Kerry/Vietnam/Bob Smith/POW-MIA's

Fellow FReepers, I know this is technically a vanity, but my friend is the Chairman of the American Legion POW/MIA committee in our home state, and an associate FReeper at heart. He asked me to put this up for your consideration, and I know this subject has been disected here on FR:

Thursday night, during the debate, Sen. Kerry said he visited Mr. Putin in the former Soviet Union along with Sen. Bob Smith of New Hampshire.

This needs to be investigated as it leads into the most disgraceful events of Sen. Kerry's career.

In 1992, Mr. Kerry was the chairman of a Senate Select Committee on the POW/MIA issue. This issue was the main obstruction to the normalization of relations with Vietnam.

Many hearings were held and many prominent people gave testimony. The majority opinion was written by Chairman Kerry stating that there were no live prisoners, and that the issue was effectually over.

The minority opinion was written by Vice Chairman Bob Smith (Rep., NH) now retired. Mr. Smith wrote a scathing report stating that the Kerry report did not consider the tons of testimony given to the committee.

One year after President Clinton took office relations with Vietnam were re-established, based on the Kerry report. It was also rumored that John Kerry's cousin, J. Forbes, was appointed as the liason for American Corporations looking to open business' in Vietnam.

Here is a portion of comments that Senator Smith made on the POWs in 1998...

