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POW FLAG'S IMPORTANCE PERSEVERES LONG AFTER
VIETNAM WAR -- The flag remains a symbol to men
and
women who served in the military that POWs
matter.
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http://www.vawatchdog.org/07/
nf07/nfAUG07/nf081907-7.htm
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Story here...
http://www.thnt.com/apps/pbcs
.dll/article?AID=/20070902/COLU
MNISTS01/709020439
Story below:
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POW flag's importance perseveres long after
Vietnam War
by Rick Malwitz
Home News Tribune Online
On the occasion of India's Independence Day, an Indian flag was placed
below an American flag in the space where the POW-MIA flag normally
flies.
Veterans groups protested, and then came away satisfied after meeting
with Mayor Jun Choi.
"The mayor apologized to everyone there and this won't happen again,"
said Joe McNulty, commander of the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 3117.
The flag became part of the culture during the Vietnam War. It was
linked to pop culture when Slyvester Stallone's and Chuck Norris'
characters helped rescue POWs. Rutgers professor Wayne Franklin, author
of "MIA, Mythmaking in America," called the issue mythology, and says
the flag was introduced to win support for the American effort in
Vietnam.
By 1976, a congressional committee concluded there were no prisoners of
war alive in Vietnam, Korea or elsewhere. Thirty-one years later a
black-and-white flag with an image of a POW remains an issue. Why?
Recently George Lisicki of Carteret was named national commander of the
2.3 million-member Veterans of Foreign Wars. A Vietnam veteran, he has
returned to Vietnam twice, once joining volunteers with the Joint
POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC), who search for the remains of men
lost in the war.
He told me one story of a team that recovered a woman's high school
class ring, and were able to trace it to the girlfriend of a soldier
killed in Vietnam. He told of meeting a Vietnamese man who lost his
uncle in the war, and wished that Vietnam cared as much about its war
dead.
JPAC is based at Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii. It's motto: "Until
They Are Home." Since it was created in 2003, it has been identifying
remains of about six American war dead a month. When Congress proposed
eliminating JPAC from the budget, veterans groups showed their muscle,
and the $46 million budget was returned in 2006.
Staff Sgt. Elizabeth Feeney, stationed at Hickam, explained the mission.
"The military made a promise to these men and women when they went off
to war. Either they would return home safely, or an accounting would be
made of their remains. We are still upholding that," she said.
JPAC employs about 30 anthropologists, and has the largest skeletal
identification lab in the world. "It's a huge statement for us to make,"
said Feeney.
When remains from Pacific theaters of war are recovered and identified,
they are returned to American soil in Hawaii with an elaborate ceremony.
The oldest recovery came last year when the remains of Lt. Francis Lupo,
killed in World War I in the Second Battle of the Marne, were discovered
in 2003 by archaeologists. The identification was made by using
mitochondrial DNA evidence from his niece, and a scrap of a leather
wallet with his name. On Sept. 26, 2006, he was buried at Arlington
National Cemetery with full military honors.
Closer to home the issue of locating and identifying remains of victims
of Sept. 11 remains an emotional one. To this day some family members
have no evidence of their loved one. Those not affected would suggest
it's time to get beyond the absence of remains; families will hear
nothing of it.
According to Feeney, many anthropologists used in New York after Sept.
11 came from JPAC.
Though the image of a POW in a barbed-wire prison camp may no longer be
relevant, the flag remains a symbol to men and women who served in the
military that they matter, which is why the reaction of veterans and
their families in Edison is understandable.
Rick Malwitz's column appears Sundays and Thursdays. His Tuesday Musings
blog appears at www.thnt.com.
Rmalwitz@thnt.com, (732)
565-7291.
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Larry Scott --
