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 few years of the war in Vietnam, posed relatively little risk to American pilots. That changed as the pace of war accelerated and the eyes on both sides turned to the skies.
Mr. Everett Alvarez is a prior Navy pilot and officer who served during the Vietnam War as a Lieutenant Junior Grade (LTJG, O-2). Mr. Alvarez was the first pilot shot down, captured, and held as a prisoner of war (POW) at the Hỏa Lò Prison, also known as the “Hanoi
“On Earth as it is heaven.” It engulfed his mind as he stood there dirty, hungry and in pain. He struggled to hold his hands up against the wall. His knees shook as he spread his feet wide and tried with everything inside of him not to move a muscle,
It was supposed to be a routine mission, a “milk run” in the words of George Coker, who was serving on his 55th missions in Vietnam as a bombardier/navigator. Usually, his missions consisted of flying over Vietnam from the aircraft carrier USS Constellation and bombing strategic points like bridges and
Dozens attended a funeral service at Barrancas National Cemetery (BNC) onboard Naval Air Station (NAS) Pensacola May 16 for retired Cmdr. Ralph Ellis Gaither Jr., a naval aviator well-known in the Pensacola community as a Vietnam veteran and Prisoner of War (POW) who had exemplified defiance while in enemy hands.