Some military families are still awaiting their veteran’s return — 50 years later | Opinion

This year marks 50 years since the last prisoner of war was released from captivity in Operation Homecoming in 1973. Most people look at the Vietnam War as ancient history, yet it has been 50 long years for refugees, veterans, surviving POWs and the 1,578 families (162 of whom are Californians, 64 of which reside in Northern California) awaiting full accounting for those missing in action.

This Veterans Day, let us honor all of those who served, including those who have yet to return from battle. Let us remember their stories and their families still awaiting closure.

Why has our government’s POW/MIA accounting promise fallen so short for the Vietnam War? In part, it’s due to a lack of pressure from constituents. Our youngest generations have only heard about the Vietnam War in passing. Textbooks and history classes treat it as an afterthought given that we “lost” (compared to the great victory we achieved in World War II). But the tragedy in not facing our failures is to not learn from it and prevent making the same mistakes as we face new wars.

Educating others about the Vietnam War and mistakes made has become my mission, as has advocacy for MIA families. I am the proud daughter of Air Force Veteran and Second Lieutenant Michael R. Moore, a Sacramento State graduate who was drafted and piloted secret intelligence missions to identify targets along the Ho Chi Minh Trail from 1972 to 1973.

Tragedy struck other members of his 361st Tactical Electronic Warfare Squadron stationed at Ubon Royal Thai Airforce Base. The Baron 52 mission was downed by enemy fire over Southern Laos on February 5, 1973, a week after the Peace Accords were signed and just one week prior to the return of the POWs. Of the eight men on board, three pilots and the navigator were identified in a brief search and rescue mission, but no trace of the four intelligence “backenders” from the 6994th Security Squadron was found. All were deemed killed in the crash — despite contrary evidence on the survivability of how the plane descended and crashed.

Baron 52 was a major focus of a Senate Select Committee for POW/MIA affairs in 1992. A 1993 site investigation in Laos yielded only dog tags, one tooth and a few tiny bone fragments that were never DNA tested by government labs to confirm whether they were human or animal remains (due to rudimentary DNA technology at the time). Despite this inconclusive evidence, officials declared the case closed. Despite push back from Senate Select Committee Co-Chair Bob Smith, the items were declared to officially represent all of the men in the crash and were buried in a single casket with a formal ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery.

Since my father passed away in 2017, I have spent countless hours in my Placer County home examining this case and learning why it haunted him for decades. In 2020, I joined forces with the Matejov family, whose family member is among one of the missing, to push for reopening Joe Matejov’s case given the wealth of declassified documents that continue to point toward the government’s premature declaration of “killed in action” without solid evidence.

We need the public’s help to pressure their U.S. representatives to support the promise of a full accounting for all remaining MIA cases.

Public support to pressure for better accounting is elusive if our younger generations are not informed of the problem of MIA accounting. President Richard Nixon promised a full accounting for those still missing when Operation Homecoming ended in 1973, yet more than 1,500 still have not returned. We are losing more than 500 Vietnam Veterans per day who deserve that closure. There is no time to waste.

Talking about the war helps remove the stigma for those still traumatized, including veterans and their families as well as refugees and younger family members. Support those still fighting for answers on missing loved ones and those who fled still bearing the scars of that trauma.

We must help each other heal those wounds and discover lessons to prevent these mistakes from being repeated in Ukraine or the Middle East. Seek out organizations like Legacies of War, where I am a board member, which advocates for the removal of leftover unexploded bombs in war-torn countries of Southeast Asia.

Please educate yourself about the politics of the war and the lesser known but most damaging acts of the war in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. The parallels to our own political climate are astounding.