[House Hearing, 106 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
THE CUBAN PROGRAM: TORTURE OF AMERICAN PRISONERS BY CUBAN AGENTS
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON
INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 1999
__________
Serial No. 106-118
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on International Relations
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.house.gov/international
relations
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
65-278 cc WASHINGTON : 2000
COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York, Chairman
WILLIAM F. GOODLING, Pennsylvania SAM GEJDENSON, Connecticut
JAMES A. LEACH, Iowa TOM LANTOS, California
HENRY J. HYDE, Illinois HOWARD L. BERMAN, California
DOUG BEREUTER, Nebraska GARY L. ACKERMAN, New York
CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American
DAN BURTON, Indiana Samoa
ELTON GALLEGLY, California MATTHEW G. MARTINEZ, California
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida DONALD M. PAYNE, New Jersey
CASS BALLENGER, North Carolina ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey
DANA ROHRABACHER, California SHERROD BROWN, Ohio
DONALD A. MANZULLO, Illinois CYNTHIA A. McKINNEY, Georgia
EDWARD R. ROYCE, California ALCEE L. HASTINGS, Florida
PETER T. KING, New York PAT DANNER, Missouri
STEVE CHABOT, Ohio EARL F. HILLIARD, Alabama
MARSHALL ``MARK'' SANFORD, South BRAD SHERMAN, California
Carolina ROBERT WEXLER, Florida
MATT SALMON, Arizona STEVEN R. ROTHMAN, New Jersey
AMO HOUGHTON, New York JIM DAVIS, Florida
TOM CAMPBELL, California EARL POMEROY, North Dakota
JOHN M. McHUGH, New York WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts
KEVIN BRADY, Texas GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York
RICHARD BURR, North Carolina BARBARA LEE, California
PAUL E. GILLMOR, Ohio JOSEPH CROWLEY, New York
GEORGE RADANOVICH, California JOSEPH M. HOEFFEL, Pennsylvania
JOHN COOKSEY, Louisiana
THOMAS G. TANCREDO, Colorado
Richard J. Garon, Chief of Staff
Kathleen Bertelsen Moazed, Democratic Chief of Staff
Caleb C. McCarry, Senior Professional Staff Member and Counsel
Marilyn C. Owen, Staff Associate
C O N T E N T S
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WITNESSES
Page
Colonel Jack W. Bomar, United States Air Force, Retired.......... 7
Andres F. Garcia, Vice President, Cuban American Veterans
Association.................................................... 16
Captain Raymond Vohden, United States Navy, Retired.............. 10
Michael D. Benge, civilian Economic Development Officer and
Prisoner of War Historian...................................... 13
Robert L. Jones, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, Prisoner
of War/Missing Personnel Affairs, Department of Defense........ 28
Robert J. Destatte, Chief Analyst, Research and Analysis
Directorate, Defence Prisoner of War and Missing in Action
Office, Department of Defense.................................. 30
The Honorable Mark Foley, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Florida............................................... 19
APPENDIX
Prepared statements:
The Honorable Benjamin A. Gilman, a Representative in Congress
from New York and Chairman, Committee on International
Relations...................................................... 50
The Honorable Ileana Ros-Lehtinen a Representative in Congress
from Florida................................................... 51
Colonel Jack W. Bomar............................................ 54
Col. Jack W. Bomar supplement: A definitive history of
American Prisoner-of-War Experience in Vietnam, 1964-1973,
entitled ``P.O.W.'' by John G. Hubbell..................... 58
Andres F. Garcia................................................. 95
Raymond Vohden................................................... 107
Michael D. Benge................................................. 114
Michael D. Benge supplementary research on ``Cuban War Crimes
Against American POW's During the Vietnam War''............ 121
Robert L. Jones.................................................. 140
Robert J. Destatte............................................... 143
Additional material submitted for the record:
Letter to Honorable Lewis J. Freeh, Director, FBI, dated
September 24, 1999, from the Honorable Ileana Ros-Lehtinen..... 148
Letter to Honorable Doris Meissner, Commissioner, U.S.
Immigration and Naturalization Service, dated October 6, 1999,
from the Honorable Ileana Ros-Lehtinen......................... 149
Letter to Honorable Douglas B. Peterson, U.S. Ambassador to
Vietnam, dated October 6, 1999, from the Honorable Ileana Ros-
Lehtinen....................................................... 151
Letter to Honorable William J. Clinton, President, dated October
26, 1999, from David Monson, President of Paralyzed Veterans
Association of Florida, Inc.................................... 153
Letter to Honorable Lewis Freeh, Director, FBI, dated November 1,
1999 from Benjamin A. Gilman................................... 154
Letter to Honorable Ileana Ros-Lehtinen dated November 4, 1999,
from Pete Peterson, Ambassador, Embassy of the United States,
Hanoi.......................................................... 156
Letter to Honorable Benjamin A. Gilman dated November 22, 1999,
from Robert L. Jones, with attachment concerning Aircraft
Losses......................................................... 157
Letter to Honorable Robert L. Jones dated December 15, 1999, from
Benjamin A. Gilman............................................. 159
Letter to Honorable Benjamin A. Gilman dated January 10, 2000
from Robert L. Jones........................................... 160
THE CUBAN PROGRAM: TORTURE OF AMERICAN PRISONERS BY CUBAN AGENTS
----------
Thursday, November 4, 19994House of Representatives,
Committee on International Relations,
Washington, D.C.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:10 a.m., in
room 2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Benjamin A.
Gilman (Chairman of the Committee) Presiding.
Chairman Gilman. The Committee will come to order. Members
please take their seats.
Between July 1967 and August 1968 a team of interrogators,
believed to be Cubans, brutally beat and tortured 19 American
airmen, killing one in the prisoner of war camp known as ``The
Zoo.'' I want to thank Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, our
distinguished Chairman of our Subcommittee on International
Economic Policy and Trade for her leadership in pursuing this
issue.
I served on the Select Committee that initially
investigated the fate of American prisoners of war and those
missing in action, and I look forward to hearing from our
witnesses today. This morning, we will hear testimony from two
distinguished panels.
On our first panel, we are honored to have three former
prisoners of war, including two who were subjected to the so-
called ``Cuban Program'': Captain Raymond Vohden, who later
served with the Defense Department's POW-Missing Personnel
office, and Air Force Colonel Jack Bomar, of Arizona. Our other
witnesses include Michael Benge, a foreign service officer who
was a prisoner of war in Vietnam for 5 years; and Andres
Garcia, the Vice President of the Cuban American Veterans
Association.
On our second panel, we will be joined by Robert Jones,
Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Prisoner of War and
Missing Personnel Affairs; and Robert Destatte of the Defense
Department's Prisoner of War-Missing Personnel office.
Recent press reports have revived interest in this terrible
chapter of the Vietnam War and raised hopes that those
responsible for those crimes can be identified. In that regard,
we have written to FBI Director Louis Freeh to ask the Bureau
for its assistance in pursuing information in the files of
former Soviet Bloc countries regarding the Cuban program.
Those who murdered or tortured our American servicemen are
still at large somewhere, possibly in Cuba. There is no statute
of limitations on the crimes committed against these American
servicemen. Neither shall there be a statute of limitations on
our commitment to discovering the true identity of those
responsible for such crimes, so that they may be brought to
justice. Our Nation owes this to the courageous men and women
who served us so loyally in Vietnam.
Before we begin with our first panel, let me ask our
Ranking Member, Congressman--Judge Hastings, if he would like
to make any opening remarks.
Mr. Hastings. In the interest of time I will ask that any
comment that I make be inserted in the record.
I would like to thank Ileana Ros-Lehtinen for her
leadership in this effort.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Gilman. Dr. Cooksey has asked to be recognized.
Mr. Cooksey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
My request, Mr. Chairman is that we minimize opening
statements as much as possible. I am particularly interested in
this issue. I want the facts out. I would like to have the
maximum amount of time with these witnesses. Due to a counter-
request, I am not going to demand that we have a total limit of
time. But I hope we can get to the witnesses.
Chairman Gilman. We will get to the witnesses as quickly as
possible. I would like to recognize the distinguished Chairman
of the Subcommittee on International Economic Policy and Trade,
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen, the gentle lady from Florida.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Thank you so much. I would like to thank
you, Chairman Gilman, for convening this hearing and for your
leadership and commitment. This issue is particularly important
to me for various reasons; but most importantly, as I read
through the accounts of what our men and women in uniform have
endured throughout this century of war, I think of my husband,
Dexter Lehtinen, who served in the Special Forces in Vietnam
and was injured in combat--he was relatively fortunate, but so
many were not.
I look at our POW's who are here today, many in our
audience especially, and I am humbled by their sacrifices and
honored to know them. I thank them for sharing their stories
with us. I know that it is difficult, but their presence is
indicative of their caliber as human beings and as citizens in
the service of our country.
The Geneva Convention prohibits ``violence to life and
person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel
treatment and torture and outrages upon personal dignity and
particular humiliating and degrading treatment.'' This is
exactly what took place at a prison camp in North Vietnam known
as ``The Zoo,'' seen there in a declassified aerial photograph
during the period of August 1967 to August 1968, where 19 of
our courageous servicemen were psychologically tortured, some
brutally beaten by interrogators assessed to be Cuban agents
working under orders from Hanoi.
Described by some to be a psychological experiment, the
goals of the ``Cuba Program,'' as the torture project has been
labeled by our Defense Department and our intelligence
agencies, has been described in different ways as an attempt to
test interrogation methods, to obtain absolute compliance and
submission to captor demands, and ultimately to be used as
propaganda by the international Communist effort, as Mike Benge
will elaborate upon during today's session.
Some POW's were tortured and then instructed to copy a
series of questions and answers given to them by their
interrogators. These excerpts on most occasions included
statements declaring that the United States was waging an
illegal, immoral, and unjust war.
Prisoners were tortured--again, some psychologically,
others physically--to ensure cooperation in appearances they
were forced to make before visiting delegations. Refusal to
comply with the captor's demands usually meant that ``Fidel,''
``Chico,'' and ``Pancho''--as the torturers were called by our
POW's--would be called in for more intense beatings of the
prisoners.
In a chapter of ``P.O.W.,'' a book published by Reader's
Digest Press in 1976, Colonel Bomar describes different
incidents where attempts were made to break the prisoners so
they would recite the Communist Vietnam script before visiting
groups.
One of these occurred on July 3, 1968, when the camp medic
entered the cell of Air Force Major James Kasler to bandage his
draining leg. Having defied the camp commander the day before,
telling him he would not tow the line before a delegation which
as to visit ``The Zoo,'' Kasler knew that this visit meant that
it was done, as he says, prior to torture to keep the blood and
the pus from staining the interrogation room.
Within an hour he was in torture. Enter ``Fidel.''
``Fidel'' reached down, grabbed Jim by the neck of his shirt,
and shook him like a rag doll. ``Fidel'' seemed beside himself
with rage. Then he slammed the heel of his boot down in the
center of Kasler's chest. Jim gasped, fought for air.
Kasler would not cooperate, and after a while, ``Fidel''
shifted psychological gears, offering a drink of water, a
cigarette, turning a small table fan on Kasler. Unable to get
him to surrender, ``Fidel'' administered another beating, and
another and another. Jim's thumbs were wired together describes
Bomar, ropes were tied around his elbows. The flogging went on
and on. After 36 lashes Kasler's lower back and legs hung in
shreds. This skin had been entirely whipped away and the area
was a bluish, purplish, greenish mass of bloody raw meat.
Unable to get Kasler to surrender, ``Fidel'' promised to
return the next day for more.
The ruthless nature of the interrogators and the severity
of their actions led prisoners such as Captain Raymond Vohden
and Colonel Jack Bomar, as well as Lieutenant Carpenter, who is
in the audience today, to question how human beings could so
batter another human being. They stood firm in the face of
unrestrained brutality, intimidation, and humiliation 30 years
ago.
They are demonstrating their courage here again today by
working with us to ensure that the sacrifices made in defense
of freedom and democracy are not forgotten; to ensure that the
life and death of one of their fellow POW's and victims of the
``Cuba Program,'' Air Force pilot Earl Cobeil, who is pictured
in one of the posters there, is not ignored; to ensure that
justice is indeed served.
Captain Vohden and Colonel Bomar will offer compelling and
detailed testimony describing the actions committed against
them by Cuban agents at ``The Zoo,'' acts which are in direct
violation of the Geneva Convention on Prisoners of War. To
violate the provisions enshrined in this document runs against
the grain of civilized society and undermines the integrity of
our international community as a whole. Humanity is one; when
one suffers, we all suffer. Violations of this protocol are not
just crimes against one individual, but against all of
humanity.
That is the message that one of our witnesses, Andres
Garcia, of my congressional district, a Vietnam veteran and the
Vice President of the Cuban American Veterans Association, will
underscore today.
Survivors of the ``Cuba Program'' have been eager to
identify and trace the Cuba agents who systematically
interrogated them and tortured their fellow Americans. Yet
despite their efforts, a successful resolution of this matter
has not been achieved. This hearing is the first of many steps
aimed at changing that outcome.
We hope to accomplish three goals today. The first is to
get leads that could take us closer to an identification of the
Cuban torturers. Could ``Fidel'' be Fernando Vecino Alegret, or
is he Luis Perez Jaen, as a 1974 CIA report alleged? Is
``Chico'' a man by the name of Veiga, as our intelligence
agencies suggested in this same document? Is Gustavo Robreno
Dolz the man our POW's called ``Pancho?'' The answer to these
should be our first priority.
Our second goal is to provide the basis for an ensuing
interagency investigation of new evidence, including a search
of pertinent data and sources previously unavailable under Cold
War parameters. We are fully cognizant of the mission of DOD's
Office of POW/Missing Personnel who will be testifying today,
and while they are most familiar with the ``Cuba Program,''
they have completed their mission successfully by accounting
for and bringing back all 20 of our servicemen who were part of
the ``Cuba Program.'' We want the State Department, CIA, FBI,
INS, and the Defense Intelligence Agency to coordinate the
comprehensive approach to this case.
Last, this hearing will begin to establish the foundation
for future action against the torturers.
On a broader scale, this investigation will serve to
highlight the brutal nature of the Castro regime and the
historic and ongoing threat it poses to the American people.
Ultimately, our hope is that this hearing will serve to honor
those POW's who were willing to give life and limb so that we
may all be free.
Mr. Chairman, as part of our preliminary investigation on
this issue, I requested information from INS, FBI, and the
Vietnamese Government through our embassy in Hanoi. I ask that
these letters be included in the record of today's proceedings.
Chairman Gilman. Without objection.
Mr. Ros-Lehtinen. Just this morning I received a letter
from Ambassador Peterson in Hanoi which I would like also to be
included in the record.
Chairman Gilman. Without objection.
[The letters appears in the appendix.]
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. In the letter he states, ``I have
personally presented your request to the appropriate Vietnamese
officials.'' He further states that, ``Given my personal
experience, I share and deeply appreciate your abhorrence for
the inhumane treatment of POW's by any country.''
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your leadership.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Chair lady Ros-Lehtinen.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Ros-Lehtinen appears in the
appendix.]
Chairman Gilman. Mr. Menendez.
Mr. Menendez. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me, at the
outset, thank you, Mr. Chairman, for giving your attention to
this issue in the crowded agenda of the Committee's schedule
and for agreeing to hold a hearing before the Committee.
Let me also recognize the leadership of my colleague from
Florida, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, for pursuing what others would
clearly want to have be a closed door on a sad chapter in our
relationships. Let me salute all of those whose testimony today
will relive some painful memories, but whom we appreciate in
our effort to ultimately get to the truth.