Finally, Mr. Chairman, I want to say a few words about Hanoi's efforts to fully disclose relevant information about our unaccounted for POWs and MIAs from the war. Many of you may not recall this, but in the Trade Act of 1974, the very next section following freedom of emigration as a condition for trade credits, is a section with a similar condition on trade credits for countries based on their cooperation on the POW/MIA issue.
As you know, I co-chaired the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs and wrote the legislation that established that Committee. I worked closely with you, Mr. Chairman, and my colleagues, Senators Bob Kerrey, John Kerry, John McCain, and Jesse Helms, among others. I know all of us are sensitive to this issue, and we've wrestled with the facts and tried to separate out the emotions. Last December, when Jackson-Vanik first surfaced as an issue for Vietnam, Senator McCain stated to the Washington Post that, "as usual, we'll have a fight. Vietnam will always be an emotional issue. Any issue involved with it will always turn out to be very emotional," he said. I'm still trying to separate out the emotions, and stick to the facts, Mr. Chairman, because I think everyone agrees that facts should drive our drive our policy toward Vietnam, not emotions.
To those who say that for 20 years, we didn't engage Vietnam on the POW/MIA issue and that they gave us nothing even when we held firm, the facts show this is simply not true. While I have criticized both Republican and Democrat Administrations for their handling of this issue, I at least recognize that President Reagan engaged Vietnam on the POW/MIA issue, and used both carrots and sticks, not just carrots, and his carrots consisted of humanitarian aid, not economic aid. He appointed a Special Emissary to Hanoi, General Vessey, and during both Reagan Administrations, we saw Vietnam return nearly 200 sets of remains which were identified, many of which were found to have been stored in a warehouse since the war. So to say Vietnam gave us nothing during that period is simply not true.
With regard to the 2,087 Americans still unaccounted for from the war, I noted that Senator Kerry stated two and a half weeks ago on June 18, 1998, that as of that day, "fate has been determined for all but 43 last known alive discrepancy cases... in other words, all but 43 POW/MIA families now know what happened to their loved ones, and that is progress by any measure," he said. I found that interesting, Mr. Chairman, because on August 4, 1992, nearly six years ago, Senator Kerry, as Chairman of our Select Committee, stated that "the number 43 is simply the universe of people about whom there remain valid questions, whether because they were once listed as having been taken prisoner or because they were otherwise known or thought to have survived their incident." So, in six years, we've gone from 43 to 43. I don't see how that represents "progress by any measure."
Senator Kerry and I have differed over the universe of numbers for many years now, and I don't think we're going to resolve it here, but I would urge you, Mr. Chairman, to simply look at the data from the Department of Defense on the breakdown of POW/MIA and so-called KIA/BNR cases by service and country, and then determine for yourself how much progress has really been made. I'd be happy to provide that data for the record.
Getting aside from the confusion we get about POW/MIA statistics, I think it's more relevant, Mr. Chairman, to look at the concerns you yourself raised on the Senate floor during the trade embargo debate in January, 1994 -- again, that was the last time the Senate was put on record on trade issues with Vietnam -- 4 1/2 year ago. At that time, you said:
"Why would we lift the embargo now before we get Vietnam's central-committee level documents which contain in essence Vietnam's wartime national secrets on U.S. prisoner activity and information thereto? This information would tell us what happened to our prisoners and to our missing... Furthermore, if we move ahead with lifting the embargo, without full disclosure by Vietnam, we will be rewarding Vietnam, while ignoring their human rights abuses... Our Secretary of State has been talking to the Chinese about improving their record if they want this body to keep most-favored nation status going. Why that concern about China? Why not the concern about human rights in Vietnam? I do not know."
I do not know, either, Mr. Chairman. But I'll tell you what I do know. First, as I mentioned earlier, waiving Jackson-Vanik does not signal Vietnam that we're seriously concerned about their restrictions on basic freedoms for their people, like freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom to emigrate, and freedom to worship. For goodness sake, I am told the Vietnamese Government even expelled nuns from Mother Teresa's order a few months ago, the only country ever to have done so.
Second, concerning the POW/MIA concerns you expressed in 1994, Mr. Chairman, Vietnam has still not opened their Central-Committee level documents on POWs to the United States, and they have not been fully forthcoming. Most of the progress that has been made has been due to the investigative work done by our Joint Task Force in Vietnam as opposed to unilateral disclosures by the central Government in Hanoi.
Senator Kerry claims we have a "full-time archive process in Hanoi" and passing my bill is somehow going to "threaten shutting down" our people working in those archives, even though Ambassador Peterson testified Vietnam would continue to cooperate even if Congress did rescind the waiver. However, I am told we no longer have any full-time presence in the archives in Hanoi, and we certainly don't have full-time access to central level Community Party records on the POW/MIA issue.
Moreover, much of the Joint Task Force investigative work has focused on recovering the remains of our troops who we know died during the war, as opposed to making substantial progress on cases of unaccounted for American personnel listed as prisoner or missing in action when the war ended in 1973.
Since the waiver of Jackson-Vanik, by law, deals solely with emigration, I was prepared not to dwell on the POW/MIA aspects until I received a letter from the President this past February telling me that his waiver of Jackson-Vanik waiver was somehow also going to build on the momentum of POW/MIA accounting. One week after I received that letter, he certified to Congress that Vietnam was "fully cooperating in full faith" on the POW/MIA issue, leading me to really wonder what incentive Hanoi now had to pick up its momentum on POW/MIA accounting. If everything is fine, why is there a need to build on momentum in POW/MIA accounting?
This is no small issue, Mr. Chairman, and I would encourage your Members to obtain a copy of the classified National Intelligence Estimate on the Vietnam POW/MIA issue which has recently been completed. While I do have some very serious concerns about that Estimate, there are, nonetheless, some interesting points that are worth your reading.
In conclusion, I want to emphasize that the debate on passing S.J. Res. 47 is not about turning back the clock or choosing isolationism over engagement with Vietnam. Frankly, those arguments simply do not have merit because we have engagement with Vietnam, and that fact won't change if we pass S.J. Res. 47.
Nothing in my resolution requires us to recall our Ambassador, scale back our diplomatic relations, or reimpose the trade embargo. We've already taken those steps forward in the normalization process. My bill doesn't change that one iota. My resolution is about looking toward the future, and using both carrots and sticks in our negotiating policy with Vietnam, not just carrots alone.
While I'm not one to often quote our President, I was struck by something he said last week in China about societies going forward into the 21st century. He said, "the forces of history have brought us to a new age of human possibility, but our dreams can only be recognized by nations whose citizens are both responsible and free... if you are so afraid of personal freedom that you limit people's freedom too much, then you pay, I believe, an even greater price in a world where the whole economy is based on ideas and information and exchange and debate, and children everywhere dreaming dreams and feeling they can live their dreams out."
Mr. Chairman, Senate Joint Resolution 47 puts moral principles over dwindling profits in Vietnam, not the other way around, and it will send the strongest possible message to Hanoi that we do care about people being able to live out their dreams.
This resolution is supported by several key Members from the House on both sides of the aisle, and it has widespread support from all major Vietnamese-American organizations, Refugee Assistance organizations, POW/MIA family groups, and many former POWs and national veterans organizations, including our nation's largest, The American Legion. With your permission, I would like to enter their statements into the record, and I would note that many of the leaders of these organizations are in the audience today.
http://usembassy-australia.state.gov/hyper/WF980707/epf209.htm

There is some interesting stuff about Jonn Kerry in there especially this

Second, concerning the POW/MIA concerns you expressed in 1994, Mr. Chairman, Vietnam has still not opened their Central-Committee level documents on POWs to the United States, and they have not been fully forthcoming. Most of the progress that has been made has been due to the investigative work done by our Joint Task Force in Vietnam as opposed to unilateral disclosures by the central Government in Hanoi.

