US-India Relations and Recovery of American World War II MIAs: A History of India’s Broken Promises, 2015 - Present (Part II)

By Gary Zaetz, Chairman, Families and Supporters of America’s Arunachal Missing in Action

2015 (continued)

18 November 2015:?DPAA releases official news story “DPAA Conducts Recovery Operations in India” quoting?DPAA anthropologist Dr. Meghan-Tomisita Cosgriff-Hernandez, that “the [Hot as Hell recovery] team stayed mentally vigilant and committed to the mission, which helped us excavate the site to its evidentiary and archaeological boundaries."?This statement is flatly contradicted by later DoD assertions in after-action reports that the recovery operation had to be prematurely terminated, leaving large parts of the crash site uninvestigated for the presence of human remains, due to the alleged dangers to recovery team personnel posed by terrain instability.?While this 18 November 2015 official DPAA news story stated that “The excavation process was slow due to the larger amounts of moss covering the soil which revealed large unstable boulders underneath the excavation area” it doesn’t indicate that the operation had to be terminated due to terrain instability.?(https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/Recent-News-Stories/Article/630302/dpaa-conducts-recovery-operations-in-india/) It only contends that the recovery was slowed by this terrain instability.?One can reasonably speculate, in view of these contradictory statements by the Defense Department, that the real unspoken reason for the recovery operation’s premature termination was diplomatic or political pressure from the Indian and/or Chinese Governments to limit the amount of time the team remained at the crash site. It’s more than likely that the presence of large unstable boulders was merely seized upon by the Obama Administration as a convenient pretext for justifying premature termination of the operation, and thereby avoiding public embarrassment to the Indian and/or Chinese Governments.

1 December 2015:?Journalist Becky Clark Watts, writing for the Pike County Times, reports this question she posed to MAJ Natasha Waggoner, public affairs officer at DPAA, along with MAJ Waggoner’s response:

“QUESTION 11) Does the American government have written confirmation from the Indian government that it is going to allow recovery efforts like this to continue?

ANSWER: The GOI continues to be supportive of DPAA’s investigation and recovery efforts, but can’t predict future security concerns that may impact our operations.” (https://www.pikecountytimes.com/secondary/oxford12.1.15.html#.XBkcXVVKiUn)

Interestingly, Maj. Waggoner evaded addressing the question of whether the Indian Government had provided “written confirmation...that it is going to allow recovery efforts like this to continue.”

15 December 2015:?A highly trusted, well-informed, and objective source in India notifies Clayton Kuhles via email that he believes that the 2015 DPAA recovery operation at the Hot as Hell crash site was was terminated prematurely, leaving large parts of the crash site uninvestigated for human remains, because “they had a fixed period to do the job and they left as scheduled.” This statement directly contradicts DPAA’s latest self-serving assertion that terrain instability at the Hot as Hell crash site was the reason for the recovery operation’s premature termination.??

18 December 2015:?As reported in the October-December 2015 issue of?the Newsletter of the Anthropological Survey of India, the “Survey organized a Joint Forensic Review Meeting with the DPAA at Head Office, Kolkata...in collaboration with the Indo-US JPAC mission in India.” (https://ansi.gov.in/wp-content/uploads/formidable/7/AnthroNewsletterOct-Dec15.pdf) Although the Newsletter did not say so explicitly, it can be reasonably assumed that this Meeting was held to initiate the review of biological remains recovered from the Hot as Hell (MACR 2140) crash site in Arunachal Pradesh earlier in 2015.

2016

April 6, 2016:?Indian journalist Sushant?Singh, writing in The Indian Express, points out that “The repatriation of remains of these American soldiers...also points to increasing US-India cooperation under the BJP government as the previous UPA government had stopped recovery of remains in 2009. (italics added)”?

April 12, 2016:?“IMMEDIATE RELEASE India-United States Joint Statement on the visit of Secretary of Defense Carter to India April 10-13, 2016

Press Operations

Release No: NR-124-16?April 12, 2016

....

Before departing India, Secretary Carter will oversee a repatriation ceremony of U.S. World War II remains from India to the United States. Secretary Carter expressed his gratitude to Raksha Mantri Parrikar and the Government of India for their support in facilitating the recovery effort. The Indian Government agreed to support America’s commitment to bringing its fallen personnel home and providing their families the fullest possible accounting, and looks forward to further humanitarian missions of this kind over the next few years to return the remains of these U.S. heroes to their families.”?Reflecting the low priority of this humanitarian mission for the Obama Defense Department and the Government of Indian Prime Minister Modi, the preceding information was relegated to the final paragraph of the Joint Statement. “ (https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Releases/News-Release-View/Article/718589/india-united-states-joint-statement-on-the-visit-of-secretary-of-defense-carter/)

April 13, 2016:?“ Defense Secretary Ash Carter participated this morning in a repatriation ceremony in New Delhi, India, Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said in a statement.The ceremony marked the return of possible remains of U.S service members lost in World War II, Cook said.” (Department of Defense, “Carter Attends Repatriation Ceremony for WWII Aviators Lost in India”, https://www.defense.gov/News/Article/Article/719828/carter-attends-repatriation-ceremony-for-wwii-aviators-lost-in-india/; https://dod.defense.gov/News/News-Releases/News-Release-View/Article/719733/statement-by-pentagon-press-secretary-peter-cook-on-repatriation-ceremony/)).?Despite the fact that both Secretary of Defense Carter and US Ambassador to India Richard Verma attended this solemn repatriation ceremony, no senior officials of the Indian Ministry of Defence or the Ministry of External Affairs bothered to attend, marking a serious violation of diplomatic protocol by the Indian Government, and reflecting the abysmally low priority the Government of Prime Minister Modi evidently assigns to this mission.?

April 2016:?The Indian Ministry of External Affairs, in its review of Indian foreign relations from April 2015 - March 2016, stated the following:?“India has been assisting the US Government humanitarian missions to recover the remains of fallen US soldiers during World War II in India. The US Defense Prisoners of War/ Missing in Action Accounting Agency (DPAA) Mission, located in Hawaii, conducted a search and recovery mission in Arunachal Pradesh from 27 September- 12 December 2015.” ( https://www.mea.gov.in/Uploads/PublicationDocs/26525_26525_External_Affairs_English_AR_2015-16_Final_compressed.pdf)?The Ministry’s claim that the mission lasted from 27 September - 12 December 2015 wildly inflates the duration of the actual recovery operation from 35 days (October 2 - November 5, 2015, as documented by the US Defense Department) to a?span of 77 days!?The intention of this gross exaggeration is clear - to make it appear that the Indian Government permitted the team to be at the crash site much longer than it actually did.?To paraphrase a famous quotation:?There are three kinds of lies:?

?lies, damned lies, and Indian Government statements.

June 7, 2016:?US and India release “JOINT STATEMENT: The United States and India: Enduring Global Partners in the 21st Century”. (https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2016/06/07/joint-statement-united-states-and-india-enduring-global-partners-21st) at the conclusion of a summit meeting between Obama and Modi.?The statement included this paragraph in the section?Securing the Domains: Land, Maritime, Air, Space, and Cyber :?“ 19 President Obama thanked Prime Minister Modi for his government’s support for the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) missions in India, including a recovery mission that resulted in the recent repatriation of remains of the United States Service Members missing since the Second World War. The leaders announced their commitment to future DPAA missions.”?As it turned out the statement that multiple service members’ remains were recovered was misleading and premature - only one set of remains was repatriated as a result of the referenced mission.???

August 2016:?An article by Sushant Singh in the Indian publication The Dawnlit Post indicates that “A diplomatic note moved by the US embassy has also sought permission from the external affairs ministry to start recovery operations at a crash site in Assam next year....It is one of the rare crash sites, which is not located in Arunachal Pradesh. This site, which falls in the middle of a farmer’s field, was identified two years ago. Broad terms of compensation with the farmer, including recovery, loss of crops and restoration of land, have now been agreed to and the mission is to expected to start early next year.”?(https://thedawnlitpost.com/2016/08/us-wants-to-search-more-world-war-ii-crash-sites-in-northeast/)??

