‘Of all people, you would think he would have pushed and pushed for a COMPLETE accounting of all of his fellow POW/MIAs. Pox on both of those sellouts.’
This is how ‘reasonable, sane, statesmanlike, Beltway Establishment Republicans think about such an issue:
The Viet Commies are never under any circumstances own up to the deaths of the fifty or more POW’s they themselves stated that they held prisoner and then denied ever saying such a thing when the 1973 POW exchange took place. Even more they will never admit to having any unacknowledged (publicly unacknowledged that is , what Kissinger and RN knew is another matter), POWs that they held back as a guarantee for the big payoff RN verbally promised the Viets through Kissinger and then made it clear to the commies by never breathing a word of it that they had been taken. Presumably these Americans were just liquidated , if there were any, when the Viets realized they had been played by the K and RN team. So if the commies are never going to admit these things lets just let the dead bury the dead and move on to a more ‘productive’ relationship. There will be some good optics to be gotten and there will be opportunities for campaign donators to do deals with the Viets for something or other . Nothing else makes any sense to a Beltway type. Today’s poll numbers and a 2 minute spot on CBS Evening News trumps anything else.
There is no sense of honor or even basic virtue and humanity Inside the Beltway it is all relative advantage and opportunities for favorable publicity and kickbacks from ‘donators’.
Unfortunately It Is All About The Money To The Beltway Occupants