisoner/torture survivor oppose MIA information? Because Vietnam opening all their documents and the US declassifying all their documents would expose Johnny boy for the fraud and traitor he really is.

I see you already did. Most disturbing report. Why would McCain actively bury an investigation into POWs/MIAs left behind? Why would Kerry be seemingly complicit has head of this committee?

Google "Songbird McCain" to get lots of links of McCain's POW years.

far beyond what was done in WWII or at other times. The percent of missing soldiers is far less - and their effort led to the repatriation of remains of American service men and civilians. (Remember in Dec 2003 when Dean's brother's body was returned from Laos - than was because of this effort - that Kerry pushed)

The effort to determine if POWs was held was led by John Kerry and almost every Vietnam vet in the Senate was on the committee. They all signed off on the final report - including Bob Smith, the extremely conservative Senator who came in as the clear proponent of the believe that people were left behind.

Kerry had Nixon administration people testify before the committee and even had questions submitted to Nixon. With his history, both in supporting veterans and having been personally targeted by Nixon, he had no reason to let them off the hook. In addition, Kerry gave Smith, who was the ranking member (not McCain, who thought it politically risky) half the staff of the committee - in stead of having more staff himself.

Kerry negotiated the ability of the Senate team and the investigators to go anywhere with no notice. CSPAN had a long (several hours) video replayed sometime last year that showed one trip over there by Kerry, Bob Smith and another Senator. The impression I got was how immense the job was. They had taken the reports of any sightings and mapped them and concentrated on those areas. (Later the investigators looked into each individual account and did there best to determine the circumstances.) All the committee members made trips to Vietnam. Kerry made 14, some to areas he was in. Bob Smith, at one point in the CSPAN footage, speaking of how hard this was for him spoke of how tough this had to be for Kerry. For all of them, this was a difficult, grueling effort that was always seen as a no win situation. (Kerry's entire staff was said to have wanted him not to accept the committee assignment, much less the chairmanship. It was Kerry's managerial skill that designed a process that the others agreed with and his diplomatic skills that kept the committee fights from destroying the effort.

Kerry also pushed the Vietnamese and neighboring countries to undertake a more concerted effort to repatriate remains. This effort was later included in the treaty. At this point, a MUCH lower percent of Americans unaccounted for exists from the Vietnam War than from the Korean War and WWII.

So, why do these stories exist. The reason that committee started was a Newsweek cover that purported to show three POWs still in captivity. The committee debunked this ultimately showing the picture was a fraud, they were not American and it was not Vietnam. What there was were various conscienceless people who raised money from the families and friends of the missing soldiers - saying they would do the investigation the country didn't do. Shapley was one of the most prominent of these and he verbally attacked McCain at many of these hearings - to the point where he was ordered thrown out by Kerry. The committee proved many of these people were con men and that they had actually done nothing other than raise money.

In addition to the conmen were the conned. Some were people who had lost people and who, not only never had the cloture that a body would provide, but had people holding out hope that they were still alive. Then throw in people on both the far left and the far right who are intensely suspicious of the government.

Now, take it a step forward, what is the gain to Vietnam to keep these men for what is now more than 3 decades after the war. During that time, they would need to pay guards and costs of shelter. In addition, as it is secret, they can't be put to work in the country and they can't be used as a bargaining chip. The committee checked every large building in the areas where there were rumours and they interacted with people in the area to learn what they knew - knowing they might not get the full truth.

In the CSPAN video tape, you have the Senators, especially Kerry speaking (through a US interpretor) with citizens everywhere - often with not Vietnamese officials. In a very cute segment, Kerry had a large group of little kids following him. At the beginning, he pointed to an animal and said a name and the kids corrected his pronunciation. Both the kids and Kerry were laughing. Later, he asked if they had seen Americans like him and they hadn't. (Seeing this reminded me of how my kids (then 6,8 and 11) were asked if they knew Hebrew by El AL when we flew out of NYC on a trip that was to Eqypt, where my sister was living and Israel. The 8 year old said yes, so they switched to Hebrew, and she stammered she only knew things like (Jewish prayers). That guy then came over spoke to our questioner and the tone changed immensely - they knew from the innocent 8 year old that we were a Jewish family with kids. In this case, if there were Americans - a kid might have blurted it out - especially to the Senator, who they were fascinated by.

In addition, you need to find a reason why not just McCain, but all the members of that committee could either be conned by the Vietnamese or lying on purpose. I seriously doubt either Kerrey, who spoke of hating Nixon, or Kerry would have any interest in covering up for Nixon. (Kerry was still pushing the real time investigation of BCCI, which was showing a huge amount of corruption from both Democrats and Republicans. That investigation was hard to understand, where the POW one wasn't. Kerry had also exposed the (then) ongoing gun and drug running to illegally support the Contras. So, you can't claim he didn't have the guts to expose something as awful as Americans spending over 2 decades in captivity.)

those records google Song Bird McCain!

