On November 17, 2013 Robert Wideman sat down and told of his experiences in the Vietnam War. Robert, born in Montreal, Canada and raised in upstate New York and Cleveland, OH, served in the Navy. A pilot, he flew 120+ missions into Vietnam off the carriers Enterprise and Hancock. On May 6, 1967, his plane was shot down over North Vietnam and Robert became a POW for the next six years. In this clip, he
Commander George Coker was one of the “Alcatraz 11,” a group considered by the North Vietnamese to be the resistance leadership, even though he was a junior officer. The Alcatraz 11 were moved from Hao Lo to a separate facility “Alcatraz” in 1967. Among them were Jim Stockdale and Bob Shumaker. Like Shumaker, Coker was a key communications link in the command structure at Hao Lo and the other Hanoi prisons. He also has the
In August 1964, an American pilot was shot down and captured by the North Vietnamese. In the following years of the Vietnam Conflict, hundreds of American prisoners of war were interrogated, starved and tortured in Communist prisons. Prisoners of Hope presents the experiences of ten of these individuals who were denied that most valuable and precious possession — freedom. Their stories are filled with suffering and survival, death and deliverance. But above all, they are
COL ROBERT CERTAIN | U.S. Air Force, B-52 Navigator, 307th Strategic Air Wing – Air Force
Captured and held in a prisoner of war camp for five years, Dr. Kushner’s tale of torture, abuse, survival, humanity, and perseverance was both sobering and moving. As our closing keynote speaker for VMI’s Vietnam symposium ‘The Vietnam War at 50,’ our audience leaves on a powerful note among the several personal stories they heard today.
