National Alliance Of Families
For the Return of America's Missing Servicemen
+ World War II + Korea + Cold War + Vietnam +

Dolores Apodaca-Alfond, National Chairperson, voice/fax 1-425-881-1499
Lynn O'Shea, NYS Director, voice/fax 1-718-846-4350



warrant officer training courses mentioned that foreign inmates- - were held in Syktyvkar during the fifties and sixties. While he was guard at the inter-oblast MVD/KGB hospital (ITK-12) in St. Petersburg, Minayev maintained that as recently as three years ago he saw foreign inmates brought there and secretly treated in a separate hospital wing in a ward for "imperialist intruders."F81

Sighting No. 4. On 26 March 1993, in response to the advertisement placed in the Russian newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta, Alekandra Yakovelevna Istogina called TFR-M to report that her husband, Leonid Sidko, had met an American POW in Minlag Camp, Inta, which is located south of Vorkuta in the Komi ASSR. She stated that Sidko had met and served with the American from 1953 to 1954, whose name he remembered as Alek Muller Zayolitz. According to Istogina, her husband had described him as approximately 30 years old, had dark hair, and spoke Russian well. She said her husband indicated that the American was transferred with several Germans to Moscow in 1954.F82

Sighting No. 5. On 6 April 1993, TFR-M team members received a letter at the U.S. Embassy in Talinn from Mr. Elmar Vesker. Mr. Vesker stated that after Stalin's death in March 1953, an American named Boris Holtzman, was taken to Schahto Kapitalnaya Camp 75/1 in Vorkuta. The American spoke some Estonian and fluent English and Russian. He was about 175-180 cm tall, stout, round-faced, curly-haired. Mr. Veskar stated that the American was sent to the Soviet Union from China and captured. He was first imprisoned in a special camp in Moscow after which he was taken to Vorkuta.F83

Sighting No. 6. On 15 April 1993, TFR-M team members in Talinn, Estonia, received a letter from Mrs. Lidia Hallemaa. Mrs. Hallemaa enclosed a photo, taken in 1955 in a prison camp in Vorkuta, where her brother Otto Adler had been imprisoned. Adler told his sister that three or four Americans were imprisoned in the same camp. Mr. Adler is now dead.

81 Amembassy Moscow Message, 281821Z Mar 93, Subject: POW/MIA: Interview With Former Prison Guard Grigoriy Minayev St. Petersburg.

82 Amembassy Moscow Message, 060913Z Apr 93, Subject: POW/MIA Team - Moscow: Weekly Activity Report 12/93, March 21 to 27, 1993.

83 Amembassy Talinn Message, 201028Z Apr 93, Subject: POW/MIA: Information from Residents of Estonia.

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Sightings in Khabarovsk


Sighting No. 7. Japanese POWs. A Japanese POW from World War II repatriated from POW Camp No. 21 at Khabarovsk, stated that (1) he had heard from a camp guard that two Americans had been brought to Khabarovsk prison and were being investigated as spies; (2) he had heard from Soviet guards, prisoners, and laborers in April and May 1953 that 12 or 13 Americans, crew members of a military plane shot down by the Soviets were in a Khabarovsk prison; (3) he heard from prisoners in 1951 or early 1952 that an American fisherman, captured in the Gulf of Alaska, was brought to the Magadan region; and (4) he heard from a guard on a Soviet prisoner train at No. 2 station, Khabarovsk, in about June 1952 that there was a prison camp in the USSR for Americans only. Another Japanese reported that he had heard from the chief of the POW camp at Debin in October 1953 that an American Air Force officer was in a military hospital 500 miles north of Magadan (location unlocatable due to phonetic rendering). He reported that the officer had been sentenced to 25 years in prison in 1925 as a suspected spy.F84

Sighting No. 8. On 4 August 1992, Task Force Russia-Moscow team members interviewed Vladimir Yakovlevich Voronin, a prisoner in Semipalatinsk, who claimed to have met three Americans while serving an earlier sentence from 1951 to 1953 at the 5th Lagpunkt in Khabarovsk.