I would bet that the reason was that he knew the pressure applied and he feels that for others these records should not be in the public domain to destroy lives of people who facing terror did things that they never would have thought they could ever be forced to do. These people already have to deal with what they did and the torture itself, adding possible exposure by people never in those circumstances is cruel. I assume the military already reviewed everything - and if they opted to forgive because of the circumstances - that should be the case.

There are tons of things to go after McCain for - starting with his entire foreign policy and his entire domestic policy. We do not need to go after his time in service.

Enough is enough.

JSM III pretends he is a hero, delaying his own return to the USA. Yet tried to suppress attempts to bring back others still left behind.

Sydney Schanberg's article is really interesting. It reminds us of issues we thought were solved. Didn't realize they were just pushed away by the Republican POW, John Sidney McCain III.

Could be another sore spot for 527 ads to explore.

Can you imagine it. The war's over. You wait for your rescue from the country you fought for...and it never comes.

The Vietnamese has said they turned over ALL American POWs. Now there is a difference in the list mentioned in the article. The problem is the list cited by the Vietnamese to the Soviets seems to be "American" Troops even if those troops were native Vietnamese serving in the US army (Many did so, especially in the Special Forces, since such natives new the land and the language better then American Soldiers). Thus for intelligence purposes such soldiers, if captured, would be classified as "American" even if they NEVER left Vietnam in their life. Many of these "Americans" were believed captured while on behind the line activities in North Vietnam. Thus the North Vietnamese treated them as "Americans" for intelligence purposes (i.e. what they knew about US plans and capabilities) but the US called them South Vietnamese (which was their country).

Anyway, even before the end of the war in Vietnam, the GOP ran a program about demanding from the North Vietnamese information about out MIAs. The missing POWs are now treated as MIAs. The GOP line in the 1970s was the US could NOT pull out of Vietnam until ALL of out MIAs were accounted for and since it was impossible to do so, we could never pull out. The whole MIA program was a political ploy by the GOP to keep the US in Vietnam. Now many of the people (especially the Families of the MIAs) were and are NOT award of this background, they just wanted to know what happened to their family members (The same concern WWII families had about their missing family members, but it never became a political issue given we won WWII). Thus the MIA claim had a strong pull on people, even through the people most pushing it cared less about the MIAs but just wanted to continue US support for the war in Vietnam. Even after the fall of Vietnam, claims of American MIA continued and continued to be used by the GOP as attacks on the Democratic Party for having abandoned the MIAs by cutting off funding for South Vietnam as it fell.

Now this brings me to the late 1970s. Why would Vietnam (By then United) keep US POSs? There were no longer any advantages for the Vietnamese. The South had joined the North, the war was over and the US was in no position to reverse that. Thus the keeping the POWs as "Hostages" against the US made no sense by that time (and given the need for Vietnam for money to rebuild, return of any POWs at that time would have given them a good pat of the back, some people might object to why did they keep them but the advantages far outweighed the disadvantages). In simple terms I do not see Vietnam keeping any US servicemen as POWs after the mid 1970s, and even less reason as time went on. This brings me what may be why such reports exists:

1. That Vietnam still has the POWs. Possible but not probable, but such people would be over 60 years of age by now (Vietnam fell in 1974, thus to be 18 in 1974 meant you were born in 1956, which makes you 52 year old, most US POWs would be older up to 20 years older, with most about 10 years older i.e. up to 72 but many around 62). Could people live that long in a Vietnamese Prison? Possible, but more probable, on some sort of release i.e. house, food and a job, but activities limited. Possible but not probable see above for details.

2. Europeans spotted and mistaken for US POWs, remember the Soviet Union moved its navy into Vietnam starting in 1975, Russian acted as Americans during films made by Vietnam about the war (Which may explain the huge number of reports of "Americans" foreign seeing actors in US Uniforms off duty from filming, maybe even as school lessons on history of the war.

3. The MIA went native, i.e. moved in with a Vietnamese or Hmong tribe and became one of the local. Still be a White man, but by now as much Vietnamese as any Vietnamese. Vietnam would watch such people for such people, if caught by foreigners, could be mistaken as being forced to stay in Vietnam (and some maybe see 1 above). I seriously doubt this given how Vietnam was changed since the 1960s but possible and an explanation of the reports.

My bet is that the reports reflect sightings of Soviet Army and Navy Personnel in the 1970s and 1980s. The people seeing the reported American MIAs are most familiar with US uniforms and assume any white man in a uniform they saw was an American. Given that the US pulled out prior to 1974 to be alive such MIAs have to be over 50, with most over 60. The reports are rare and most are second hand reports (X told me se saw an American POW) not first hand (We have similar reports of MIAs during WWII, and found them to be unreliable so why would these reports be any different). The first hand reports are even rarer but can be explained by the existence of Soviet Army and Naval personnel and wishful thinking (and some people seeing the MIA reports as a ticket to get into the US, or at least some money). I can not claim for certain that the Vietnamese had no POWs after 1972, but given the Vietnamese released most of the prisoners and had no good reason to keep the rest, I see no reason for the MIAs to be alive. This is just a GOP plan that is backfiring against McCain, as it has over the last 20 years as the GOP preferred to open sweat shops in Vietnam then look for any of the MIAs.

