Battlefield atrocities by the NVA

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Peter H
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Re: Battlefield atrocities by the NVA

#16

Post by Peter H » 15 Oct 2008, 02:02

Hi Bob,

Smearing "ammo with human feces" sounds a bit odd as well.Hadn't heard of that one before.

American lower rank prisoners were taken in the ground fighting in the south.For example the 3/3 Marines had Lance Corporal Leonard R.Budd captured near the DMZ in August 1967,released in 1973.

http://www.chadduck.com/ymarines/pow-mia/bios/b115.htm

PFC William Baird of the 196th Brigade was also captured near the DMZ in 1968,released in 1973:

http://www.pownetwork.org/bios/b/b007.htm
Baird was assigned as an infantryman with the 196th Light Infantry Brigade
of the Americal Division. He took part in patrols, search and destroy
missions, guard duty, and fought in the Tet Offensive in March 1968.
About 3:00 PM on the afternoon of May 6, 1968, thirty men of Baird's company
went out on patrol. They were close to the de-militarized zone on the
border of North Vietnam. Bill was pointman and a good 20 feet ahead of the
rest of the men. They had no idea they were walking into an ambush. While
walking on top of a dike in a rice paddy, Bill stepped on a land mine. The
explosion not only rendered him unconscious, it also alerted the Viet Cong
and a firefight broke out.
Three hours later Baird regained consciousness and heard the action going
on. Men were yelling, screaming, and shooting. An artillery barrage was
going on and planes were overhead. Bill began to take stock of where he was
and realized he must have stepped on a mine. There was no one near to help
him. He tried to stand up but discovered he had no feeling from the waist
down and through his efforts he passed out again.
As darkness approached things quieted down but Bill suffered the trauma of
being wounded and left alone. Eventually he heard the voices of Vietnamese
approaching. He had no idea if they were friendly or not. Then as they
came upon him he heard, "Chu Hoi"', surrender or die.
The Vietnamese surrounded Baird and when he told them he was injured they
did not believe him. They told him, "Americans are sneaky, lie, and can not
be trusted." Several times they tried to make him stand but he could not.
He then felt a sharp pain and a ringing in his head and discovered that they
had shot him. Fortunately the bullet hit no vital point, entering his neck
and exiting out his ear.
Finally convinced that Baird could not walk, the Vietnamese made a makeshift
stretcher and drug him along with them. After dragging him for three or
four hours they stopped and gave him a bowl of rice. Traveling to the north
they proceeded to show him off at all the villages they passed through and
the people would kick and spit at him. This went on for most of a month.
Peter

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Peter H
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Re: Battlefield atrocities by the NVA

#17

Post by Peter H » 31 Oct 2008, 02:00

Anthony Herbert's Soldier ,1973,page 151

Lt Colonel Herbert was with the 173rd Airborne Brigade.This incident was in January 1969.
..Werner had gone in and brought out the bodies of three of our guys who had been staked out on a hillside...it was clear to the men who saw the bodies that they had brought the farm the hard way.The three deaths,the torture,and the manner in which they had been found were logged and would have been forgotten,except that a few days later three more bodies were spotted from the air in precisely the same spot.They were from the other side.A note was pinned to one of them.It said that a court martial would have been impossible under the circumstances,and so the three men who had tortured and executed the three Americans had been tortured and executed in a similar manner.The note was signed,"An NVA Major"...
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mikel
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Re: Battlefield atrocities by the NVA

#18

Post by mikel » 07 Nov 2008, 01:47

Different days, different events.
Probably anything you can imagine happened at one time or another.
Officially US troops were required to handle enemy prisoners according to all regulations.
There was a card called "The Enemy in Your Hands" that was required reading at one time.
At one point we were required to have these and a few others in our possession.
Shot cards, Geneva Convention, etc.

I worked with CIDG and prisoners were not a consideration. We as advisors just had to stand aside.
My time was July '68-April '70.

I spent a week in intensive care at 3rd field hospital in Saigon.
There were two NVA there under guard. They were about the most seriously wounded in the ward.
An old lady next to me had her jaw shot away and they fed her with a tube down her throat.
I was very glad to leave that ward.

War brings out the best and the worst in those of us who have participated in it.
It is not glorious and it is not a game.

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IvanSR
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Re: Battlefield atrocities by the NVA

#19

Post by IvanSR » 26 Nov 2008, 02:15

mikei: Thank you very much for this informative post! That's something I read in several books as well. When it came to the handling of captured P.O.W., the U.S. were almost angels when compared to what the South-Vietnamese soldiers used to do.

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Peter H
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Re: Battlefield atrocities by the NVA

#20

Post by Peter H » 03 Apr 2011, 06:59

Photo from ebay,seller dixie_auctions

http://militarytimes.com/citations-meda ... ntid=27789
David Devers was interned as a Prisoner of War in Southeast Asia after he was captured in South Vietnam on August 13, 1966 and was held until his death in captivity on or about September 30, 1966. He and fellow prisoner John H. O'Neill were reportedly dragged from village to village in a public display by the Viet Cong and then executed forty days after their capture. His remains were recovered and returned on January 9, 1970.
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PFLB
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Re: Battlefield atrocities by the NVA

#21

Post by PFLB » 05 Apr 2011, 15:04

The SRV is notable for being the one state which, at the Geneva Diplomatic Conference in 1977, proposed that the law of armed conflict ought not to apply for the protection of members of the armed forces and civilians of 'aggressor' states (in a Marxist sense). That ought to tell you something about the mindset of the political leadership which was obliged to ensure that the armed force respected the law of armed conflict.

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