While it has been more than 30 years since the ``Cuba
Program'' ended for the 19 American POW's who suffered the
daily beatings and interrogations of their Cuban torturers, the
``Cuba Program'' remains for them a vivid memory, and for some,
an everyday nightmare.
Today, we are here to announce that the search for
``Fidel,'' ``Chico,'' and ``Pancho'' Garcia is not over. The
atrocities committed by these Cuban agents constitute clear
violations of the Geneva Convention, which has no statute of
limitations. It is our intent to reinvigorate the
investigation, uncover the identities of these men and bring
them to trial for their crimes.
I have read the information provided by the Department of
Defense, which provides detailed accounts of the Cuban program.
Unfortunately, the Department has been unable to definitively
identify the Cuban perpetrators, but I believe our search does
not end here. The clues we need to positively identify the
three Cuban torturers may very well lie in the further review
and declassification of documents from that time period, which
I will join my colleague in pursuing.
We have encouraged the Department to renew its effort so
that we can find these men before it is too late to bring them
to trial or too late for their victims to see them brought to
justice. We should also fully investigate Fernando Vecino
Alegret, the man identified by retired Air Force Colonel Ed
Hubbard as ``Fidel.'' It seems quite feasible that the man who
has claimed to be Cuba's Minister of Higher Education for more
than 20 years was part of the ``Cuba Program.'' Alegret's
contention that he doesn't, ``have the face of a torturer'' is
hardly a satisfactory response.
The allegation against Vecino Alegret is not a recent one.
A Washington Post article of March 5, 1981, indicates that not
only did he take part in the ``Cuba Program,'' but that he was
one of the most-watched people in Latin America by U.S.
Intelligence services. He has been linked to Cuba's Cold War
activities in Central America and Africa and served as Cuba's
military attache to Vietnam during the time of the ``Cuba
Program.''
Now, personally, I can't tell you that he is ``Fidel,'' but
certainly his past should tell us that he is not above
scrutiny. As former Chilean Dictator Pinochet has discovered,
the passage of years has increased, not decreased, the
likelihood of prosecution in cases involving violations of
international law.
I welcome that reality. I would hate to think that in the
world we would send the message that those who think that
through the passage of time they can escape the violations of
international law and the consequences that one should receive
for those violations. That would send a very wrong message.
Castro's tyranny continues today in Cuba, not against
American POW's, but against his own people. Pinochet's trial
sends a message to all individuals who violate human rights
that they, too, can and will be held accountable for their
crimes.
I look forward to the testimony. I will be going back and
forth, Mr. Chairman. I have a hearing across the hall,
unfortunately, at the same time. But I have read the testimony
that has been submitted to the Committee. I think it is rather
compelling and gives us a strong foundation to move forward in
the future, and I thank you.
Chairman Gilman. We will now proceed with the statement of
Mr. Rohrabacher.
Mr. Rohrabacher. I will be very quick, because I know Mr.
Cooksey wants to get right to the testimony, and so I do.
Let me just say that Ileana has done a terrific job here.
We all owe her a debt of gratitude. It is about time we set the
record straight about Fidel Castro; and there are just so many
misconceptions and so many false images created about this
monster. I mean, Fidel Castro is portrayed by so many on the
left as being some nationalist just opposed to American
domination, but you take a look at the picture a little closer
and you are going to find that that man is a ghoul.
He is a criminal, he is the worst type of gangster and ran
a gangster regime for all these years in Cuba. He was, from the
very beginning, a fanatic Communist who put his own people,
thousands of them, in harm's way throughout the world, as
cannon fodder for the Communist movement in Africa; and he sent
his people--he hated the United States so much that he sent his
people over to torture Americans in Vietnam. We need to know
these facts.
I am very pleased that you are here with us today to alert
the American people about Fidel Castro--that his past crimes
shouldn't be just sloughed off and taken lightly. This man is
as evil a war criminal and is as committed to crimes against
humanity as have ever been committed in this century. We need
to remember that and make sure we put it on the record.
So thank you for helping set the record straight and being
with us today.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Mr. Rohrabacher.
We will now proceed with testimony from our witnesses.
Chairman Gilman. United States Air Force Colonel Jack Bomar
was born in Michigan in 1926. After refusing a transplant to
correct a kidney disorder, Colonel Bomar was grounded, but was
later granted a waiver at his request and assigned to the 41st
Tactical Reconnaissance Squadron in Thailand. Colonel Bomar was
shot down over North Vietnam on February 4, 1967. During his
captivity, Colonel Bomar was tortured by the Cuban known as
``Fidel.'' Colonel Bomar retired from the Air Force in 1974.
Colonel Bomar, you may proceed with your testimony. We will
put your full statement in the record and you may summarize,
whichever you deem appropriate.
STATEMENT OF COLONEL JACK BOMAR, UNITED STATES AIR FORCE,
RETIRED
Mr. Bomar. Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee. My
testimony is a summary of a lengthier, more detailed statement.
Chairman Gilman. Do you want to put the full statement in
the record at this time?
Mr. Bomar. I ask that it be included in its entirety in the
record.
Chairman Gilman. Without objection. Please proceed.
Mr. Bomar. Good morning. My name is Jack Bomar, retired Air
Force Colonel. I am a graduate of the ``Fidel'' Program, Class
of 1968. I wish to thank the Members of this panel for their
interest in uncovering the truth about a subject that has been
buried for 31 years--especially you, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen from
Florida.
When I was shot down in 1967, we were flying an ECM
aircraft out of Takhli, Thailand. It is kind of amazing that a
SAM suppression aircraft can get knocked down by a SAM. But
that is what happened. There were six of us on the aircraft;
three of us survived. One was captured by the Chinese and
turned over to the North Vietnamese. I went through the initial
torture of peasants on the ground trying to spear me with
spears as I came toward the ground. I kicked one of them aside
and in doing that, I think I ruptured a disc in my back, and
broke an ankle. I got a big chunk of shrapnel through my left
leg before bailing out. So when I arrived in North Vietnam, I
was not in the mood for games. I was tired, I just wanted a
drink of water and to be allowed to lay down. The peasants
tortured me all day.
Finally I got into Hanoi that night, and went into some
real torture by the North Vietnamese.
They didn't need our ``Fidel'' to teach them how to torture
people. The Vietnamese were experts at this. I went through
what we call the ``Rope Trick.'' Your arms are tied behind your
back, wrists in manacles and the pressure is slowly applied to
the upper arms with straps. Eventually I was hung from a hook
because I would not reveal the names of my crew.
Finally after three days with no food or water, constant
interrogation, the camp commander was suddenly there, then
gone. The torture guy--we call him ``Straps and Bars''--applied
the pressure again. Finally, they showed me a list of my crew
members, so they had been working on one of the other three of
us pretty harshly.
I was sent to ``The Zoo'' and put in a camp where I met a
delegation from the United States. There were three men in this
delegation. One was a doctor, I think from France, one was a
lawyer from Denmark or someplace, and the other was an anti war
type from Berkeley, California, named Neilands, a professor
from Berkeley. He and I immediately hit it off by him sticking
out his hand--I was on crutches, had bandages from here to here
to cover up all the wounds on my hands. I asked him, ``What the
hell are you doing in North Vietnam?'' He said, ``Dean Rusk,
the son of a bitch, will not tell me where I can go and when I
can be there.'' So my purpose, primarily, was to get a letter
to my family, which got my name out in public. We felt that if
you were known to be a POW, your survival chances were much
greater than those that were not known.
After that interrogation, I was tortured several more times
by the Vietnamese and thrown into solitary. I was in solitary
confinement in June. After the delegation visit, there was no
more treatment for the hole in my leg. I dug the shrapnel out
with my fingers. I was on crutches when I saw the delegation;
but now the crutches were long gone. Because of my attitude at
the delegation, I was stashed in solitary.
Suddenly they came in and wanted me to meet ``several of my
countrymen''. I think they said, ``When you go to Quiz at
night, it is a pretty scary thing; you are not sure what is
coming.'' I wasn't sure when I walked in the room with Dum Dum
and there were two Caucasians sitting at this table, and the
one in the center was quite tall, spoke good English, had a
Latin accent, offered me a cigarette, which I refused; and then
I took it after a few words of encouragement from him. On his
side was another gentleman--smaller, lighter hair, I believe--
and they said, ``Where do you think we are from?'' I said ``I
think you are from Romania.'' It was obvious that they were
Latin Americans. He said he was there to help me with my
defense. I was to be tried by the war crimes tribunal, the
Bertrand Russell Tribunal for War Crimes against the Vietnamese
people, and he would work on my defense for me. Then he sent me
back to the room.
I didn't know what to make of these two guys, but they
weren't the normal delegation like the one I had just seen.
They were a little scarier; they were a little more intense.
They were sitting with the camp commander to his right, which
is a position of authority. I was called back a couple of days
later after he told me now we must fill out a sheet of paper
and you will describe your aircraft, 20 pages written there. I
left it lying on my bunk. Being in solitary, I had a bunk
there, a platform of boards, and I left it blank. Finally, at
the last minute, I scratched in a crude sketch of the aircraft.
This is a wing, this is a window, this is a door--this is the
top, this is the bottom, pure nonsense. The next day I gathered
up my stuff, and I met with two other POW's.
Ray Vohden was one of them, on crutches. He was badly hurt;
he had also met ``Fidel.'' The other one was a gentleman named
Dave Duart; I think he was an Air Force captain flying a 105.
There we sat in this room looking at each other, wondering,
what is going on here. Ray Vohden made the--I will not repeat
the statement he made, but it was, I think, that we are in deep
you-know-what. and we were.
We were in that position maybe three or four weeks. We
would go to Quiz, he would threaten us; ``Fidel'' would
threaten us. His entire program to me, I felt was, you will
surrender. He didn't say surrender to what, he didn't say what
he wanted you to do, he said surrender. I think he was running
a surrender program up there and could get maybe 10 or 15 POW's
to surrender to anything that came up. That's a bad position to
be in.
I was badly tortured by him when I refused to surrender, or
as he said, choose the match box or choose the cigarette case.
The match box I chose and went through the straps again. It was
just as bad the second time with the manacles that tore up my
hands. I was just off crutches, I didn't walk that well right
then. So he got my attention after a guard came running toward
me and grabbed me by the throat and tried to crush my windpipe.
That got my attention.
So I nodded, ``I surrender.'' There was some histrionics of
knocking me around the room, and I was sent back to solitary
confinement with some leg irons. We were finally joined in a
large group, either nine or ten POW's, and some of them are
right here. Jim Kasler was not in our group, as such.
I felt that we were being held in limbo there. He would
threaten us. He would send us to Quiz. We would go back there,
back and forth. He sounded like a Cuban revolutionary to me--
Che Guevara. I made a big mistake one day; when Che Guevara
died, I said something like ``Good riddance''--really a bright
statement at the time--and that got me in real big trouble, as
if I could get in any more.
We were joined eventually by a fellow prisoner, Earl
Cobeil. Cobeil was a complete physical disaster when we saw
him. He had been tortured for days and days and days. I went
down to clean him up. When ``Fidel'' dragged us down there, he
said, Clean him up; and if anything happens to this man you,
Bomar, are responsible. Then he hit him right in the face,
knocked him down again.
His hands were almost severed from the manacles. He had
bamboo in his shins. All kinds of welts up and down all over;
his face was bloody. He was a complete mess. They brought him
into the room and as far as we could tell, Captain Cobeil was
totally mentally out of it. He did not know where he was. I
don't think he knew where he had been or where he was going. He
was just there.
``Fidel'' began to beat him with a fan belt. I call it a
fan belt but it wasn't really a fan belt. I think it was the
side of a Russian truck tire, a very, very painful experience
to be hit by this length of fan belt. I saw Cobeil hit as many
as 12 or 13 times directly in the face. He never blinked his
eyes. He never opened his mouth. He just stood there.
We had him in our cell for I would say 8 months or so. He
refused to eat. He refused to bow to the guards. You must
understand when the door opened, the guards demanded you will
bow, all criminals will bow. We were always a criminal in North
Vietnam. We were never a POW. We were governed by the camp
regulations, not the U.S. code of conduct for military
personnel.
We took care of Cobeil for about a year. We force-fed him
by holding him down, putting a stick in his mouth, and pushing
the food down his throat. In all that time he never recognized
anything that was going on. Finally he was removed from the
room for electrical shock treatments, and then finally was
gone. I understand he died a couple of years later there at the
Hanoi Hilton.
I don't believe ``Fidel'' was in Hanoi just to torture
American POW's. I think that events controlled him that he had
no control over. I think the Tet Offensive of 1968 was
involved. I think when Johnson halted the bombing in 1968, that
involved what ``Fidel'' was doing up there. I believe a
conference that was taking place in Hanoi--Havana in 1968 had
something to do with ``Fidel'' being up there. I think we were
being prepared for some selective release that would enhance
the Vietnam image of lenient and humane treatment worldwide. We
were almost waiting for something to trigger this release.
``Fidel'' used torture not for direct propaganda or anti
war statement as the Vietnamese did. He used torture to break
us initially, and to control us and keep us right under his
thumb so we would do what he wanted done. His brutal torture of
Cobeil and Kasler was due mostly to his frustration and his
inability to force his will on others.
When he lost his temper, he was a complete madman. He would
get red in the face; he just exploded with rage. So if you
refused to bow to him like Cobeil refused to do or if I refused
to take the cigarette case instead of the deal, his temper just
went out of control.
The North Vietnamese knew exactly what ``Fidel'' was doing
up there. They may tell you that he was there to teach English
to the guards. I don't think that had any part in it
whatsoever. He was allowed to do to Cobeil, Kasler and others
what was unjustifiable in any society, even a Communist
society.
Perhaps one day we will positively identify and locate this
man. Thank you.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you very much, Colonel Bomar.
[The prepared statement of Colonel Bomar appears in the
appendix.]
Chairman Gilman. Our next witness is Captain Raymond
Vohden. Captain Vohden was shot down over Vietnam. He was held
as a prisoner of war from April, 1965 through February 12,
1973. During his captivity, he was tortured by the Cuban known
as ``Fidel.'' From 1975 to 1978, he served as a principal
adviser to the Secretary of Defense on POW/MIA matters.
Captain, you may put your full statement in the record or
summarize, whichever you may deem appropriate. Please proceed.
Mr. Chabot. Excuse me, Mr. Chairman. There is a vote on the
floor.
Chairman Gilman. We are going to continue. Mr. Rohrabacher
has gone over; he'll come back and preside while we go over to
vote. Please do it quickly if you are going over, because we
have so many witnesses we want to hear.
Chairman Gilman. Please proceed, Captain Vohden.
STATEMENT OF CAPTAIN RAYMOND VOHDEN, UNITED STATES NAVY,
RETIRED
Mr. Vohden. Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee, my
testimony is a summary of a lengthier, more detailed statement.
I ask that it be included in its entirety in the record.
Chairman Gilman. Without objection.
Mr. Vohden. In August 1964, I was assigned to Attack
Squadron 216 as the operations officer flying in the A4C
Skyhawk off the USS Hancock. Our carrier was in the South China
Sea in early 1965 when the war against North Vietnam began to
escalate.
On my fifth mission, I was shot down bombing a bridge in
North Vietnam. I broke both bones above the ankle when I
landed. I was then taken to the camp known as the Hanoi Hilton,
where I was in complete solitary and was never moved off a
wooden board for four months except to go to the hospital for
two hours one night.