To the best of Voronin's recollection, the three Americans arrived at the camp in October 1952, and departed two months later. Voronin mainly observed the Americans at a distance, over a period of only a few weeks. The three Americans left the camp together with the Vlasov contingent (anti-communist Russians who had served under General Vlasov with the Germans in World War II) of about 20. A camp orderly, Volodya Khrustalev, told Voronin that the American had left with the "traitors". Khrustalev told Voronin that the Vlasov troopers were shot, but he did not know the fate of the Americans . . . . No one really knew who these Americans were, Voronin asserted. They were rumored to be U.S. military flyers, but none spoke Russian.F85


Voronin further related that he had contact with one American for an hour on a woodcutting detail. The American was notably thin, well over six feet (the tallest man in the camp), appeared to be

84 Information Report, 29 December 1953, Subject: American Prisoners-of-War Held in the USSR.

85 Amembassy Message, 050135Z Aug 92, Subject: Interview in Semipalatinsk with Individual Who Saw Americans in Khabarovsk.

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about 30, had light hair and fair complexion. The other Americans appeared to be of darker complexion and were about 5'10" . All three Americans stood together at camp roll calls.F86

Sighting No. 9. On 22 March 1993 TFR-M received from the Central Russian Military Museum copies of a secret telegram and a top secret report from the files of the convoy troops which show the transfer in September 1953 of a Cecil August Stoner (NFI) from Khabarovsk to Moscow.F87

Sighting No. 10. On 7 April 1993, TFR-M received a letter from Artur Roopalu in Estonia. Mr. Roopalu stated that in 1951, he spent two days in a Vladivostok transit camp with two Americans. They had arrived there earlier and stayed after he left. These Americans did not have contact with other prisoners. One of them was abut 185 cm tall, well-built, dark, and the other was 180 cm tall. Mr. Roopalu heard in this camp that many Americans were taken from Khabarovsk to Magadan and from there to Kalama [Kolyma] or Puhtavanina.

Sightings in Irkutsk


Sighting No. 11. In August 1956 a recently returned Austrian prisoner of war, Mr. Albert Skala, reported to the U.S. Embassy in Vienna that he had known a U.S. Army officer, named Lieutenant Racek, with whom he had been imprisoned in the Soviet Union. Mr. Scala stated that the American was an officer of armored forces in Korea. Skala stated the he first met Racek in 1951 in Prison #2 in Irkutsk and that the two were cellmates there and subsequently in Lubyanka Prison in Moscow until the time of Skala's release in 1955.F88

Sighting No. 12. On 11 December 1992, a TFR-M team representative interviewed Romas Kausevicius near Vilnius, Lithuania. Mr. Kausevicius consistently repeated his story of meeting an American pilot named Robert in an Irkutsk KGB prison

86 Ibid .

87 Amembassy Moscow Message, 060913Z Apr 93, Subject: POW/MIA Team - Moscow: Weekly Activity Report 12/93, March 21 to 27, 1993.

88 Amembassy Vienna, Foreign Service Dispatch No. 169, August 21, 1956, Subject: American Citizen Detained in USSR.

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cell in June 1950.F89

Sighting No. 13. From 6-12 December 1992, TFR-M team members traveled to Irkutsk and Khabarovsk to investigate the claim made by Mr. Romas Kaluskevicius that he had met an American POW in transit prison Camp #7 in Irkutsk in the late Summer of 1950. TFR-M confirmed that Mr. Kaluskevicius was, indeed, imprisoned in Irkutsk in that period, ending on 3 August 1950.F 90

Sighting in Taishet


Sighting No. 14. On 6 April 1993, TFR-M received a letter from Enn Kivilo in Estonia. Mr. Kivilo stated that he was imprisoned in prison camp L/P 011 (50 km from Bratsk in the direction of Taishet) in 1952 and served with an American POW named Jimmy Braiton or Baker. The American was about 180 cm tall, had dark eyes, played chess very well. F91

