Dorothy H. McDaniel - After the Heros Welcome: A POW Wifes Story of the Battle Against a New Enemy

While they were in our home during the writing of their book Kiss the Boys Goodbye, Bill Stevenson and Monika Jensen-Stevenson persuaded me to tell my story in my own words. The American Defense Institute staff gave generously of their time and energy to encourage me and proofread my writing.

My purpose in writing our story was not to offer proof that some of our POWs were left behind when American forces left Vietnam. Other excellent works have accomplished that purpose. In addition to Kiss the Boys Goodbye, An Enormous Crime by former congressman Bill Hendon and MIA daughter Elizabeth Stewart and The Men We Left Behind by Mark Sauter and Jim Sanders are among many excellent resources for understanding this tragic chapter in our nations history. However, After the Heros Welcome is my recounting of the price my family paid for our efforts to focus attention on those abandoned Americans.

My wonderful children Mike, Dave, and Leslie helped me piece together the story of the hard days we shared while their father was away. Reliving those days with them caused me to look with amazement and gratitude at their resiliency and strength. Red, my towering six-foot-three-inch husband, who stands ten feet tall in my eyes, thought my writing was great even when it wasnt. I wanted to write of him and of his commitment to do the right thing no matter what it cost him. After the Heros Welcome is my tribute to Red, my most admired man and the love of my life.

Twenty-three years have passed since After the Heros Welcome was first published in 1991. None of the POWs America left behind in Southeast Asia after the 1973 cease-fire has returned to freedom. But their story refuses to die.

In An American in the Basement (Trine Day, 2013), former naval intelligence officer Amy Yarsinske reveals her knowledge of our nations cover-up of information concerning POWs held in Southeast Asia long after the Vietnam cease-fire in 1973 (see pages 269279 of the book). Knowing that the sacrifices of Reds fellow POWs, especially those who were abandoned, are still being acknowledged has helped us to live out the rest of our lives in peace and contentment. We have given our very best effort to focus public attention on those forsaken men.

I often reflect on the six years I waited for Red to return and wonder how I would have survived those long hard years had I known there was even a remote possibility that he could be abandoned by the country that sent him to war. And therein lies the crux of the unresolved issue of the men still missing in Southeast Asia, whose fate remains unknown.

Our family continues to be a source of great joy. All three children are married and parents to our nine grandchildren and one great-grandchild. After thirty-five years of naval service (including his four years as a midshipman at Annapolis), Mike retired from the Navy and presently serves as president of the American Defense Institute. Dave, still surfing in his fifties, followed his heart and settled in San Diego as owner of a beachwear shop. Leslie and her husband, Jim, are managers of a local, family-owned elder care agency.

We are all keenly aware of what might have been our fate and thankful that while Red was in communist captivity, we did not know that America was capable of knowingly abandoning some of her finest and bravest warriors. Our hearts are full of gratitude for Gods protection and faithfulness in bringing Red home to freedom. Our family is determined to do whatever is in our limited power to do in the effort to focus attention on the brave warriors who are living out their lives in communist captivity. There, but for the grace of God, is our own family, and we trust Him to give those abandoned men an extra measure of His grace.

Recently, it was hard to hear my husband, a man who gave almost six years of his life in communist captivity, tell a group of influential men and women,

Im sad to say Ive come to feel that our current leaders are not worthy of the sacrifices of our sons and daughters. Had I known for 2,116 days of communist captivity that I would experience the callous, non-caring attitudes of some of our present national leaders, I could not have survived.

I hope hes wrong. But even a cursory glance through a growing list of national failures convinces me that the values of our forefathers, whose dedication and courage gave us the proud and glorious nation we inherited, are being desecrated every day. Our nation has lost her way because her leaders have lost their way. Where is the sense of honor that seems to have disappeared from our national leadership? Where is the transparency in government that our forefathers envisioned?

However, we continue to thank God for His goodness in bringing our family together after Reds long captivity and for the unbelievable joy we have experienced in the forty-one years since he came home to freedom.

Dorothy McDaniel, 2014

WHITE HOUSE MEMORANDA

April 26, 1971

MEMORANDUM FOR: GENERAL HUGHES

FROM: H.R. HALDEMAN

With the demonstrations gaining ground after the Veterans effort last week, weve got to be doubly sure we are keeping the POW wives in line. Is there anything you can think of that should be done at this point?

THE WHITE HOUSE

Washington

April 29, 1971

MEMORANDUM FOR H.R. HALDEMAN

Subject: POW/MIA Wives

This is in response to your memorandum of April 26th on this subject.

You are aware of my increasing concern about purely PR therapy being effective for much longer. Nevertheless, after a meeting with Al Haig and Chuck Colson, I feel that increased efforts in the cosmetic area are warranted and indeed essential to keep the families with us during the critical period of the next six to eight weeks. In addition to personal daily contact with the National League of Families in a continuing effort to show our concern by attempting to keep them informed and solve problems for them, here are some of the other activities we plan.

Today, Ambassador Bruce will propose a package deal on the POW/MIA in Paris. This is a new concept which wraps up impartial inspection, release of the sick and wounded and those imprisoned the longest, and internment in a neutral country. The President will be prepared to highlight this tonight at the Press Conference which should give it an even greater significance.

Henry Kissinger will have a meeting with the Board of Directors of the National League of Families on Saturday, 8 May.

The Vice President will address the National Red Cross Convention in Washington on 17 May on the POW/MIA issue (it may be that the President should reconsider and pre-empt him and I am making a separate proposal along those lines.)

We are working to get Major Rowe (Army escapee from the Viet Cong) and Mrs. Joan Vinson, the National Coordinator for the National League of Families, on the David Frost Show to counter the extremely bad job done by Jane Fonda on this show.

General Chappie James appeared on the Today Show on 28 April and did a superb job of upholding the Administrations position and setting the POW/MIA matter in proper prospective.

Secretary Laird announced at a Washington luncheon in his honor, that neutral shipping was available and ready to repatriate prisoners or to intern them in a third country.

According to Al Haig, the next eight weeks are critical and the efforts of the Ad Hoc Coordinating Group on POW/MIA matters will be devoted to keeping the families on the reservation in order to buy this time.

BRIGADIER GENERAL JAMES D. HUGHES

MEMORANDUM

NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

INFORMATION

March 12, 1979