August 29, 2016:?“IMMEDIATE RELEASE , U.S.-India Joint Statement on the visit of Minister of Defence Manohar Parrikar to the United States:.... Secretary [of Defense Ashton] Carter reiterated his appreciation for the support provided by Minister Parrikar and the Government of India that facilitated the recovery and repatriation of U.S. World War II remains in April. Minister Parrikar reinforced his commitment to this important mission and he and Secretary Carter were pleased that the U.S. Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) would return to India Nov. 1-Dec. 14 [2016] to survey additional aircraft crash locations.” (https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Releases/News-Release-View/Article/929270/us-india-joint-statement-on-the-visit-of-minister-of-defence-manohar-parrikar-t/)?Reflecting the low priority of this humanitarian mission for the Obama Defense Department and the Government of Indian Prime Minister Modi, the preceding information was relegated to the final paragraph of the Joint Statement.

21 October 2016:?To its credit, the Obama Administration permitted US Ambassador to India Richard Verma to accept an Indian Government invitation to visit the disputed Indian territory of Arunachal Pradesh, where the vast majority of remains of unrecovered US war dead in India are believed to still lie.?Unfortunately, Ambassador Verma failed to use this opportunity to speak out about the need to accelerate Indian Government permissions for further recoveries in Arunachal Pradesh.?In fact, while in Arunachal Pradesh, not only did he not bother to visit any of the many US crash sites located there in recent years, he didn’t even bother to mention the fact that there are unrecovered US missing in action servicemen in Arunachal Pradesh (https://thewire.in/diplomacy/usambassador-visits-tawang).

November 1 – December 14, 2016:?According to a Defense Department 3 January 2017 news report entitled “U.S. and India Search for WWII American Airmen”, which states “The U.S. Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) recently completed a mission [from November 1 - December 14, 2016] in India to locate the remains of servicemen missing since World War II. The DPAA team concentrated their efforts on sites where U.S. aircraft are believed to have crashed in the Himalayas with still unaccounted-for U.S. servicemen. The DPAA team visited several locations in Arunachal Pradesh to determine if the reported sites can be definitively correlated to known crash sites involving missing U.S. servicemen... If the team can corroborate evidence at the site with historical records and reports, future missions to the sites may conduct an excavation in an attempt to recover the remains and return them to DPAA’s laboratory for identification.....While discussing the sites with local residents, the team received a presentation of human remains and osseous material, which a witness recovered near the wreckage of a crashed aircraft. After arriving at the site, the team found additional human remains believed to be associated with missing U.S. service members. Once approved by the Indian government, these remains will be sent to the DPAA Laboratory with the goal of identification.?All the sites were located within the Indian northeastern state of Arunachal Pradesh, which is where the vast majority of losses occurred. The DPAA team trekked to sites ranging from 2,500 feet to 10,000 feet in altitude, over trails that took anywhere from a few hours to several days to reach from the last point a vehicle could travel.”?(https://www.c7f.navy.mil/Media/News/Display/Article/1042182/us-and-india-search-for-wwii-american-airmen/)?According to one report, the remains recovered were “from a dense forest area near Bhismaknagar in Lower Dibang Valley district of Indian northeastern state of Arunachal Pradesh.”?(https://sputniknews.com/asia/201612211048826303-ww-indo-china-border/).?On 2 June 2017, the Defense Department released more details on this operation in a report entitled “Field Activities in India Yield Evidence Possibly Associated with U.S. WWII Unaccounted-For Personnel”, stating that “ The U.S. Department of Defense Prisoner of War/Missing in Action Accounting Agency (DPAA) conducted field activities in Arunachal Pradesh, India from November 1 – December 14, 2016, in search of U.S. World War II unaccounted for personnel.?The DPAA team recovered evidence that was subsequently examined by a Joint Forensic Review Committee comprising both DPAA and Anthropological Survey of India (AnSI) members.?On December 07, 2016, the committee determined that the evidence was possibly correlated to U.S. WWII service members unaccounted for from that region, and recommended the remains and material evidence be transported to a DPAA laboratory for further analysis.”?(https://in.usembassy.gov/field-activities-india-yield-evidence-possibly-associated-u-s-wwii-unaccounted-personnel/) This?operation was the only DoD MIA operation permitted by the Government of India in the entire territory of India during the year 2016, in blatant violation of the spirit and letter of the Geneva Conventions and Additional Protocols.?An article that year in the Indian press also made it clear that this operation was intended to be an “investigation” mission only, not a full-scale recovery operation. (https://www.indiablooms.com/world-details/USN/11555/us-investigating-team-believes-indian-field-evidence-may-provide-answer-to-wwii-unaccounted-for-personnel.html)

November 18, 2016: The DoD and India’s Washington Embassy issue this joint press release: “Airman Missing From World War II Accounted For (Langhorst)... Army Air Forces 1st Lt. Frederick W. Langhorst, 24, of Yonkers, New York, will be buried Nov. 26 in Battle Creek, Michigan....In late 2007, an independent investigator, Clayton Kuhles, discovered aircraft wreckage near the village of Bismarknagar, India, in a deep ravine at a high altitude, which he believed correlated to the missing aircraft. Bone fragments were recovered and sent to the former Joint Personnel Accounting Command’s Central Identification Lab, now DPAA’s laboratory. “?(https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/News-Releases/Article/1008332/airman-missing-from-world-war-ii-accounted-for-langhorst/. https://www.indianembassy.org/press_detail.php?nid=24684)?It took a total of 9 years for the Defense Department to identify the remains recovered by Clayton Kuhles in 2007.?Astounding and shameful !?

20 December 2016:?The US India in Kolkata issues a statement that includes this quote from US Ambassador to India Richard Verma:?“The United States is committed to making sure all the soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines who served our country come home. DPAA's mission in India is a vital part of that commitment." (Sumir Karmakar,?“More WWII remains in Arunachal”, The Telegraph, 21 December 2016, https://www.telegraphindia.com/india/more-wwii-remains-in-arunachal/cid/1486194)

?

2017

05/24/2017:?H. Con. Res. 61 introduced into the US House of Representatives by Rep. Glenn Thompson (R-PA).?It expresses “the sense of Congress that all trade agreements the United States enters into with a foreign country should provide reasonable collaboration with that country for the purpose of search and recovery activities for Armed Forces members missing in action from prior wars or military conflicts.”?Ultimately, this bill died in Committee, sabotaged by House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Rep. Kevin Brady (R-TX) and the House leadership.?The Trump Administration refused to endorse this resolution.

2 June 2017: “ Dpaa News Releases ‘Airman Missing From World War II Accounted For (Oxford)’:?The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) announced today that the remains of a U.S. serviceman, missing from World War II, have been identified and will be returned to his family for burial with full military honors.Army Air Forces 1st Lt. Robert E. Oxford, 24, of Concord, Georgia, will be buried June 11 in his hometown. On Jan. 25, 1944, Oxford was a member of 425th Bomb Squadron, 308th Bomb Group, 14th Air Force, aboard a B-24J Liberator aircraft, departing Kunming, China on a supply mission to Chabua, India. Despite initially favorable weather, conditions deteriorated rapidly and the aircraft failed to arrive at its destination. Four other aircraft were also lost during their approach to Chabua. Due to inability to pinpoint a loss location, no search efforts were initiated. The War Department Adjutant General’s Office declared Oxford deceased as of Jan. 26, 1946. Oxford’s name was memorialized by the American Battle Monuments Commission, who included his name on the Tablets of the Missing, Manila American Cemetery and Memorial, the Philippines.In late 2006, American Clayton Kuhles, hiking in northeast India located a site containing aircraft wreckage near Damro Village, Arunachal Pradesh Province. He located a wing and a panel, which correlated with a B-24J aircraft, call sign “Hot as Hell,” and reported the finding to the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (now DPAA.)In the fall of 2008, the Government of India granted access to the location and a team conducted a survey of the site, confirming the crash site correlated with the missing aircraft.In early 2009, a Joint Field Activity (JFA) recovery team returned to the site to begin excavation, but due to adverse weather, work was suspended until November 2009. No osseous material was recovered at that time.Due to access issues and security concerns, further recovery operations did not resume until late 2015. During a JFA mission in October 2015, a DPAA team recovered possible human remains and after review by the Government of India, DPAA received them into the Laboratory on April 14, 2016.To identify Oxford’s remains, scientists from DPAA and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory used mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) analysis, which matched a niece and a nephew, Y-chromosome DNA (Y-STR), which matched a nephew, laboratory analysis, including dental and anthropological analysis, which matched his records, as well as circumstantial evidence.” (https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/News-Releases/Article/1210711/airman-missing-from-world-war-ii-accounted-for-oxford/)