Senator Kerry claims we have a "full-time archive process in Hanoi" and passing my bill is somehow going to "threaten shutting down" our people working in those archives, even though Ambassador Peterson testified Vietnam would continue to cooperate even if Congress did rescind the waiver. However, I am told we no longer have any full-time presence in the archives in Hanoi, and we certainly don't have full-time access to central level Community Party records on the POW/MIA issue.

VIETNAM WAR WORKING GROUP

The Vietnam War Working Group (VWWG) was established in 1993. The U.S. Chairman is Senator Bob Smith (R-NH), former Vice Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs (1991-1993) and currently a senior member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. The Russian Chairman is General-Major Nikolai Maksimovich Bezborodov, an active duty Russian Army officer and three-term member of the Duma, serving as Deputy Chairman of the Committee on Defense. Senator Smith has been a member of the Commission since its inception in 1992 and has co-chaired the working group since January 1997; General Bezborodov assumed his position as a member of the Commission and VWWG co-chairman in February 2000.

Senator Bob Smith,
U.S. Co-Chairman
General-Major Nikolai
Maksimovich Bezborodov,
Russian Co-Chairman

Objectives

The VWWG is focused on two primary objectives: to determine what information is available in the former Soviet Union that might help to clarify the fate of unaccounted-for American service members from the Vietnam War and, in particular, to determine whether any American service members were transferred from Southeast Asia (North and South Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia) to the former Soviet Union during the Vietnam War period (1964-75).

In support of these objectives, the VWWG seeks to obtain broader, and in many cases, first-ever access to Russian archives, particularly the Central Archives of the Russian Ministry of Defense, the Central Archives of the Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU), the Central Archives of the Federal Security Service (FSB) and the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), and the Presidential Archives. The U.S. side also continues to collect and analyze as much information as possible through an intensive interview program with former Soviet officials, military veterans, and others who are potentially knowledgeable about Soviet involvement in the Vietnam War.

In this particular working group, there are few unresolved Russian issues to be examined, since the Russian side reports that it has no unaccounted-for service members from the Vietnam War. Therefore, since most Vietnam War-related issues before the working group are of concern primarily to the American side, Senator Smith has actively pursued information possibly in possession of the United States Government that could help account for missing Russian service members from a range of past and current conflicts.

Research and Investigative Process

The U.S. side of the VWWG seeks comprehensive answers from its Russian interlocutors to the following areas of inquiry:

* What information is available that provides names of American POWs, identifying data, shoot down records, interrogation reports, and any other information relating directly or indirectly to American POW/MIAs who were not repatriated from Southeast Asia at the conclusion of hostilities in 1973?
* Is there information available indicating whether any American POWs were held back by Communist forces in Southeast Asia after April 1, 1973? If so, where were they held, by whom, and for what purpose?
* According to Russian-held data, in which specific locations were American POWs held captive in Southeast Asia?
* According to Russian-held data, how many American POWs were held captive in Southeast Asia? What was their fate?
* What additional information is available about the origin and authenticity of the so-called "735" and "1205" documents?

Senator Smith and Rear Admiral Boris Popov discuss POW/MIA issues at Frunze Naval Academy in St. Petersburg

In pursuit of answers to these questions, the VWWG approaches its work from two directions. The first is to conduct detailed interviews with a wide range of former Soviet officials and veterans who served in Southeast Asia or are otherwise potentially knowledgeable about Soviet involvement in or policies toward that region during the Vietnam War. The second is to examine which Russian archives may hold more useful information than has so far been obtained for review by the Joint Commission.

The Interview Program

Several thousand members of the Soviet Armed Forces served in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam conflict. 1 The U.S. side of the working group has a program that seeks to interview key former Soviet officials whose positions during the Vietnam War likely would have provided them access to information about American POW/MIAs and their loss incidents. In order to identify such individuals, the VWWG performs detailed research in U.S. intelligence and archival holdings and reviews open-source reporting in the Russian and English languages. In addition, interview candidates are identified from diplomatic listings, referrals from interviews, and through appeals for support to various Russian veterans' groups and associations and through the mass media in the former USSR.

The interview program prioritizes candidates for interviews based on their assessed knowledgeability. Individuals with an expected high degree of access to POW/MIA-related information are considered first-priority interview candidates. The current interview program contains the names of 63 first-priority interview candidates: 11 former GRU (Soviet Military Intelligence) officers; 16 former KGB officers; and 36 former Soviet military and government officials. Among the highest-priority interviews sought from this group are: General Petr Ivashutin, the chief of the GRU during the Vietnam War; Yevgeniy Primakov, former Russian Prime Minister, who, according to General Volkogonov, in 1994 as chief of the Foreign Intelligence Service, showed General Volkogonov a Soviet KGB plan to "deliver knowledgeable Americans to the USSR for intelligence purposes" (see box on the Volkogonov memoirs); General Vladimir Chukhrov, an official of the SVR.