For the next 2\1/2\ years I was moved from camp to camp,
until being sent to ``The Zoo'' in November 1965. In the early
part of 1967, September 1967, I was looking forward to the end
of the war and my homecoming, when one night I was taken to an
interrogation. To my astonishment, the man sitting across from
me was a Caucasian. One of the Vietnamese camp officers sat
next to him. We talked about the war for the next half hour. He
had an excellent command of English and appeared to be very
knowledgeable about the U.S. and the war.
Several days later, I was moved to another room with Jack
Bomar and another Air Force officer. They both had recently
been shot down and had also talked to the Caucasian. One of us
named him ``Fidel'' because we guessed he might be Cuban.
Individually, we met with him daily. The war was essentially
the main topic.
One day I was taken to Quiz. ``The Elf,'' one of the other
Vietnamese officers, was there. The Elf asked me four or five
times, what orders did I give. I said, none. He left and came
back with six or seven guards who forced me onto floor, put
manacles on my wrists behind me and strapped my elbows together
behind me. After some time he finally gave me a clue what the
order was, it was about throwing food away. I had ordered--I
was an SRO in a building one time before, and I told the guys
to throw away some food because some of the younger people
didn't get enough, so they thought it would be better if we
didn't turn back food.
Five minutes later, as they were taking the manacles and
straps off, the door burst open. In comes ``Fidel,'' ranting
and raving like a madman, pointing his finger at me and telling
me that I better have a good attitude now and do everything he
says. He slapped me 10 or 15 times. I then had to write on a
piece of notebook paper that I surrendered to the Vietnamese
people and would do everything they wanted me to do. He told me
other things to write and then told me to sign it and then eat
it to prove I would do everything he told me to do. Eating
paper is interesting.
I went back to the room with Bomar, but Bomar and Duart
were gone. For the next two weeks, I was beaten 3 or 4 times a
day until I became demoralized and depressed and started to
lose my appetite. I finally gave up eating anything. After
failing to eat several meals, ``Fidel'' came in yelling and
screaming at me that I was trying to cheat him again and that
he would kill me if I didn't eat. I had reached bottom. I
didn't care if I lived or died. ``Fidel'' just stood there and
watched. Without a word, he left.
A week later, the tactic shifted; the treatment improved.
``Fidel'' responded if we didn't use what he gave us we would
be very sorry. One by one, more POW's joined us; all had been
forced to surrender. At Quiz, ``Fidel'' tried every argument in
the book to convince us that the U.S. was wrong in its war of
aggression. Every day he reminded us not to become reactionary
or we would suffer.
One morning in early 1968, one of the camp officers came to
the outside of our room and disconnected the wires to our
speaker. Later that day we heard from guys in another building
who had heard the radio program that the first three U.S.
prisoners had been released by the Vietnamese. I felt very
relieved and proud of myself and the others who served with me
in the ``Fidel'' program because, although I can't say for sure
what the original purpose of Fidel's presence was, I believe,
the way the program was run, that its purpose was to find
someone who could be of value to the North Vietnamese if
released. Some found it hard to believe that ``Fidel'' expected
us to adopt the enemy views on the war and talk about good
treatment after we were tortured and forced to surrender; but
after getting to know ``Fidel,'' I could see how this was his
goal and how he believed it was possible.
After ``Fidel'' failed in having any of his group released,
the ``Cuba Program'' continued without any real purpose or
meaning. Two weeks later I moved to another room with Paul
Schultz. I rarely saw ``Fidel'' again, except on one or two
occasions. ``Fidel'' had been working with some other men and
it appeared that one of them, Earl Cobeil, was resisting
``Fidel'' to the maximum. Of course, ``Fidel'' was retaliating.
Several days after I was moved, Earl Cobeil was moved in with
Don Waltman into the room next to mine. Waltman said Earl was
all mixed up in his mind.
On one occasion, one of the guards, Grimsey, came to the
shower area and took us back to our room. ``Fidel'' was
standing at the door. All three of us lined up. I had moved
into this room with Waltman and Cobeil. We went to the shower,
then we came back. So Waltman and I bowed, but Cobeil just
stood there again. I said, ``Hey, Cobeil, bow.'' Nothing
happened. Suddenly Grimsey raised his leg and pushed his foot
against Cobeil's body, who went tumbling over toward the back
of the room. ``Fidel'' yelled loudly at Cobeil to stop cheating
him or he would teach him a lesson he would never forget. The
door closed.
After having seen ``Fidel'' for almost every day for six
months, I knew that ``Fidel'' was going to get his way. He was
not going to let the Vietnamese see him fail in any endeavor. I
was convinced that he would take a man to any length to get
what he wanted. In addition, the difference between the
Vietnamese and ``Fidel'' was that more or less once the
Vietnamese got what they wanted they let up at least for
awhile. Not so with ``Fidel.'' There wasn't a day that went by
that there weren't threats or warnings to all of us.
I was in this room with Cobeil and Waltman now; and for the
rest of the quiet hour, Waltman and I tried everything
imaginable to get Cobeil to come down to earth, but we were
unsuccessful. Shortly after the gong sounded ending the quiet
hour, ``Fidel'' came to the door and told me to come outside.
``Fidel'' asked me if Cobeil was squared away. I told him that
in my honest opinion, Cobeil was not at all rational; if he
continued working Cobeil over, Cobeil would never make it. I
was hopeful that he would believe me about Cobeil.
He accused me of trying to help Cobeil cheat him. The door
was closed, locked, and bolted. I started to talk to Cobeil
again for a few minutes, when all of a sudden, ``Fidel'' jumped
up in the window, holding the bars, screaming in his loud
voice, ``I caught you, I caught you cheating me.'' Seconds
later the door slammed open. ``Fidel'' screamed to me, get out,
get out. A few minutes later ``Fidel'' returned with what
looked like a fan belt of a car, but cut so it was like a whip.
As ``Fidel'' passed by he looked at me with a glaze in his eyes
of an enraged madman.
``Fidel'' went in after Cobeil with Grimsey and Cedric. I
could hear the thud of the belt against Cobeil's body again and
again as ``Fidel'' screamed. I guess Cobeil was hit around 20
or 30 times.
It was hard to listen, as I did, to ``Fidel'' beating
Cobeil, a frail, diminutive man, his wrists swollen three times
the normal size, a vacant stare in his eyes already pushed by
torture beyond the limit for which he might have a chance to
regain his sanity. It had been far easier for me to endure the
straps than to have to go through this.
The guards all stood around talking loudly, laughing and
yelling in Vietnamese. When I saw ``Fidel'' with the fan belt,
I was surprised, because up to that time I had never heard of
anyone getting hit like that. As I stood there with my
crutches, my heart and mind overflowed with emotion. It was the
most sickening feeling to hear what was going on and know there
was nothing I could do about it.
That was the last day I saw Cobeil. ``Fidel'' unmercifully
beat a mentally defenseless, sick man to death. He, as well as
the North Vietnamese Communists, must bear full responsibility
for that and other acts.
There have been considerable efforts to locate ``Fidel'' in
Cuba, but without success. I have often wondered what we would
do if we found him. Try him as a war criminal?
No mention was ever made to try the North Vietnamese
leaders as criminals. Thus, I question whether trying to locate
``Fidel'' would be a wasted effort. Maybe this hearing and the
interest shown by Congressman Gilman and Congresswoman Ros-
Lehtinen to investigate will mean some justice will be served.
[The prepared statement of Captain Vohden appears in the
appendix.]
Mr. Cooksey. [Presiding.] Thank you, Captain, that was very
moving testimony, and I appreciate your remarks.
Mr. Benge, you are going to be the next witness. I am
sitting in because I am going to skip this vote. To me, your
testimony is more important than voting on the Journal. You
will notice, as long as I am here, there is no time limit. We
have a lot of politicians that need a time limit, but you men
are heroes and you can testify as long as you want.
STATEMENT OF MIKE BENGE, FORMER POW AND POW HISTORIAN
Mr. Benge. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, Madam Chair Lady,
Members of the Committee, fellow former POW's, our Cuban
friends and distinguished guests. My testimony is a summary of
a lengthy, more detailed statement that I am presenting here
today, and also of my research report and references on the
``Cuba Program.'' I ask that these be included in their
entirety in the record.
Mr. Cooksey. So ordered.
Mr. Benge. My name is Michael Benge, and while serving as a
civilian economic development officer in the Central Highlands
of South Vietnam, I was captured by the North Vietnamese during
the Tet Offensive on January 28, 1968. I was held in numerous
camps in South Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos and North Vietnam. I was
a POW for over five years spent 27 months in solitary
confinement, one year in a black box, and 1 year in a cage in
Cambodia.
I served for over 11 years in Vietnam. I was released
during Operation Homecoming in 1973.
I am a board member of the National Alliance of Families
for the Return of America's Missing Servicemen, and I am a POW
activist; that is, I am one who is actively seeking the truth
regarding the fate of our prisoners of war and missing in
action.
I was not tortured by the Cubans nor was I part of the
``Cuba Program.'' There were 19 American POW's that I know of
who were tortured by the Cubans in Hanoi during the Vietnam
War. These brave men include Colonel Bomar, Captain Ray Vohden,
and Commander Al Carpenter, who is in the audience. They named
the torturers ``Fidel,'' ``Chico,'' and ``Pancho.'' The torture
took place in ``The Zoo''. It was run by a Vietnamese camp
commander call ``The Lump.'' He was called that because of the
presence of a large fatty tumor in the middle of his forehead.
I was not tortured by the Cubans in Vietnam, but I was
interrogated by The Lump and a person who appeared to be a
Latino who spoke a few words of Spanish to The Lump during my
interrogation in the early part of 1970. Upon my return to the
U.S., I was shown a picture taken in Cuba of The Lump, which
was taken with an American anti war group. Yes, it was the same
one who had interrogated me in 1970.
I was told by a congressional investigator that he was the
man who was in charge of funneling Soviet KGB money to the
American anti war groups and activists, such as Jane Fonda.
After researching my paper, this made more sense, for who would
be better suited to liaison with the Cubans then The Lump? This
was my first piece of the puzzle.
I decided to research the ``Cuba Program'' after repeated
claims by the Administration, Senators John McCain and John
Kerry, Ambassador Pete Peterson and members of the Department
of Defense that the Vietnamese Government was cooperating fully
in resolving the POW/MIA issue. This is far from the truth. If
the Vietnamese Communists were fully cooperating, as purported,
they would have told us the true fate of the 173 U.S.
servicemen who are still missing, who were last known to be
alive and in the hands of North Vietnamese Communists. They
would have helped us resolve the fate of over 600 American
servicemen who were lost in Laos, of which over 80 percent were
lost in areas totally under the control of the North
Vietnamese. If the Vietnamese were fully cooperating, we would
not be here today, for they would have revealed the names of
the Cubans--``Fidel'', ``Chico,'' and ``Pancho''--who were
responsible for the torture of 19 POW's, beating one so
severely that it resulted in his death.
Upon their return to the U.S., the POW's were told by the
U.S. Government not to talk about the ``Cuba Program.'' Some of
them resisted as they had resisted ``Fidel'', and they broke
silence. Regardless, the ``Cuba Program'' was swept under the
rug by the U.S. Government. I began researching the ``Cuba
Program'' and had a draft paper in 1996 for presentation at the
annual meeting of the National Alliance of Families.
After this, former Congressman Bob Dornan held hearings on
it, and it forced the Department of Defense's Office for POW/
MIA Affairs to do an analysis and a compilation which was
submitted to Congress. I reassessed the information in the DPMO
compilation and, nevertheless, from my reading the documents in
this compilation, I found a profile. Regardless of what was
testified, I read through these documents and I found the
profile of a man that seemed to match almost perfectly the
POW's description of the Cuban called ``Chico.'' However, this
profile also partially fit the POW's characterization of
``Fidel.'' The profile was that of Major Fernando Vecino
Alegret.
Last August 22nd, the Miami Herald published an article on
the ``Cuba Program,'' based partially on my report; however, it
was misreported that I had identified a man named Raul Valdes
Vivo as ``Fidel.'' That was wrong. However, it produced out of
the Cuban exile community a photograph and a report that indeed
the man who was suspected to be ``Fidel'' was Alegret.
Alegret is now Cuba's Minister of Education, and Fidel
Castro has issued a denial that Alegret was ever in Vietnam.
However, there was evidence compiled by the DIA, documented and
the report submitted to Congress, that he was in Vietnam.
Mr. Bob Destatte of the DPMO office made this report to
Congress. However, he says that he was not responsible for the
analysis of the ``Cuba Program;'' and I find it very hard,
after reading this evidence, which was very poorly analyzed,
that the Administration, Department of Defense, the POW/Missing
Personnel Office have mastered the art of obfuscation.
I grew up on a farm in the West, and I used to try to catch
greased pigs at the county fair; and I can assure you that
trying to pin down DPMO to truthful facts oftentimes is much
more difficult than catching a greased pig.
Mr. Destatte testified to DPMO's conclusions that the
``Cuba Program'' was nothing more than a plan to provide
instruction in basic English to the North Vietnamese army
personnel working with American prison POW's. I have taught
English to the Vietnamese, and I have been tortured by the
Vietnamese, and I can tell the difference between the two. One
might conclude from Mr. Destatte's testimony that neither he
nor his associate, Mr. Tarabochia, knew the difference between
torture and teaching English. I can also read English and
understand what I read. From reading that report, it is very
evident that the profile fits Alegret, and that perhaps they
could take some English lessons from the Cubans.
Mr. Destatte had the audacity to testify that the high
command was unaware that the Cubans were torturing American
POW's. I find this incomprehensible. I ask, how did Mr.
Destatte reach this conclusion? He questioned a North
Vietnamese colonel, Colonel Pham Teo, who told Destatte that he
was in South Vietnam in 1967 and 1968 during the Cuban torture
program. He knew nothing of the ``Cuba Program;'' however, he
had heard rumors that it was an English language instruction
program that had gone awry.
Mr. Destatte testified that the Vietnamese explanation is
fully consistent with what we know about the conduct of the
Cubans. I find this deplorable.
Mr. Destatte chose to believe a Vietnamese Communist
colonel over American POW's who were tortured by the Cubans. I
find this incomprehensible. What bewilders me, as it should
you, is that Destatte's superiors at DPMO had the audacity to
let him testify before Congress to this foolishness. This
exemplifies the quality of DPMO's investigation and analysis of
the ``Cuba Program.''
My analysis, from what I read over and from what was very
evident within the documentation provided by DPMO to Congress,
was that it was a program to gain the complete submission of
American POW's, and it was in preparation for an October 18 to
21, 1968, Communist International Second Symposium Against
Yankee Genocide in Vietnam, held in Cuba. This symposium was in
continuum of the Bertrand Russell War Crimes Tribunal, a
kangaroo court and dog-and-pony show held in Denmark the
previous year.
My research paper is based partially on what DPMO gave to
Congress, as well as other documents I have obtained through
the Freedom of Information Act. However, I just scratched the
surface, but I have found enough documents to indicate that
there should be a plethora of other documents related to the
Cuban involvement in Vietnam if they were ever declassified, as
two U.S. Presidents have decreed. I also recommend that this
matter be thoroughly investigated by professional
investigators, not DPMO analysts.
I shall end this up shortly.
The Cubans were very heavily involved in Vietnam. They
maintained a whole section of the Ho Chi Minh Trail, where many
American POW's were lost. I have also uncovered evidence of the
possibility that American POW's from the Vietnam War have been
held in Los Maristas, a secret Cuban prison run by Castro's G-2
intelligence service. The Cubans who claimed to have seen them,
later escaped, made it to the U.S. and were debriefed by the
FBI. At the FBI, when I requested documents to be released, I
got an answer of ``Give me their birthdays.''