Sightings in Mordova


Sighting No. 15. On 2 August 1993, TFR-M team members interviewed Mr. Boris Uibo in Estonia. Mr. Uibo stated that in 1952 he served with an American Korean War POW in Camp #18, a close-hold camp for foreign prisoners, near Potma in Mordova (Mordvin ASSR). This American's name was Gary or Harry and, according to Uibo, definitely an American shot down in the Korean War. The American and Uibo worked together making wooden chess pieces. Uibo described Gary as no older than 25. Uibo stated that there was a concerted effort by the Soviets to hide the fact that they were holding foreign prisoners. Sometime late in 1953, Uibo was transferred to a hospital in Camp #9 and lost track of Gary. Uibo said that Soviet citizen prisoners were permitted to write two letters per year in Russian so they could easily be censored, but foreign prisoners, including Gary, were not permitted this privilege even though they could have gotten someone to translate their letters into Russian. He said no Soviet would take the risk of sending a letter on behalf of, or

89 Amembassy Moscow Message, 311510 Dec 92, Subject: POW/MIA Team - Moscow: Weekly Activity Report 22/92, December 6 to 26, 1992.

90 Amembassy Moscow Message, 311004 Dec 92, Subject: TFR-M Trip to Irkutsk and Khabarovsk.

91 Amembassy Talinn, 201028Z Apr 93, Subject: POW/MIA: Information from Residents of Estonia.

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mentioning, a foreign prisoner.F92

Sighting No. 16. Sometime in the Winter of early 1954 after his release from Camp #9, Mr. Uibo was transferred to Camp #5 where he was assigned to work in the power station. It was at this camp that he met a black American pilot whom he described as 180 cm tall, slim, and athletic. He worked in a woodworking shop where furniture was made for the Kremlin. He believes that the American was still in the camp when he was released on 30 March 1955.F93

Sighting in Novosibirsk


Sighting No. 17. On 22 June 1993, a TFR-M team representative interviewed Mr. Bronius Skardzius near Utena, Lithuania. Mr. Skardzius told of his encounter with Americans at a Novosibirsk transit prison about June, 1952. He stated that there were two American pilots in the group of prisoners brought into his small room. The other prisoners were Germans. The Americans told him they had been shot down in Korea. They were dressed in khaki shirts and trousers with no belts or shoelaces (the authorities did not allow these to be kept). The first American told him that he was a captain in the Air Force.F94

Sighting in the Bashkir ASSR


Sighting No. 18. On 13 April 1993, TFR-M team members in Tallin, Estonia, received a letter from Felix Pullerits. Mr. Pullerits stated that from 1953 to 1955 he was imprisoned along with an American pilot named Lieberman, in a prison camp of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), Building No. 18, near Salavati in the Ishinbai district of Bashkiria (Bashkir ASSR).F95

Sightings in Norllsk


Sighting No. 19. During the week of 19-26 April 1993, TFR-M team members interviewed Mr. Apollinaris Klivecka in Vilnius,

92 Amembassy Moscow Message, 161156 Aug 93, Subject: POW/MIA Interviews in Estonia.

93 Ibid.

94 Amembassy Vilnius Message, 191431Z Apr 93, Subject: Reports of Contacts with POW/MIAs.

95 Amembassy Tallinn Message, 201028Z Apr 93, Subject: Information from Residents of Estonia.

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Lithuania. Mr. Klivecka stated that while imprisoned in the Kairakam (Death Field) he worked in the infirmary at the camp near Norilsk. In 1953 shortly after Stalin's death (March), he was ordered to inspect twenty prisoners who were waiting at the guard gate. He stated that two of them were so emaciated and exhausted that he recommended they be placed in the infirmary. One of them was a Japanese officer from the Kwangtung Army captured at the end of World War II. The other was an American pilot, named Robertson. The American spoke fluent Korean and also used a Korean name, Kim Sung Chung. He spent three months recuperating and regaining his strength. Since the infirmary was shorthanded, he was trained as a nurse's aid. Mr. Klivecka stated that Robertson and he lived in the same barracks until his release in January 1955. The American explained that he had been shot down over North Korea but had not been captured immediately. Since he spoke Korean, he turned himself in claiming that he was fleeing South Korea and that his mother was Korean, his father European. Korean officials sentenced him to a work camp where American POWs were imprisoned, especially pilots. When one of them recognized him, his Korean captors interrogated and tortured him. After he revealed his identity, he was turned over to the Soviets. Since he used two names, he was accused of espionage and sentenced to 15 years imprisonment. After Stalin's death, all the prisoners received Red Cross packages except the American.F96