The Volkogonov Memoirs

In early February 1998, Senator Bob Smith arranged for Joint Commission researchers to work in the personal papers of the late General-Colonel Dmitrii A. Volkogonov, located at the Library of Congress. The Commission staff members found in this collection a six-page, Russian-language autobiographical sketch entitled, "A Little More About Myself." This brief memoir, written by Volkogonov in August 1994, reveals his discovery in Russian archives of a document from the late 1960s that assigned the KGB the task of "delivering knowledgeable Americans to the USSR for intelligence purposes." Volkogonov wrote that he was shown a copy of the actual KGB plan in the early 1990s by then Chief of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, Ye.M. Primakov, who claimed that the plan had never been implemented. In his memoir, Volkogonov expressed skepticism about Primakov's claim, stating that it remained "a secret I was unable to penetrate." (See text for more information on the investigative and diplomatic efforts and developments on this case.)

General-Colonel Dmitrii Volkogonov, noted Russian military historian, author, and first Russian Co-Chairman of the Commission

Second-priority interview candidates are less likely to possess first-hand, POW/MIA related information, but their positions during the Vietnam War offer some expectation that their information might prove insightful. The current interview program contains the names of 55 second-priority interview candidates.

Besides the research-based formal interview program, the VWWG routinely attempts to interview as many former Soviet veterans who served in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam conflict as possible. For example, the government of Belarus provided a list of all veterans residing in that country with credited service in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War, and VWWG analysts have interviewed many of these veterans. Although the working group continues to seek a similar comprehensive listing of Russian Vietnam War veterans, only partial lists have been generated.

VWWG analysts travel extensively throughout the former Soviet Union, routinely visiting Russian cities and former Soviet republics, such as Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Belarus, Georgia, and the Baltic states, in search of interview opportunities with former Soviet veterans of the Vietnam War. These interviews are a prime source of information for the Vietnam War Working Group, especially in view of the current low level of access by the working group to Russian archival holdings.

Access to the Archives of the Russian Federation

The VWWG seeks far broader access to Russian archival materials than it has obtained to date. The working group's research, including information from knowledgeable Russian officials and Joint Commission representatives, strongly suggests that Russian archives contain potentially valuable materials that might greatly contribute to American efforts to provide the fullest possible accounting for missing service members. This research has led to some preliminary conclusions, outlined below, about which materials and archives hold the greatest promise for future Joint Commission efforts.

The Central Archives of the Defense Ministry of the Russian Federation at Podolsk contain the unit records of all Soviet and Russian Armed Forces except the Navy, archival documents for which are sent to the Central Naval Archives in Gatchina, Russia. Elements of one Soviet air defense regiment deployed to North Vietnam from 3 March to 3 November 1966, during which time the unit claims to have downed several dozen American aircraft. American and Russian representatives of the Joint Commission visited the headquarters of this regiment in March 1994, and they determined that the records of this unit's service in North Vietnam, most likely including the records of the shoot-down of American combat aircraft, are held in the Podolsk archives. Since 1994, the American side has worked closely with the Russian side to gain access to these and other important materials located in the Podolsk archives. The working group has made limited progress on this issue, but it is encouraged that a recent dialogue at Senator Smith's request between the U.S. Secretary of Defense and the Russian Minister of Defense on access by Joint Commission researchers to Defense Ministry archives will help facilitate this process.

A second repository in which Vietnam War-related materials are held is the archives of the GRU (Russian Military Intelligence). The American side believes that these archives contain information of potential value to the accounting mission of the Joint Commission. This includes the records of a "special group" (spetsgruppa) of GRU officers whose mission during the Vietnam War was to receive captured American combat equipment for transshipment to the former USSR and technical exploitation. The U.S. side learned about the activities of the "special group" from documents passed by the Russian side early in the life of the Joint Commission. The GRU "special group" operated in North Vietnam throughout the war and is believed to have acquired several thousand pieces of American combat equipment, ranging in significance from small arms to entire aircraft and major components. The U.S. side believes the records of this "special group" would contain data, including the serial numbers of components, that might be traced to incidents of U.S. loss and, perhaps, correlated to open MIA cases, potentially helping to clarify the circumstances of loss. (See box entitled "F-111 Cockpit in Moscow")

F-111 Cockpit in Moscow

In 1992, Joint Commission researchers working in Moscow discovered the largely intact crew capsule of a U.S. F-111 fighter-bomber that was shot down over North Vietnam in 1972. The cockpit was found at the Moscow Aviation Institute, where it was being used as a training mockup for Russian students. The condition of the capsule suggested that the crew might have survived. Moreover, the serial number of the aircraft initially suggested that the loss incident could potentially correlate to either one of two loss incidents, one in November 1972 involving two MIAs and one in December 1972 from which two POWs were repatriated. An FBI team of technical specialists was subsequently dispatched to examine the capsule, and their work enabled the U.S. Government to correlate the capsule to the two repatriated American POWs.