My paper raises more questions than it answers, but only
history will prove me right or wrong. However, I think I am on
the right track. Only through full disclosure will we ever know
the truth. I was brought up with old-fashioned values. My
mother taught me at a young age that no matter how hard you
search for the truth, you won't find it, no matter what, unless
you really want to.
I end up concluding with there remarks: ignorance,
arrogance, disinterest, lack of caring, incompetence,
obfuscation. I rest my case.
Mr. Cooksey. Thank you, Mr. Benge.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Benge appears in the
appendix.]
Mr. Cooksey. Mr. Garcia. I understand you are a Vietnam
veteran, but not a POW; is that correct?
STATEMENT OF ANDRES F. GARCIA, VICE PRESIDENT, CUBAN AMERICAN
VETERANS ASSOCIATION
Mr. Garcia. I am a Vietnam veteran, sir, not a POW.
Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee, my testimony is a
summary of my lengthier statement, and I would like it to be
included in the record in its entirety.
Mr. Cooksey. Without objection.
Mr. Garcia. I would also like to have in the record a
letter from the Paralyzed Veterans Association of Florida
supporting these hearings.
Mr. Cooksey. Without objection, it will be part of the
permanent record.
[The information referred to appears in the appendix.]
Mr. Garcia. Chairman Gilman, Members of the House
International Relations Committee, ladies and gentlemen. It is
a privilege to participate in these hearings.
Let me begin by thanking you and the Members of your
Committee for your efforts to learn what happened to our POW's
during the Cuban Program, under which 20 Americans in Cu Loc,
the POW camp in North Vietnam, were tortured by agents of Fidel
Castro's government, resulting in the tragic death of one of
our POW's. My most sincere gratitude to Congresswoman Ileana
Ros-Lehtinen for her constant defense of veterans' rights and
for her tireless efforts in uncovering the truth of the cruelty
of Fidel Castro, not only against his own people, but also
against the American people whom he hates with a passion, as
demonstrated again and again by his actions throughout his
life.
This time his involvement in atrocities committed against
our servicemen cannot be left unpunished.
For the past 40 years Castro's Ministry of the Interior has
utilized cruel methods of torture to break down those they
consider enemies of the revolution. These same methods were
used against 20 defenseless POW's in North Vietnam. My voice
today is not the voice of a single veteran, who proudly served
with the 82nd Airborne Division in Vietnam in 1968-1969 while I
was still a Cuban refugee, but I am speaking for those Cuban-
American men, like me, who do not have a voice today because
they gave their lives fighting for freedom and justice with the
U.S. Armed forces in Korea, Vietnam and Lebanon.
What a difference between the actions of these men and the
actions of those monsters that tortured our POW's.
I am also speaking on behalf of a highly decorated Cuban-
born Marine who served two tours in Vietnam and was killed by
the same terrorist state that tortured our POW's. His name is
Armando Alejandre, Jr. On February 24, 1996, Castro's air force
shot down two U.S. unarmed civilian aircraft, killing Armando,
two U.S.-born youngsters of Cuban descent and a legal U.S.
resident.
Speaking on behalf of my organization, CAVA, we stand ready
to work with any Federal agency that asks for our support in
getting more information on the POW issue. With the
communication we now have with dissidents on the island and a
number of Castro's military residing in the U.S., it is
possible for us to obtain much more information today than in
past years.
We veterans will not allow this issue to fade away. We are
committed to inform the American people of Castro's crimes
again our servicemen, and we will mobilize the veterans at the
national level if necessary. I am not only a member of CAVA but
a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American Legion
and the Vietnam Veterans of America, and I will seek their
support.
Men in Congress, the press, some mayors, Governors and even
the U.S. Chamber of Commerce believe we should be soft with
Fidel Castro in order to change him. I propose that they ask
Fidel Castro that, as a gesture of goodwill, he allow the
alleged torturers to come to the United States to be questioned
and to face their victims. If they have nothing to hide, Castro
should cooperate.
The fact is that nothing has changed since 1967. Fidel
Castro continues to be the worst enemy the U.S. ever had. He is
a dagger pointing at the U.S. underbelly. Yes, he is capable--
after having ordered the torture of POW's in Vietnam, he is
capable of killing innocent children. He is capable of shooting
down civilian unarmed airplanes carrying U.S. citizens. He is
capable of using the drug trade to further undermine the U.S.
and, yes, he is capable, willing, and able to perpetrate
biological attack against the American people.
He is capable, and he will continue to plan further attacks
against the U.S. with impunity because he has always gotten
away with anything he does.
The time to stand firm is now. We should create a task
force comprised of intelligence agencies to conduct a thorough
investigation of the crimes against the POW's. But more
important, we should indict and prosecute those found guilty,
including Fidel Castro, who has all the responsibility.
Every time we have taken a weak stand, we have lost. Look
at the Bay of Pigs, Vietnam, and Iran. When we have taken a
stand from a position of strength, we have been victorious.
Look at Grenada, Panama, Iraq, and Kosovo. We are the strongest
power in the world and the world respects a leader.
The leaders of this great Nation must assume a very
important responsibility. We pray to God that your actions will
lead to America doing the just, the moral, the right thing,
without giving up its political and commercial interest.
I do not want to close my testimony without trying to take
care of a doubt you may have in your mind. Is this another
reckless statement by a Cuban? I am a Cuban American. My
parents sent me to this country when I was a teenager. I paid
my dues in Vietnam; I am no longer a refugee, but a proud
American citizen. My children were born here.
I love this country. I want nothing but the best for
America. I am Cuban by birth and American by choice. I am very
proud of both.
Thank you for this opportunity you have given me today and
God bless you all.
Mr. Cooksey. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Garcia appears in the
appendix.]
Mr. Cooksey. I want to thank all of you for your testimony.
It is very important. It is a story that needs to be out there.
Americans need to hear it, the world needs to hear it, and your
testimony has been good.
I will open the questioning first with Congresswoman Ros-
Lehtinen.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman. Thank
you for this opportunity. I would like, before I ask the
panelists my questions, to recognize Congressman Mark Foley,
our colleague from Florida, who has been participating in the
briefings that we have held and is very anxious for us to move
this investigation.
Congressman Foley.
STATEMENT OF THE HON. MARK FOLEY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS
FROM THE STATE OF FLORIDA
Mr. Foley. Let me thank my colleague for all of her
leadership on this important issue.
More appalling than the fact that Fernando Vecino Alegret
is now a high-ranking Cuban official is the fact that he has
been able to visit our country. Our country should not be open
to thugs like him. This is why I introduced, with Gary Ackerman
and Bob Franks and supported by my colleague, Ms. Ros-Lehtinen,
the Anti-Atrocity Alien Deportation Act, H.R. 3058, which would
make all war criminals and perpetrators of atrocities, such as
torture, excludable from the United States of America.
I didn't become aware of this problem of war criminals
entering the United States until I recently learned that a key
member of the brutal military dictatorship that ruled Haiti
from 1991 to 1994 is now living comfortably in my congressional
district. In fact, more bizarre, he is a winner of over $3
million in the Florida lottery. Brutalized his countrymen, came
to America under the auspices of the State Department, and then
wins the lottery and lives in a guarded, gate community in Port
St. Lucie, Florida, unlike those that he beat and brutally
assassinated and murdered; they didn't have that luxury of
travel to the United States.
Initially, I just assumed it was a bizarre and isolated
episode. However, once I began to look into the issue more, I
realized how big a problem we have on our hands. According to
the Center for Justice and Accountability in San Francisco, at
least 60 alleged human rights violators are currently residing
in the United States. These are just the ones who have been
identified as living here; that is not even counting those who
have been able to visit the U.S. on visas.
In 1998, Canada began an aggressive campaign to locate and
keep out human rights abusers who attempt to enter their
country. As of July 1999, the Canadian Government indicated
that 400 cases are being processed toward removal, 307
suspected war criminals have been denied visas, 23 were
deported. That is a total of 700 war criminals that Canada has
detected. I applaud Canada for their pursuit of these people. I
think it is fair to say that based on Canada's figures and
taking into account the much bigger population in the U.S. and
other socioeconomic factors, we could have as many as 7,000
human rights abusers either living in or visiting the United
States at any given time.
We owe it to our brave veterans and refugees who have fled
persecution abroad that they should not have to come face to
face with their former tormentors in the Land of the Free.
Canada has been successful in tracking down modern war
criminals, and so can we.
If I may ask Mr. Garcia a quick question. Obviously, we are
aware of the visit in the past, in 1979. Are you aware of any
other visits Mr. Alegret has made to the United States
subsequently?
Mr. Garcia. No, sir. I am not aware of it.
Mr. Foley. Thank you. I appreciate my colleague yielding
the time, and I hope the Chairman will give her some additional
time since I took up her whole five minutes.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman, for
allowing Mr. Foley to speak. I think that the reason the
Administration is not fully behind your bill is that then they
would not be able to allow one of the biggest war criminals in
the world today, Fidel Castro, entry into the United States.
But we certainly hope that that bill passes.
I would like to thank the panelists for excellent
testimony. I want to ask you about the debriefing that has been
going on and the information shared and how much you have been
a part of that. News sources and other official and unofficial
sources have referred to the existence of a CIA document
published in the early 1970's which provides an assessment of
who the Agency believes could be ``Fidel'' and ``Chico.''
Were you, or to the best of your knowledge, were any of
your fellow survivors of the ``Cuba Program'' ever shown this
report, and were you debriefed by the CIA and other
intelligence agencies?
Last in this set, what more could have been done by these
entities, and do you believe that with their resources that
they should have been able to more firmly identify these
torturers?
Colonel Bomar.
Colonel Bomar. I was not aware of being shown a report by
the FBI, or whoever it was who did this, no.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Captain Vohden.
Captain Vohden. There may have been that report, but it is
a long time ago now. I may have been shown it, but I just don't
recall.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. In the debriefing process, sketches were
made of the torturers; however, those varied, differing
degrees, from one to another. What physical characteristics
stand out about ``Fidel'' that could facilitate an
identification?
Some of your colleagues have identified this person
Fernando Vecino Alegret as ``Fidel,'' or the man in the photo
that is going to be shown to you--his name is Luis Perez Jaen--
fits the description of ``Fidel.'' What personality traits
would you attribute to ``Fidel'' and the others?
Colonel Bomar.
Colonel Bomar. Jaen, I would not recognize this as
``Fidel'' at all, no. My comment was, ``was it taken from
30,000 feet over Cuba?'' However, this photograph is the same
as that one. I was shown this, or sent this, by Colonel
Hubbard, this picture. My reaction was, it could have been, or
maybe it couldn't have been. I wasn't 100 percent sure that
this picture--I think probably because, is he 20 years old
here? This is a long time before we met him, and he matured a
lot.
However, there was another picture, Ray.
Captain Vohden. I don't know. Maybe that. That's all I
have.
Colonel Bomar. There was another one that he could very
possibly have been. That was the closest that I have seen, but
I don't have it right here. I think she showed it to me
earlier.
Yes, this picture right here. This would have been as close
as I have seen, right here. This man right here. That could be
him, but I am not 100 percent sure.
Mr. Rohrabacher. For the record, could you tell us who it
is that you are talking about?
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. That would be Fernando.
Colonel Bomar. The man in the center in this photograph.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. That was given to us by people close to
Fernando Vecino Alegret. These are photos taken in Cuba, family
photographs and social events that he attended.
Colonel Bomar. Very young in this picture.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. He is pointing to a photograph of a
social occasion that took place in Cuba where he seems to share
those characteristics.
Now, getting back to my other question, unless Captain
Vohden wants to weigh in on this----
Captain Vohden. I don't recognize this man as ``Fidel'' at
all. The other pictures, in one picture here there is a shirt
that he is wearing that is almost identical to the shirt that
he wore when I first met him. I don't know what you call that
shirt.
Identifying features of ``Fidel'': First, he was
exceptionally tall for a Cuban; he is probably 6'2'', 6'2-1/
2'', or something like that, which I think is unusual. He also
spoke excellent English and he was very knowledgeable about the
United States. So that would indicate he would have to have
spent some time here in the United States. I had an impression
that he was kind of comparable to Li'l Abner sometimes. He was
a big, husky, robust sort of a man.
But so far as the pictures are concerned, they could be.
This is probably as close as I have seen. I have seen the
picture of Alegret when he was older, but that is not at all
possible. But this here, it could be. That is all I know.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. After the initial debriefings, were you
ever approached again about new information, new sketches, new
photographs, on the torturers; and if so, by whom and what was
the result of these followups?
Colonel Bomar. No, I never was. We did some initial
sketches then. That was the last I heard of it. It was over.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Is that true for you?
Captain Vohden. I saw sketches initially and there was a
time, maybe eight or ten years ago, the FBI came to my house
and asked if I would look at some pictures; and for about three
days, I thumbed through photo albums and I never found a
picture of ``Fidel.'' Also, there was staff from a Senate
Committee, a number of years back, who talked to me on a few
occasions.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. When visiting delegations were allowed
directly into the camp, were you taken outside to meet them? Do
you recall seeing any outsiders in the camp? By ``outsiders,''
I mean Vietnamese officials or non-Vietnamese officials, not
stationed at the camp and folks from other countries,
journalists, any visits that we could use to locate the
participants in an attempt to gain information about the
torturers and who they were?
How closed was ``The Zoo'' to others?
Colonel Bomar. I believe I saw some Chinese in the camp.
Obviously there were some Russians, but we never spoke with
them. But other than one man that was working on some
electrical box, the squawk box in our room--he was definitely a
friend of ``Fidel.''
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Now you had said in your testimony that
``Fidel'' had had a position of authority in the camp based on
where he was sitting, where he was standing. That would seem to
indicate that the Vietnamese certainly knew who this individual
and the others were. Do you believe that they could give us
information to further clarify the identity?
Colonel Bomar. I don't think there is any doubt in any mind
that the North Vietnamese knew exactly who this was. He came to
the camp in a staff car, a Russian car, driven by a Vietnamese
officer. We had never seen that before. That is how he
traveled.
He did not live in this camp. He came from off-camp
somewhere. He came quite often, and it was always in a staff
car. The camp commander, ``Lump,'' rode a bicycle. That was the
best they got; going up, there was the bicycle.
But he rode around in a chauffeured staff car, so he was
not an ordinary visitor to the camp.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Just one last question, if I may. I know
my time is up, Mr. Chairman.
What more do you think can be done by our agencies to get
to the identities of these three torturers?
Captain Vohden. One thing, just for starters, they should
try to get a picture of this Alegret now, or try to get
something from 1968 somewhere around that period of time. That
would be very helpful to really identify and nail him.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Colonel?
Colonel Bomar. I would give Ambassador Pete Peterson a call
and say, hey, ask the Vietnamese who this guy is, who he was.
Maybe we will turn the aide back on if you tell us. I would put
pressure on our Ambassador up there to put pressure on the
Vietnamese, and I think Peterson could do that.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Thank you, gentlemen. Thank you for your
excellent testimony. We will have some other followup questions
for you at a later date.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Cooksey. Mr. Rohrabacher.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Colonel Bomar, is it ``Fidel'' who had his own car? Is that
who we are talking about, the man who is responsible for
torturing you American prisoners, and he had his own car that
he was driven around in?
Colonel Bomar. Yes.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Do you believe that if he was simply an
English teacher he would have had his own car?
Colonel Bomar. That is really hard to believe. No, I never
did believe that.
Mr. Rohrabacher. So anyone who is suggesting that this
program with the Cubans was simply a program to teach English
is ignoring facts, like the fact that ``Fidel'' was being
driven around in his own staff car, correct?
Colonel Bomar. Yes.
Mr. Rohrabacher. It would have to be either an intentional
ignoring of facts like that, or we are talking about a total
idiot.
Colonel Bomar. Yes, I agree.
Mr. Rohrabacher. I want to make this very clear. Because
this information that he had his own staff car isn't just
something, you know; it has to be known by other people as
well, right, especially people who might have been looking into
this issue?
Colonel Bomar. Yes.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Do you think that as you just testified,
the Vietnamese, of course, would have to know the name of the
fellow that they issued the car to, right?
Colonel Bomar. Absolutely.
Mr. Rohrabacher. So the relationship between the Vietnamese
and these Cubans that you are describing was not a relationship
where someone was simply there teaching them English, but it
seemed like they were actually in a position of authority; was
that not true?
Colonel Bomar. Yes.
Captain Vohden. He was a high-ranking official from
somewhere, and the Vietnamese gave him a lot of power to do
what he did. He ran that whole show by himself. Because the
Vietnamese knew what he did to Cobeil, and they just let him go
ahead and do it. So this guy really had to have a lot of power
to be able to do that, because I don't think the Vietnamese
liked what happened to Cobeil.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Let's just say, for the record, having
been in Vietnam several times since the war and once during the
war, let me note that the Vietnamese are claiming that all the
reports from every one of the prison camps have just vanished,
disappeared. They were destroyed at the end of the war, B-52
raids, and everything like that. That is an incredulous answer
to those of us asking for those records.
Colonel Bomar. They kept very minute notes when you were
being interrogated. I am sure they have records of every
possible thing that happened up there.
Mr. Rohrabacher. They would certainly keep the records of
the person that they issued the car to, right? I mean, this is
not like the camp commander riding on a bicycle, right?
So let us note that the people supposedly representing our
government are telling us that they are letting the Vietnamese
off the hook on those records. I am going to ask today--we will
ask and find out whether or not they have insisted on the name
of this English teacher, ``Fidel,'' from the Vietnamese. If
they are not pushing the Vietnamese on this, why are they not
pushing to get these things from the Vietnamese? Why are they
offering these excuses for the Vietnamese?
Would any of you like to add to that?
Captain Vohden. For one thing, there was this guy called
``The Rabbit.'' He was probably the most well-known
interrogation officer up in Vietnam. I have seen ``Rabbit''
talking to ``Fidel,'' so there is no doubt in my mind
whatsoever that they know. They would have to go to ``Rabbit''
and ask ``Rabbit'' what his name was. I am sure ``Rabbit''
wouldn't say.
Mr. Benge. I might also end up suggesting that they ask
``The Lump,'' and there are DIA reports of ``The Lump's''
presence that should have his name in Cuba.
There are also congressional reports.
Mr. Rohrabacher. So we should be pushing----
Mr. Benge. That would seem be the first person to ask.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Ask about that particular person ``The
Lump''--they should find him in order to ask about the names of
these torturers. We will try to find out whether or not those
people, supposedly representing our interest and supposedly
representing the U.S. Government, have actually fulfilled that
responsibility in a competent manner. You can count on that.
Mr. Garcia, you mentioned something previously--I read
something by you where you said that during the war, you were
in Central Highlands and that someone had said something about
your not using your name, because there were other Cubans
around but were on the other side; is that correct?
Mr. Garcia. No, that is the testimony of one of the members
of our organization. His name is Leonardo Viota-Sesin, and he
was in a fire base close to the Cambodia border. There was an
American officer in charge of the base, and they had
Montagnards working on that base. When he came to the base, the
officer asked him where was he from; he said that he was Cuban,
and he took him aside. He said, don't ever mention on this base
that you are a Cuban, or they will kill you. When he asked why,
the officer pointed out toward Cambodia and said, there is a
brigade of North Vietnamese on the other side of the border.
They have a group of Cubans who take care of all the
interrogation, and many of the Montagnards have died over
there.
Mr. Rohrabacher. So there was evidence that the Cubans are
not only in North Vietnam interrogating prisoners, but outside
of Vietnam. Perhaps in South Vietnam there are some
intelligence reports that have been privy to that, that
indicate that as well.
During the war I was not in the military, but I spent a
little time in the Central Highlands with the Montagnards and
found them to be very brave people. The word would have gotten
around--these people had their whispering networks--if there
was a Cuban person torturing them on the other side of the
border.
I don't think I have any more time, but did you have
something you wanted to add?
Mr. Benge. Yes. There was Raul Valdes Vivo, who was
assigned to COSVN headquarters in South Vietnam. There was a
Cuban contingent at the COSVN headquarters, which was the North
Vietnamese headquarters for South Vietnamese operations in
Cambodia. Ironically, he was placed there by ``Fidel's''
brother, at the insistence of ``Fidel's'' brother, and the
Cuban also was on the front tank.
When the North Vietnamese overran the palace in Saigon, the
Cuban contingent had prestige enough with the North Vietnamese,
that they were on the first tanks going into the palace. They
had an engineering brigade that had maintained a good portion
of the Ho Chi Minh Trail there.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Thank you very much.
Let us just note, finally, you expected the fanatic
Communists under Fidel Castro to have done what you are talking
about because they considered that as being their job. You have
to consider the Vietnamese did that, because they were doing
their job. What we have to find out is why our government isn't
doing its job in protecting the interest of our people and
getting the word out to the people of the United States. It is
either incompetence or worse.
I appreciate you putting these words on the record. This is
information we need to talk about and call our government to
task for not following up on information they knew about, but
the rest of us didn't. Thank you.
Mr. Cooksey. Mr. Chabot.
Mr. Chabot. Thank you. I can't tell you how much respect I
have, and I think every Member of the Committee has, for you
gentlemen for putting your lives on the line and having to go
through this terrible torture. It is almost incomprehensible
that one human being can carry out this type of barbarity on
another human being.
I think it is embarrassing that our government hasn't done
more to bring to justice these criminals, these people that
visited this horror on you. This is something that should not
be swept under the rug. This is something that we ought to use
the full powers of this government to get to the bottom of and
to bring these people to justice.
I know we have another panel here, so I will not take up
all my time. The only question I would have is, if we could
actually determine who these people are--I hate to even use the
term people for those who did this to the U.S. Air Force pilot
and the rest of you--what do you think would be appropriate if
we could bring these people to justice at this time for what
they have done?
Captain Vohden. You say, what would be ``appropriate?''
Mr. Chabot. Yes. What do you think? If our government could
bring these people to justice, what do you think would be the
appropriate punishment at this point, these many years later?
What do you think we should do?
Captain Vohden. What are they doing with Pinochet right
now, I would say. What they are doing with Pinochet at a
minimum and try him. If he is found guilty, hang him.
Mr. Chabot. Colonel Bomar, I heard your testimony before,
so I was wondering if you had any feelings with respect to
that.
Colonel Bomar. Yes, I think he should be tried and brought
to task for what he did there. He is a murderer, and we have
laws that govern this.
Mr. Chabot. Thank you very much, and we appreciate your
testimony here today. Hopefully, as I say, this will not be
swept under the rug.
Mr. Cooksey. Mrs. Ros-Lehtinen, did you have another
question?
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Thank you. I just had one more question,
if I might. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Captain, you had testified today that you believe that the
purpose of the ``Cuba Program'' was to prepare POW's for
release. I have a question about the reasons that you all
thought this heinous program was under way.
It has also been said that this was part of a propaganda
campaign. Others said that it was a psychological experiment
linked to the university at Hanoi, and still others say that it
was used as a method to test interrogation techniques.
Could it have been a combination of all of these? Please
elaborate, if you might, on what you believe to have been the
role of these torturers; why bring these three in, rather than
Vietnamese interrogators; and why did the Vietnamese allow them
such access to our U.S. pilots.
Captain Vohden. I think they wanted to release some
prisoners about the time this program started. I think this
``surrender'' program was like, you have a child; you want the
child to do something, and you spank that kid to make him do
what you want him to do.
There may have been some guys in the program who
surrendered without being tortured, but they wanted you to
surrender. So, after we all had surrendered, we started to get
a few extra cigarettes a day. He brought us tea in the morning.
We got a chess set. He gave me a cigar to smoke. He gave us
these extra-special things to make us feel good. Then he
started moving more and more guys into the room. So that, if we
were released, we could say, yeah, we were with a bunch of
guys?
Another thing he did, he forced us to carve things, little
wooden toys and things like this. This would be used to show
our remorse, and we could give these to the Vietnamese people.
Everything to make us look good if we were released.
Another thing we did, we built a fish pond; we dug a big
hole, and they put fish in it to help the Vietnamese people.
Then that last day when the announcement came that the
POW's were going to be released, they came down and cut our
wires so we couldn't hear it. So I think all these reasons
indicate to me that it was a release program.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Colonel?
Colonel Bomar. I agree that we were there for more than
Vietnamese propaganda. It was a bigger thing to me, as I
stated, whether it was the Tet Offensive or whether it was this
meeting in Havana. There was more to this ``Fidel'' program.
But I think it was also, as you said, it could have been
techniques that they could use to break Americans or prisoners.
You listed several reasons, and every one seemed to fit. They
could all have been, but I think release may have been a
possibility, although I don't think they would have released
me.
Captain Vohden. Could I add something?
I think they were just looking for someone in the group who
potentially might be released.
Another thing, when we had quizzes, ``Fidel'' talked about
the war and about going home all the time. He showed us
pictures of fashion models in Magazines. He talked about our
wives and families. We saw articles in Time and Newsweek
magazine. He tried every argument in the book to convince us
that the U.S. war was wrong. He did a lot of these things.
Again, this helped me to form my opinion.
Mr. Benge. In my research report, there is a copy of an FBI
report that gives the name of a Cuban gentleman who went to
Hanoi and coincides with the exact time that the ``Cuba
Program'' stopped. It coincides with the exact time that the
outside Cuban showed up at the camp and the program was shut
down, and in that FBI report it says that this man was going to
gather this information for this second symposium on war crimes
trials. It is a very interesting, interesting piece, and it
fits exactly right with the timing that the program was shut
down.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman. I would
ask that Chairman Gilman's letter, dated November 1st, to Louis
Freeh, the Director of the FBI, be made a part of our record,
indicating that he would like the FBI's cooperation, especially
as it relates to the new partners that we have in Eastern
Europe and the new Soviet Republics and elsewhere, former
Communist regimes that are now moving further toward democracy,
who have opened up many of their records. We would like for the
FBI to work with our new allies to look at those files and ask
the individuals there for help in discovering who these three
torturers were and identifying them. I ask that it be made a
part of the record.
[The information referred to appears in the appendix.]
Mr. Cooksey. Without objection.
Again, you have been excellent witnesses, and again, this
is a story that needs to be told.
Today we find time to investigate the war criminals that
have committed similar crimes in the Balkans just in very
recent history and very recent memory. But this world also has
time to investigate the people that committed war crimes in
World War II. Stalin, he probably killed more people than
anyone else, also Hitler and his henchmen. Vietnam is recent
memory for those of us that were in the military at the time.
This is something that should be pursued, too, no matter what
the politics of it is.
I think that it is interesting to observe who is here today
and who is not here today at this hearing. I know that two of
you were on active duty in the military at the time. You were
Cold War warriors in what was probably the Third World War, and
you did win ultimately that war by standing up to this
Communist threat. Those records that my colleague just referred
to are out there; they are out there in some recent
publications.
But, going back to the time that we were all in the
military--Air Force, Navy, Army, whatever--we had incompetent
leadership in the executive branch of government at that time.
According to David Halberstam's book, ``The Best and the
Brightest,'' the people that were in Johnson's Cabinet were
incompetent as well and were responsible for some real dumb
things that were done in fighting the air war in Vietnam. If
you want to get a good look at that period, I would encourage
you to read a book, ``The Tragedy of the Soviet Period,''
written by Martin Malia. It was written by a UC-Berkeley
professor. I know you made a comment about a UC-Berkeley
professor, but this is a book I would encourage you to read.
There is another book, ``The Black Book of Communism.''
Where you can go back and find out what really went on. These
records are available.
Again, I want to thank you for coming, for being here
today. I feel very strongly that this should be pursued. Again,
you have been excellent witnesses. We will move on to the next
panel. Thank you very much.
Mr. Cooksey. Our second panel is made up of two individuals
who are former military officers, former United States Army
officers, and they are now at the Department of Defense. The
first is Mr. Robert Jones, who has served as the Deputy
Assistant Secretary of Defense for Prisoner of War-Missing
Personnel Affairs since May 1998. Mr. Jones is a decorated two-
tour Vietnam combat veteran; he is also a disabled veteran.
Previously, Mr. Jones was a Special Assistant to the Assistant
Secretary for Public and Intergovernmental Affairs in the
Department of Veterans Affairs.
Mr. Robert Destatte is a Technical Adviser to the Deputy
Assistant Secretary. Mr. Destatte is the Chief Analyst of the
Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office.
So we are delighted to have you here. I feel that you both
can speak with some authority because you are both veterans,
Vietnam veterans, and have a major responsibility for looking
into this matter.
Mr. Cooksey. We will open with you, Mr. Jones.
STATEMENT OF ROBERT L. JONES, DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF
DEFENSE, PRISONER OF WAR-MISSING PERSONNEL AFFAIRS
Mr. Jones. Thank you. I welcome today's opportunity to
address the Committee on the roles my office and the former
Defense Intelligence Agency's Special Office on POW/MIA Affairs
have had in the ``Cuba Program,'' a program whose brutal
purpose still remains unresolved.
I ask that my statement in its entirety be entered into the
record after this hearing.
Mr. Cooksey. Without objection.
Mr. Jones. Mr. Chairman, DOD became aware of the ``Cuba
Program'' immediately following Operation Homecoming, and we
have shared our knowledge with the appropriate agencies and the
Congress beginning as early as July, 1973. We have appeared
before in congressional hearings on this subject in 1987 and
again in 1996.
Mr. Chairman, I truly am humbled to follow this group of
former POW's who have addressed the Committee here this
morning. None of us can fully understand the trying experiences
and inhumane treatment that they endured while they were in
captivity. These men sacrificed greatly for this Nation. They
are truly American heroes whose sacrifices stretch the limits
of one's imagination. Those who endured the abuses of the
``Cuba Program'' suffered dearly and are examples of those
whose sense of duty and commitment to our Nation was tested to
the limits of their human endurance. Thankfully, all of those
who were involved in this brutal activity have been accounted
for and returned to the United States.
The mission of my agency is to account for those American
heroes who were lost while serving in foreign lands and have
not returned to American soil. Currently, there are 2,047
Americans who remain unaccounted for in Southeast Asia. My
office pursues the resolution of those cases by using a number
of investigative tools. We have received more than 21,000
reports possibly pertaining to Americans in Southeast Asia.
Unfortunately, none of those have led us to the return of a
single live American.
We have a robust archival research and oral history
program, as well as unilateral and trilateral investigations in
each of the three Southeast Asian countries. These methods
have, in fact, produced significant investigative leads that
have led to a number of resolved cases. To date, we have
accounted for 536 missing Americans. We continue to pursue all
avenues with live Americans as our No. 1 priority.
As my staff explained in their separate briefing to
Representative Ros-Lehtinen, our ability to accomplish this
humanitarian mission is wholly dependent on the willingness of
foreign governments around the globe to allow American POW/MIA
specialists access to their territory, their citizens and their
historical records. I firmly believe that any attempt on the
part of the Department of Defense to merge investigations of
war crimes into our accounting activities may jeopardize our
ability to accomplish our humanitarian mission.
DPMO is not a criminal investigative arm of the Federal
Government. Our mission is separate. We are charged with the
fullest possible accounting for U.S. military and certain
American civilian personnel who become missing as a result of
hostile action. Our mission is humanitarian in nature, not
linked to other bilateral foreign policy concerns.
DPMO's role with regard to the ``Cuba Program'' has been to
act as a repository of historical information to ensure it is
available to the appropriate Federal agencies. The
sensitivities associated with our humanitarian accounting
mission clearly prohibit us from any involvement in the pursuit
of the perpetrators of these misdeeds.
Based upon recent congressional inquiries, I directed a
complete historical file review and requested other Federal
agencies to provide us with information they may have related
to this issue. This is being done to ensure that my office has
a comprehensive record of the ``Cuba Program'' as a historical
file.
I was informed on October 29th that Ambassador Peterson has
met with Mr. Hung, Director of the Americas Department of the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to request the assistance of the
Government of Vietnam in supplying information about the Cuban
interrogators of American POW's from 1967 to 1968. Mr. Hung
listened with interest and responded that he would research the
questions presented in the talking points that the Ambassador
left with him. I believe we all look forward to the responses
to those questions.
I personally will be in Southeast Asia during the period of
November 29th through the 11th of December, traveling
throughout Southeast Asia, to include Vietnam. Rest assured I
will discuss this program with Ambassador Peterson upon my
arrival in Hanoi.
Mr. Chairman, I share the same sense of outrage that you
and the Members of the Committee do regarding the torturous
abuse endured by our prisoners of war at the hands of these
presumed Cuban interrogators. I believe that the pursuit of
these criminals by my agency has a real potential to disrupt
our mission to return our men, or their remains, to their
families, many of whom have waited for more than 50 years. I do
not recommend my office taking such action when it has the
potential to jeopardize the hopes of the families of our
missing.
I do believe with all my heart that these men should be
tracked down, brought to justice by the appropriate agency. I
recommend that requests for further investigation of the ``Cuba
Program'' be directed to the appropriate agencies that are
chartered to pursue violations of the law of armed conflict.
DPMO stands equally ready to continue to provide information to
an interagency group as required. We will continue our policy
of transparency, making available our historical files and
knowledge on this issue.
I clearly support the goals for this hearing as stated by
Representative Ros-Lehtinen. I will also say that I will be in
Moscow next week. Rest assured that I will raise this ``Cuba
Program'' with my Moscow counterpart.
Mr. Chairman, in closing, I would like to introduce a
Member of my staff, Mr. Bob Destatte, a senior Southeast Asia
analyst, a man who I respect very highly for his knowledge of
Southeast Asia. I believe Mr. Destatte can address any
technical questions you or the Committee may have.
Thank you. This concludes my remarks.
Chairman Gilman. [Presiding.] Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Jones appears in the
appendix.]
Chairman Gilman. Mr. Destatte, if you wish you may put your
full statement in the record or you may summarize, whichever
you may deem appropriate.
STATEMENT OF ROBERT DESTATTE, CHIEF ANALYST, PRISONER OF WAR-
MISSING PERSONNEL OFFICE, DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
Mr. Destatte. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good morning,
Chairman Gilman, and distinguished Committee Members. I have a
short statement. I would like to read it and I would like to
ask that the statement be entered into the record in its
entirety.
Chairman Gilman. Without objection, the full statement will
be made part of the record.
Mr. Destatte. First, let me join Deputy Assistant Secretary
of Defense Jones in saluting the American heroes who shared
with this Committee this morning their experiences as victims
of what has become known as the ``Cuba Program.'' One of those
gentleman, Captain Ray Vohden, and I worked together for a
while in the Pentagon, when I first joined this issue. Let me
begin.
Chairman Gilman. Put the mike a little closer, Mr.
Destatte. Thank you.
Mr. Destatte. I would like to begin with a brief
description of the ``Cuba Program'' on the basis of what is in
the written record, which I believe will complement the
personal accounts that we received earlier this morning.
The American POW's coined the term ``Cuba Program'' to
describe a program in which a small team of Caucasian
interrogators brutally beat and tortured 19 American aviators
in a camp that our POW's nicknamed ``The Zoo'' in Hanoi,
between July 1967 and August 1968. One of those POW's, as we
heard earlier today, U.S. Air Force Major Earl Cobeil,
eventually died from those beatings.
The Caucasian interrogators spoke English fluently, but
with a Spanish accent. They spoke knowledgeably about Central
America and the United States. In an exchange with one of our
POW's, a Vietnamese guard referred to the Caucasian
interrogators as Cubans. These and other factors led many of
the POW's and analysts, including myself, to believe that the
interrogators were Cubans, possibly Cubans who had lived in the
United States.
The POW's nicknamed the chief Caucasian interrogator
``Fidel.'' They nicknamed his principal assistant ``Chico.''
several days before the program ended, a third man the POW's
nicknamed variously ``Pancho'' and ``Garcia'' appeared to
replace ``Fidel.'' The POW's, as we heard earlier, observed
another man who might have been Cuban working as an electrical
technician in the POW camp during the closing months of the
program. They also heard the voice of a woman they believed was
Cuban on the camp radio for about two weeks near the end of the
program.
The DOD first learned about the ``Cuba Program'' in March,
1973 when the reports of the first post-homecoming debriefings
began arriving in the Defense Intelligence Agency's Prisoner of
War/Missing in Action Office. By March 1973, nearly two weeks
before the last POW was released, the DIA's POW/MIA Office had
brought this issue to the attention of senior Department of
Defense officials; and by the 23rd of March, the U.S.
Government had established a coordinated effort to learn the
identity of the Cubans. That effort involved the Defense
Intelligence Agency, each of the armed services, the National
Security Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the
Central Intelligence Agency, and the Senate Internal Security
Subcommittee's chief investigator, among others.
In April, 1974, a little over a year later, the CIA
informed the DIA that CIA analysts had tentatively identified
the interrogator, nicknamed ``Fidel,'' as one Luis Perez, also
known as Luis Perez Jaen, a captain in the Cuban Ministry of
Interior. This captain was in Hanoi during the ``Cuba
Program'', had a history of interrogating foreigners in Cuba,
and was in the U.S. during 1956 and 1957, buying and shipping
arms to Cuba; and he possessed most of the physical and
personality traits of ``Fidel'' that our POW's had described.
The CIA provided DIA a copy of a photograph of Luis Perez
Jaen that was published in the Cuban newspaper, Oriente, on 25
February 1959. The photograph, which we have shared with the
Committee, depicts Perez Jaen wearing a military cap and a full
beard.
Between November, 1975 and mid-1976, U.S. Air Force
investigators asked seven victims of the ``Cuba Program'' to
examine this photograph of Luis Perez Jaen. Six of these men
could not state positively that he was the interrogator they
nicknamed ``Fidel,'' primarily because the photograph depicts
him wearing a full beard. One of the seven, Colonel Donald
Waltman, wrote in a 1976 note to a U.S. Air Force investigator,
quote, ``I say, yes, that is 'Fidel', or at least a guy who
looks too much like him. I have to try to imagine him clean
shaven, and when I do, it is him. Maybe because I would like to
ID him so damn bad. It is the most look-alike 'Fidel' picture I
have seen,'' end quote.
Also in April, 1974, the CIA informed the DIA that
``Chico'' might be a Cuban named Veiga, whose first name they
did not know, an employee of the Cuban Department of State
Security. Reportedly, Veiga had studied at Tulane University in
New Orleans, Louisiana, in 1958 and 1959. An extensive followup
investigation by U.S. Air Force investigators failed to confirm
the identity of this person. Other names have been suggested
over the years; however, subsequent investigations either ruled
them out or proved inconclusive.
For example, the DIA POW/MIA Office provided historical
information about the ``Cuba Program'' to the FBI when it
investigated a 1987 report that a Cuban employee of the United
Nations might be one of the Cuban interrogators. The FBI worked
closely with returned POW's in that investigation.
Captain Vohden described the three days he spent going over
photos associated with that investigation. However, the POW's
could not positively identify the Cuban at the United Nations
as one of the men who tortured them in Hanoi.
Recent news stories suggest that the Cuban Minister of
Education, Fernando Vecino Alegret, is the interrogator our
POW's nicknamed ``Fidel.'' Fernando Vecino Alegret first came
to our attention shortly before he visited the United States in
November, 1978. At that time, Federal law enforcement and
intelligence agencies examined the possibility that he was the
interrogator named ``Fidel.'' We have been searching our
historical files for any record we might have received from
those agencies concerning this man. Two days ago, we discovered
a still-classified September, 1973 report that described
Fernando Vecino Alegret as an engineering graduate, who studied
at the University of Havana during 1962-65. The report also
stated that he founded the Cuban Military Technical Institute
in September 1966 and that he was its Director from September,
1966 until January, 1973.
We have not yet had time to confirm the origin and
reliability of that report. However, if the information in the
report is accurate, there is little chance that Fernando Vecino
Alegret could be the interrogator ``Fidel.''
Among the names we have received, the two names the CIA
suggested in 1974 remain the most likely candidates for the
interrogators named ``Fidel'' and ``Chico,'' but I should
emphasize we do not know who he is.
The only information we have concerning the purpose of the
``Cuba Program'' comes from the American POW's who were victims
and two Vietnamese military officers. The preponderance of
information in our files, most of it coming from the returnees
themselves, suggests that the ``Cuba Program'' was a Cuban
assistance program that went awry, and that the Vietnamese
terminated the program shortly after the interrogator named
``Fidel'' beat Major Cobeil into a near-catatonic state from
which he never recovered.
The Department of Defense has kept the Congress informed
about the ``Cuba Program'' from the very beginning. For
example, the DPMO's predecessor office, the Defense
Intelligence Agency's Special Office for Prisoners of War/
Missing in Action Affairs, presented testimony about the ``Cuba
Program'' to the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee during
hearings on 2 July 1973, about three months after the last
American POW was released. A former POW who was a victim of the
program, U.S. Navy Lieutenant Commander Larry Spencer, also
testified before the Subcommittee.
Later, the DIA POW/MIA Office provided historical
information to the Subcommittee's chief investigator, Mr.
Alfonso L. Tarabochia, who conducted an independent effort to
identify the interrogators. I believe Captain Vohden also made
reference to that investigation. By September, 1974, Mr.
Tarabochia had tentatively concluded that ``Fidel'' was a Cuban
named Pedro Fumero. Unfortunately, the returned POW's who were
victims of ``Fidel'' could not identify Fumero as one of their
interrogators.
The DPMO's DIA predecessor office also provided an
appraisal to the House Armed Services Committee on 6 October,
1977. More recently, the DPMO provided updates on the ``Cuba
Program'' to Congressman Dornan in March, 1987, August, 1996,
and 11 and 17 September, 1996.
The story about the ``Cuba Program'' is not new. For
example, I have with me eight news articles about the ``Cuba
Program'' published in 1973, 1977, and 1981 in Washington,
D.C., New York, Baltimore, Denver, and Des Moines. These
articles are based on information released by DPMO's
predecessor, the DIA's POW/MIA Office, and personal accounts by
POW's who were victims of the program.
I would like to comment briefly for the public record about
recent press reports about the ``Cuba Program.'' News reports
published in the Miami Herald on 22 August, 1999, and the
Seattle Times on 28 October 1999, suggested that this issue
was, ``concealed for decades by official U.S. secrecy'' and,
``the full story of Fidel and the so-called `Cuba Program' is
finally becoming public,''. The same article speculated that
the reason the story has drawn little attention is, ``perhaps
because most POW's obeyed Pentagon orders to keep quiet to
protect POW's who might remain in Vietnam and perhaps because
'Fidel's' identification as a Cuban was then only an
unconfirmed allegation by the POW's.''
The facts are that the Department of Defense officials
asked the POW's who were returning during Operation Homecoming
in 1973 not to speak out publicly about the torture until after
the last POW was released. The last POW was released on 1 April
1973; the first stories by returning POW's about the ``Cuba
Program'' appeared in American newspapers the next day, on 2
April, 1973.
Some of the sources cited in these articles portrayed
DPMO's role incorrectly. As Mr. Jones stated, we are not a
counterintelligence office or a law enforcement office. Our
mission is humanitarian. It is to account for American
servicemen who were lost while serving abroad. All American
victims of the ``Cuba Program'' are accounted for.
Successive administrations, the Congress, the Department of
State, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the Defense Prisoner of
War/Missing Personnel Office, the Pacific Command's Joint Task
Force, the U.S. Army Central Identifications Laboratory, the
National League of Families--literally thousands of Americans
have worked hard for many years to build and sustain programs
that today are allowing us to account for Americans lost in the
old Soviet Union, in North Korea, in Southeast Asia, and many
other areas in the world.
As Secretary Jones stated earlier, our mission is
humanitarian, and it is worldwide. Our ability to accomplish
our mission is wholly dependent on the willingness of foreign
governments to allow our POW/MIA specialists to have access to
their citizens, their records, and their territory. Suggestions
that DPMO should investigate war crimes risks undoing the
results of years of hard work and would jeopardize our ability
to accomplish our humanitarian mission.
Now, having said that, DPMO is a central repository for
historical information concerning the American POW/MIA issue.
As Secretary Jones stated earlier, DPMO stands ready to share
historical information and knowledge about the program with
appropriate U.S. agencies. In conclusion, the history of the
issue is that the POW/MIA Office informed senior Department of
Defense officials immediately upon learning about the actions
of the presumably Cuban interrogators. Those officials
immediately directed appropriate intelligence and investigative
agencies to try to identify those interrogators. In 1974, CIA
analysts tentatively identified two Cuban officials as the
interrogators ``Fidel'' and ``Chico.'' Their victims, however,
were not able to confirm their identities.
We have also kept the Congress and the public informed. We
will remain a repository of historical information about all
aspects of the POW/MIA issue and remain ready to share that
historical information with appropriate Federal intelligence
and investigative offices. However, as Secretary Jones stated
earlier, we believe that DPMO should not become involved in
efforts to investigate the program and jeopardize our
accounting mission.
I am ready to respond to questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Destatte appears in the
appendix.]
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Thank you so much. There were several
Vietnamese interrogators at ``The Zoo,'' as we had heard from
the POW's, ``Spot,'' ``Rabbit,'' ``Elf,'' in addition to the
camp commander who we discussed in the previous panel known as
``The Lump.''
Have any attempts been made by DOD or any other U.S. agency
to question these individuals in order to try to obtain further
information about these Cuban torturers?
Mr. Destatte. I personally asked the interrogator whom
Captain Vohden and Colonel Bomar call ``The Rabbit'' about this
program. While he acknowledged that these men were Cubans, he
did not provide the names, and I don't know of any other
efforts.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. So he said they were Cubans.
Mr. Destatte. I don't recall the exact words of the
conversation, but it was during a formal interview. My memory
is that I mentioned to him that several of our returned POW's
described having been interrogated by Cubans at the POW camp
the Americans called ``The Zoo,'' and that the Vietnamese
called Nga Tu So.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. When did this conversation take place?
Mr. Destatte. This conversation took place--I would have to
check my notes--in the early 1990's, sometime in 1992.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. We will followup on that. Thank you.