2 June 2017: India’s Washington Embassy issues this press bulletin:?“ The U.S. Department of Defense Prisoner of War/Missing in Action Accounting Agency (DPAA) conducted field activities in Arunachal Pradesh, India, from November 1 – December 14, 2016, in search of remains of and artifacts associated with the U.S. World War-II unaccounted-for personnel. The DPAA team recovered evidence that was subsequently examined by a Joint Forensic Review Committee comprising both DPAA and Anthropological Survey of India (AnSI) members. On December 07, 2016, the Committee determined that the evidence was possibly correlated to the U.S. WW-II service members unaccounted-for from that region, and recommended the remains and material evidence be transported to a DPAA laboratory for further analysis. In June 2017, DPAA personnel will escort the evidence from Kolkata to the U.S. laboratory in Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.A. for analysis.?This was seventh such humanitarian mission conducted in India. Government of India has extended its full support to all these humanitarian missions.

New Delhi June 02, 2017”

(https://indianembassy.org/press_detail.php?nid=24684;https://www.indianembassy.org/archives_details.php?nid=24684)?

The Indian Government, first under Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and now under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, apparently believes that if it repeats a lie often enough, the world will believe it.

Consider this statement from the press release: “This was seventh such humanitarian mission conducted in India. Government of India has extended its full support to all these humanitarian missions.”

This statement neglects to point out that one of these humanitarian missions was abruptly terminated by the Government of India in late 2009 before the mission could recover any human remains.??The only justifiable reason for terminating a mission prematurely is grave danger to the recovery crew, but the Government of India only offered transparent excuses like “logistical issues” for terminating the mission, and did not come close to citing any danger to the recovery crew.?This hardly qualifies as?“full support.”

The statement also neglects to point out that another one of these humanitarian missions was?abruptly terminated by the Indian Government after remains of only one of the eight crewmen being searched for were recovered.?Again, this is anything but “full support.”

Most importantly, this statement conveniently omits to mention that from January 2010 -?August 2015 (a period of almost six years), the Government of India refused permission for US Government MIA recovery teams to enter Arunachal Pradesh on humanitarian recovery missions !?This de facto moratorium by the Indian Government is the diametric opposite of “full support to all these humanitarian missions.”??

Stop this brazen lying, Indian Government !?The families of our soldiers killed and still unrecovered in India see through your falsehoods.??

And shame on the Trump Administration for failing to take the Indian Government to task for these falsehoods.

6 June 2017: Indian Ministry of External Affairs publishes?“Brief on India-U.S. Relations.”?Reflecting the abysmally low priority the Indian Government attaches to recovery of US MIAs, this 10-page,?4256-word document doesn’t devote even a single word to the need to effect the recovery of the estimated 400 US MIAs still unrecovered at US crash sites in India’s territory. (https://www.mea.gov.in/Portal/ForeignRelation/India_US_brief.pdf)

13 June 2017:?Rep. George Holding, co-chairperson of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans, delivers the following speech on "U.S. WWII MIA RECOVERY OPERATIONS IN INDIA" on the floor of the US House of Representatives:

"Mr. Speaker, I rise today to call attention to the?

ongoing and long-standing efforts to recover the remains of American?

service members who served during World War II in northeast India.

???These service members remain missing in action to this day and they?

deserve a proper burial.

???During World War II, the United States flew hundreds of supply?

missions on a route that included flight paths directly over the?

Himalayas through enemy territory from India to China.

???Given these treacherous routes and hazardous flying conditions, the?

United States took heavy causalities.

???To this day Mr. Speaker, U.S. airmen remain unrecovered and?

unburied.

???Efforts to locate and document these crash sites have been?

intermittently undertaken by both private citizens and the U.S.?

Department of Defense.

???Over the years, in addition to these documentation efforts, the?

Governments of the United States and India have worked together to?

recover our service members.

???However Mr. Speaker, the tempo of recovery operations could be?

categorized as slow at best for a variety of reasons, leaving the?

families of the deceased without closure.

???Part of the problem involves the challenging conditions in which?

these crash sites are located--some have been located on the Himalayan?

mountainsides at altitudes approaching 10,000 feet.

??Unfortunately Mr. Speaker, the single largest impediment to these?

recovery operations came when the Government of India placed a de facto?

moratorium on operations in Arunachal Pradesh for the vast majority of?

2010 until 2015.

???It should be noted during this time, that Leon Panetta, who at the?

time was Secretary of Defense, visited India and was able to secure?

permission for the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command to recover remains?

and bring them back to the United States. The spirit of this agreement?

lives on today.

???In early 2016, then-Secretary of Defense Ash Carter participated in?

a repatriation ceremony in New Delhi which highlighted a recovery?

operation undertaken by the Joint POW/MIA Account Command at the end of?

2015.

???Mr. Speaker, the United States and India today enjoy ever-increasing?

defense and security ties that underscore our strategic partnership.

???As co-chair of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian?

Americans, I urge the Governments of the United States and India to?

increase their collaboration and accelerate the recovery of these?

remains. The families of those lost during World War II deserve?

closure. We need to bring our airmen home."

19 June 2017: Reflecting the low priority Congress attaches to the recovery of?the 400 missing US servicemen in India, the Congressional Research Service, in its highly detailed 39-page report “India-US Relations:?Issues for Congress”, omits any discussion of that issue. (https://www.everycrsreport.com/reports/R44876.html)

27 June 2017:?Joint statement by Trump Administration and Prime Minister Modi (“United States and India: Prosperity Through Partnership”) neglects to mention the MIA recovery issue in its broad survey of US-India relations. (https://mea.gov.in/bilateral-documents.htm?dtl/28560/Joint_Statement__United_States_and_India_Prosperity_Through_Partnership)

June 2017 : “In June 2017, DPAA contractor Abor Country was tasked to perform a reconnaissance of a site near Kese Bagang Village, East Kameng District, State of Arunachal Pradesh, based on information provided by Mr. Clayton Kuhles. Abor Country reported they had located an aircraft crash site with a significant amount of debris, including wreckage that resembled an aircraft wing. The contractor turned possible human remains over to the U.S. Consulate in Kolkata.”?The crash site described in this official DoD statement is that of the 308th Bomb Group B-24J “Haley’s Comet.” (https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/News-Releases/PressReleaseArticleView/Article/1849311/airman-accounted-for-from-world-war-ii-gochnauer-t/)

October 2017:?Following October 3, 2018 hearing on his nomination to become US Ambassador to India, Kenneth Juster responded to these follow-up questions from Senator Marco Rubio, member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee:

Question:?"What is the State Department doing to recover the remains of

unaccounted military personnel in India?"

?

Answer:?The Department of State, including Embassy New Delhi and Consulate

General Kolkata, work closely with the Department of Defense and the

Government of India to facilitate Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA)

investigative and recovery missions at locations throughout northeast India.

With support from the Indian government, DPAA has undertaken multiple

investigative and recovery missions in recent years, including one in 2016

that culminated in the return of two sets of remains.?DPAA is currently

preparing to deploy an investigative team to India that will spend several

weeks surveying possible crash sites in Arunachal Pradesh.?We anticipate

further missions in 2018, including in the northeast states of Assam and

Nagaland.

?

Question:?"Mr. Juster, do you commit to support the Defense POW/MIA

Accounting Agency in working with the Government of India to recover the

remains of unaccounted U.S. military personnel in India, including those

lost in Arunachal Pradesh near the Indo-China border??Will you help

facilitate any efforts between the United States and the Government of India

until all of those missing American personnel are returned home?"

Answer:?I firmly believe that we owe a deep debt of gratitude to those

members of our armed forces who made the ultimate sacrifice for our country.