The U.S. side of the Joint Commission believes the F-111 crew capsule was one of several thousand pieces of captured American combat equipment that was acquired in North Vietnam by a GRU (Soviet Military Intelligence) "special group." The F-111 capsule demonstrates the potential that equipment brought to the USSR for technical exploitation might be correlated to an actual incident of U.S. loss in Southeast Asia. In this case, the crew survived its loss incident and returned home after a period of captivity. The U.S. side is interested in other equipment acquired by the "special group" in the hope that documents describing equipment might provide data that would help clarify incidents of U.S. loss or the fate of Americans who did not return home.

Crew capsule of the F-111 shot down over North Vietnam on 22 December 1972

Fragments of an American B-52 aircraft shot down over Hanoi in December 1972, displayed at the museum of the Air Defense Forces, Balashikha, Russia

The GRU archives may also contain Vietnamese-originated interrogation records of American POWs in Southeast Asia that were shared with Soviet military officials. In the early 1990s, the Russian side of the Commission uncovered a document showing that a bilateral agreement existed between North Vietnam and the former USSR obligating the Vietnamese to share reports of their interrogation of American POWs with the Soviets. Based on its research to date, the U.S. side of the working group believes these reports were passed from the Vietnamese to the Soviets through GRU channels, and that copies of these reports likely reside today in the GRU archives. The potential exists that these materials might help to clarify the fate of unaccounted-for American service members.

A third example of valuable materials that likely are held in Russian archives are the reports of Soviet officials who participated directly in the interrogation of American POWs held in Southeast Asia. The American side of the VWWG has uncovered at least five such instances from the testimony of former American POWs. Interviews with several Russian veterans and certain U.S. intelligence reports tend to buttress the argument that the Soviets, on occasion, were granted direct access to American POWs for the purpose of interrogation. The U.S. side believes that Russian archives should contain the reports of the five known encounters, and possibly other such encounters, between American POWs and Soviet officials during interrogation. Such reports might contribute to American efforts to account for missing service members. The U.S. presented its evidence to the Russian side during the 16th Plenum (November 1999) and asked the Russian side to research this topic. The Russian side agreed to this effort and is currently reviewing the U.S. research on this important issue.

These are major examples of materials believed to be held in Russian archives that warrant a comprehensive review by the Joint Commission. Other examples could be offered. This subject has been discussed routinely at each meeting of the Joint Commission and has resulted in dozens of formal correspondences between the two sides. Senator Smith and other U.S. Commissioners have pressed the case for increased access to Russian archives in search of POW/MIA-related materials from the Vietnam War era. As mentioned, Secretary of Defense Cohen and Minister of Defense Sergeyev discussed the issue of archival access during their meetings in September 1999 and June 2000. It is hoped that these discussions will finally lead to an arrangement that permits the review of potentially helpful Russian records from the Vietnam War era.

As noted earlier, Joint Commission access to Russian archives for POW/MIA-related materials from the Vietnam War era has been sharply limited. This is demonstrated by the comparatively small number of Vietnam War archival materials reviewed by the Joint Commission. In the first three years of the Joint Commission's work (1992-95), the American side of the VWWG received 74 documents comprising 322 pages. Compared with the number of pages received by the Commission's other working groups in the same time frame, this is by far the smallest contribution. For example, the Korean War Working Group (KWWG) received in the same time frame 410 documents comprising over 12,000 pages. In the past five years (1996-2000), the VWWG has received only 10 additional documents (67 pages) of Vietnam War-related materials from the Russian side, and some of these were duplicates of materials received earlier. In contrast, KWWG figures for the same time frame are 260 documents comprising 16,000 pages. The U.S. side continues to identify specific documents, often by archival citation, that are potentially valuable to the accounting effort and has requested their declassification and release to the American side.

The "Quang Documents"

When a civilian researcher named Dr. Stephen Morris discovered the so-called "735" and "1205" documents in the archives of the former Soviet Politburo in 1993, he also noted two GRU documents which purported to be speeches to the Politburo of the North Vietnamese Workers' Party in the early 1970s by the author of the "1205" document, North Vietnamese General Lieutenant Tran Van Quang.