Its all a hoax.

John McCain and John Kerry worked together on debunking the cruel POW hoax. They both reached the same conclusions. I don't know the specifics of why McCain might not want documents released but there probably are good reasons. Just because some information wasn't shared with the public doesn't mean there was some kind of big coverup. Perhaps the documents contained embarrassing confessions of former POWs.

There's tons of nasty stuff out about McCain. We don't need this nonsense. I hope this accusation goes nowhere because its been debunked before and would likely backfire if it gains wide circulation.


For more on the POW/MIA hoax:

http://www.miafacts.org/

unfaithful toward its citizens, it is very difficult to place any value on what they purport to be true.

You may be right, and you may be wrong, or it could be somewhere in between.

But I tell you, our government has a nasty habit of exaggerating, embellishing, fabricating, and lying to protect men who place their careers, and Party, above the truth.

http://www.miafacts.org/french.htm

In simple term, Nixon in a speech he made in 1970 made a claim that the North Vietnamese had NOT returned French POWs till long after the Armistice of 1954 (when France pulled out of Vietnam). Right after that Speech the French Government sent Nixon a letter stating clearly that the Vietnamese had turned over ALL French POWs within three months of the Armistice (While within the time limit of that Armistice).

As I said above, the whole POW issue is a product of the GOP to get voters to vote GOP as the GOP continued the War in Vietnam. It has come to back fire on McClain but that is the problem with lies, they bit even the people who use them.

All agreed to the final report.

it'll need some interest from us so the media feels secure in running it. The same as the Palin background was at first. Both The Nation and Schanberg have a lot of credibility, so I think follow-ups will come. If WaPo picks it up, he's cooked.

HuffPo has a link to it. And I found two other little nibbles...
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003852333

http://thepoliticalcarnival.blogspot.com/2008/09/sydney-schanberg-writes-massive-piece.html


"On it" with you. This is the dealbreaker for Prince Johnny. And he's so far out on that POW-hero limb now, there's no way out of it for him once it breaks big. The POW families have suffered enough from him, and his treatment of Bobby Garwood was shameful. Garwood was the longest-held, last POW to return (for those who don't remember). McCain's discrediting operation smeared Garwood into oblivion for his welcome home... assisted by the same Pentagon friends. (Btw, the Pentagon's angle was to leave men there who were in ops we didn't admit to - they didn't want their "inconvenient memories" coming home.)

What you begin to realize is, that this is the way McCain has been all along. What we're seeing now from him in this campaign has consistently been his M.O. He has no scruples whatsoever.

But this... could show that to the public more clearly than anything else could. It shows a connect-the-dots pattern.

Want to know MORE about McCain and the POWs that were left behind? This article is not for the faint of heart...

http://www.nationinstitute.org/p/schanberg09182008pt1


Must see video - stunning to watch - stunning in a BAD way... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CazKanlYDg - very, very disturbing... Senate Hearing of the POW/MIA that McCain headed up

:kick:

if I did something wrong. Why is there an alert re/ my post?

U.S. POW/MIAs Who May Have Survived In Captivity

Prepared by the Office of Senator Bob Smith
Vice-Chairman, Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs

December 1, 1992

http://www.aiipowmia.com/ssc/smth324.html

I once thought it was hoax played on the bereft and delusional family members of MIAs, but then I'd run across occasional stories in the MSM, but never any followup. Then I found Schanberg in the Village Voice.

http://www.villagevoice.com/2004-02-17/news/did-america-abandon-vietnam-war-p-o-w-s-part-1/1

Currently be sure to read the complete Nation version in the Nationinstitute.org website.

Why did McCain do everything possible to squash the investigation into possible POWs/MIAs? Why do MIA families hate him?

This tragedy has the power to reach across the Red/Blue state divide. It suddenly unifies all RepubliCON acts of treason: the treatment of VA patients, exposing our fighting men and women to depleted uranium munitions (not to mention the civilians), 9/11, etc. This is the age of Repuke treason.

When the story isn't true McCain winds up getting sympathy and the reputation of net lefties, which isn't great now, suffer even more. Of course, the GOP and the right wing media will blame Obama for smear jobs based on falsehoods.

How long has this hoax been on the front page?

Most of it isn't evidence. It argues that because POW/MIA myth proponents aren't satisfied with the proof offered that the myth is false then the myth must be true.

There could be lots of good reasons for keeping secrets. Some might give away methods and tactics for downed pilot rescues. Mostly, I don't want men who endured brutal captivity for this country forever shamed by acts they committed while under terrible duress. I don't think the public should hear their confessions or debriefings or anything like that. They've been through more than enough already.

Most of the remaining bits of evidence in the article are probably debunked at the link I left above. Like all other conspiracy theories, there is no possible way to ever convince those who want to believe it that there is not enough evidence to support it. Its an unfair burden. The burden should be to prove men were left behind. The proponents should be able to prove that this remarkably large conspiracy exists without exposure. When the theories are subjected to scrutiny, they turn out to be as crazy as they sound.