If confirmed, I will work closely with the U.S. Department of Defense and

the Government of India to support the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency's

efforts to locate and recover the remains of U.S. military personnel lost in

India in World War II.?(Source:?Email, dated?Tue, Oct 31, 2017 11:11 am, Subject: Kenneth Juster, from Greg Langowski, Regional Director,?Office of United States Senator Marco Rubio to Andrea Plescia.)?

18 October 2017:?In a detailed five-page speech entitled “Defining Our Relationship with India for the Next Century” Secretary of State Rex Tillerson fails to devote even one word to the ongoing issue of India’s subpar level of cooperation with US MIA recovery efforts in India.?The message is obvious:?not only does the Trump Administration attach the lowest possible priority to recovering our India MIAs; it is also actively engaged, up to and including the Cabinet level, in covering up for the Indian Government’s refusal to honor to the fullest its obligations under the Geneva Conventions,?and its promises to the US Government and the families of these MIAs.

3 November 2017:?India Reimposes Illegal Moratorium on MIA Recoveries. For the first time since 2014, an entire year will pass without the Government of India permitting a full-scale MIA recovery operation anywhere in the entire territory of India.?According to a just issued US Government report, the only MIA operation that India will allow the US Government to conduct in 2017 is one MIA “investigation” operation, an operation which will not be allowed to recover human remains.?This action amounts to a reimposition and extension of the illegal moratorium the Government of India imposed on recovery operations in Arunachal Pradesh for six years, from early 2010 until late 2015.

The unclassified US Government report, issued on November 3, 2017 by the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency and entitled "Families/VSO/MSO and Partners DPAA Quarterly In Person/Teleconference Update Notes", stated that in India during the next sixty days, "One organic investigation team is deploying traveling to conduct investigations of multiple World War II aircraft crash sites."?(https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/Re...)?No other MIA operations had occurred anywhere in India in 2017 to this point in time (4 November 2017).

The only operation permitted in 2017 in India is an "investigation" operation, not a “recovery” operation.?DPAA makes a sharp distinction between the two types of operations.?Unlike a full-scale “recovery” team, which includes a forensic anthropologist, the much smaller “investigation” team does not include a forensic anthropologist.?Only forensic anthropologists have the skill to distinguish a human bone from an animal bone.?

As was the case with previous breaches of trust by the Indian Government over the issue of MIA recoveries, the Administration in power in the United States has made a conscious decision not to file a protest with the Indian Government.?Like the Obama Administation before it, the Trump Administration has decided that the recovery of our servicemen who made the ultimate sacrifice is just not important enough to risk offending the Indians by filing a protest.?Pending trade and arms sales are clearly considered much more important, and the Trump Administration, like the Obama Administration, doesn’t want to do anything that might jeopardize those deals.?Shame on Defense Secretary Mattis, Secretary of State Tillerson, and their boss, President Trump, for permitting the Indian Government to reimpose this flagrantly illegal moratorium without protest.?

9 November 2017:?The Times of India publishes an article announcing the arrival in India of a DPAA field team, explicitly confirming in the article that the mission is only a survey operation, not a full-scale recovery operation:?“This year, the team would conduct a similar mission in the northeast, surveying several different sites from?those visited during the 2016 investigation effort.” (https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/us-team-in-india-to-search-for-world-war-ii-dead/articleshow/61572269.cms)

December 2017:?“In December 2017, during a Joint Field Activity, a DPAA investigation team visited the crash site and recovered human remains. The remains were consolidated into the laboratory for analysis.”?The crash site described in this official DoD statement is that of the 308th Bomb Group B-24J “Haley’s Comet.” (tail number 42-73242). (https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/News-Releases/PressReleaseArticleView/Article/1849311/airman-accounted-for-from-world-war-ii-gochnauer-t/)

11 December 2017:?“The US DPAA team of two officers Kyle M. Cone USAF DPAA TH (US) and DR. Meghan-Tomasita Cosgriff-Hernandez visited the Anthropological Survey of India, Head Office on 11th December, 2017 for Joint Forensic Review Meeting with the material evidences recovered from site MACR 2139 [“Haley’s Comet”, tail number 42-73242], Arunachal Pradesh, India. The team opened up the materials before the committee constituted by the Director, Anthropological Survey of India, Kolkata from An.S.I, namely Dr. Umesh Kumar, Head of Office, Prabir Chowdhury, Assistant Anthropologist (Physical), Dr.Shiv Kumar Patel, Assistant Anthropologist (Physical) and Dr. B N Sarkar, Former Superintending Anthropologist as an external expert. Altogether Eight (8) plastic packets containing two fragments of bones probably of human tibia and femur. Besides number of fragments of leather, life supports accessories which include parachutes, leather shoes, oxygen mask, leather jacket, gloves and few fragments of metal items like button and life supporting accessories.” (https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=1837560519619947&id=265683356807679)?

?

2018

February 8, 2018:?DPAA Quarterly Family/VSO/MSO Call Notes lists worldwide field operations that occurred in the previous 60 days and are scheduled in the next 30 days.?No India operations appeared in either category.???????????????(https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/Recent-News-Stories/Article/1498195/dpaa-2nd-quarter-2018-update/)

?

March 4, 2018:?Pensacola News Journal publishes article about Ellen Watson Vinson’s efforts to recover the remains of her stepfather and his crew mates?from his confirmed World War II crashsite in India.?“Vinson has been in contact with the office of U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, which has already sent letters to Indian authorities detailing a desire to work out a plan to recover the remains. Gaetz's office has also written to the U.S. Secretary of Defense to assist in coordination of a recovery mission.”?(https://www.pnj.com/story/news/2018/03/04/these-men-were-heroes-pensacola-woman-looks-closure-world-war-ii-tragedy/386498002/)

March 6, 2018:?Under Secretary of Defense John Rood responds to a?February 8, 2018 letter from House Armed Services Committee Member Matt Gaetz to Secretary of Defense Mattis concerning the Defense Department’s efforts to account for missing DoD personnel lost in India during World War II.??Paradoxically, while claiming that “excellent support [has been received] from the Government of India”, Under Secretary Rood also conceded that “at times, Indian political sensitivities have also presented challenges.”?In diplospeak, the term “challenges” is a well-known code word for obstructionism.?Clearly, his claim of excellent support from the Indian Government is only a transparent ruse intended to deceive Members of Congress, members of the media, and ordinary Americans who aren’t paying attention.

March 21, 2018:?Marysville (Ohio) Journal Tribune publishes article (“Blackie’s Final Flight:?Florida Woman Fighting to Have Local WWII Pilot’s Body Returned”) about Ellen Watson Vinson’s campaign to persuade the Indian Government to release her stepfather’s remains from his World War II crash site. “She knew her mission to recover Porter’s remains would be difficult because of India’s tough laws on transporting them. However, those restrictions became more relaxed in 2015, giving her more incentive to pursue them. Vinson started putting together a scrapbook devoted to her mother and Porter in 2017. This past January, she started writing to her congressman to secure the rights to Porter’s remains. She’s experienced some bumps along the way, but she remains hopeful in her mission. Her latest updates in her endeavors include contacting Ohio Representative Jim Jordan and getting him to partner with Florida Representative Matt Gaetz.”?(https://www.marysvillejt.com/news/blackies-final-flight-florida-woman-fighting-to-have-local-wwii-pilots-body-returned/)

April 18, 2018: the Pentagon's report DPAA Year in Review: October 2016-September 2017 listed the locations it investigated around the world for the remains of missing in action US servicemen. The locations investigated were Laos, Italy, Vietnam, Korea, Tarawa, Cambodia, Hong Kong, France, Bulgaria, and Slovenia. Significantly, India was not mentioned at all. This omission reflects both the low priority our Government attaches to recovering our 400 missing in action in India and the dismal progress our Government has made in obtaining Indian Government cooperation with their recovery.

April 23, 2018, US Defense Attache in India Brig. Gen. David Brigham (US Army) responded to a note of mine as follows: "Gary, My sincerest apologies for the delay.?We are currently in the process of gathering all of the pertinent materials to provide a detailed [MIA] briefing to the ambassador [Ambassador Kenneth Juster] so that he may engage substantially.?

I will consolidate my understanding of progress and pass that by you before and after we discuss with the Ambassador.

Thank you Gary and I will circle back soonest.