In assessing the "1205" document, some analysts have argued that General Quang allegedly had a relatively low rank and position at this period of time and therefore is highly unlikely to have addressed the Politburo on any subject, much less on the subject of American POWs. The "1205" document thus has been dismissed partly based on this argument.

Because the two "Quang documents" in the former Central Committee archives appear to demonstrate that, indeed, General Quang spoke to the Politburo on more than one occasion and on a range of topics during this time frame, the U.S. side of the Joint Commission has repeatedly sought access to these materials. It has provided the Russian side with the precise location within the archives where these materials can be found, and it has presented its case for access to these documents on numerous occasions. Senator Smith has argued this case personally to his Russian counterparts, and they agreed to work out an arrangement whereby the American side of the VWWG could review these documents. The U.S. side continues to await Russian fulfillment of this pledge.

There is one hopeful development to report in the area of broader U.S. access to Russian archival holdings that may lead to access to Vietnam War-era documents. The Commission's Korean War Working Group, through the tireless efforts of its American Co-Chairman, Congressman Sam Johnson, obtained access to Korean War records in the Central Archives of the Russian Ministry of Defense in August 1997 and has continued its review of these archives since that time. The VWWG hopes to obtain similar access there as well through a continued dialogue between Senator Smith and his Russian counterparts.

RESULTS

The Interview Program

Since the Joint Commission's May 1995 Interim Report, the VWWG has interviewed 515 citizens of the former USSR, including diplomats, military and security-service officers, high-level Communist Party and government officials, researchers, and journalists. In the past five years, VWWG analysts have traveled to eight of the fifteen newly independent states of the former Soviet Union, some of them repeatedly, to locate and interview veterans of the Vietnam War.

The American side is grateful for the assistance of the Russian side in arranging several of these important interviews. For example, during the 15th Plenum (November 1998), and again during the 16th Plenum (November 1999), the Russian side arranged for the American side to interview former KGB Chief Vladimir Semichastnyy (KGB Chief from December 1961 to May 1967) and former KGB Chief Vladimir Kryuchkov in November 1999. [The highest ranking KGB official who is alive today from the end of Semichastnyy’s tenure at the KGB (1967) to the end of the Vietnam War, Kryuchkov also headed the KGB from October 1988 to August 1991.] Also with Russian assistance, the U.S. side interviewed Konstantin Katushev, a CPSU Central Committee Secretary during the Vietnam War.

The American side has had considerable success unilaterally obtaining interviews with former Soviet veterans of the Vietnam War. Interviews conducted by the VWWG since 1995 have revealed numerous alleged firsthand sightings by Soviet officials of live American POWs in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War. After analytical review, the majority of these reports were found to be credible. Many were successfully correlated to known incidents of U.S. loss in which personnel have been accounted for either as repatriated POWs or as individuals whose remains have been returned to U.S. control. Several other Soviet firsthand live sightings are still under review in the working group.

The interview program also has provided valuable insight into a number of analytical areas of high interest to the U.S. side. For example, since 1995, the VWWG has interviewed several dozen high-level former Soviet officials about the documents found in Russian archives in 1993, the so-called "735" and "1205" documents (see box). Those interviewed include the current chief of the GRU (Russian Military Intelligence), retired and serving GRU officers, several former Soviet ambassadors to Hanoi, Soviet Communist Party Central Committee officials, several former chiefs of the KGB, and a number of retired KGB officers. These interviews formed the basis of a judgment contained in the U.S. Intelligence Community's 1998 National Intelligence Estimate that both documents probably are authentic GRU acquisitions and not merely fabrications of Soviet intelligence services, as claimed by the Vietnamese.

The working group's interview program also has provided valuable information about another of the VWWG's current highest priority analytical issues-the meaning of the Volkogonov memoirs. After the discovery in early 1998 of Volkogonov's draft autobiography, VWWG analysts interviewed over twenty of Volkogonov's past associates and confidants. The information they provided has led the U.S. side to the following conclusions: Volkogonov believed that the purported KGB plan to "deliver knowledgeable Americans to the USSR for intelligence purposes" applied to American POWs; he briefed the plan to President Yeltsin and told his closest professional associates about his discovery; and he continued to believe until his death in December 1995 that the KGB plan could possibly have been implemented and hoped that it would become public knowledge through the publication of his memoirs.

