European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - March 30, 1991, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Dead Vna dog tags May make it simple by Larry Thompson Washington Post on future battlefields unknown soldiers May Well be identified by the genetic Structure of cells. Found in blood muscle tissue and Bone. The technology to decipher Dnay the Basic chemical element of genes a is so precise that the Pentagon is studying ways to develop a kind of Quot Dan do tag Quot for every Man and woman in the military. Just As it keeps dental records and fingerprints of american soldiers the military envisions a genetic record that could be used to identify soldiers killed in Battle a a a in the future there should not be any More unknown soldiers Quot said . Army maj. Victor Weedn chief of the armed forces Dan identification Laboratory at the. Armed forces Institute of pathology headquartered at Walter Reed army medical Center. None of the More than 539,000 troops in the persian Gulf have had their genes Analysed for identification purposes but according to Weedn and other military officials plans to set up such a program Are under Way the concept of identifying soldiers by Means of Dan do tags is simple the Dan or detox ribonucleic acid that carries genetic information is As unique in every person As a fingerprint. According to the Pentagon a proposal,.cells would be collected from inside the Mouth of each Soldier in addition to a blood Sample. The samples would be a stored so that the Dan they contain could be compared with that taken from an unknown Corpse. Matching the Dan would positively identify the dead Soldier. Weedn joined the service two years ago to set up the Dan identification Laboratory and to develop the needed technology. He has begun buying equipment and hiring a staff of five to 10 professionals who eventually will be located at the mortuary at Dover fab del., where soldiers killed  line of duty Are positively identified before their bodies Are sent to their families for burial just How much it would Cost to set up and maintain a Dan system is not known defense department officials declined to release the projected Cost of the Dan proposal saying it is Stajl being reviewed internally there Are 3.29 million Active and Reserve members of the armed forces. If Dan do tags became a principal Way of identifying military personnel a genetic record would have to be made on each one. A $3.6 million contract was recently awarded to Ritzco readers action line late mail it i would like you to publish this letter and hopefully a response to it from the appropriate office within the . Postal service. We constantly read articles about the Quot deluge of mail for troops Quot assigned to the Gulf persian Gulf and saudi arabian desert. Articles continue to pledge Quot faster delivery Quot for the troops away from Home. . Postal sen ice and military postal officials continue to claim that the Gulf crisis has had no effect on regular mail service. I contend that the officials do not know what they Are talking about. A. ,. I have been receiving my Bank statements mailed. From Illinois 20 to 25 Days after the postmark Date. My credit card Bills mailed from the East coast arrive not less than 18 Days after postmark. I could continue the list forever. Friends and co workers have indicated they Are having the  with their mail. Prior to operation desert shield the delivery times were half the current times. I recently received notices from Al of my creditors stating that they had not received my payments. I have a inc., of Plymouth minn., for special kits to collect Gene samples from recruit collecting the Dan samples is not the Only expense there is an additional Cost to store them. Life codes inc a Valhalla n.y., company that Sells Dan identification services operates a Dan program that stores the celts of children in Case Dan is needed to identify them. The company charges $150 to freeze and store each cell Sample for 18 years. The military would freeze samples As Well. Storage costs also do not include the expense of a analysing the Dan. Again there Are no military Cost estimates but life codes charges $190 per Sample for a paternity test and $485 per Sample for a Standard Dan analysis in a criminal Case. The Prospect of switching to a Dan identification system raises a number of controversial issues such As the Labelling and confidentiality of samples. One question is whether the military would make the Dan Sample available to the Fri or local Law enforcement agencies for criminal investigations As it does with fingerprints and dental records. 1. Alaw enforcement authorities currently use Dan a identification techniques to investigate some crimes including rape and to identity bodies in missing person cases. While courts in the United states have generally accepted Dan fingerprinting As valid some questions have been raised about the accuracy and standards of individual laboratories that conduct such studies. Weedn said the questions raised about forensic analysis in court cases would not be a problem in the military because compared to the general population the armed forces represent a smaller Pool of people. Military officials say they Are confident that it is possible to retrieve genetic prints from dead soldiers. In May 1987, when an iraqi Jet hit the Stark with a missile 37 sailors were killed a most from the blast and fire below deck. In Many cases the bodies were not recognizable. The Navy sent four of five tissue samples to life codes to see if it could get a Dan fingerprint of the sailors. Quot we were Able to get Dan out of three of them,1 