P.O.W.S: Tarnished Homecoming

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The Nixon Administration wanted nothing to mar the triumphant return of the U.S. prisoners of war from Viet Nam. Melvin R. Laird, then Secretary of Defense, declared that no returned P.O.W. would be prosecuted for propaganda statements made under the duress of captivity. The Pentagon discouraged former prisoners from bringing misconduct charges against one another. But along with the red-carpet welcomes, free visits to Walt Disney World and dinner on the White House lawn, some bitter recriminations began to emerge. In two separate cases, an Air Force colonel and an admiral, both of whom had been imprisoned, brought charges of collaboration with the enemy against fellow prisoners.

In the first case, Air Force Colonel Theodore W. Guy charged (TIME, June 11) eight enlisted men with accepting favors from their North Vietnamese captors in return for making antiwar statements and giving information about P.O.W. organization. After a delayed and apparently superficial investigation, the Army and Navy last week dismissed the charges for lack of evidence. For one of those accused, the news came too late. A week before, Marine Sergeant Abel ("Larry") Kavanaugh, 24, had put a bullet through his brain in his father-in-law's bedroom in Commerce City, Colo. The second suicide among the returned P.O.W.s, Kavanaugh had no history of mental depression and was a confirmed skeptic about U.S. involvement in the war.

Kavanaugh's suicide underscored the cruelty of allowing Colonel Guy's charges to hang in the air for six weeks and spurred the Pentagon announcement that the remaining seven men would not be put on trial. But it brought scant comfort to Kavanaugh's widow, who bitterly charged that "the Government murdered my husband." She is considering a lawsuit against Guy and the Pentagon for damages, based, perhaps, on "malicious prosecution." The State Department expert on P.O.W. affairs, Frank A. Sieverts, commented on Kavanaugh's death: "It could have been the captivity and then the specter of public humiliation through a court proceeding. Perhaps we'll never know, but you can't help but wonder."

Still awaiting a ruling by the Navy is the second case, brought by Rear Admiral James B. Stockdale. He has accused Navy Captain Walter E. Wilber and Marine Lieut. Colonel Edison W. Miller of mutiny, refusal to obey orders and aiding the enemy. Directed against high-ranking officers within his own service, Stockdale's charges are considered more serious. Like Guy, Stockdale did not want to bring the charges but felt an obligation to other prisoners to do his duty, even at the cost of tarnishing the P.O.W.s' heroes' welcome.