Best Regards,

Dave Brigham

DAVID E. BRIGHAM

BG, USA

Senior U.S. Defense Official, India"?As of this date in time (23 December 2018) BG Brigham’s promised follow-up to this note has still not been received.

23 May 2018: “DCM MaryKay Carlson welcomed Colonel Michael Gann, Director, Indo-Pacific Region and his delegation from Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) to the U.S. Mission in India as they plan for their next recovery mission.” (https://twitter.com/usandindia/status/999220082155933696)

28 May 2018:?According to the caption ("Honorable Carry from India") of this Defense Department photo, an undisclosed number of unidentified human remains arrived from India at the DPAA facility in Hawaii on May 28, 2018 to begin the process of identification.?This potentially momentous event received very little publicity from the Defense Department, most probably because DPAA wants to avoid offending the Indian Government and the Chinese Government, as well as the Vietnam-era veterans and POW/MIA familiy organizations which have spoken out against investing more money into World War II MIA recoveries.?(https://www.dvidshub.net/image/4426100/honorable-carry-india)

29 June 2018:?The Trump Administration’s Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for South and Southeast Asia, Dr. Joseph Felter, sends me this email:

“ Gary,

?

Thank you for your note. We certainly appreciate your concerns and those of the many others whose family members remain unaccounted for. I'm sorry if you have the impression the US DoD is not fully committed to this cause and want to reaffirm the importance the Defense Department places on the personnel accounting mission in India.?DPAA and its important mission enjoy the full support of the U.S. Ambassador and his team.

?

The U.S. Government remains engaged on this issue. Since 2013, DPAA has conducted multiple successful investigation and recovery missions in India.?Earlier in 2017, DPAA repatriated remains discovered in 2016 for further forensic analysis at their laboratory in Hawaii.?Encouragingly, the DPAA recently established a contract with SEARCH, a cultural resource company, to conduct recoveries in India.?This partnership initiative provides additional capacity for DPAA’s India missions.?DPAA met with Indian government counterparts in late May to resolve Government of India issues and concerns to enable SEARCH to pursue World War II losses.?

?

I realize the above actions have not resulted in the return of your family members' remains- I can only imagine the impact this has had on your family over these many decades of uncertainty. That said, I sincerely hope you can appreciate the efforts DPAA is making. We will continue to work with India on this issue, and OSD-Policy and DPAA will continue to raise this issue and the importance of the WWII Accounting Mission in India with the GOI.?

?

Sincerely,

Joe

?

Joseph H. Felter, Ph.D.

Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense?

South and Southeast Asia

Tel: 703-614-1116

(Secure) 302-221-0029 “

I immediately responded as follows:

“ Dr. Felter,

Thank you for your note, such as it is.

Frankly, I am flabbergasted by your absolutely groundless statement, bordering on fantasy, that "Since 2013, DPAA has conducted multiple successful investigation and recovery missions in India."?Going back to 2007, I have closely monitored all DPAA MIA recovery operations in India, and the public record clearly indicates that only one recovery operation since 2013 in India has resulted in a successful identification of an American MIA - the September-October 2015 recovery operation near Damroh, Arunachal Pradesh, that resulted in the recovery and successful identification of only one of the eight crewmen of the B-24 42-73308 (MACR 2140), 1st Lt. Robert Eugene Oxford.

As far as the 2016 recovery operation you referenced, no positive identification has yet emerged from that operation, so it's premature for you to claim it as a "success."?"One" is not the same as "multiple", Dr. Felter.?Either substantiate your claim that recovery operations in India since 2013 have resulted in multiple identifications, or cease making this unsubstantiated statement, which is obviously intended to cover up for DPAA's poor record of MIA recoveries in India.

I give DPAA due credit for the single successful recovery and identification from its 2015 recovery operation at the MACR 2140 site, but DPAA is clearly claiming more credit than it is due by this inaccurate and highly misleading statement.?So, Dr. Felter, what are those other DPAA recovery operations that resulted in a successful identification?

It's also revealing that your note only referred to recovery operations since 2013, conveniently omitting to mention the 2009 recovery operation at the MACR 2140 crash site that was aborted by the Indian Government for purely political reasons, the de facto ban on Arunachal Pradesh recoveries that the Indian Government imposed at the end of 2009 and which continued until the end of 2015, and India's continued imposition of a one recovery/one investigation mission quota for the entire territory of India during any given year, a restriction that was publicly acknowledged (but not criticized) by Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (POW/MIA) Robert Newberry during his tenure. All of these antihumanitarian and anti-American GoI actions are flagrant violations by the Indian Government of the Geneva Conventions, and breaches of faith with the US Government and the families of our MIAs in India.?

There are other convenient omissions of fact from your note:?the fact that the US Government has never filed a diplomatic protest with the Indian Government over that ban, that the Indian Government has neither apologized for that ban nor committed to excluding a de facto ban on MIA recoveries as a future policy option, the fact that Rep. George Holding, co-chair of the Congressional India Caucus, publicly criticized the Indian Government in 2017 for its lack of cooperation in the area of MIA recoveries, and the fact that you didn't refer in your note to your promise to me - made during your phone conversation with me in February 2018 - that you would speak to your counterparts in the Indian MoD about this issue, a promise that you apparently never kept.

Finally, you claim that "DPAA and its important mission enjoy the full support of the U.S. Ambassador and his team."?I have not seen a single public statement by Ambassador Juster on this issue since assuming his post in New Delhi.?His failure to speak out about this issue in any of his public statements since taking his post does not reassure me or the other family members of our India MIAs that he attaches high priority to this mission.?It certainly doesn't assure me that he's willing to aggressively confront the Indian Government on this issue..

In short, by omitting pertinent facts and failing to substantiate your claims about "multiple" successful recoveries, your assurances are simply not credible. For the same reason, neither are the assurances previously made to me by India Defense Attache Brigadier Ravi Murugan, US Defense Attache BG David Brigham, and State Department South Asia Bureau official Thomas Vajda.

Sincerely,

Gary Zaetz”

Note:?As of December 2, 2018, five months after receiving that email’ed response of mine, Dr. Felter has still failed to acknowledge that email.?In the absence of any objections to the points I raised in that note, Dr. Felter has tacitly conceded the validity of ALL of those points.

??

19 July 2018: ??DPAA Families/VSO/MSO Quarterly Call and Update lists worldwide field operations that occurred in the previous 60 days (May-June) and are scheduled in the next 30 days (July-August).?To the great disappointment of the families of our 400 India MIAs, no field operations in India appeared in either category. ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????(https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/Recent-News-Stories/Article/1498195/dpaa-2nd-quarter-2018-update/)

14 August 2018:?George Maupin, son of a World War II Army Air Force officer whose remains still lie unrecovered in India - seven years after his crash site’s discovery in 2011 -?????????????????-?sent the following email to the US State Department:?“My father G.R. Maupin was a bombardier on Hailey’s Comet who crash landed in India. I would like to recover his remains, and brought home to the U.S., some time ago I saw an article from Clayton Kuhles who discovered the crash site. Who confirmed the presence of human remains.?Your help would be much appreciated so that we could get my father’s remains home to be buried with my mother and I, as a family.

Thank you,

George R. Maupin”???

6 September 2018:?At the conclusion of the inaugural 2+2 meeting of the Trump Administration’s Defense Secretary James Mattis and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo with the Modi Government’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, the US and Indian Government issued a “Joint Statement on the Inaugural India-US 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue” (https://www.dnaindia.com/india/report-full-text-joint-statement-on-the-inaugural-india-us-22-ministerial-dialogue-2659930).?It's clear from reading this statement that the Trump Administration and the Modi Government have agreed to betray the families of 400 US families waiting for the Modi Government to permit the recovery of their loved ones - US servicemen killed in India in World War II - from their numerous crash sites in northeast India. Their joint statement goes into detail on many issues (among them, trade, counter-terrorism, debt financing, Afghanistan, North Korea, nuclear energy, and space), but not one word on MIA recoveries. That glaring omission is?ample evidence that both countries place ZERO priority on recovering the remains of those heroic men. Shame on BOTH governments !

