KEY TAKEAWAYS
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Since 2021, USIP’s Vietnam War Legacies and Reconciliation Initiative has contributed to stronger U.S.-Vietnam relations through research, communications and exchange about ongoing legacies of war in Indochina. One of our priorities is the location and identification of missing persons from all sides of the war — work that is being led by American and Vietnamese citizens together with both countries’ governments. An estimated 300,000 Vietnamese families are still waiting for information about the location of their loved ones lost in the war.
U.S. veterans and MIA families’ organizations have built cooperative links with their counterparts in Vietnam. The collaboration among these groups continues to facilitate the identification of U.S. and Vietnamese remains even as the 50th anniversary of the war’s end approaches in 2025.
This past June, USIP sponsored a delegation of U.S. veterans and families of MIA soldiers to visit former battle sites in Vietnam. Richard Magner, Bob Connor and Jeanie Jacobs Huffman were among the 7 American participants, and USIP Vietnam program manager Tô Thị Bảy organized and accompanied the delegation. They discuss their experiences on the trip, the progress made on locating and identifying the remains of missing soldiers, and why doing so is so important for reconciliation and healing.
Richard Magner: I was a member of a veterans’ delegation engaged in research on mass graves adjacent to former U.S. LZs (landing zones) and firebases. Together with our Vietnamese research partners, Nguyễn Xuân Thắng and Lâm Hồng Tiên, we presented 21 sets of documents and aerial photographs to provincial military commands of seven provinces: Đồng Nai, Bình Dương, Bình Phước, Tây Ninh, Bình Định, Quảng Ngãi and Quảng Nam.
These provincial militaries are responsible for excavating sites that may contain remains of fallen soldiers. And following our delegation’s visit, based on information we provided, authorities in Bình Phước found at least 41 remains in a mass grave by the runway at Lộc Ninh Air Base. This discovery represents a meaningful step in the healing process for the families of those who lost their lives during the Vietnam War and underscores the importance of ongoing dialogue and cooperation. We expect that more results will follow.
As a former helicopter pilot, I also appreciated seeing areas of southern Vietnam from the ground that I had known only from the air during the war. Of particular interest were the sites of LZ Bird in Bình Định, which was the subject of the “Fragments of Memory” documentary, and LZ Liz in Quảng Ngãi, which we have only begun to research.
In each province, we were ceremoniously greeted and hosted by authorities of the local military commands, representatives of the Vietnam Martyrs Family Support Association and the Vietnam Union of Friendship Organizations (VUFO). They made us feel most welcome. I am grateful to the veterans for their contributions and to our Vietnamese partners for their continued collaboration.
Bob Connor: This trip back to Vietnam was a rare opportunity to work directly with those accountable for the on-site search and excavation of mass graves. Some of our team met face-to-face for the first time when we arrived in Hanoi. It felt like light at the end of a long tunnel, because in most of the 20 cases I have researched since 2016, it has taken years to connect with eyewitnesses to ascertain the exact location of the graves.
And there were others I might never have had the opportunity to meet because their work is focused on finding U.S. MIAs. It is important to bring veterans, MIA families and Vietnamese counterparts together.
My involvement as a researcher began with the identification of two mass grave sites at Biên Hòa Air Base, where I served as a military policeman. And on this visit, we spent considerable and effective time discussing the positions of two additional graves near the gates of the air base. These sites hold at least 200 remains of the estimated 1,600 witnessed and documented at six known sites around Biên Hòa.
We presented the findings of our research to the base commander and Đồng Nai provincial authorities for future action. While we were at Biên Hòa, we also paid respect to an American killed in action in that battle, U.S. Air Force Captain Reginald Maisey, who died while resupplying a bunker.
In other locations we visited, I experienced two extremely important private visits that in time will produce informative and detailed facts by reliable witnesses concerning Vietnamese grave locations, as well as detailed information about the locations of six U.S. MIAs. Opportunities like these are never scripted in advance. But for this humanitarian project, unplanned encounters are sometimes the most effective way to help families of both sides.
Jeanie Jacobs Huffman: This was my first trip to Vietnam. My dad, U.S. Navy Commander Edward James Jacobs, Jr., disappeared there while his aircraft was conducting a night reconnaissance mission on August 25, 1967, when I was only 5 months old.
As an adult, I began to push forward with efforts to find him, with inspiration and motivation from my husband. Now, with this trip, I was finally going to a place that was always been so far away I had only read about it. It was a chance to help other MIA families and to be closer to where my dad disappeared.
Both sides have a common thread: They want closure and answers for our fallen and missing soldiers.
Growing up, I never knew the culture and history of this beautiful country or how many tears were shed by families in Vietnam, just like the tears we shed back home. We are a lot more alike than one realizes. While in Vietnam, I saw families from two countries, once enemies, come together as friends to move forward and heal. Both sides have a common thread: They want closure and answers for our fallen and missing soldiers.
Tô Thị Bảy: As USIP’s Hanoi-based program manager, I had the opportunity to guide the delegation southwards toward central Vietnam. When we reached Thanh Hóa province, thanks to the local Union of Friendship Organizations, we met with Vietnamese families who are still waiting for the return of their loved ones. There, everyone exchanged stories — Jeanie losing her father, Vietnamese men losing their fathers and brothers, women losing their husbands.
While she listened to the Vietnamese families’ stories, I could see that this experience was like therapy for Jeanie. She realized that many Vietnamese families shared the same pain, the same lack of closure, that her family and other American families suffered.
I could sympathize with the tears on both sides, as I also experienced family tragedies while growing up during wartime. My aunt and grandmother were killed in a bomb attack in 1966, and my parents were unable to return for the funeral. For both Jeanie and me, that pain has been transformed into a love of peace and desire for reconciliation.
Huffman: It struck me deeply how a war that ended over 50 years ago still burdens the wives, children and siblings of those who were lost. Both sides carry so much pain inside — and it hasn’t gone away.
While in Thanh Hóa, we had planned to take a boat to the coordinates where my dad’s aircraft had been lost near Hòn Mê Island. Unfortunately, we did not have permission to go, since the island is still a restricted military zone. Later that day, we drove down to the beach, the closest point I would be able to go and honor my dad and his crew. On the way, I asked Bảy if we could buy yellow flowers to take with us. I laid the flowers in the grainy sand and placed one POW-MIA bracelet around each flower honoring the crew of QuizShow09, the callsign of my father’s plane.
As I sat near the shore, I whispered a prayer under my breath. Then it hit me: How could I be so close to my dad and never have had a chance to know him, to hear his voice, or to feel his hugs? There was so much I wanted to say, but I was unable to get the words out. I looked at Bảy and she slipped off her shoes, rolled her pants up, and asked me to come into the water with her. We felt the waves splash against our legs, holding hands and looking out to where my dad’s plane rested just two miles from us. I knew that Bảy understood my emotions, as she had experienced so much pain in her life as well. At that moment, we became sisters.