Pearl Harbor's Missing Aircraft - 7 Dec 1941

[David_Aiken]

Originally Posted by JeffK

I believe the United States Armed Forces have made a commitment to ensure that every effort is made to return the mortal remaind of its Soldiers (Sailors & Airmen) no matter at what cost or period of time.

Aloha Jeff,
Good points! This task is due in big part to the widows of Vietnam veterans still missing and the campaign they made to bring their loved ones home. I noted the effects in my own search, from about 1969. Prior to 1969 folks did not know the term "MIA".

In OZ we get an excellent coverage of the work undertaken in Papua New Guinea by CIL-HI (Central Identification Laboratory - Hawaii)

Yes, Brian Bennett (the New Guinea, New Britian representative of JPAC-CILHI) is doing an excellent job. He and I have corresponded since 1983. He had been roaming the jungles at that time for various civilian plantations, etc, and finding aircraft while doing his job...he now tracks aircraft crashes for JPAC.

The US Army set up the Identification Lab in Hawaii after a move from the Orient. Johnie Webb was a mere Captain when my mother (a hospital nurse) took care of his mother in 1975...which introduced me to him and his commanding job. Johnie led CILHI until he retired from the military, and now is the top civilian at CILHI...this organization was taken over recently by a combined services unit called "Joint POW-MIA Accounting Command (JPAC)". The facility in Hawaii is still the central location for identification of suspected military human remains. http://www.jpac.pacom.mil/

In 1981, I got a phone call from the Army's Casualty and Memorial Affairs Branch (the former CILHI's direct boss) in Washington DC. In this most friendly call, he was concerned that I was using the term "MIA" as applied to World War II deceased personnel. He told me that the term "MIA" is like a pay scale for widows. As long as the loved one is declared "Missing", the widow gets money. Once the person is declared "Body Not Recoverable", that pay stops. Then it really "hit" me that I understood why the widows raised such a ruckus...money!

For some light reading on one "BNR" from Pearl Harbor: http://www.flightjournal.com/article.../sterling1.asp

Thanks for your interest, Jeff!
Cheers,
David Aiken