Appointing a Permanent Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for POW/MIA Affairs -- As you know the DASD position was vacated in December with the long overdue resignation of Jerry D. Jennings. Currently in place is a transition team led by Mr. Robert Newberry. We expect the transition team to be in place from 3 – 6 months, while issues of concern are addressed within DPMO and a new DASD is chosen.

The National Alliance of Families, along with the Korea/Cold War Families of the Missing, the Korean War POW/MIA Network, the Coalition of Families of Korean & Cold War POW/MIAs, the POW Network, Help Free POW*MIA's Now, the Northeast POW/MIA Network, and the Prisoner of War/ Missing in Action CT Forget-Me-Nots, Inc have all endorsed Mr. Norman Kass for the position of Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (DASD) for POW/MIA Affairs.

We urge you all to contact President Bush at President@whitehouse.gov and voice your support for Mr. Kass. If you've already sent a message, send another. Organizations should also send letter to: Mr. Peter Rodman, Assistant Secretary of Defense for For International Security Affairs, The Pentagon, Washington, D.C. 20301

This is the most important thing you can do for the POW/MIA issue right now. DPMO needs strong honest leadership and Mr. Kass is the man to provide it.

Restoring the POW Status/Designation, POW vs. MIA-C… – DPMO continues to mislead Congressional representatives inquiring about the lack of a POW designation for captured service personnel like Scott Speicher and Matt Maupin. We all understand that the POW designation exists internationally, as provided for under the Geneva Conventions.

We object to is the "domestic," DPMO's word not ours, designation of captured service personnel as Missing-Captured. DPMO would simply like everyone to believe that MIA-C has always been the designation for captured service personnel. But that is simply not true. As shown in our Bits N Pieces newsletter of May 7, 2005, the designation during the Vietnam War and before was POW. Official U.S. records list captured servicemen as POW or PW.

Nowhere has anyone found nor has DPMO produced a record or document carrying the designation "Missing-Captured," or any of its variations "Missing/Capture" "MIA-C" or "MIA/C." You will find documents that state; a serviceman is missing. You will also find documents that state a serviceman is captured. Nowhere have we found a document that states a serviceman is in an MIA-C status.

We now challenge DPMO to produce a document from the records of any POW unaccounted for in Southeast Asia, showing their status as "Missing-Captured" "Missing/Captured" "MIA-C" or "MIA/C." Many families of known POWs signed waivers releasing their files to the Library of Congress; so, there should be no issue of privacy involved in our challenge. DPMO should readily be able to produce documents showing known POWs from the war in Southeast Asia in the status/designation of "Missing-Captured" "Missing/Captured" "MIA-C" or "MIA/C."

To Our Readers – who continue to receive congressional responses to there inquiries on a POW status, we know those responses continue to regurgitate the misleading statements of DPMO. We suggest you print out our May 7, 2005 newsletter, http://www.nationalalliance.org/bits/naf2005/050507.htm and send it to your congressional representative. Have them ask DPMO why all documentation referring to captured service personnel from the war in Southeast Asia indicate the serviceman is in a POW or PW status. Have them ask DPMO to produce a document relating to captured service member from the Vietnam War that uses the status "Missing-Captured" "Missing/Captured" "MIA-C" or "MIA/C." They might also ask why the DD1300 "Correction of Records for Roger Dumas states; "he was in a Prisoner of War status from 4 Nov. 1950 to 24 Feb. 1954."

We've produced several documents, and possess many more, indicating the status of a captured service member, from the war in Southeast Asia, to be either POW or PW, or that their status should be changed from Missing to POW or PW.

We now challenge DPMO to produce one document, just one, that says a recognized captured service member from war in Southeast Asia that shows his status to be "Missing-Captured" "Missing/Captured" "MIA-C" or "MIA/C."

Why is the POW Status/Designation Important – Within the last two weeks, we saw an Op/Ed piece referring to Sgt. Matt Maupin as "kidnaped" in Iraq.