20 September 2018:?President Trump signs a proclamation designating September 21, 2018 National POW/MIA Recognition Day.?In this proclamation, he states that “I have pledged my Administration’s best efforts to account for our country’s missing heroes." President Trump, your Administration's half-hearted efforts to recover our MIAs in India demonstrate that you have BROKEN this pledge.??

24 September 2018:?DPAA announces that remains of Army Air Forces Pfc. Joseph I. Natvik, 20, of Madison, Wisconsin, have been positively identified. Information released by the DPAA indicates that remains were recovered in India by independent investigator Clayton Kuhles and a local Indian resident. (https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/News-Releases/Article/1684684/funeral-announcement-for-airman-killed-during-world-war-ii-natvik-j/)

24 September 2018:?DPAA announces that remains of Army Air Forces 1st Lt. Allen R. Turner, 25, of Brookline, Massachusetts, have been positively identified. Information released by the DPAA indicates that remains were recovered in India by independent investigator Clayton Kuhles and a local Indian resident. (https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/News-Releases/Article/1684684/funeral-announcement-for-airman-killed-during-world-war-ii-natvik-j/)

30 September 2018:?While celebrating the field operations of the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) during FY 2018, it is very disturbing that during the entirety of FY 2018 (1 October 2017 - 30 September 2018), not a single full-scale DPAA recovery operation occurred in India, the location of a total of 400 missing US World War II servicemen, among whom there are believed to be 80 at well-documented aircraft crash sites. This omission reflects the low priority attached to India recoveries by DPAA Director McKeague, as well as other key Trump Administration officials, especially Secretary of Defense Mattis and US Ambassador to India Kenneth Juster. This is a slap in the face to the families of these men !

14 November 2018:?The DPAA holds the DPAA Families/VSO/MSO Quarterly Call and Update.?According to the summary published on the DPAA website, many geographical locations of DPAA activity worldwide were discussed at this meeting, but recovery operations in India for the 400 missing Americans there weren’t mentioned even once, indicating the absence of DPAA operations there and the low priority the Trump Administration and the Government of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi attaches to these operations. (https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/Recent-News-Stories/Article/1690287/dpaa-familiesvsomso-quarterly-call-and-update/)

19 November 2018:?The online journal United States-India Monitor publishes the article “Let’s Finally Bring Home the WWII Arunachal MIA War Dead”, written by the journal’s publisher and editor, Mr. Mahanth Joishy. (https://usindiamonitor.com/2018/11/19/lets-finally-bring-home-the-wwii-arunachal-mia-war-dead/)

?

2019

14 January 2019:?I sent the?following email to the new Indian Ambassador to the United States, Mr. Harsh Vardhan Shringla.?As of today (23 April 2019), more than three months later, I haven’t received the courtesy of a response.?I encourage anyone who supports the families of our 400 India MIAs to send him a similar email. His email address is [email protected]

Your Excellency,

I represent the families of 400 United States servicemen whose mortal remains still lie unrecovered at numerous World War II crash sites in India's northeast region, primarily Arunachal Pradesh.

The precise locations of many of these aircraft crash sites have been pinpointed by an agency of the US Department of Defense - the United States National-Geospatial Intelligence Agency (NGA) - in recent years, but unnecessary Indian Government restrictions have prevented the recovery from these crash sites of the remains of these military martyrs at a pace that one would expect from a major defense partner of the United States.

The unnecessarily slow tempo of these recovery operations is extremely troubling to the families of these men. This situation has been highlighted by Rep. George Holding, co-chairperson of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans, who made the following speech on "U.S. WWII MIA RECOVERY OPERATIONS IN INDIA" on the floor of the US House of Representatives on 13 June 2017:

"Mr. Speaker, I rise today to call attention to the ongoing and long-standing efforts to recover the remains of American service members who served during World War II in northeast India.

These service members remain missing in action to this day and they deserve a proper burial.

During World War II, the United States flew hundreds of supply missions on a route that included flight paths directly over the Himalayas through enemy territory from India to China.

Given these treacherous routes and hazardous flying conditions, the United States took heavy causalities.

To this day Mr. Speaker, U.S. airmen remain unrecovered and unburied.

Efforts to locate and document these crash sites have been intermittently undertaken by both private citizens and the U.S. Department of Defense.

Over the years, in addition to these documentation efforts, the Governments of the United States and India have worked together to recover our service members.

However Mr. Speaker, the tempo of recovery operations could be categorized as slow at best for a variety of reasons, leaving the families of the deceased without closure.

Part of the problem involves the challenging conditions in which these crash sites are located--some have been located on the Himalayan mountainsides at altitudes approaching 10,000 feet.

Unfortunately Mr. Speaker, the single largest impediment to these recovery operations came when the Government of India placed a de facto moratorium on operations in Arunachal Pradesh for the vast majority of 2010 until 2015.

It should be noted during this time, that Leon Panetta, who at the time was Secretary of Defense, visited India and was able to secure permission for the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command to recover remains and bring them back to the United States. The spirit of this agreement lives on today.

In early 2016, then-Secretary of Defense Ash Carter participated in a repatriation ceremony in New Delhi which highlighted a recovery operation undertaken by the Joint POW/MIA Account Command at the end of 2015.

Mr. Speaker, the United States and India today enjoy ever-increasing defense and security ties that underscore our strategic partnership.

As co-chair of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans, I urge the Governments of the United States and India to increase their collaboration and accelerate the recovery of these remains. The families of those lost during World War II deserve closure. We need to bring our airmen home."

Mr. Ambassador, as I'm sure you are aware, as signatory to the Geneva Conventions, India is bound to permit recovery operations to proceed at the fastest tempo practical. Rep. Holding's speech makes it very clear that the current tempo of recovery operations is unacceptably slow.

Mr. Ambassador, please document for the families of these men what the Government of India plans to do to (1) make sure that a de facto moratorium on MIA recoveries in Arunachal Pradesh is never again imposed; and (2) significantly accelerate the tempo of recovery operations.

I await your response.

Sincerely,

Gary D. Zaetz

Chairman, Families and Supporters of America's Arunachal Missing in Action

124 Long Shadow Lane

Cary, NC 27518

Tel: 919-851-2242

May 11, 2019:?Clayton Kuhles, President, MIA Recoveries, Inc.,?sent me an email with the following statement:?"I am disturbed by the fact that DPAA continues to disseminate inaccurate information about their unsuccessful attempt to reach the crash site of C-47B #43-48308. Neither DPAA, nor their predecessor agency JPAC, nor any family member associated with that aircraft loss has ever requested a copy of my Crashed Aircraft Site Report on that aircraft discovery, nor have they accepted my offer of assistance in reaching the crash site. As far as I can determine, DPAA did not hire the same local guide as I did, and the DPAA team was subsequently lead to another site miles away from my discovery site."?

May 15, 2019:?DPAA announces that the remains of 2nd Lt. Toney Gochnauer, co-pilot of B-24J #42-73242, have finally been recovered and identified. Clayton Kuhles, President of MIA Recoveries discovered 2nd Lt. Gochnauer's crash site in Arunachal Pradesh, India on 4 January 2011. 2nd Lt. Gochnauer's B-24, "Haley's Comet", was lost with all 12 aboard on 25 January 1944 while flying from south China to northern India on a routine supply mission. The aircraft was attached to the 425th Bomb Squadron, 308th Bomb Group, 14th Air Force. A DPAA field team recovered 2nd Lt. Gochnauer's remains in 2017. 2nd Lt. Gochnauer was from Amarillo, Texas.

4 November 2019 - 4 December 2019: “From 4 November to 4 December, a ten-member team from Southeastern Archeological Research, Inc. (SEARCH) conducted recovery operations at a World War II crash site in India. SEARCH is partnering with DPAA to conduct operations in India. DPAA's valued partners provide the agency the ability to increase the number of operations conducted each year in support of the personnel accounting mission.” (https://www.dpaa.mil/Portals/85/DDO%20Fiscal%20Year%202020%20Mission%20Executive%20Summaries.pdf) In DPAA’s January 30, 2020 Family/VSO/MSO Quarterly Call and Update Notes,?it was reported that “a return visit to India by our partner, SEARCH,...advanced recovery of a crash site (Nov. 1 - Dec. 8), with successful recovery of possible remains.” (https://www.dpaa.mil/Portals/85/Jan%2030%202020%20Family-VSO%20Update%20Meeting%20Notes.PDF?ver=2020-02-07-134307-317)

4 November 2019 - 30 December 2019:?MIA Recoveries, Inc. team led by Clayton Kuhles conducts MIA recovery expedition at crash site of B-25D 41-30362 (nicknamed “Blackie’s Gang”) near village of Gandhigram, Arunachal Pradesh, India. (report dated 11 January 2020 posted on?MIA Recoveries website (www.miarecoveries.org)).?This operation was privately funded after attempts to gain funding from the Defense Department were denied, the bid surprisingly going to SEARCH, Inc., a contractor which submitted a higher bid and, unlike MIA Recoveries, Inc., had zero experience doing MIA recovery operations in India.

