Airmen search for fallen heroes in Southeast Asia

  • Published
  • By Jillian K. Speake
  • Air Education and Training Command Public Affairs
RANDOLPH AIR FORCE BASE, Texas (AFPN) --  When Master Sgt. Delbert Anderson received his deployment assignment to Southeast Asia, he said he did not anticipate his definition of patriotism would change forever.

Sergeant Anderson, superintendent of trainer aircraft operations for life support in the Air Education and Training Command’s directorate of operations here, volunteered to spend 45 days in Laos. He was there to help Joint Prisoners of War and Missing in Action Accounting Command officials recover remains of fallen or missing servicemembers,

The command, located on the island of Oahu in Hawaii, is responsible for the fullest possible accounting of those missing people. To accomplish this, the command is organized into five main areas: analysis, negotiations, investigations, recovery and identification.

Teams visit Southeast Asia about 10 times a year hoping to bring home remains of Americans still unaccounted for. Missions typically last 35 to 60 days, depending on the location, terrain and recovery methods.

“I liked the idea of going to where the war was fought, being where guys before us had been and seeing the terrain and the conditions that were out there,” Sergeant Anderson said. “I wanted to walk where they walked and see what they saw.”

The surreal idea of visiting the battle site where several servicemembers lost their lives quickly became a somber reality when members of the recovery team began reviewing packages with detailed information about the missing people they were looking for. The information in the packages included everything from the type of aircraft they were flying and their last known location to the color of their hair and type of glasses they wore.

“When I first went to Laos, I was just going to a dig site,” Sergeant Anderson said. “But once I got out there and started going through the packages, seeing the faces and the names of the people we were looking for, it became more personal because I was looking for people now.”

A typical search-and-recovery team consists of 10 to 14 people with specialized duties and skills including anthropology, photography, explosive ordnance disposal, medicine, life support, mortuary affairs, linguistics and radio communications.

Investigative work, safety, accessibility and available weather windows dictate which sites the recovery teams excavate.

Once the recovery team arrives at the site, they spend the majority of the day digging and sifting through soil. Any material or remains found that might be items from wreckage are placed in buckets and brought back to a base camp for further analysis.

As a life-support technician, Sergeant Anderson helped determine the significance and possible origins of the collected items. In his day-to-day career, Sergeant Anderson works closely with the equipment pilots wear so he is able to look at wreckage and tell, for example, if it is part of a parachute or a mask. From Sergeant Anderson’s conclusions, recovery teams are able to narrow down possible sites where human remains might be.

Each recovery team has a different excavation site and is cautioned ahead of time that not every site produces the desired results.

“I think it was a personal challenge for me to not get too tied up into trying to solve the case and bring closure,” Sergeant Anderson said. “I found myself out there talking to the guys I was looking for saying, ‘Come on, I know you want to be found. Help me.’ It was a surprise to me that I would get hooked in that much.”

Master Sgt. Randy Hill, a life-support trainer here at AETC headquarters, did not find any remains on his first mission to Vietnam so he has volunteered for a second deployment.

“I went to provide closure to a family and be part of that mission, and I didn’t do that,” Sergeant Hill said. “When I went to Washington, D.C., last year and went to the (Vietnam Wall), there were my two guys with a missing-in-action symbol by their names. It doesn’t leave you. You never forget those names and what you did, and in the future, you want to see that emblem come off.”

Many servicemembers who died in battle have yet to get the welcome home they deserve, Sergeant Anderson said.

“There are a lot of heroes that never got a hero’s welcome, especially in Vietnam,” Sergeant Anderson said. “We’re trying to get some of that recognition back that those guys missed out on.”

As of February, there is one American still missing from the Gulf War; more than 1,800 from the Vietnam War; 120 from the Cold War; 8,100 from the Korean War; and 78,000 from World War II, according to JPAC figures.

Although Sergeant Anderson left for Southeast Asia with hopes of understanding the challenges faced by servicemembers before him, he returned with much more.

“I felt like I was repatriated by going out there,” Sergeant Anderson said. “I like the idea that if I do get captured or die out in combat that somebody’s going to be looking for me. Here it is 30 to 40 years later, and we’re still out there searching for people’s remains to bring them home. You can’t get that support probably anywhere but our military.”

Sergeant Anderson tells families anxiously waiting for their loved one’s return to “have faith because we are going out there every opportunity to find their remains and believe that we’re going to be out there until they come home.”

For more information on JPAC, visit www.jpac.pacom.mil. (Courtesy of AETC News Service)