The application of torture against American POWs was, intensified in the mid-1960s. The first six years of imprisonment in North Vietnam was rife with prolonged solitary confinement, with higher-ranking POWs and stubborn individuals isolated to block communication. Two higher-ranking officers were, placed in solitary confinement for three and four years. Named the Alcatraz Gang, these 11 POWs were, housed separately because of their defiant behaviour toward their captors, in order to cope with isolation and, not being able to verbally communicate with others, a number of POWs used a form of 'tap code' to communicate. POWs had to endure extended malnutrition, physical torture, beatings, and irons.
BELOW IS A LIST OF THE 13 CAMPS USED TO INCARCERATE-TORMENT AMERICAN POWS DURING THE VIETNAM WAR. FIVE OF WHICH WERE LOCATED IN HANOI (THE CONTEMPORARY CAPITAL OF VIETNAM), THE OTHERS WERE LOCATED OUTSIDE OF THE CITY LIMITS:
Representative Sam Johnson (R-Texas) survived seven years as a POW in a Vietnam camp. As he says, the 'Hanoi Hilton' is no Trump Hotel. In his opinion, he along with many other veterans does not, consider him-self to be a hero in the literal sense, "Ask a veteran, and most will tell you they are not heroes. I share this sentiment. I do not feel like a hero, and I do not call myself one—I reserve that title for my fellow veterans who fought and paid the ultimate sacrifice with their lives. I reserve that title for my wife, Shirley, who held our family together while I was rotting in a cell in the Hanoi Hilton for nearly seven years during the Vietnam War. They are heroes. They served our country faithfully and with all their heart. I am grateful for them." (Source: Representative Johnson's Office, politico.com: I Spent Seven Years as a Vietnam POW. The ‘Hanoi Hilton’ Is No Trump Hotel)
Representative Johnson says he is a proud American veteran, and he firmly believes that his country should respect their troops and veterans. He, like many other Americans, veterans, active service-men and service women, and civilians are deeply disappointed in the soon to be President of the United States, Donald Trump's statement (made during his campaign) trivializing the bravery of captured service-men, saying that he does not like soldiers who are caught. This man never served in any military capacity.
The Vietnam War and the Korean War were horrible, the victims in the respective countries, by far and immeasurably got the worst of it. The policy makers were playing a very bloody game. Nevertheless, all tortured POWs and civilians in any conflict are victims, and as such, they deserve to have their story told.
Representative Johnson was, drafted at the age of twenty during the Vietnam War. He signed up to be a fighter pilot, spending nearly thirty years in the Air Force, flying more than sixty combat missions during the Korean War and more than two dozen during the Vietnam War. Representative Johnson and his co- pilot, Chelsey, were, shot down on his 25th mission over North Vietnam. He was thirty-five years old, married, and a father of three children. He would later spend forty-two months of his seven-year stay in solitary confinement with ten other American POWs, who their North Vietnamese captors believed them to be defiant.
At the 'Hanoi Hotel' Representative Johnson took vivid notice of a meat hook hanging from the ceiling in the torture room. A typical torture session would go like this the Vietnamese captors would tie the victim's hands and feet, then strap his hands to his ankles, on occasion behind the back, at other times in front. In addition, the ropes were, tightened to the point of complete numbing of pain, the limbs turned purple and ballooned to twice the size, lasting from hours to days on end. Leg irons and leg stocks were, used on Representative Johnson, for months and years on end. He admits that his survival was due to the grace and mercy of GOD, a very strong POW support group; within this group were Jerry Denton and Jim Stockdale, the highest-ranking officers in the prison, who taught Representative Johnson the tap code done on the prison walls, opening up a communication link among the POWs.
In late spring of 1966, Jerry was brutally tortured and forced to make a TV interview. He took advantage of the situation by blinking his eyes in Morse code, during the interview, thereby spelling the word T-O-R-T-U-R-E. ; Following his covert message, there was no doubt about American POWs being tortured in the North Vietnam prisons.
Flying at low altitude over the treacherous, impenetrable Laotian forest on a bombing mission against the Viet Cong, U.S. Air Force Colonel Eugene Deatrick noticed a lone person waving to him from a clearing below. He shrugged it off, maintaining his flight path. However, a short while later, he thought that it was quite odd that a native would wave to him, so he backtracked and flew over the same area again. This time he saw SOS written on a rock. Beside the rock stood a gaunt, wasted man dressed in rags, waving what remained of a parachute and gesturing despairingly.
Colonel Deatrick radioed headquarters. He was, told that no Americans had been, shot down in the area and ordered him to continue his mission. However, the gaunt, wasted man did not stop waving, saying over and over again, 'Please Don't Leave'! Colonel Deatrick did not relent in his empathy for the man in the clearing, convincing headquarters to send two rescue helicopters. Dropping a cable to the man in the clearing, they hoisted him aboard. Frightened at the prospect that he could be a Viet Cong suicide bomber, the crew held down the 120 lbs. (55 kg.) man to, the helicopter deck and frisked him. His backpack contained a half-eaten snake. The man could barely speak, informing the crew that he was an American pilot and that he wanted to be, taken home. Soon, verification of the man's identity as sent to the helicopter crew. Lieutenant Dieter Dengler was the only American able to escape from a POW camp in the Laotian forest and survived to tell his tale.
In 1966, Lieutenant Dengler was missing, and was, believed to be dead, for six months and was, forced to endure brutal torture at the hands of his captors. He planned his escape quite well, surviving in a terrible forest environment with extreme fortitude. Shortly following his return home, Dengler was able to convey his story, baffling listeners; his good looks were a bonus. His story was, made into a movie in 2006, in a movie entitled ‘Rescue Dawn’, starring Christian Bale.
Lieutenant Dengler was born in Germany. During his teen years, he immigrated to the United States, later enlisting in the U.S. Navy. He became a pilot, assigned to an aircraft carrier that was, heading towards Vietnam. The fateful morning was February 1, 1966, shortly after his engagement to his sweat- heart, Marina. Dengler launched from the U.S.S. Ranger, along with three other aircraft on a covert bombing mission near the Loatian border. Aggravating the situation was the poor visibility. Then the aircraft was, attacked with anti-aircraft fire.
As conveyed by Lieutenant Dengler, "There was a large explosion on my right side," he remembered when interviewed shortly before his death in 2001. "It was like lightning striking. The right wing was gone ... The airplane seemed to cartwheel through the sky in slow motion. There were more explosions - boom, boom, boom - and I was still able to guide the plane into a clearing ... Many times, people have asked me if I was afraid. Just before dying, there is no more fear. I felt I was floating." (By Zoe Brennan, November 23, 2007; Tortured with razor-sharp bamboo and fed alive to ants: The story behind one POW’s incredible escape from Vietnam)
Lieutenant Dengler was, catapulted 100 feet from the plane due to a crash landing. He lost consciousness for a short while before running into the forest for cover, spending two days therein. Sustaining an injured leg, he strapped it with bamboo sticks. He was, later discovered by the Pathet Lao, the Laotian equivalent to Vietnam's Viet Cong. He was, immediately taken captive and forced to travel through the jungle. Even without the human torture, he would have to face the mosquito’s nemesis, biting him so often his face would swell up.
Later Lieutenant Dengler attempted to escape. This first attempt was unsuccessful he was apprehended by guards at a forest water hole. This is when things started to get worse. They were intent on retaliation and deterrence. He had to endure multiple forms of torture including being, hanged upside down by his ankles with a nest of ferocious ants over his face, forced to endure this until he lost consciousness. At night, he was suspended in a freezing well; the fear of drowning prevented sleep.
Bloodied and physically harmed, Lieutenant Dengler was, asked by Pathet Lao officials to sign a document condemning America; he refused; the torture worsened. "They were always thinking of something new to do to me ... One guy made a rope tourniquet around my upper arm. He inserted a piece of wood, and twisted and twisted until my nerves cut against the bone. The hand was completely unusable for six months." (ibid)
Shockingly, things would get worse. A few weeks following the intensified level of torture, Lieutenant Dengler was, handed over to the more ruthless Viet Cong. Walking through a village, a man slipped Lieutenant Dengler's engagement ring off his finger. He complained, and shockingly, they searched for the culprit and found him. His finger was, chopped off with a machete; the ring was, returned to a shocked Lieutenant Dengler. It became apparent to him that his Viet Cong captors were not a group of people to mess with.
When Lieutenant Dengler arrived at the POW camp he was horrified by what he first saw. The first American POW he saw was holding his intestines in his hands. There were six other prisoners, five Thai and two Americans, Duane Martin and Eugene DeBruin. One of the Americans had no teeth due to repeated infections. He had pleaded with the other prisoners to knock his teeth out with a rock and a rusty nail in order to release pus from his gums. These prisoners had been in the camp for two years. Lieutenant Dengler did not want to end up like them.
Soon, food became scarce. The guards gave the prisoners one handful of rice to eat, not for each one, but for all to share. Naturally, tension rose amongst the prisoners. The guards, on the other hand, hunted deer. Following a successful hunt, they would disembowel a deer, remove the grass therein, and then give the grass to the prisoners, while they ate the meat. Special 'treats' for the prisoners included snakes and rats.
Night was an atrocious period. The prisoners were, handcuffed and shackled together to archaic foot blocks. Chronic ailments were rampant. In addition, the POWs were, forced to lie on their own excrement, out of sheer necessity and the instinct to live, Lieutenant Dengler planned another escape he was able to get hold of a machine gun, shoot a machete-wielding guard, in total five were killed. Lieutenant Dengler and Duane Martin escaped into the forest the other prisoners were nowhere to be, seen. It was later, discovered that of the seven prisoners who escaped, Lieutenant Dengler was the only one to make it out alive.
Escape was not a piece of cake. Soon, both men's feet became white. They found the sole of a tennis shoe, alternating its use. They eventually came across a fast-flowing river, which flowed into the Mekong River, taking them to Thailand and safety. The men constructed a raft, floating downstream on treacherous rapids. At night, they securely fastened themselves, to trees so they would, not be taken by the currents and drown. By morning, they would, be smothered in mud and countless leeches. In a severely weakened state, they were barely able to travel but eventually made it to a village, the residents therein were not very friendly. The pair knelt on their knees and pleaded.
One machete-wielding man struck Duane in the leg, causing severe bleeding then he was, beheaded. Lieutenant Dengler snatched the rubber sole, of the tennis shoe from Duane's foot and then he ran feeling mentally numb. Surprisingly an animal helped him maintain his fortitude. A beautiful boar followed him, becoming a 'pet dog' and only friend. The next problem to deal with was the intermittent hallucinations; it was bad enough trying to survive as a walking skeleton.
Lieutenant Dengler's freedom came five days later, on July 20, 1966. Colonel Deatrick had spotted the desperate waving of a figure in a clearing. The gaunt soldier was, taken to Da Nang Hospital in Vietnam, where he was, interrogated by the CIA. He was, removed from the CIA's care, by fellow service-men intent on bringing him home. His physical state improved, but he was never able to forget his terrible ordeal. He retired from the military and became a civilian pilot. Lieutenant Dengler spent the rest of his life in San Francisco, California, marrying three times, and dying from brain disease.
The death of the brutal dictator of Cuba, Fidel Castro (August 13, 1926 - November 25, 2016) was widely reported throughout the world, but the torture and brutality that his regime was involved has not been, reported in its entirety to the world media. One peculiar series of tortures is a bit more striking than, the others it concerns Castro’s role in the torture and killing of American POWs, during the Vietnam War.
Castro sent a group of men to run the ‘Cuban Program’ at the Cu Loc POW camp (the Zoo) in Hanoi, at the time the capital of North Vietnam. One of the main objectives of the program was to ascertain the level of physical and mental torment a human being could endure. Castro chose American POWs as his test subjects. The main torturer was a man nicknamed ‘Fidel’; he instituted his own brutal torture methods. Information known about this man reveal that he was educated in psychology and in prison control. One of his common methods of torture included whipping a person in every part of the body without mercy. American investigators determined that there were over 2,000 Cuban nationals in North Vietnam during the late 1960s.
Former POW and author John Hubbell details the horrifying abuse of Lt. Colonel Earl Glenn Cobeil August 29, 1964 - November 5, 1967), and F-105 pilot. Corbeil could hardly walk, his agony was apparent. Many parts of his body were bleeding, awfully swollen, creamy-coloured and purple throughout his body. His gaze was, pointed downward, making no eye contact with any other person. Fidel punched Cobeil in the face with extreme ferocity, catapulting him against a nearby wall, and then, he was put in the center of the, torture room and ordered to get on his knees. Screaming like a mad man Fidel took hold of a rubber hose from a guard and struck it against Cobeil’s face, with intense ferocity. Cobeil lay there motionless, not showing any sign of distress. This non-reaction infuriated Fidel, resulting in another whipping across the face, a total of a dozen or so times. By then, his face appeared quite injured. The hell cuffs (specially designed cuffs that can be operated to administer a painful, high-voltage shock; outside of this context the term applies to shocking dogs to keep them within a certain boundary or to help control their behaviour) appeared to seriously injure his wrists; numerous other injury sites were quite apparent. Lt. Colonel Cobeil died because of the accumulation of torture and torment as a POW.
Colonel James Helm Kasler (May 2, 1926 - April 24, 2014) was a POW in North Vietnam from August 1966 until March 1973, another of Fidel’s victims. At the time of Kasler’s detainment, he held the rank of Major. The following is a harrowing detail of some of the cruelty Kasler had to endure.
“He [Fidel] deprived Kasler of water, wired his thumbs together, and flogged him until his ‘buttocks, lower back, and legs hung in shreds’. During one barbaric stretch, he turned Cedric [another torturer] loose for three days with a rubber whip. . . . The PW [POW] was in a semi-coma and bleeding profusely with a ruptured eardrum, fractured rib, his face swollen and teeth broken so that he could not open his mouth, and his leg re-injured from attackers repeatedly kicking it.” (By Jamie Glazov, December 8, 2016; brietbart.com: GLAZOV: Castro’s Torture of American POWs in Vietnam: An Untold Story)
Due to his March 2016 visit to Cuba, President Obama was, urged to seriously bring up and speak about the topic of Cuban interrogators torturing American POWs and killing at least one of them during the Vietnam War. Concerned Americans want the Cuban interrogators-torturers in the Cuban Program to be, brought to justice. According to U.S. officials, repression in Cuba has intensified following President Obama’s diplomatic overture. As far as is known no names torturers were, given. Shockingly, some investigators believe that a number of the Cuban interrogator-torturers may be living in the United States. For the time being this topic matter, does not appear to be a subject that is of great concern for Policy makers. As is often the case in a brutal elongated war the use of torture is not one-sided. Indeed, this also applies to the Vietnam War.
Operation Phoenix (1965 - 1972; comparable efforts occurred before and after) was a plan that was organized, coordinated, and carried out by the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA; a non-military foreign intelligence service of the United States federal government whose primary purpose is to acquire foreign intelligence information-national security information). In addition, Special Operations Forces (SOF), US Army Intelligence, special forces agents from the Australian Army Team Vietnam (AATV), and the special operations system of the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam) security system during the Vietnam War.
The combined effort plan's primary purpose was, devised to recognize, single out, and neutralize the framework of the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam (NLF or Viet Cong). This was to be done by penetration, apprehension, counter- terrorism operations, interrogation (the use of torture and brutality occurred if, deemed necessary), and killings or targeted killings. It is, believed that Phoenix agents had neutralized more than 80,000 probable operatives from the NLF, and auxiliaries. The primary feature of Operation Phoenix was the gathering of intelligence, by whichever means deemed most successful.
Torture was a routine practice under Operation Phoenix. The methods of reported torture that Douglass Valentine (renowned writer, historian, journalist, and poet) wrote about were at interrogation centers. "Rape, gang rape, rape using eels, snakes, or hard objects, and rape followed by murder; electric shock ('the Bell Telephone Hour') rendered by attaching wires to the genitals or other sensitive parts of the body, like the tongue; the 'water treatment'; the 'airplane' in which the prisoner's arms were tied behind the back, and the rope looped over a hook on the ceiling, suspending the prisoner in midair, after which he or she was beaten; beatings with rubber hoses and whips; the use of police dogs to maul prisoners." (Quoted by Ruth Blakely, 2009; State Terrorism and Neo-liberalism: The North in the South; Published by Taylor & Francis Group, p.50 via Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopaedia: Phoenix Program)
The following use of, torture under Operation Phoenix was, described by Military Intelligence Officer K. Barton Osborne: “The use of the insertion of the 6-inch dowel into the canal of one of my detainee's ears, and the tapping through the brain until dead. The starvation to death (in a cage), of a Vietnamese woman who was, suspected of being part of the local political education cadre in one of the local villages... The use of electronic gear such as sealed telephones attached to ... both the women's vaginas and men's testicles [to] shock them into submission." (By Joe Allen & John Pilger, 2008; Vietnam: The (Last) War the U.S. Lost; Published by Haymarket Books, p.164 via Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopaedia: Phoenix Program)
Operation Phoenix in Vietnam is a very good indicator of what the CIA does in other part of the world too, in particular Third World Countries; they kill bad people and good people. The CIA has helped support and place in power monstrous, corrupt dictators-regimes, in particular the Middle East and to a lesser extent Central and South America, and Asia. Every single American who cares about human rights and wants to live in a free country should be weary of this organization. Thanks to benevolent, brave individuals like Douglass Valentine, who was able to dig deep into CIA activities in Vietnam. Apparently, they believed that he was supportive to their activities in Vietnam. By the time the CIA realized their blunder, it was too late. Valentine had already accrued numerous valuable taped interviews it was, a miracle that he did not disappear.
The Province Interrogation Centers (PIC), involving a CIA front company called Pacific Architects and Engineers the CIA erected prisons throughout South Vietnam to be, used to interrogate, terrify, and torture suspects and political prisoners. Note that confessions and valuable information was highly sought after, meaning that if a poor soul knew nothing, he or she would have to bear the brunt of torture, or lie and give the interrogators some kind of a believable story. Falsely implicating of innocent persons by tortured victims is, expected.
USAID (United States Agency for International Development) is a CIA front impersonating a benevolent charity. USCIA is another front used by this dangerous, underhanded secret police force. Mark Weisbrot of the Center for Economic and Policy Research said, “In a number of countries, including Venezuela and Bolivia, USAID is acting more as an agency involved in covert action, like the CIA, than as an aid or development agency.” (pando.com: The Murderous History of US AID, the US Government agency behind Cuba's fake Twitter clone)
What follows is a quote from Former New York Times correspondent A. J. Langguth's book regarding Dan Mitrione (a USAID official) and USAID's torture programs, 'Hidden Terrors', he quotes Manuel Heva's (CIA double-agent secretly working for Cuba). Eyewitness accounts of Mitrione's live torture demonstration