Fort Rucker to Host POW/MIA Day Ceremony Friday
FORT RUCKER — The United States Army Aviation Center of Excellence and Fort Rucker will hold a POW/MIA Day Ceremony on Friday, Sept. 19, at 8:30 a.m. in Veterans Park.
The annual event honors and recognizes America’s Prisoners of War (POWs) and those missing in Action (MIA) from past conflicts, reaffirming the nation’s commitment to never forget their sacrifice and to continue the search for the missing.
Maj. Gen. Clair Gill, commanding general of the U.S. Army Aviation Center of Excellence and Fort Rucker, will deliver the keynote address.
The public is invited to attend.
The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) is responsible for the work of identifying and bringing home Prisoners of War (POW) and those Missing in Action (MIA).
“The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency’s mission is to provide the fullest possible accounting for our missing personnel from past conflicts to their families and the nation. Within this mission, we search for missing personnel from World War II (WWII), the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Cold War, the Gulf Wars, and other recent conflicts. Our research and operational missions include coordination with hundreds of countries and municipalities around the world,” the agency says on its website.
According to the agency, “less than 81,000 Americans remain missing from WWII, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Cold War, and the Gulf Wars/other conflicts. Out of the less than 81,000 missing, 75% of the losses are located in the Indo-Pacific, and over 41,000 of the missing are presumed lost at sea.”
Most recently, the DPAA had a major success in recovering service members lost in the line of duty. In July, a U.S.-Vietnamese recovery team carried out a repatriation mission in Da Nang province, retrieving possible remains of American service members lost during the Vietnam War. The remains were transported to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency laboratory in Hawaii, where they will undergo scientific analysis that may take more than a year to complete. The mission, conducted during the 50th anniversary of the war’s end, underscores the commitment to account for the 1,567 Americans still missing from the Vietnam War and reflects the close cooperation between the United States and Vietnam in addressing the war’s complicated legacy.