The "735" and "1205" Documents

The "735" document purports to be a report by the North Vietnamese Workers' Party Secretary Hoang Anh to the Party’s 20th Plenum in Hanoi in December 1971/January 1972. In the report, Hoang Anh claims that the North Vietnamese were holding 735 American aviators at that time. The Commission believes that the document is a legitimate Soviet Military Intelligence (GRU) acquisition. During the September 1993 plenary session of the Joint Commission, the Russian side officially passed to the American side two pages of the document that specifically mentioned the subject of U.S. POWs. The U.S. Government received a copy of the entire document from Dr. Stephen Morris, a civilian researcher working in the Russian archives, who originally discovered the document.

The "1205" document purports to be a report to the North Vietnamese Workers' Party Politburo by General-Lieutenant Tran Van Quang on 15 September 1972. According to the report, Quang told the Politburo that Hanoi was holding 1,205 American POWs at that time, more than twice the number of POWs who were repatriated during Operation Homecoming in 1973. The U.S. side received eleven pages of this document which directly pertained to American POWs from the Russian side, but Dr. Stephen Morris, who discovered the document in January 1993 in Russian archives, provided the entire document for examination by American analysts.

The U.S. side of the VWWG considers the 735 and 1205 documents a top priority issue. Senator Smith met with General Quang in Vietnam in July 1993 and found his answers to questions about the origin, contents, and authenticity of the 1205 document evasive and unconvincing. Other U.S. Government officials also have interviewed Quang and Anh. The working group will continue to seek information about the manner in which the GRU acquired these documents, the source(s) from whom the documents were acquired, the manner in which these materials were handled by the Soviets after the documents were acquired, and the credibility assigned by the Soviets to these materials and their source(s).

The Russian side maintains that no such plan as that described in Volkogonov’s memoirs ever existed, and it denies that its archives hold the documents described by Volkogonov. Nevertheless, the U.S. continues to seek appropriate documentation that either would validate Russian assertions that no such plan existed, or would provide further details about the existence of the plan. At the request of the American side of the Joint Commission, the Vice President and the Secretary of State have raised this issue to their Russian counterparts through letters, brief discussions, and non-papers. The issue also has been raised repeatedly within the Joint Commission. As the U.S. Chairman of the Commission’s Vietnam War Working Group, Senator Bob Smith vigorously leads the American approach to Russian counterparts on this important issue.

Archival Access in the Former USSR Republics and the Eastern European Nations

The VWWG has obtained access to a number of important archives in non-Russian states of the former USSR. In the past five years, VWWG researchers have worked in defense ministry, Communist Party, and security archives of several former republics of the USSR, as well as in a number of archives in Eastern Europe. Support from these states for continued access to their archives is encouraging, and there is sufficient reason to believe that useful information might still be uncovered. Nonetheless, the most important archival information related to the fate of unaccounted-for American service members from the Vietnam War most likely resides in Russian archives.

Next Steps

The VWWG has actively pressed for official Russian support to the working group's humanitarian mission at all levels. In a number of important areas, obtaining such support has been challenging. In every forum available, however, the U.S. side of the working group will continue to urge a more active high-level involvement on the part of the Russian side.

The U.S. side of the working group is heartened by the prospect that it might soon obtain access to the Central Archives of the Russian Ministry of Defense at Podolsk. It is anticipated that materials will be forthcoming from these archives that will substantively contribute to the fullest possible accounting of missing Americans from the Vietnam War. The U.S. side of the working group will continue to press for the widest possible access to this and other Russian archives. Meanwhile, research in the archives of non-Russian republics of the former USSR, the U.S., and East European nations will continue.

http://www.aiipowmia.com/usg/jcsdrpt2001.html#vnwwg

HON. ROBERT K. DORNAN

in the House of Representatives

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 26, 1994

Mr. DORNAN. Mr. Speaker, I would like to enter into the Record the following editorial by Al Santoli which calls for immediate action, including public release of Government files, on American POW's and MIA's from Southeast Asia. I highly recommend this article to all of my colleagues and all Americans who are committed to finally getting the truth on these brave American servicemen.

[FROM THE WASHINGTON TIMES, JAN. 24, 1994]

(BY AL SANTOLI)
In the last battle of the Vietnam War, surviving American families and veterans are fighting to learn the fate of missing servicemen. Similar to victims of secret nuclear tests, they are trying to pry the truth from an entrenched bureaucracy that lacks adequate congressional or administrative oversight.

Many veterans now look to the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Gen. John Shalikashvili, to resolve the MIA tragedy with integrity and honor.

In an orchestrated campaign, U.S. civilian and military officials--supported by business consultants and publicists--praise Hanoi for `excellent cooperation' and `not holding anything back.' Hundreds of live sightings of American prisoners by Vietnamese, Lao and even a Japanese monk have been trivialized.