Dead Man Walking, H.Res 123 – as of Feb. 23rd H.Res 123 had 27 cosponsors far short of the 52 cosponsors its predecessor H.Res 103 when it died at the end of the 2004 session of Congress. Technically, H.Res 123 is still alive. However, it is still in committee. There is no indication that the Rules Committee will schedule a vote H.Res 123, a requirement before it can go to the full House for a vote.

Even if voted out of committee and passed on the floor, this House Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs would last only until the end of this session of Congress, in December 2006. Factoring in Easter, Summer and Campaign recesses (this is an election for all 435 members of the House,) there would not be enough time to form a committee, hire a staff and conduct the kind of investigation needed… H.Res 123, Dead Man Walking…

Government Agencies Reclassify Previously Declassified Material – The New York Times reported, on Feb. 21, that once declassified material held at the National Archives is undergoing reclassification. According to the NY Times, this ongoing secret effort began seven years ago.

One document reclassified, according to the NY Times is a Central Intelligence Agency report dated April 27, 1951. The report is based on a September 12, 1950 request by the State Department to provide an "intelligence estimate on Chinese Communist intentions concerning intervention in Korea."

On October 12, 1950 the Director of the CIA forwarded the intelligence estimate to the President. "The estimate indicated that full-scale Chinese Communist intervention in Korea, barring a Soviet decision for global war, was not probably in 1950."

Some two weeks later 300,000 Chinese troops crossed the border and joined forces with the North Koreans against South Korean, American and United Nations forces.

We can certainly see why the CIA would want this memo reclassified. It clearly shows analytical errors are not new to the CIA. As pointed out in an editorial in the Seattle-Post Intelligencer, this reclassification of documents may be nothing more than a program of CYA…. "Cover your Arsenal."

Is this reclassification effort to protect national security or to cover national embarrassment?

You decide…

Below is a list of agency withdrawals including number of pages withdrawn as of Jan. 13, 2006, excluding the Department of Energy.

Source National Archives and Records Administration. For more on the re-classification of previously declassified documents visit the National Security Archives at http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/

How Does This Re-Classification Program Impact the POW/MIA Issue – The short answer is…. We don't know. We do know that at least one previously declassified document was reclassified when release to the National Archives.

During a 2002 trip to the National Archives, to review records of the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs, release as a result of a Mandatory Declassification Request file by Roger Hall, we located a heavily redacted memo signed by General Eugene Tighe with an attached chronology. The memo dealt the efforts to verify POWs held at Nhommarath in Laos. We recognized the document immediately.

Two years before; we located the same document, almost completely declassified in the Library of Congress. In September of 2000, we wrote about the document in our newsletter and posted it on our web site.

We also posted the 2002 find on our web site on July 12, 2002 and again wrote about the document, in its redacted format. You can view both the declassified and re-classified document on our web site click here.

While we have no way of knowing if the Tighe memo, is among the 55,000+ pages reclassified in the seven year secret program, we do know that the CIA when reviewing files of the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs, reclassified the Tighe memo.

We can only assume that other POW/MIA documents relating to Korea, the Cold War and Vietnam have also been reclassified.

Why does Johnie Webb still have a job?

National Alliance of Families 17th Annual Forum is scheduled for June 22th - 24th, 2006. Hotel information to follow. We have no idea if DPMO will again hold a concerned citizens briefing. As soon as we hear anything, we will let you know.

Our forum is conducted to coincide with the Governments annual Vietnam POW/MIA Family Briefings. We urge all family members to attend this years' government briefing. The government will provide free airfare to two family members to attend the government briefings. There is no charge or registration fee to attend the government briefings and you do not have to belong to any organization to attend these briefings.

The Alliance is an all volunteer organization. Our meetings are open to all, without charge. At this time of year, we actively seek contributions to finance our forum. If you wish to contribute, donations may be mailed to: