[Y]

6/10/87

CHRIS

I would greatly love to have for
research purposes the transcript
of HAK's involvement in this show
(attached).

Any chance you got it in New York?

Or do you have any objective to our
calling whomever (starting with
Channel 26) and asking for a file
copy of transcript, for HAK's office?

Rosemary

PAGE 2B / WEDNESDAY, MAY 20, 1987.

The Washington Times

TELEVISION / Don Kowet

Another look at the MIA mystery

Public television rubs a raw nerve tonight at 8 when WETA (Channel 26) airs "MIA: We Can Keep You Forever."

Are U.S. prisoners of war still being held by the Vietnamese?

That suspicion — spawned by hundreds of alleged "sightings" since the Vietnam War ended in 1975 — has lodged in our collective conscience like a splinter, resisting every surgical effort to remove it. Congressional inquiries come and go; the reports of living American POWs just keep on coming.

The program, produced by the BBC, asserts that "today, there's firsthand evidence of live Americans left behind in Southeast Asia" and provides a motive to explain the "mystery" of their continued captivity.

If the Vietnamese are holding U.S. prisoners, why not say so?

The filmmakers suggest that missing-in-action Americans are being held as "bargaining chips," pawns to be bartered for war repayments from the United States or diplomatic recognition or United

Nations membership.

But, says former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger in the film, "If they had those prisoners, they had to surface them in order to bar gain with them. However, they didn't do that then [when the hostil ities ended]." He adds, "and they haven't done that since."

Mr. Kissinger plays his own dev il's advocate. "Of course, if they had admitted that they had prison ers," he says, "they would have had to be extremely worried what Pres ident Nixon would do, since we would have surely used it to take drastic action."

The film is full of true-believers — refugees and relief-workers who say they have seen living U.S. POWs in Vietnam; government of ficials who sifted the evidence and say they couldn't refute a hard core of reports; MIA wives certain that their government is withholding vi tal data; Vietnam veterans, former POWs — all convinced that as many as several hundred U.S. sol diers may still be captives.

But it is Mr. Kissinger — who doesn't claim to have any answers

— who turns out to be the most compelling witness of all.

"I do not exclude in Laos that, due to the general inefficiency of the situation, there might have been some [POWs] left behind," Mr. Kissinger says. His participation in the program lends it credibility; he has nothing to gain — neither a missing loved one, nor a coveted U.S. visa capable of spurring a ref ugee to concoct a "sighting" story.

In fact, by voicing his own doubts as to whether the Vietnam ese have dealt honestly with the MIA issue, he is questioning one of his and Mr. Nixon's acknowledged foreign-policy triumphs: "Opera tion Homecoming," in March 1973, when 591 U.S. POWs came back — and 3,500 MIAs didn't.

At the Paris peace talks, the North Vietnamese presented a list of only nine U.S. prisoners of the Pathet Lao.

Mr. Kissinger says that when he confronted the North Vietnamese with his best evidence that there were far more survivors, the North Vietnamese "denied everything." They had given him the full list.

There were no other U.S. prisoners anywhere. Mr. Kissinger calls his evidence "incontrovertible."

The fact that Mr. Kissinger is still troubled by the question of whether any U.S. POWs remain in Vietnam weighs more heavily than any individual sighting. His conviction that the Vietnamese are at least capable of playing a cruel chess match, using U.S. POWs as pawns, is an echo in history.

The filmmakers point out that after the French departed from Vietnam, the Vietnamese also vehe mently denied holding back any prisoners. But within a year or so, some 1,000 French troops "missing in action" suddenly materialized, reportedly after the French had paid the Vietnamese several mil lion dollars.

The film — a 1986 BBC produc tion — will be followed by an inter view with Air Force Col. Howard Hill, principal adviser to the secretary of defense on POW/MIA affairs. Judy Woodruff will then mod erate a pre-taped panel discussion, with New Jersey Republican Rep Christopher H. Smith — a member of the House Task Force on POW Affairs — and a pair of MIA activ ists whose fathers' files are both still stamped "MIA."

Henry Kissinger