Get Well Wishes to Laverne Ransbottom, mother of POW/MIA Lt. Frederick Ransbottom and Jan Visconti, wife of POW/MIA Major Frank Visconti. We missed you at the meeting and hope you are feeling better.

We Survived Another Forum - we've got lots to tell you about the forum, but most of that will have to wait until our next Bits.

This edition will be devoted to Navy Capt. Scott Speicher, the two Gulf War I KIA/BNR's, Navy pilots Robert Dwyer and Barry Cook, and the crew of an Air Force AC 130, Paul Weaver Arthur Galvan; John P. Blessinger; Dixon L.Walters, Jr.; Paul G. Buege; Barry M. Clark; Thomas C. Bland Jr.; William D. Grimm; Timothy R. Harrison; Robert K. Hodges; Damon V. Kanuha; James B. May II; John L. Oelschlager; and Mark J. Schmauss.

As you read this Bits, please remember that July 12th is Scott Speicher's 46th Birthday. We all hope and pray that it is his last Birthday in captivity.

New Evidence - If you've watched the news, over the last few days, you know that new information has surfaced in the Speicher case. Senator Bill Nelson returned this past week, from a 1 day fact-finding trip to Baghdad. He is reporting "new and highly classified" information on Speicher, but stressed that he does not know if Speicher is alive or not. Although, he is optimistic that the case will be resolved.

During his July 6/7 visit to Baghdad, Senator Nelson visited the cell in Hakmiyah Prison, where the initials M S S, along with a smaller H were found. During his visit to the cell, Nelson took rubbings of those initials, and displayed them for the media. This event directly contradicts information presented by representatives of DPMO at the National Alliance of Families Forum.

First... The New Evidence - On July 10th, MSNBC and NBC News reported "The U.S. military has found a document referring to Lt. Cmdr. Michael Scott Speicher, the Navy pilot whose fate has remained a mystery since his fighter jet was shot down over Iraq on the first night of the 1991 Gulf War, U.S. officials told NBC News on Thursday."

"The officials said analysts were working to determine the meaning of the 90-page document, dated January 2003, which listed prisoners of war held by the government of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein."

"The document includes Speicher's name, officials said. It could not immediately be determined whether it included any dates or locations where Speicher might have been held, but in April, U.S. investigators found Speicher's initials carved into the wall of a cell in the Hakmiyah prison in Baghdad...."

"Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., who has pressed the government to resolve the question of Speicher's fate, told reporters Wednesday after visiting the Hakmiyah prison that new information gave him reason to be optimistic that the mystery could be solved. He said he could not elaborate because the information was highly classified."

"U.S. officials cautioned that the document did nothing to clarify what really happened to Speicher 12 years ago or whether he was still alive. The recent date could mean Iraqi officials were hastily trying to create an accurate record of POWs or that they were falsifying a document to mislead U.S. investigators, they said."

The Nelson Visit... The Cell - On July 7th, First Coast News out of Jacksonville Florida reported "Nelson spent much of Monday seeing first hand what the public has only seen in pictures; the alleged initials of MSS scrawled upon a wall. The hope is that Michael Scott Speicher once stayed in the cell where those letters were found. Nelson says that the carvings look to have been there for a while and noted that they can tell because of the paint that is on the walls."

"DNA test results are still not back from the prison cell wall. Nelson says he has no idea what is causing the delay in the DNA test results but says he does know that samples taken are being analyzed in Washington DC. He says, "I have been pessimistic and for the first time I'm optimistic."

The Contradictory Information - On Friday June 27th, during the Question and Answer session, with DPMO, one of our members asked about the cell and the initials. Unfortunately, we don't have our video tapes of the meeting (more about the tape jinx in our next Bits.)

However, in our attempt to confirm our memory of the answer, we did find a member who had a hand held recorder and taped the question and answer. We do not have a copy of the tape, yet. However, our member was kind enough to duplicate the relevant section into a computer wav file and emailed it to us.

The questions & answers were transcribed as follows:

Question: "My question is to you, Mr. Cronauer. Where is the piece from the jail cell. Do we have this back in the United States and are we testing it...and have we tested the jail cell to find out any more information?"

*****

Comment: You can hear muffled discussion and one individual says "I can answer that" and Mr. Cronauer tells indicates he should do so.

*****

Answer: "Yes, the answer to the question is...Yes, we have that portion of the wall, Yes it is in the United States and Yes, it is being examined by a forensic laboratory."

Question: "And how long will that take?"

Answer: "I can't tell you that. I can tell you that it has been here for about the last three weeks."

Question: "So we will have some answers very shortly then...it won't take years, since they have that piece?"

