I had written an article concerning the situation of the Navy 3E’s reconnaissance plane and China’s
F-8 fighter jet before it had been resolved. Thank G-D it has been resolved. The terminology “air
accident” has been used many times in the past 50 or so years. You may ask the family members of the
crews still missing how many times that they heard or read those words.
The group of words such as diplomacy, dialogue, negotiate, in touch with and communications has
been the mantra of our government for more than 50 years. Our planes have “strayed”,” been lost” or
had ”air accidents” while flying in or near Russia or China’s territory. We have since found out that
over the years the majority of these planes were on reconnaissance missions. Those missions were and
still are necessary for our government to be aware of shipping, arms and nuclear testing or any other
information that can be gathered to protect our troops in war and peace.
The question I raise is: When our men and women are put in harm’s way by our government, why does
our government play word games while our people sit in captivity? Fifty years ago we trusted the
politicians and military brass to get our men back by using diplomacy. We are still waiting for their
return. We knew the Russians and Chinese were probably lying to us and we were probably lying to them,
maybe that is still going on. They spy on us and we spy on them. We get caught, they get caught. Why
play these word games? Admit it and go on.
The diplomacy did not work back then, our government was afraid to go to war over lives that they
felt were expendable. My closing in the article that I wrote earlier read as follows: ”Now we are using
the same methods because of global trade relations. We want to trade with China and I am sure China
wants to trade with us more. We can afford to say to China, ‘ Let our people go!!’ Or you get no money
from us, no trade with us, you get zero, zilch nothing from us.” We must have said something similar
this time only with far more “diplomacy.“ Whatever we said or did it worked.
Now that the crew members are back home safely it may be time for our government to reconsider its’
old methods of negotiations concerning the 8000 men that are still missing from the Korean and Cold Wars.
We know that the Russians and Chinese and the North Koreans had more to do with these men not returning
home than they care to admit.
These countries want our money, our trade and our feelings are mutual, I’m sure. The question is,
does our country have the guts to stand up for the men of the Forgotten Wars, or will those men still
remain the men we left behind, abandoned because our government, the wheelers and dealers in the
commerce and trade business just don’t think it’s worth their while?