Without actually revealing the details since the report is
still classified, do you know the origin, the author, the
source of the information in the CIA report on the ``Cuba
Program'' and the two men mentioned in the CIA report,
``Fidel'' and ``Chico,'' as possibly being Cuban agents, part
of Castro's Ministry of Interior. Was any followup done to this
CIA report?
Mr. Destatte. There was followup. The CIA report included,
as an enclosure, a 1959 photograph of the Cuban their analysts
believe was ``Fidel.'' The Air Force, Air Force investigator
showed that photograph to seven of the victims of the program.
Six of those men stated that they were unable to confirm that
this was ``Fidel.'' The seventh, as I mentioned in my
statement, Colonel Waltman, believed that it was ``Fidel,'' or
at least the most look-alike photograph he had seen of
``Fidel.''
Other persons have looked at that photograph. As a matter
of fact, at the close of the last panel, I asked Colonel
Carpenter, who was sitting behind the table here, and Captain
Vohden again about that, and they were quite insistent this is
not ``Fidel.'' So I suppose, parenthetically, our experience
has been that making identifications of persons from
photographs is a very uncertain endeavor. It is unlikely to
yield conclusive results.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Mr. Jones, you had said in your testimony
that you will soon be in Vietnam, in just a few days. In our
dealings with the Vietnamese, particularly in recent years as
trade negotiations have intensified, has the U.S. raised the
issue of the ``Cuba Program'' specifically with those
officials? Have there been any official requests for
information? Why or why not?
Mr. Jones. I cannot answer in regard to the trade
negotiations because my office does not participate in those
negotiations, ma'am. We are fully engaged in negotiating with
the Vietnamese concerning accounting for missing Americans. So
I am afraid I am not the person to answer that question.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Eliminate the part about trade
negotiations. I just said that to parenthetically state that we
are in such a positive working relationship with Vietnam that
now we are discussing trade deals.
But having nothing to do with trade, what about the many
U.S. agencies that have specifically asked? Do you know if
yours or any others asked the Vietnamese officials about the
``Cuba Program,'' specific requests made for information?
Mr. Jones. As I mentioned and as Mr. Destatte mentioned
earlier, he personally took part in an oral history interview
of one of the guards that was mentioned by the former POW's. So
there has been some followup in that regard. However, as we
testified earlier, all of the participants in this particular
program have been accounted for. Thus, the role of my office
has been completed in terms of investigating specifically what
happened to those 19 individuals. We continue to act as a
repository for the historical records related to that program.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Do you believe that the acts committed
against the POW's violate the Geneva Convention? If those are
found to be true, do you believe that, once identified, the
three torturers should be tried as war criminals and that we
should gear efforts toward that goal?
Mr. Jones. As I testified in my statement, ma'am, I firmly
support the goals that you stated earlier for the purposes of
this hearing, and I most certainly believe that those
individuals should be tracked down and brought to justice for
their conduct.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Now, you had said that your specific
agency has a specified mission. What agency then do you believe
should lead the investigation on the ``Cuba Program'' and what
agencies, in addition, should be included? Should CIA, DIA,
FBI, State Department be? What agencies should be involved?
Mr. Jones. Looking at the nature of the circumstances, I
believe that the State Department should be lead agency. I
believe that they have an office that is charged to investigate
violations of the Geneva Convention and the laws of armed
conflict. So I believe that the State Department would be the
best agency to lead a review of this program and to conduct a
followup investigation. I believe that they should be supported
by the appropriate Intelligence Community--DIA, CIA, as well as
the FBI.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Mr. Destatte, we understand that DPMO has
joint commissions with Russia and is working together with
former Eastern Bloc countries in an attempt to obtain
information about American POW's which may have been sent to
those countries during various Cold War conflicts. Further, we
understand that television and other mediums are used to reach
out to the general population of those countries so that they
can help us have information to contribute.
Have similar attempts been made regarding information on
the ``Cuba Program'' and the torturers?
Mr. Destatte. We have taken a different approach in
Vietnam. Let me preface my remarks by stating that I helped
open the first U.S. office in Vietnam after the war in 1991,
and worked over there for the American POW/MIA Office which we
opened in mid-1991. One of the first things we did was put
together a program where we visited each of the military region
headquarters and each of the province headquarters and
delivered to each of those headquarters information about
Americans who were lost in their respective areas, requesting
their support in finding witnesses, finding documents and
otherwise accounting for the men who were lost in those
regions.
We have also since 1988, approximately 5 times a year, sent
for a month at a time approximately 100 Americans, mostly
active duty military personnel, into Vietnam. They break down
into small teams of varying sizes, they fan out through the
country looking for information or excavating crash sites or
grave sites that were discovered during earlier investigations.
I believe that it would be difficult to find a single village
in Vietnam that has not been visited at least once by one of
our teams. I think it would be almost impossible to find an
adult citizen of Vietnam who is not aware of our keen interest
in accounting for our people.
So we have taken a different approach in Vietnam than the
Joint Commission is taking in Russia. I believe we have covered
the country very effectively, and I believe the results that we
have seen in recent years of this approach demonstrates the
effectiveness of that approach.
Mr. Jones. If I might add to that, I will be traveling to
Moscow on Sunday. I will be in Moscow through the 10th of
November. Rest assured that I will raise this at the U.S.
Embassy in Moscow and with the Russian with whom I will be
meeting.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Thank you, Mr. Jones. Have you had a
chance to look at Ambassador Peterson's letter that we just
received this morning? You will be following up with him and
other officials in Vietnam on this issue?
Mr. Jones. I am hopeful, ma'am, that we will have a
response from the Vietnamese before I get to Vietnam. But if we
do not, rest assured that I will speak to the Ambassador in
regard to this program.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. One last question: Are you aware of
reports which state that the suspect that the CIA believes to
be ``Fidel'' was in the U.S. and involved in smuggling arms to
Castro in the 1950's; and did you know that both Alegret and
Jaen were in the United States at the same time, and this comes
from Alegret by his own admission as quoted in a book that was
published by the Castro regime?
We want to note, if there is any followup that you know of
on this data, was it used to trying to discern which of the two
was in fact ``Fidel,'' if any; and given that Alegret and the
one whom the CIA believes to be ``Chico'' were in Louisiana and
other U.S. locations at the same time, were there any efforts
to determine whether Alegret was actually ``Chico,'' and that
the name that the CIA had for ``Chico'' was an alias? What
attempts have been made to followup on any of these bits of
information?
Mr. Destatte. I don't know that we have. I know that we do
not have a comprehensive record of all the actions that were
taken because, as I mentioned earlier, we were not the
investigators. The investigations were conducted by the Air
Force, by the other service agencies--the FBI, CIA, et cetera.
The document that I mentioned to you earlier this morning
recognizes that there are unconfirmed reports that Alegret
attended high school in the United States. Given his age, I
believe his date of birth is 1939, I graduated from high school
in 1957, and I was born in 1939. So he was in the United States
at conceivably the same time as Jaen, but under different
circumstances. But that is just speculation on my part. I don't
know what efforts were made by other agencies.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. I think it is clear that since this first
was looked at at this point in time a lot of new information
has come out, a lot of new testimony, declassified papers, new
information that could help us to identify these individuals;
and certainly an interagency task force would be one of the
ways to get at this information. We hope that that comes about.
I would like to recognize Mr. Rohrabacher for questions.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman.
Now, Mr. Destatte, you asked one of the guards----
Mr. Destatte. Not a guard, he was a----
Mr. Rohrabacher. Interrogator.
Mr. Destatte. He was a commissioned officer. He described
himself as an interpreter. POW's described him as an
interrogator.
Mr. Rohrabacher. You asked him about whether or not the
other interrogators were Cuban, and the answer was?
Mr. Destatte. I described the program in a sentence or
two--my memory is that I described it in a sentence or two and
asked him to comment on it. In response, he referred to them as
Cubans. Now, whether he was following my lead or whether that
was confirmation, I leave that up to your judgment.
Mr. Rohrabacher. This was a formal interview, you said.
That is how you described it?
Mr. Destatte. Yes.
Mr. Rohrabacher. You recorded this interview?
Mr. Destatte. I don't recall whether we recorded that
interview or not. I know typically when I write a report I
usually record over the interview tapes in any event.
Mr. Rohrabacher. You record over the interview tapes after
you have conducted a formal interview?
Mr. Destatte. The purpose of the recording the interview in
most instances is to aid in report writing.
Mr. Rohrabacher. I am a little fascinated by that. You are
saying that of your formal interviews, you actually don't keep
records of them then?
Mr. Destatte. That is not what I said.
Mr. Rohrabacher. It sounds like what you are telling me is
that you record over the tapes when you do--I am just
requesting you to send that tape and that interview to me.
Mr. Destatte. If I have the tape.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Seeing that you just said you record over
the interviews, perhaps that will be a good excuse for not
sending me the tape.
But if you have it, I am making a formal request, Madam
Chairman, from this Committee; and we will confirm this with
the Chairman of the Committee, that this is a formal request
from the Committee.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Thank you, Mr. Rohrabacher. We will pass
that on to the Chairman, and I am sure that he will work with
you on that.
Mr. Rohrabacher. I would like the notes and the tape that
you have from that interview.
During that interview you said you asked about the names,
but he wouldn't tell. Is that what you said?
Mr. Destatte. Did not tell me.
Mr. Rohrabacher. What year was this interview?
Mr. Destatte. June, 1992.
Mr. Rohrabacher. June, 1992.
Mr. Destatte. I might add that the document that I just
consulted for that date is part of the official record of the
17 September 1996 hearing held by Congressman Dornan. You can
find that document.
Mr. Rohrabacher. All right. I am not just asking for the
document; I am asking for that tape, and if the tape still
exists----
Mr. Destatte. As I told you, Congressman, that was several
years ago. I do not know whether I have that specific tape or
not. I told you that routinely when I use a tape recorder,
which is not in all cases, I use the tape recorder only to
assist me in writing my report. When I finish writing the
report, typically I record over that. I will have to consult
our files at the office to know whether or not I retained a
copy of that tape.
Mr. Rohrabacher. That is fine. It just doesn't seem that
that is a very professional way to handle----
Mr. Destatte. Sir, I resent your implications that I am
being less than honest with you.
Mr. Rohrabacher. You may resent anything you want. I am
here to ask questions. If you resent those questions----
Mr. Destatte. Sir, I came here to provide accurate
information.
Mr. Rohrabacher. How long have you been in the position
that you are in today with this POW/MIA issue?
Mr. Destatte. I joined this issue in September 1979.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Is it normal that they have someone who is
an employee of the Department of Defense at the same job for as
long as that?
Mr. Destatte. I don't know what is ``normal'' in that
respect.
Mr. Rohrabacher. You don't know what is normal policy for
the Department of Defense where you have worked for all those
years? You haven't noticed that other jobs seem to be rotating,
but you seem to be staying in the same spot?
Mr. Destatte. I don't know your point.
Mr. Jones. Mr. Rohrabacher, rest assured, as soon as we
return to the office, we will ascertain if the documents and
the tape that you are requesting are in fact part of our files.
I will do everything to personally ensure that you receive
those documents.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Thank you.
Was this the first time that you testified that we knew the
day after the prisoners got back that there was a Cuban
interrogation program? Was this the first time, in your
interview in 1992, that a Vietnamese was officially asked about
the ``Cuba Program''?
Mr. Destatte. Let me repeat, our mission is to account for
missing personnel.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Yes.
Mr. Destatte. The purpose of my interview that day was to
gather information that would lead to an accounting for our
personnel. Out of personal curiosity on this particular issue,
the ``Cuba Program,'' I took advantage of the opportunity to
ask that question.
Mr. Rohrabacher. You don't believe that perhaps--we have a
picture of a gentleman who is murdered under interrogation by
these Cubans; you don't think that there might perhaps be
another American that was unaccounted for that might have been
murdered by the same program that we don't know about and that
maybe that is your job?
Mr. Destatte. That assertion rests on the preposterous
notion that the 19 survivors of that program either, failed to
know about this alleged other prisoner, or knowing about it,
failed to tell about it when they came home.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Is it preposterous to say then that there
is information about this program that those 19 prisoners may
not know about?
Mr. Destatte. No, I didn't say that.
Mr. Rohrabacher. That is what it sounds like you are
saying.
Is it preposterous, for example, that the Vietnamese kept
Ambassador Peterson, when he was a POW, totally isolated from
the other POW's for the first three years of his captivity? Is
that a preposterous suggestion?
Mr. Destatte. Are you familiar with the record?
Mr. Rohrabacher. No other POW knew that Congressman
Peterson was being held captive during those first three years;
is that preposterous?
Mr. Destatte. How does that relate to our discussion here?
Mr. Rohrabacher. It relates to it because you have a
situation with interrogators from Cuba who may have information
about prisoners that is not being followed up on by you, and it
is your job to followup on it. It is your job to determine if
there are any MIA's out there.
Mr. Destatte. Are you suggesting then that there was a
secret POW camp system or something of that nature?
Mr. Rohrabacher. Well----
Mr. Destatte. I truly don't understand your question.
Mr. Rohrabacher. I will tell you. I will tell what you my
question is. My question is, is there any evidence that perhaps
some MIA's or people who were MIA were being held during that
time period and were actually POW's, and the information was
not available to the rest of the prisoners or to the United
States Government?
Mr. Destatte. I believe that we know the identity of every
American who was in that prisoner of war camp during that
period of time, and that all of those prisoners are accounted
for.
Mr. Rohrabacher. That was a really good answer to a
question that I didn't ask. It was really great of you to word
it that way.
Mr. Destatte. I believe that our focus on the ``Cuba
Program'' and what the----
Mr. Rohrabacher. The point, Mr. Destatte, is that the
``Cuba Program'' may be a key to answer some information about
other missing prisoners rather than just these 19.
Now, they have committed crimes----
Mr. Destatte. To the best of our knowledge and the to best
of the knowledge of the witnesses that have appeared here
today, those Cubans were active in one prisoner of war camp,
the prisoner of war camp that our American prisoners called
``The Zoo,'' that the Vietnamese called Nga Tu So. We know the
identity of every American who was in that camp, and all of
those Americans are accounted for.
Now, if you have information that the Cubans were active in
another camp, fine. I don't have that information.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Did you ask in your formal interview in
1992 whether there were Cubans involved in any other camps?
Mr. Destatte. As I told you before, the purpose of that
interview was to learn information that might help us account
for Americans who were still unaccounted for, not to learn
about the ``Cuba Program.'' The Americans who were involved in
the ``Cuba Program'' are all accounted for.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Fine. Luckily, I have some time to
followup on these questions on the record rather than being
stuck at five minutes, so your attempt to use up the time will
not get you off the hook.
Is the fact that there might be another Cuban prison camp
which might indicate that there are some American POW's that
you didn't know about, but you are not bothering to ask whether
there were Cubans at another prison in this particular formal
interview that you went through?
Mr. Destatte. I believe that the information that the
intelligence services, that the DPMO and its predecessor
office, have collected over the years allows us to state with
confidence that we know of every POW camp which held American
prisoners in North Vietnam and all of the prisoners that were
in those camps; and all of those prisoners were accounted for.
There is no separate prison camp or there are no American
prisoners who were held in a separate prison.
The question about the possibility of Cubans in another
prison camp is a moot question. There wasn't another prison
camp for them.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Not even worth asking about it. Not even
worth asking, right? Here you are, the one we are depending on
to get this information.
Mr. Destatte. No, sir, you are depending on my office to
account for Americans who are still unaccounted for. If you
want to know about the Cubans, if you want to know what the
Cubans did or did not do in Vietnam, then, as we have said
before, we suggest that you address that question to agencies
that are appropriately chartered to pursue those questions.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Is your office tasked with coordinating
all government activity in terms of POW/MIA's in Vietnam?