December 19, 2019:?In a “Joint Statement on the Second India-U.S. 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue”, the following claim is made in the section “Building Bonds Between Our Citizens”:?“Secretaries Pompeo and Esper expressed appreciation to the Government of India for its continuing support to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) as it works to repatriate the remains of U.S. service members missing from World War II.”?This claim of Indian support flies in the face of the Indian Government’s refusal to even acknowledge that it imposed an illegal moratorium on US MIA recoveries in India for six years, from the end of 2009 until the autumn of 2015.?This joint statement also signals that the US Government under President Trump will continue to turn a blind eye to the Modi Government’s imposition of severe restrictions on the number of annual MIA recovery operations permitted in India, in contravention of international humanitarian law. (https://in.usembassy.gov/joint-statement-on-the-second-u-s-india-22-ministerial-dialogue/; https://mea.gov.in/bilateral-documents.htm?dtl/32227/Joint+Statement+on+the+Second+IndiaUS+2432+Ministerial+Dialogue)

2020

March 23, 2020:?DPAA makes the following announcement:?“All field missions this month have completed or terminated earlier than planned, and personnel have returned home. Future missions are currently postponed or canceled, at least through early June.

‘COVID-19 dynamics have forced us to radically alter our operations, but keeping our team safe, here at home and abroad, is paramount,’ said Kelly McKeague, DPAA Director. ‘At the same time, we are continuing to take actions with which our personnel can remain productive in their duties while maintaining the required distancing.’” (https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/Recent-News-Stories/Article/2122187/dpaa-impacted-by-covid-19/)

October 25, 2020:?US India-Monitor publishes op-ed “When will Arunachal WWII American Airmen MIA Ever Get Justice???”, by Gary Zaetz, Chairman, Families and Supporters of America’s Arunachal MIAs (https://usindiamonitor.com/2020/10/25/when-will-arunachal-wwii-american-airmen-mia-ever-get-justice/?fbclid=IwAR297bTwHJpn2peetaG9k9sqV1ifJ68qwD-IDYczSJggbt6Cvpbwq3oF0xE)

October 29, 2020:?DPAA Families/VSO Quarterly Call and Update Notes points out that “in support of future research and field activities, PI [Partnerships & Innovations] signed five separate arrangements in the fourth quarter that either modified existing, or created new, agreements for partnerships and projects. One notable example is an MOU with the National Forensic Science University of India. This university is charged by the Indian government with the advancement of forensic science within India and around the world. In conjunction with the International Committee of the Red Cross, it operates and hosts the International Centre for Humanitarian Forensics. Through this agreement, DPAA will have personnel—Indian scientists—who are resident at the university and who will help facilitate future DPAA activities within the whole of India. This also will be a vehicle to assist in developing additional in-country partnerships in an area of the world that has proven difficult for us to operate effectively.” (https://www.dpaa.mil/Portals/85/Oct%2029%202020%20Family-VSO%20Update%20Meeting%20Notes%20%281%29.pdf)

November 24, 2020: The Indian newspaper The Hindu publishes article “U.S. group expresses concern over highway projects at WWII crash sites in Arunachal”, by Rahul Karmakar. “Reacting to an interview of Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu in The Hindu, the advocacy group’s founder-chairman Gary Zaetz said: ‘We are very concerned that the government of India will not be taking the necessary precautions to avoid disturbing these crash sites, which are the temporary resting places of our loved ones – temporary until India gives permission that all such crash sites may be recovered for human remains.’” (https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/us-group-expresses-concern-over-highway-projects-at-wwii-crash-sites-in-arunachal/article33167119.ece)

2021

January 19, 2021:?NAVSUP (Naval Supply Systems Command) issues solicitation notice for “Archaeological Survey and Remains Recovery Services for Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) in The Republic of India”:?“This requirement is for archaeological survey and remains recovery work for the Defense Prisoner of War (POW)/Missing in Action (MIA) Accounting Agency (DPAA) in The Republic of India. DPAA plans to conduct up to two (2) missions per year and the archaeological field survey and recovery operations will primarily take place in Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya States and Nagaland in Northeast India. Each mission is expected not to exceed 60 days, depending on the operation scheduling and complexity. The Contractor shall provide personnel who are professionally qualified and who have the requisite experience and expertise to conduct Phase I survey, Phase II archaeological testing, and Phase III archaeological excavation operations as required under the performance based work statement of the contract.”?(https://www.fbodaily.com/archive/2021/01-January/21-Jan-2021/FBO-05894474.htm)

March 9, 2021 The Defense Department's US Indo-Pacific Command (USINDOPACOM) leadership, based on the March 9, 2021 congressional testimony of then USINDOPACOM Commander Admiral Philip Davidson on USINDOPACOM's activities in India, has no interest at all in US MIA recovery operations there. Nowhere in his summary of DoD's India activities was US MIA recovery operations mentioned. However, Admiral Davidson gave much attention to those areas the Defense Department considers to have importance, such as information sharing, the huge increase in advanced arms sales to India, and joint military-to-military exercises. (https://www.armed-services.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Davidson_03-09-21.pdf, pp. 13-14) In contrast, Admiral Davidson did discuss DPAA activities in other countries falling under USINDOPACOM's purview, namely Laos and Cambodia.

?

March 2021: the Indian Ministry of External Affairs issued a long statement, entitled "India-U.S. Bilateral Relations", extolling the record of US-India cooperation in many areas, including?defence, security and strategic cooperation, energy, counter-terrorism, medical product safety, mental health, COVID-19, trade policy, civil nuclear cooperation, higher education, and space exploration. . Significantly, US-India cooperation to recover the remains of US servicemen from India's territory was not mentioned. (https://www.indianembassyusa.gov.in/pdf/menu/IndiaUSnew2021.pdf) It can be reasonably concluded that this document reflects the joint US-Indian opinion that recovery of US MIAs, as a priority, ranks below all of those other issues.

May 27, 2021: From 2008, when the Defense Department first concluded an agreement with the Government of India to permit US Defense Department MIA recovery teams on its territory to recover the remains of an estimated 400 US airmen still unrecovered from World War II, so they may be repatriated to their families in the US, until the date of this article (12/21/2021), the remains of fewer than ten of those airmen have been recovered, largely due a multitude of cancellations, postponements, delays, moratoria, and restrictions imposed without justification by the Government of India. During the first year of the Biden Administration, not a single new recovery was announced. In spite of these troubling facts, the Defense Department's Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) claimed, in a statement issued on May 27, 2021, that "DPAA has made great progress with the country of India." In that statement, DPAA did not even attempt to substantiate that claim, most likely because it knew it would be attempting to defend the indefensible. (https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/Recent-News-Stories/Article/2635768/dpaa-establishes-partnership-with-national-forensic-sciences-university-india/).