Answer: "Well that...the...I can't give you a specific time, in terms of how long it will take them to run all of the different tests that they can run. There is a limited amount of information that we can get from that piece of wall. We can find out, perhaps, how long ago his initials were put in the wall. Unless there is a blood or some sort of DNA sample near the initials, we cannot necessarily say who put those initials in the wall. But a whole series of tests is being conducted right now and like I said, I don't have a time frame for when those....Let me just say this. That particular bit of evidence is not under the control right now of the Defense Prisoner of War Missing Personnel Office. There are entities in country, in Iraq right now, who are looking...who are gathering evidence for war crimes prosecution. So other elements of the government are looking at this. If Speicher was in fact captured and was alive for a period of time after the downing, and he was killed, then this is potentially evidence to charge those involved in the former Iraq regime with. So that evidence is on that side of the house right now, not just the US Army, CILHI, the Central Identification lab....

Question: "We're kind of on a time limit here, so I wanted to know...What's being done with the rest of the jail cell. Have they made any....I mean just because they have this one piece of block, there could be something in that jail cell...and is it top priority?"

Answer: "Yes, of course......The jail cell....

Question: "But it won't take a long time if it's a top priority, on the front burner?"

Answer: " It has already been done. The jail cell has already been done. There is a considerable amount of effort, ongoing, in Iraq at this time. Every single known detention facility, jail cell......

Question: "Okay, Okay...we're on a time line....

To hear the tape, visit http://www.nationalalliance.org/gulf/audio.htm

On June 27th, based on information provided by a DPMO representative, we believed the section of the jail wall bearing the initials M S S along with the smaller H was in the United Stated.

We would never have questioned this, had we not seen a July 7th photo of Senator Bill Nelson, in Baghdad, displaying rubbings of the two sets of initials take from the cell wall. Did he bring the rubbings to Baghdad or did he do them during his visit? If he did them during his visit, how and when was the section of the cell wall returned to Baghdad?

Dolores Alfond contacted Senator Nelson's office and spoke with Gretchen Hitchner. Ms. Alfond was told the only thing taken out the cell was material for DNA testing including a hair. Ms. Hitchner also said "the cell is intact."

On June 27th, DPMO says the section of the cell with the initials is in the United States and had been for three weeks.

On July 7th, Senator Bill Nelson displays rubbings of the initials taken from the wall of the cell in Baghdad. A member of his staff, says "the cell is intact."

We should note, that the DPMO representative did say "That particular bit of evidence is not under the control right now of the Defense Prisoner of War Missing Personnel Office."

Perhaps DPMO was provided incorrect information, by another agency involved with the search for Speicher. This would raise very serious questions, as to why one agency involved in the search for Speicher would mislead another.

The other possibility is that at some point the section of cell wall, with the initials was moved to the U.S., tested, returned to Iraq and set back in place within the cell and that Senator Nelson's staff was unaware of this activity.

Which do you think is more likely? DPMO presented inaccurate information. DPMO was given false information and unknowingly passed it on. Senator Nelson's staff spoke in error and was unaware the section of wall has been transported back to the U.S. for testing and then returned and reinstalled in the cell in Baghdad. If we get further information on this, we will pass it on.

"And Three From the Gulf War..." That was the phrase used in the 2002 Presidential Proclamation for POW/MIA Recognition Day, listing the unaccounted for from America's 20th century wars. Yet, today we hear nothing about the two Navy flyers declared Killed in Action whose remains have never been recovered.

Navy Officers Barry Cook and Robert Dwyer are two of the "three from the Gulf War." Cook was aboard the A-6 along with Patrick Connor. Aircraft wreckage, along with remains eventually washed up on shore. The remains were returned to the United States and identified as Patrick Connor. There was no trace of Cook.

Robert Dwyer was flying an F/A 18, like Speicher. According to his wife, Dwyer made "feet wet" and that was the last anyone heard of him.

What about Navy pilots Cook and Dwyer?

..... And What About The Reports Of Remains Of Air Force Personnel Held In Iraq - Let's start with the official Air Force position. A letter from the Air Force, dated December 13, 2000, to the National Alliance of Families stated; "Air Force members who were listed as KIA-BNR have been recovered and identified either individually or as a group. We do not have any unaccounted members from that (Gulf War) conflict."

Yet, a May 30th 2003, report filed by David Martin of CBS News states: "New evidence has surfaced in the case of Scott Speicher, the U.S. Navy pilot shot down on the first night of the first Gulf War in 1991. Speicher was initially reported killed, but later listed as missing, his fate unknown...."

"... the new information comes from documents turned over to an American intelligence officer, who cannot be identified, by a former general in the Iraqi Air Force. After the two men examined them for three hours, the American told the Iraqi, "This brings to a close one of the great sticking points" in the 12-year saga of what happened to Speicher."

"Specifically, the documents appear to solve the grisly mystery of a pound and a half of human flesh that has been at the heart of the Speicher case. The Iraqis turned those remains over to the U.S. in 1991, identifying them only as "Michael," which is Speicher's proper first name."

"When the DNA did not match Speicher's, the Americans suspected the Iraqis of trying to trick them into thinking the Navy pilot was dead while they continued to hold him captive. The U.S. was never able to identify the remains, but the documents, some of them top-secret Iraqi memos, identify them as belonging to an Air Force pilot shot down a month after Speicher. The Pentagon will now retest those remains against the DNA of the dead Air Force pilot to finally make a positive identification."