Mr. Destatte. We are tasked with accounting for Americans
who failed to return home at the end of the war.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Are you tasked with coordinating the
activity of other government agencies?
Mr. Jones. Sir, my office as the Director of--DPMO is to be
responsible to make sure what we do everything we possibly can
to account for missing Americans, and that includes interagency
coordination.
Mr. Rohrabacher. So if these questions were going to be
examined, you would have to actually make the request or
coordinate the activity?
Mr. Destatte. No.
Mr. Rohrabacher. OK.
Mr. Jones. Sir, in regard to that comment, I would like to
say, if you recall, in my written testimony, I did in fact send
recently a request to the other Federal agencies to determine
if they had any other additional information related to this
program.
Mr. Rohrabacher. All right.
Now, in 1992, when you conducted this formal interview for
which the tapes may be missing, you asked whether or not there
were Cubans involved, and you didn't ask whether the Cubans
were involved in any other camps. But after that, you said that
they didn't want to give you the names.
You asked for the names; they wouldn't give you any names
involved. Yet haven't you categorized the North Vietnamese, or
I should say, the Vietnamese activities involved with MIA/POW's
as being in full cooperation with your efforts?
Mr. Jones. Sir, that is a certification that is required by
the Congress of the United States. It is made by the Department
of State and the President of the United States. We provide
statistical information to support that.
Mr. Rohrabacher. If we have a question being asked, and you
know what the names of these torturers of Americans are, and we
aren't getting an answer, isn't that somewhat less than full
cooperation?
Mr. Jones. Sir, that question was asked of the Vietnamese
on October 9th by Ambassador Peterson.
Mr. Rohrabacher. It was asked in June 1992.
Mr. Destatte. Let me comment on that.
The answer to that question does not contribute one iota to
our efforts to account for Americans who are missing, and that
is not----
Mr. Rohrabacher. You don't think that the torture of
Americans in prisons in Vietnam and finding them and trying to
ask them what went on and who it was that they were dealing
with would lead to any information that we might not know about
who was being held?
Have you ever met with the person that the prisoners have
called ``The Lump''?
Mr. Destatte. I have no idea who he is.
Mr. Rohrabacher. That is not the question, have you ever
met with the person. You are saying that you have not; is that
correct?
Mr. Destatte. That is correct.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Now ``The Lump,'' of course, is a
Vietnamese. Is this part of our request to the Vietnamese
Government to provide ``The Lump'' and interviews with ``The
Lump''; is that part of our request that was made by Ambassador
Peterson?
Mr. Jones. Sir, I cannot say what Ambassador Peterson
requested of the Vietnamese. I was not present.
Mr. Rohrabacher. So if we know this fellow known as ``The
Lump'' has been identified, they could say who they think he
was. I think that was part of the testimony today--maybe not--
that was part of the testimony that they could identify him. We
have not made an official request to talk to him; is that
right?
Mr. Jones. Sir, I am not aware of the identity of anyone
called ``The Lump'' that was made available to my office.
Mr. Rohrabacher. All right. So we have a request for the
names of the Cubans turned down in 1992 by a low-level person,
and that wasn't followed up again until seven years later, I
guess just recently, when Ms. Ros-Lehtinen decided to call some
attention here. Again, it seems to me that what we are talking
about is less than full cooperation with our efforts.
By the way, this idea, Mr. Destatte, about demanding that
people who tortured Americans be sought and be prosecuted for
war crimes, risks undoing all the work that we have done.
Mr. Destatte. Sir, that is a distortion of my statement.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Go right ahead and clarify it.
Mr. Destatte. I said that pursuit of that objective by my
office would risk jeopardizing our ability to accomplish our
mission.
If you wish to pursue that, my recommendation would be that
you pursue that through an agency of the U.S. Government that
is duly chartered to pursue those kinds of investigations.
Mr. Rohrabacher. But is not your office duly chartered to
task other government agencies with this type of activity?
Mr. Destatte. Is it not your suggestion that we do what we
have just told you, which is not appropriate for our office,
and that is to investigate war crimes?
Mr. Rohrabacher. If you are an American citizen and
American citizens have been tortured and a crime has been
committed against American military personnel----
Mr. Destatte. There are 2,047 families that are waiting for
answers on their missing family member. Our obligation is to
account for their missing family member.
The mission of investigating war crimes lies elsewhere in
the Federal Government, and I would suggest that you would get
better answers by pursuing it there.
Mr. Rohrabacher. War crimes committed against those people,
the torture, the brutal torture of American prisoners of war?
Is this of concern to you?
Mr. Destatte. As I told you before, we believe that we know
the identity of every American who was a prisoner of war, and
they are accounted for, those who were in the camps in North
Vietnam.
Mr. Jones. Sir, if I might interject here----
Mr. Rohrabacher. Because of the full cooperation the North
Vietnamese have been giving to you, what about again making
just one last attempt at this. Ambassador Peterson and several
other POW's and MIA's who eventually became POW's, were kept in
isolated camps and did not intermingle and were declared
missing in action, and no one knew whether they were alive or
dead for several years--isn't that the case?
Mr. Destatte. I would have to go back and look at the
record.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Let me clarify the record for you.
Ambassador Peterson told me that personally.
Mr. Destatte. I also accompanied Ambassador Peterson back
to that very prison camp, and he described for me and the
others with him how he communicated--even though isolated, how
he communicated with prisoners in other parts of that prison.
So I must tell you, I am not sure that you are accurately
portraying what he said. I would have to go back to the record
and refresh my memory.
Mr. Rohrabacher. I would hope that having been active for
so long on this issue that your memory would be pretty good,
considering that you knew we were going to have a hearing
today.
Mr. Destatte. I came here to discuss the ``Cuba Program,''
not to discuss the----
Mr. Rohrabacher. The possibility that there were other
Cubans involved in torturing Americans someplace else. That is
what the question is. These people are what I am trying to lead
to, of course----
Mr. Destatte. Persons were held in approximately--I don't
recall the exact figure offhand, but I believe--eleven
different locations in North Vietnam in the Hanoi area.
Mr. Rohrabacher. That we know of.
Mr. Destatte. We believe that that there were no others.
That has been looked at not just by myself. Thousands of
Americans have looked at that issue very carefully, and there
is not a shred of evidence that there was any other prison that
held Americans.
Mr. Rohrabacher. I will just have to say that I am not
convinced, and we have other people who are honest American
citizens who have looked into this and are not convinced.
Some questions don't seem to be asked; they don't seem to
be asked and we seem to be cataloguing or categorizing the
Vietnamese as being fully cooperating with us when we are
afraid to ask certain questions of them.
Mr. Destatte. I don't believe that that is a fair
statement. The ``we'' in this case, I presume, means the U.S.
Government; and the U.S. Government has asked the question.
This particular office of the U.S. Government should not be
asking those kinds of questions.
Mr. Rohrabacher. I am glad that you are so committed to
your humanitarian mission. I think it is extraordinary that one
individual has been at the Department of Defense at the same
humanitarian mission all of these years, and I think that the
reason why there are rotations in jobs like your own in the
Department of Defense is to ensure that one person or several
people cannot monopolize information and use their own judgment
that may be good or bad judgment.
Mr. Destatte. There are approximately 120 or 130 men and
women in our office. There is quite a turnover. There is always
fresh blood, there are always fresh views. There is always a
fresh questioning of assumptions and conclusions.
But there are also a few old-timers who help ensure that we
don't reinvent the wheel every one or two years. One of our
greatest mistakes during the Vietnam War was the
institutionalization of inexperience, the one-year tour, very
oftentimes broken up into six months in a given assignment.
I would suggest that the alternative to having experience
is chaos.
Mr. Jones. Mr. Chairman, if I might interject at this
point, the success of my office, as I testified earlier, has
been based solely upon our capability to access foreign
countries, their citizens, their historical archives without
retribution, to assist us in accounting for the missing
Americans around the globe. We have, in fact, been very
successful in that because we have not pursued war crimes, we
have left that up to the appropriate agencies.
As I testified earlier, I believe that such an
investigation into the ``Cuba Program'' should be led by the
appropriate office within the Department of State, supported by
those other agencies who have the capabilities to assist them
in that investigation. I would say for the record that based
upon the current evidence on record, we have no evidence to
substantiate that there was another ``Cuba Program'' outside
the one that we are discussing here today.
Mr. Rohrabacher. OK.
Several years ago, when I went to Vietnam with Mr. Peterson
while he was a Member of Congress, we participated in
negotiations with the Vietnamese. At that time, I asked for the
records of the prisons that the Vietnamese had of all the
Americans, and we were told that those records were not
available. Many of them are like they were erased after doing
other interviews, I guess, or their records were blown up by B-
52 raids near the end of the war.
Now, I didn't really accept that answer, and I made an
official request of them and asked our government, the people
involved in this, to follow through on insisting on receiving
the records of those camps, so that we could prove or disprove
whether or not there was a possibility that there were people
kept without other people knowing about it. Because that
information would only be available in those records.
Has there been a turnover of these records to us? I guess I
made that request five years ago.
Mr. Destatte. The Vietnamese have turned over quite a large
number of records. I don't recall the exact number, but it is
in the thousands. Among those records, the only record that
comes to mind that fits the description that you have put forth
is a record that the Vietmanese say is a record of all
Americans who entered the prison system in the North. That has
been turned over to us.
Mr. Rohrabacher. I am not talking about a record of all
Americans; I am talking about a record of their prison system,
and I was very clear about that. These people, like every other
military or government operation, they kept records of how much
food they bought, how much it cost, who was in charge of
procuring food, how many people they were protecting and
guarding, how many people they were taking care of.
Mr. Destatte. I recall you and I had a conversation about
that on a bus in Hanoi. I made a memorandum of that
conversation, and I would like to ask permission to provide a
copy of that memorandum of record of our conversation to the
Committee and make it a part of the official record of this
hearing. I believe that will answer the question for the
Committee.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Maybe instead of holding off to the point
that we can't ask a followup question, maybe you could answer
the question now, rather than us waiting for the memorandum?
Have the Vietnamese provided the information that I
requested about their camps?
Mr. Destatte. To the best of my knowledge, they have not
provided the document that you requested. But again I ask if I
might be permitted to enter into the record, in its entirety,
my memorandum of record of that conversation.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Mr. Chairman, they have not complied with
the request. Yet we are talking about the Vietnamese as fully
cooperating with us. I think I should leave it at that. I thank
the Chairman for his indulgence.
Chairman Gilman. [Presiding.] Thank you, Mr. Rohrabacher.
Mr. Rohrabacher. I appreciate Ms. Ros-Lehtinen permitting
me to have the time. Usually I get five minutes to ask
questions. I think this has been very valuable for all
concerned.
Chairman Gilman. Ms. Ros-Lehtinen.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Just a followup question on the line of
questions that Mr. Rohrabacher said. We had a previous
panelist, as you know, Andres Garcia; and he referred to the
experiences of another Cuban American veteran, several of them,
who were told that there were Cubans who served as
interrogators across the Cambodian borders, a presence of
Cubans possibly, and in other places beyond ``The Zoo.'' We
have been talking about that with Mr. Rohrabacher, that line of
questioning; and just to reiterate, we believe that is an
important area for us to do further investigation and finding
out, even though you believe that other POW's may not have been
tortured by these other Cubans.
Mr. Destatte. I can give you an answer to that offhand.
There were two camps for Americans in Cambodia. The one
camp was a camp administered by what the Communists called
Headquarters B-3 Front. This was the military headquarters that
controlled their main force units in the Western Highlands. The
other camp was subordinate to what they called B-2 Front.
In both instances, these camps were mobile, and the B-2
Front camp moved around the area along the border between
Vietnam and Cambodia. Many Americans have returned from that
camp and there is no evidence at all that there was any Cuban
involvement in either of those camps.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. Thank you. We look forward to working
with you and especially with the other agencies to followup on
some of these leads and reopen this case so that justice can be
done in the memory of Earl Cobeil, the U.S. Air Force pilot who
was murdered while in captivity, and to honor the brave service
of these men who were testifying today and others who could not
be here with us.
Mr. Destatte. If I could ask your indulgence for just a
moment, we got off the track here for awhile. I share the
interests of all Americans in ensuring that these people who so
brutally treated our POW's and, in particular, beat Major
Cobeil to death, are brought to justice properly. But at the
same time, I think that it should be done in such a way that
does not jeopardize our mission to account for those Americans
who are still missing.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Mr. Destatte.
Thank you Ms. Ros-Lehtinen.
I have just two brief questions. Secretary Jones, the fall
of the Berlin Wall created an opportunity to seek information
from our former Soviet bloc adversaries on the ``Cuba Program''
and other POW-related matters. Can you please tell us what
efforts have been made to date to glean information from
Eastern European and other sources?
Mr. Jones. Sir, my office has the responsibility for the
oversight of the Joint Commission in support of the U.S.-Russia
Commission. I have staff routinely conducting oral history
interviews in former Eastern Bloc countries, former Soviet
Union countries.
Chairman Gilman. That is still ongoing?
Mr. Jones. Yes, sir. As I mentioned while you were voting,
sir, I will personally be in Moscow this weekend and will be
meeting with the U.S.-Russia Commission in Moscow.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you.
Mr. Destatte, documents provided to our Committee provide
uncorroborated reports that American POW's may have been taken
from Vietnam to Cuba. Can you comment on those reports and tell
the Committee what efforts have been made to look into and
verify if such transfers did indeed take place?
Mr. Destatte. I am not familiar with those particular
reports. But as I said earlier, I believe that we know the
identity of all Americans who were held as prisoners in the
Vietnamese prison system, and I believe they are all accounted
for, either through their return, alive, the return of the
remains; or in some cases, their deaths have been confirmed,
but we have not yet been able to recover their----
Chairman Gilman. Have you asked any specific questions with
regard to that issue, the Cubans?
Mr. Destatte. Transfer of Americans--I think in a general
sense that we pursued this question in our pursuit of
information about Americans in the camps, we can answer that;
but no, we have not investigated specifically or focused
specifically on that that I am aware of.
Chairman Gilman. Let me ask that you do pursue that and get
back to our Committee with any response you get.
Chairman Gilman. Mr. Jones, when you travel to Vietnam in
the near future, we would like to ask you to make an effort,
either directly or through our embassy, to secure meetings with
the former guards at ``The Zoo'' or others who might be able to
identify ``Fidel'' and the other torturers.
Would you make a request of that when you----
Mr. Jones. Sir, I will be more proactive than that.
I will request that my the collection unit, Stony Beach
pursue this task and immediately begin to try to interview
those individuals.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you very much.
Secretary Jones, how many F-111's were shot down? How many
F-111 pilots survived and how many were returned?
Mr. Jones. Sir, I am not qualified to answer that type of
technical question. May I defer to Mr. Destatte and see if he
has the information at hand.
Chairman Gilman. F-111's?
Mr. Destatte. Can I give you a written answer on that? I
don't recall that offhand.
Chairman Gilman. If you could provide that for a Committee,
we would appreciate that.
Ms. Ros-Lehtinen. I want to thank you so much, Mr.
Chairman, for your leadership and your commitment to
discovering the truth about this terrible ``Cuba Program.'' We
thank you so much.
Chairman Gilman. We thank our witnesses for your patience
and for being here with us throughout the questioning, and we
appreciate your response.
Committee will stand adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 1:05 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
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A P P E N D I X
November 4, 1999
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