Sighting No. 20. The weeks of 3-14 May 1993, TFR-M received a letter from Mr. Valentinas Piekys, Vilnius, Lithuania who wrote that he had been a political prisoner in the Kapchikan Komsomolsky Camp near Norilsk. He stated that in 1949-1950 two Americans in military uniform were brought to the camp. They were in the camp for three months and then sent to some other place.F97

Sightings in Kemerovo


Sighting No. 21. During the week of 19-26 April 1993 in Vilnius, Lithuania, TFR-M team members received a letter from Mr. Povilas Markevicius. Mr. Markevicius wrote that in the Spring of 1952 he met two American prisoners while imprisoned in Kemerovo Oblast. The Americans said they had been sentenced to 25 years imprisonment. He described the one he had conversations with in poor Russian as about 170-173 cm, of swarthy completion, and with

96 Amembassy Vilnius Message, 261531Z Apr 93, Subject: Report of Contact with POW/MIAs.

97 Amembassy Vilnius Message, 170936Z May 93, Subject: POW/MIA Report of Contacts.

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dark hair. The other American was taller and with auburn hair. The main topic of conversation was always escape. One rainy and windy night in the Spring the Americans actually did escape. Usually when escaped prisoners were caught, their dead bodies were put in the middle of the square to threaten others. However, he did not see any dead bodies after this incident.F98

Sightings ln Kazahkstan


Sighting No. 22. In April 1993, TFR-M team members in Vilnius, Lithuania, received a letter from Mr. Jokubas Bruzdeilinas who was imprisoned in a camp for political criminals at the Dzezhkazgan Mines, Karaganda Oblast, Kazakh SSR. Mr. Bruzdeilinas wrote that he served with an American pilot of the rank of major named Joseph shot down in either Korea or Vietnam. His date of birth was approximately 1920. This argues for an officer in the Korean War. Mr. Bruzdeilinas also wrote that the pilot was a Lithuanian American which was why he was put in a camp for Lithuanian prisoners. F99

Sighting No. 23. During the week of 3-14 May 1993, TFR-M received a letter from Mr. Jonas Zilaitis who wrote that he had served in the Kengyro Camp, Dzezkagan Oblast, in the Kazakh SSR. He claimed to have met a black American pilot there approximately at the time of a prisoner rebellion in May-June 1954.F100

Sighting in Archangelsk


Sighting No. 24. On 12 January 1993, a retired Ukrainian military veteran telephoned the U.S. Embassy in Kiev that he saw an American citizen in a prison camp in Russia's Archangelsk Oblast in 1969 or 1970. He did not meet the man personally but heard him speak English. The veteran identified himself only as "Viktor" said he had been assigned to the labor camp (Vypravno- Trudova Kolonia) in the Archangelsk provincial center of Yerstevo as a driver. Viktor characterized the American prisoner as robust and taller than average. Viktor was never told his name and heard no more about him. Viktor put his age at late 50s to

98 Amembassy Vilnius Message, 261531Z Apr 93, Subject: Report of Contacts With POW/MIAs.

99 Amembassy Vilnius Message, 1914312Z Apr 93, Subject: Reports of Contact With POW/MIA's.

100 Amembassy Vilnius Message, 170936Z May 93, Subject: POW/MIA Report of Contacts.

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early; 1960s.F101

Patterns Among the Sightings


Out of twenty-two sightings, six are in the Komi ASSR. The Komi ASSR was home to the infamous Vorkuta concentration camp complex. We know that there were Americans in this particular area because five of the most well-known U.S. citizens imprisoned in the Soviet Union (John Noble, William Marchuk, Homer Cox, Leland Towers, and Wilford Cumish) all served their sentences in just this area. John Noble has stated that, although he did not see any American POWs in his camps at Vorkuta, he did hear rumors that they were in the complex. F102 The Komi ASSR also on a direct rail line from the Komi-Permskaya National District and the Perm Oblast, the areas Mr. Nagorksi identified as the end of the line for Americans POWs.F103 Apparently the end of the line was a little further north than Mr. Nagorski was able to detect.