May 27, 2021:?During the Biden Administration, progress with India in the MIA recovery area has been limited to cooperation in the areas of education and research, with no evident progress in the area of recovery operations. DPAA announced on May 27, 2021, that it signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with University of Nebraska-Lincoln and India's National Forensic Science University, This MoU is highly unlikely to increase cooperation in the timing and execution of US MIA recovery operations in India, however. The official Defense Department announcement of the agreement makes it clear that the focus of the MoU is teaching and research in the area of forensic anthropology and forensic archaeology, not remains recovery: "'NFSU has always taken a lead to promote forensics in criminal investigations,' said Dr. J.M Vyas, NFSU Vice Chancellor. 'However, this partnership with DPAA and UNL will enable the scientific exchange in the areas of forensic anthropology and odontology and develop best practices for human identification.' This MoU will build internal capacity upon the humanitarian recovery concept by allowing DPAA teams to teach the specialties of their field and create unique research opportunities, student exchange and cooperatives such as forensic anthropology, forensic archeology and forensic odontology. 'The University of Nebraska-Lincoln is very pleased to have entered into an MOU with the NFSU to support teaching, student exchange and training, as well as research,' said Dr. William Belcher, UNL Associate Professor of Anthropology, School of Global Integrative Studies." (https://www.dpaa.mil/News-Stories/Recent-News-Stories/Article/2635768/dpaa-establishes-partnership-with-national-forensic-sciences-university-india/) This announcement makes it clear that the focus of this MoU is solely to "develop academic exchanges and cooperation in teaching and research." Newspaper reports that indicated that the MoU committed the Indian Government to future MIA recovery operations in India (https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/ahmedabad/nfsu-to-join-hands-with-us-agency-to-recover-remains-of-wwii-personnel-7337317/) are not credible. For an MoU to have committed the Indian Government to future MIA recovery operations would have required that the Ministry of Defence, the Ministry of External Affairs, and the Ministry of Home Affairs be parties to the MoU, and that was not the case.

May 31, 2021:?DPAA Director Kelly McKeague, in his 2021 Memorial Day article for the Military Times, highlighted DPAA activities in Vietnam, Cambodia, Belgium, Laos, and South Korea. Nowhere in this article were any DPAA activities in India even mentioned. (https://www.military.com/daily-news/opinions/2021/05/31/thousands-of-troops-past-wars-are-still-missing-well-never-stop-trying-find-them.html)

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28 July 2021: Secretary of State Blinken visited New Delhi to hold talks with Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar. A close examination of the published transcript of the press conference held by Blinken and Jaishankar after the talks concluded clearly indicates that, while the talks covered a multitude of issues affecting the US-India relationship, including COVID, Afghanistan, maritime security, counterterrorism, climate actions, trade and investment, the plight of American families demanding more action from India to return the remains of US MIAs was completely ignored. This failure makes a lie of External Affairs Minister Jaishankar's statements emphasizing "the importance of observing international law and rules and norms" and "that it is the moral obligation of all – of all polities to (inaudible) right wrongs when they have been done, including historically." ((https://in.usembassy.gov/secretary-antony-j-blinken-and-indian-external-affairs-minister-dr-subrahmanyam-jaishankar-at-a-joint-press-availability/)

1 September 2021:?The fifth U.S. – India 2+2 Intersessional Dialogue was held, co-chaired by Assistant Secretary of Defense for Indo-Pacific Affairs Dr. Ely Ratner, and with Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Ervin Massinga, Joint Secretary Somnath Ghosh of the Indian Ministry of Defense, and Joint Secretary Vani Rao of the Indian Ministry of External Affairs, as participants. A close reading of the September 2, 2021 press release on this meeting makes it crystal clear that the Biden Administration did not bother to raise the issue of our 400 MIAs in India with Indian Government officials S. Ghosh and V. Rao. (https://www.defense.gov/Newsroom/Releases/Release/Article/2762541/readout-of-us-india-22-intercessional-dialogue/source/GovDelivery/fbclid/IwAR2P98aZau4tTVoC_n8HANJLcPptTl324ERx_MENNxWNNq5BoS7rufc66bE/) The Biden Administration continues to prioritize US-India trade, US arms sales to India, and joint US-India military exercises far above the rights of the families of American men and women who sacrificed their lives for their country.??

24 September 2021:?At the conclusion of the 24 September 2021 summit meeting between President Biden and Prime Minister Modi, the White House issued a "fact sheet" entitled "FACT SHEET: The United States and India – Global Leadership in Action", which went into great detail on points of US-India cooperation. Nowhere in this very long document was US-India cooperation on MIA recoveries even mentioned. (https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/09/24/fact-sheet-the-united-states-and-india-global-leadership-in-action/) The September 25, 2021 top-level joint statement by the Biden Administration and India's Modi Government - U.S.-India Joint Leaders’ Statement: A Partnership for Global Good - hit a new low in how both governments callously disregard the rights of US MIA families. This long and detailed statement conveyed India's thanks for the "repatriation of antiquities to India by the United States," but didn't say one word about the need to repatriate the remains of our 400 heroes! This is a partnership for "good"?? (https://in.usembassy.gov/u-s-india-joint-leaders-statement-a-partnership-for-global-good/) Other statements released on the occasion of this meeting by the Indian Government were similarly disappointing, omitting any mention of the issue of US-India cooperation on MIA recoveries. ( Meeting between Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi and Vice President Kamala Harris of the USA, September 23, 2021; Transcript of Foreign Secretary's special briefing on Prime Minister's visit to USA (September 25, 2021); Transcript of Foreign Secretary's special briefing on Prime Minister's visit to USA, September 21, 2021; Transcript of Foreign Secretary's special briefing on Prime Minister's visit to USA (September 23, 2021))

September 30, 2021: The global map contained in this official summary of DPAA operations from October 2020 to September 2021 shows that not a single MIA recovery, investigation, or disinterment mission was conducted during that entire period anywhere in India, where an estimated 400 US MIAs from WWII still lie unburied. That same map shows numerous MIA operations in other countries, throughout Western Europe, East Asia, and the Pacific. The Indian Government continues to sneer at the US, and DPAA and its DoD masters continue to act like pitiful punching bags in the face of Indian Government noncooperation. This time period spans the last three months of the Trump Administration and the first nine months of the Biden Administration. Both Administrations are culpable. (https://lnkd.in/da7bxaQA)

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December 14, 2021: It's scandalous that for Senator Jim Risch, Republican from Idaho and the Ranking Republican member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the issue of India's poor-to-mediocre level of cooperation with America's efforts to recover its 400 World War II missing from crash sites in India isn't anywhere on his list of priorities.

The occasion of the Committee's December 14, 2021 public hearing on the nomination of Eric Garcetti to be the new US Ambassador to India would have been a great opportunity not only to question Mr. Garcetti on what he intended to do to expedite the recovery of those MIAs, but also to raise public awareness of the issue in a vitally important public forum. Here is what Senator Risch had to say on that nomination in his opening statement:

"On the nomination of ambassador to India – India is a critical U.S. partner in the Indo-Pacific. U.S.-India defense cooperation today is more robust than it’s ever been – and the fruits of that were evident in U.S. support during India’s border crisis with China last year.

“India plays a crucial role in the Indian Ocean region and our strategic competition with China. But we cannot ignore the reality with concerns over India’s defense relationship with Russia. We need to ensure our relationship is healthy and strong for the long-term, so we work together to advance a free and open Indo-Pacific.

“We must also work closely with India on counterterrorism. Our withdrawal from Afghanistan led to big shifts in India’s security environment. It’s a good thing that we have the nominees for both India and Pakistan on this panel so we can address these issues together and thoroughly.

“This is also an opportunity for more economic cooperation with India, especially in technology, health, and energy. We do still have economic irritants to address, like lack of intellectual property protections and high tariffs. India’s tariffs remain a key challenge for Idaho agricultural companies. The United States also needs to continue to advocate on human rights issues in India." (RANKING MEMBER RISCH OPENING STATEMENT AT NOMINATIONS HEARING FOR AMBASSADORS TO GERMANY, INDIA, PAKISTAN, Senate Foreign Relations Committee, 14 December 2021, https://www.foreign.senate.gov/press/ranking/release/ranking-member-risch-opening-statement-at-nominations-hearing-for-ambassadors-to-germany-india-pakistan)

Not a word from Senator Risch on our MIAs in India. Nor did he raise the issue during the subsequent questioning of Mr. Garcetti.

Why did Senator Risch fail to raise this issue? Is he simply unaware of it? Not likely, considering his key role in the formulation of US foreign policy. So, if he is aware of it, did he fail to raise the issue out of fear of offending the Government of India, or fear of offending the multiple interests, inside and outside the Executive Branch, which prefer to maintain good relations with India, even if it means ignoring India's multiple breaches of its promises to fully cooperate with our MIA recovery efforts? That explanation cannot simply be rejected out of hand.