said company president Walter o. Fredericks. Because there was no comparison Dan on file for the sailors military scientists could not positively identify the bodies with this technology so they were identified through More traditional techniques. A currently the identification of an unknown Soldier is made primarily through fingerprints and dental records. Metal dog tags carried by All soldiers Are not considered  they can be easily switched but they do big problem  .1 mailed allot my payments a week earlier than i normally do because of the much denied slow mail service this problem indicates that both directions of mail flow have been affected. Something must be done to Correct this Quot non existent problem Quot before someone in the area that is Quot not being affected by operation desert shield Quot gets a second or third notice from a creditor who does no to like to receive late  a. Once again this is not Only my problem but is affecting everyone that in be talked to in the past several months. Please help me find a. Solution to a problem that is affecting everyone with an Apo mailing address capt. Frederick w. Hildebrandt Frankfurt Germany Lebarbara Lutz postal service analyst . Army postal group Europe responds the writer is Correct in that there has been a significant increase in the length of time it takes to receive mail from the United states. Adding the mail sent to the persian. Gulf to the Large volume of mail already coming to Europe has overtaxed the air transportation system. Flights overseas have decreased in size and frequency further cutting the available space for mail transport an this had led to an increase in transit time bunching of mail getting More than one Days mail in on the same to write us readers action line is the readers a a court of last resort striving to answer some of the questions about life overseas in a military environment or. Questions about policies and guidelines when other avenues for a syvers Are not readily available. If you have a question and Don t know where to turn for the answer write to readers action line co the stars and stripes Apo 09211-4211. Alt letters must be a signed and preference will be Given to those seeking information of general interest to our readers. I i ires or id in it till. Lie car a to e Ign amp h in id i ill ill be Nir be serve As a starting Point for pulling records. The Success in identifying War dead has improved dramatically in the last Century half of the Givi War. Dead were buried without being identified. In world War ii. There. Were 8,526 unknown soldiers out of the 291,555 Battle deaths. A a. A a. An Korea 865 bodies were unidentified among 33,629 Battle deaths. In Vietnam officials have certified Only one. Unknown Soldier having decided that it was impossible to identify his remains. Of the 57,939 american soldiers lost in that War 2,500 were not returned to their families for burial. About halt were declared missing in action. The military is still trying to identify fewer than 100 cases of remains from soldiers killed in Vietnam. ,. ,. A based on our experience in Vietnam Quot said army col. John jewel armed forces Institute of pathology executive officer Quot this technology would be crucial for identifying Between 100 to 1,000 unknown soldiers. We consider it essential to retrieve identify and Bury All of our fallen  / Ain modern warfare the lethal Force of rockets and. Artillery High Speed tanks laser guided smart bombs and land mines Cari sometimes leave few remains making it difficult to identify dead soldiers. Quot a in the Battle to recapture the saudia arabian City of Khanji from the iraqis some of the marines who died were not easily identifiable. As a result the bodies were Quot delayed at the Dover mortuary for a few weeks so that they could be positively identified by medical examiners. Gloria Davis Mother of Marine Lance Chi. Jame Lumpkins 22, who died Jan 29 at Khanji complained that it took the military too Long to return her songs body a a for burial. Lumpkins body was returned to his family feb. 15. A \ a  a a military pathologists at Dover have begun to use a new tissue technique to identify major body parts. Called antibody profiling the technique identifies special infection fighting proteins called antibodies that circulate re in the blood. Each person has a unique set of antibodies. A test developed by Mirage inc. In san Diego produces is a pattern of lines a much like the bar code on groceries e j a that graphically shows the antibody patterns of c. Different people. A Dover pathologists used the antibody profiling system this month to sort out body parts of three marines who died when their Bradley fighting vehicle was blown apart _ by a rocket. \. A. It. A a i. Said air Force col. Kent Hartman the armed forces Institute of pathology a associate director Quot this was the first time scientific re association of body parts was accomplished a a a a a \ a. A a a ,. A. A a id i flight and out of sequence mail every Effort is being made by the  postal service uses to secure aircraft  mail overseas and they will continue. To work on this problem. Unfortunately As Long As the heavy mail volumes continue mail processing and transport will be slower than usual. Personnel who have not been Able to meet the. Deadlines for Bill payments because of the mail being delayed should Contact their Community postal officer for assistance in contacting creditors. If we can be of further assistance please Contact us at ets 379-7643/7837 or write to commander . Army postal group Europe attn Teupe Page Ops Apo 09186. A a Page 16 a the stars and stripes saturday March 30, 1991