Pentagon analysts have debunked Soviet documents independently supported by testimony from unrelated sources. A tepid State Department statement admits that prisoners could have been held back in Laos under control of Hanoi. More poignantly, documents from still-secret Defense and CIA archives point to a multi-agency coverup.

Example: `Cold Spot' was a joint CIA-Air Force program to intercept North Vietnamese and Laotian Communist radio communications from 1971 to 1975. Americans flew electronic spy planes, and indigenous soldiers with CIA advisors conducted land-based operations. Some intercepts describe the movement and detention of U.S. prisoners--long after Operation Homecoming.

An Oct. 8, 1973, communique from the governor of Nghia Lo to the Minister of Defense in Hanoi confirmed the transfer of `112 USA pilots' from Lai Chau [near the Laotian border]. The `USA prisoners' were taken to a prison that previously held `Thai [captured in Laos] and Vietnamese' prisoners. And, `their snapshots were finished and I will send them to Hanoi to register with the Ministry of Defense . . . and names and ages of all will be attached.'

On Nov. 11, 1973, the governor of Sontay Province reported to the Minister of Defense in Hanoi: `112 USA prisoners in prison in Sontay Province.' He named a doctor who treated 10 prisoners with `pain in their hearts. . . . They are not in a good way. Therefore, I quickly send this cable for you to decide what to do.'

There is no record of U.S. officials cross-referencing these and other `Cold Spot' records with in-person interviews of Vietnamese officials, prison commanders and doctors named in the communiques.

In the past, intelligence analysts have debunked such documents using
a Murphy's Law gambit--that because the U.S. government had declared all prisoners returned, any contrary evidence must be false.

This `unprofessional . . . mindset to debunk' was harshly criticized in 1985-86 DIA internal evaluations. However, rather than replace the chastised analysts, the Clinton administration refused to investigate detailed accusations, and the same entrenched bureaucrats have been promoted to wrap up MIA investigations.

In the field, the most experienced U.S. expert, Garnett Bell--who has a near-photographic memory of the Vietnamese prison and military systems--was replaced as chief of the Pentagon's Hanoi office by young infantry officers lacking intelligence backgrounds, historical knowledge or language proficiency. These novices must deal with devious Vietnamese political officers, many of whom had decades of experience playing a shell game with French MIAs.

Media junkets are taken to observe groups of American soldiers digging for crash sites. On the other hand, dissenting intelligence officers state that during the war it was communist policy to scavenge crash sites and warehouse hundreds of U.S. remains that are continuously doled out as political chips.

Former investigators describe the Pentagon's Joint Task Force Full Accounting (JTFFA) as a $100 million per year `boondoggle manipulated by Vietnamese security officers' who accompany all JTFFA teams to interview villages.

In 1992, the JTFFA chief, Maj. Gen. Thomas Needham, shredded 20 years worth of original U.S. investigative files in Bangkok. And in a slick political maneuver, Sen. John Kerry had 120 boxes of potentially explosive National Security Agency files reclassified before Senate investigators could study them.

Clinton State Department pointmen Winston Lord and Ken Quinn are classic conflict-of-interest cases. In 1970, Mr. Lord helped to create the coverup of U.S. casualties in Laos. Henry Kissinger claims in `White House Years' (page 455) that Mr. Lord coordinated a National Security Council study that purposely misled President Nixon on U.S. forces lost in Laos.

CIA documents from 1967-68 show U.S. captives by name in specific Laotian prisons. In 1970 at CIA headquarters in Laos, Pat Mahoney, an Air Force expert in special operations, discussed photos of American prisoners and a wall map of prison sites. The CIA station chief said, `The politicians have tied our hands for launching rescues.'

The Vietnamese commander of the Ho Chi Minh Trail area of Laos who oversaw the movement and detention of U.S. prisoners there between 1964-72 was Gen. Tran Van Quang (quoted in the infamous Soviet document). Yet, neither Gen. John Vessey nor Winston Lord raised the issue of prisoners in Laos when they met with Gen. Quang.

On Jan. 18, 1993, a delegation from the American Legion met with Pentagon and administration officials and mentioned the `Cold Spot' archives. The officials gave no response. The Legion has filed a Freedom of Information Act request to gain access to the records and to prevent another shredding party by Gen. Needham or his inter-agency peers.

Before the administration rewards Hanoi's duplicity with any more political or economic concessions, Gen. Shalikashvili should make sure that all POW/MIA files--such as `Cold Spot'--are made public. He should meet with Mr. Smith and representatives of the major veterans and family organizations to review charges of malfeasance and coverup.

To conclude the Vietnam War with honor, a new team of experienced investigators of unimpeachable integrity must be appointed.

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?r103:E26JA4-166:

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