If these remains are actually those of a member of the Air Force, the Air Force could have a problem. Remember, the Air Force stated in 2000; "Air Force members who were listed as KIA-BNR have been recovered and identified either individually or as a group. We do not have any unaccounted members from that (Gulf War) conflict."

The best case scenario is that the remains are partial remains of a previously identified Air Force member. Worse case... there was a misidentification of remains or these are the remains of an Air Force member who was identified and buried based on association to identifiable remains of another airman..

To our knowledge there was only one group identification, during Gulf War I. That identification involved an AC130 manned by Paul Weaver, Arthur Galvan, John P. Blessinger, Dixon L.Walters, Jr., Paul G. Buege, Barry M. Clark, Thomas C. Bland Jr., William D. Grimm, Timothy R. Harrison, Robert K. Hodges, Damon V. Kanuha, James B. May II, John L. Oelschlager, and Mark J. Schmauss.

This week, we learned that the report of remains, of American Airmen held in Iraq, may not have come as that big of a surprise to U.S. officials. One July 11th, Bill Gertz, in his "Inside the Ring" column for the Washington Times reported: "We have obtained a classified report from the Pentagon dated Dec. 9, 1991, that quotes an Iraqi refrigerator technician. The technician said he saw the bodies of three American servicemen that were being kept at a morgue of the Al Rashidia hospital in Baghdad."

"The report, labeled "secret," states that while the technician was making repairs on the hospital's refrigeration unit, he was told that the Iraqis were holding the three Americans' bodies in the morgue and was shown their identification cards."

"The bodies were covered in dried blood and had grayish uniforms with U.S. Air Force insignia. The source also said he had seen the bodies of a Saudi soldier and a British soldier at the morgue."

"It could not be learned what action was taken to pursue the technician's claims. But the report, sent from the Defense Attache Office in Amman, Jordan, is the kind of intelligence information that a special team now in Iraq is pursuing to resolve the case of a missing Navy pilot, Capt. Michael Scott Speicher. He was lost when his F-18 was shot down in January 1991 near Baghdad."

"So far, Capt. Speicher's fate has not been determined, although new evidence was uncovered in Iraq in the form of the initials "MSS" carved into a prison wall."

Let's Do The Debunking Of the 1991 Report - The source lied. The source actually saw Navy insignia and, lo and behold, we've accounted for Speicher, Dwyer and Cook. However, that still leaves the remains returned in 1991 and it doesn't explain away the live sighting report of Speicher in the Hakmiyah Prison, in the mid 1990's. Nor, does it explain away the fact that the initials M S S were found on the wall of the Haymiyah Prison. But, wait a minute "M" Mohammad.

Reality Check - The United State Government would NEVER have changed Scott Speicher's status to Missing/Captured, effectively raising him from the dead, had they not had overwhelming and very persuasive evidence that he could very well be alive.

No one in the government wanted to be in the position of dealing with a "dead man walking." To put the best spin on the situation, Speicher was resurrected. The simple fact is, and we have pointed this out on numerous occasions, there is more public evidence available on Vietnam and Korea cases to support their status change than to support a change of status on Speicher.

In Vietnam and Korea, there are cases of individuals seen by other Americans, photographed in captivity, heard on enemy radio, interviewed by foreign media and last, but not least, individuals with NO proof of death. Yet, no status change is under consideration in these cases.

We believe Speicher's status was changed, to avert the potential embarrassing situation of an American Serviceman, left behind by his government, returning from the dead. For a nation that falsely prides itself on leaving no man behind, that would be truly embarrassing.

We will leave you with a comment, relayed to us [yes, that makes it second hand hearsay, but it doesn't make it wrong] by one of our family members. While attending the annual government briefings in Washington D.C., this family member had many conversations with various military and civilian employees involved in the governments POW effort.

One of those individuals, a member of the military, told this family member...

"I told my [redacted] that if I ever go missing.... hire someone to find me."

Note: we have redacted who the military member was referring to ie: mother/father, sister/brother, husband/wife, son/daughter, aunt/uncle/cousin, so as not to provide any clue to this individuals identity.

"I told my [redacted] that if I ever go missing.... hire someone to find me."

That's quite a statement coming from a member of America's military involved with the effort to find and recover POWs and MIAs.

Think about it!

While Your Thinking About It - Remember to call, fax or write your Congressional Representative and ask that he support H. RES 103 to establish in the "House of Representatives a Select Committee to be known as the Select Committee POW and MIA Affair."

According to the legislation: "The select committee shall conduct a full investigation of all unresolved matters relating to any United States personnel unaccounted for from the Vietnam era, the Korean conflict, World War II, Cold War Missions, or Gulf War, including MIA's and POW's."

We have posted a list of all 435 Congressional Representatives, along with phone and fax numbers. You can find the list at http://www.nationalalliance.org/leg/list.htm Just find your state and look for your Congressional Representative. If you represent a statewide organization, contact all your Representatives.

Make the call and send the faxes, if you have already done that.... do it again!

This is very important and we need your help.

Why does Johnie Webb still have a job????????