Excerpts from an Oct. 20, 2019 interview with Col. Ken Cordier, a former United States Air Force pilot who was an American prisoner of war in North Vietnam for 6 years, 3 months and 2 days during the Vietnam War. This is part of the Robert H. Jackson Center’s Defenders of Freedom project. For further information see www.roberthjacskon.org.
The Documented Cases: POWs Left Behind
The actual story of Prisoners of War (POWs) left behind in previous wars is quite documented but became obscured by hoax POW pictures, small time scams, and other diversions. This is the story of those POWs left behind in Laos and Vietnam, drawn on facts from government published reports and official testimony from high-level figures such as former U.S. Defense Secretary and CIA Director James Schlesinger who testified under oath that POWs remained behind in
