It was a few days before Christmas, 1972, when Jill Drummond got the worst present imaginable. It was a letter from the United States Air Force telling her that her husband David Drummond was officially missing in action in Vietnam.
Shock, fear and worry all followed. What she didn’t know immediately was that her husband’s B-52 bomber had been shot down and he had been captured by North Vietnamese soldiers.
This afternoon, I had the honor of visiting Colonel John Dramesi, Vietnam Prisoner Of War and author of the Code of Honor, with several friends.
Arthur Burera retired Air Force colonel who was shot down over North Vietnam in 1966 and spent 83 months as a prisoner of war, has died. The highly decorated war hero, who was held for a time in Hanoi with a pilot named John McCain, was 77. Burer had Alzheimer’s disease.
Stepping off the bus, recently freed American prisoners of war formed up from the tallest to shortest, stiff at attention facing Capt. Carlyle “Smitty” Harris and with a salute they defied their Vietnamese captors one final time. Proving their grit and American pride could outlast any amount of torture or
I arrived at Udorn RTAFB in early May, 1967, to fly A-1E and A1-H Skyraider with the 602nd Fighter Squadron (Commando). I was to fly 247 combat missions during three consecutive tours and participated in the rescue of 18 aircrew members. On May 31, 1968, going for number 19, I
John McCain, the Arizona Senator who died on Saturday, lived much of his life in the public political eye — but Americans started to learn about his famous courage at a time he was notably absent. The saga began 51 years ago. As TIME reported in 1967, North Vietnamese planes had, for the first