Another four sightings were in prison camps in and around the city of Khabarovsk. Each of these sightings is described in terms of the transit of prisoners. Khabarovsk was a transit point for U.S. POWs as also described by Mr. Nagorski. This association was confirmed by Colonel Korotkov's statements that tens if not hundreds of POWs were interrogated there and his later statement that they transited Khabarovsk to unknown locations within the camp system. Three of the sightings were i Irkutsk, also a transit point in the movement of prisoners.

101 Amembassy Kiev Message, 141707Z Jan 93, Subject: Additional POW/MIA Information.

102 John Noble, Interview with Task Force Russia, 1992. Mr. Noble stated further that he did see former Soviet soldiers in the camps as prisoners, sentenced for having been captured in Korea by the Americans who repatriated them.

103 Central Intelligence Agency, Information Report, 15 July 1952, Subject: Location of Certain Soviet Transit Camps for Prisoners of War from Korea; Zygmunt Nagorski,Jr., "Unreported G.I.'s in Siberia," Esquire, May 1953.

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Summary


The Soviet and Americans sources and documentation already discussed present a consistent and mutually reinforcing description of Soviet operations to transport U.S. Korean War POWs to the USSR. These sources, where they frequently overlap, agree in the following basic elements of this operation:

1. The Soviet Union transported U.S. Korean War POWs to the Soviet Union and never repatriated them. The transfer program had two elements:

o The first element was an in execution of an intelligence collection requirement and resulted in the transfer of a limited number of POWs with specialized skills, mostly F-86 pilots and other personnel for the purpose of technical exploitation.

o The second element was politically motivated and resulted in the transfer of several hundred POWs with the intent of holding them as political hostages, for intelligence exploitation, and for use as skilled labor within the camp system.

2. The transfer operation was conducted and carefully controlled by the MGB.

3. Khabarovsk was a center for POW control operations in the Soviet Far East. Interrogation operations were based there. It also served as a temporary internment site for POWs. The Komi-Permskaya National District, the Perm Oblast, and the Komi ASSR appear to be the locations where many of these POWs were kept.

4. Other prisoners, mostly F-86 pilots, were exploited to support the work of Soviet aircraft design bureaus.


Postscript


After the death of Stalin in March 1953 and the subsequent execution of Beria, the possession of U.S. POWs as hostages may have been seen as a liability by the succeeding Soviet leadership. With the deepening of ideological animosity between the United States and the Soviet Union, acknowledgement of the taking of POWs to the Soviet Union, could only have further worsened that already deadly relationship. According to COL Corso, President Eisenhower did not press the POW issue to the

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hilt because he feared that it could have precipitated general war. Eisenhower feared 8,000,000 American dead if war occurred at this time. From the other side of the dark glass, the new Soviet leadership might well have had the same fears and consigned the POWs in their hands to oblivion.

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Appendix A


How Many Men are Truly Unaccounted for from the Korean War.


One of the more difficult problems we face in arriving at an estimate of how many Korean War POWs that may have been taken to the Soviet Union centers on a determination of how many men are truly missing in action from that conflict. Any POWs transferred to the Soviet Union would come from this group. Presented on the next three pages is one estimate of "truly unaccounted for", prepared by Dr. Paul M. Cole, RAND Corporation, in close consultation with the U.S. Army Central Investigation Laboratory, Hawaii (CILHI)

Dr. Cole's calculations yield a total of 2,195 who are truly missing. By eliminating cases where the death was witnessed or documented, he has arrived at the total of 2,195 individuals whose fate is unknown. Unfortunately, this method does not yield a list of the 2,195 by name.

At this time, CILHI is reviewing each of its 8,140 casualty (BNR) files and entering the information into a new database. This project will be not completed in less than year. Upon completion, the database will be able to provide a by-name list of those who are "truly unaccounted for".

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Continued