European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - November 4, 1992, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Wednesday november 4, 1992 commentary i the stars and stripes a Page 13meeting the flesh and blood behind pow Hunt the general Drift of the press coverage of Viet Nam Era mias has been to buy the governments pitch that All the missing men Are now dead. The White houses disinformation Campaign conceived to protect Washington from embarrassment has for 20 years sought to conceal the abandonment of these men at the end of the War. A key technique has been to Label every sighting of live pos in Indochina As either a hoax or a mistake. Today a column the latest of Many i have been writing on this Story is about a Man who cannot be dismissed As a hoax or a mistake. He is Stephen m. Studdert 43, who served As a White House aide to three presidents a Gerald Ford Ronald Reagan and George Bush. He ran Bush a inauguration committee and then became a special presidential assistant. He left the Bush White House in 1989 to spend More time with his family in Utah. Since 1990, he has been trying to Rescue living american prisoners from Laos. Studdert says his investigations and trips to Laos have convinced him that men Are still alive there. A i read a lot of data through three presidencies a he said in an interview in new York recently. A we have an obligation to do everything within our Power to get them Back be it through the government sector or the private sector. Cost is not a  Studdert says he travels often to Asia where he looks after business matters and also meets with contacts on the pow Issue. He describes his business As investment banking on the International level and says its a a a modest operation giving him the time to pursue his other interests. His last visit inside Laos a where the evidence places the bulk of the unaccounted for servicemen a was in 1991. During that stay his sources put him in Contact with laotians who said they personally had seen 11 american pos in their Home Village in the Remote Northern part of the country. They said the sighting was recent. Studdert persuaded one of these laotians to return to the Village with a camera. Weeks later the Man emerged he still had the camera but he said the film had been seized by government troops. He said the pos were still there. This laotian and others in his family and Circle of friends provided other information As Well. They said that some years earlier eight americans had been buried in their Village. One Man said he helped dig the Graves which he said remained identifiable. The father of the Man who tried to bring out pictures of the live men told Studdert that one of the 11 prisoners was a Black Man. There Are no Blacks in Indochina other than Canan me that worn or scum a  h8up�?o Sidney h. Schanberg the Black americans who served there. Studdert says he asked these laotians Why the americans could not escape. The answer was that they were under guard at All times a doing agricultural work All Day and held in detention houses at night. There was one exception they said an american who had a lao wife and lived with her elsewhere in the Village. Studdert said by Telephone from Salt Lake City that he had just returned from another trip to Asia where he met his pow contacts in Hong Kong. A there Are indications we May be making a Little Progress a he said. Progress with live pos he was asked. A a they re the Only kind in a interested in a he replied. Obviously this account is entirely Studd crts a. And there is much that i still do not know about his business Studdert companies his pow contacts and the nature of his present ties with the White House. He says he has Given his pow information to senior White House aides who have told the president but from what i have been Able to confirm i doubt very much whether he is making up any of the parts of the Story he has told me. For example he acknowledges that one of his pow contacts is Ching Kwan a something that i had Learned from a source before i met with Studdert. . A is a Well known Hong Kong millionaire who publishes the Oriental daily news the biggest chinese language paper in Hong Kong. He gives generously to Republican party causes in the United states. He was for example a big donor to the Reagan presidential Library in California at the opening of which last year he was escorted by Studdert and met with such gop figures As Caspar Weinberger and Reagan himself. Studdert says a is an admirer of this country and its principles. The prisoner Issue a a bothers a Studdert says so a the has helped open doors for me and provided financing for my  so the next time you read or hear that the live pow Story is All smoke and mirrors just think about the governments disinformation Campaign and the spoon fed press and remember that there arc people like Studdert out there who Are diligently gathering pow information a and who Are quite authentic. C no Omta military needs staunch defender to Battle cuts a these Are the times that try menus souls a said Thomas Paine in december 1776. He could have been talking about today for just As in his times the a summer soldiers and Sunshine patriots Are shrinking from the need to provide for the nations common defense. Instead they Call for a peace dividends and cuts in our armed forces far beyond the 25 percent reduction already under Way. Army chief of staff Gen. Gordon r. Sullivan has vowed there will be a no More task Force Smiths a using As his rallying  the poorly manned armed and equipped military that Harry Truman a Post world War i a peace dividend had created prior to the korean War. Promising to a Cut the fat a Truman had sliced away the muscle instead and in the Early Days of the korean War thousands of americans died As a result of his false economies. That negative Model strikes a responsive note especially among those of us who saw our friends killed at Osan and Taejon and along the Paktong River line. But there is a More positive postwar Model available a Model forged in the Wake of the Vietnam War by former army chief of staff Gen. Creighton w. Abrams. Abrams problems make those of today Pale in comparison. When he assumed office in 1972, ant military sentiment in the United states was at its Peak. With the signing of the Paris peace accords in 1973 and the total withdrawal of All . Military forces from Vietnam the cries for disarmament and a Post Vietnam War a peace dividend were overwhelming. These were Strong even within the government itself. For budgetary reason.?, there were plans to reduce the Active army already Cut to 13 divisions to nine or 10 Di-4anl0visions. But instead Abrams fought to increase the number of divisions. First he made sure that his logic was sound. A Why a he asked a did the United states need an army in the first place a to find the answer he. Formed a study. Group in the basement of the Pentagon to Ponder that fundamental question. As a member of that select group i and the rest of the groups members found that the Vietnam debacle notwithstanding the United states was in a position of relative advantage. We were partners with two of the worlds major Power centers a West Europe and Japan a and our adversaries a Harry g. Summers China and the soviet Union a were also adversaries with each other. The primary Utility of military Force we concluded was to maintain the United states in that position of relative advantage by deterring aggression by our adversaries while at the same time assuring our allies that the United states was a reliable coalition partner that could be depended onion times of crisis. With his Raison do etre now established Abrams then set out to build a constituency first within the army then within the defense establishment and finally within the Congress for the kind of army he believed necessary to safeguard americans worldwide interests. Instead of the Cut to 10 divisions As some had planned Abrams increased the army to 16 divisions. To do that Abrams rounded out Active divisions with National guard brigades and revitalized the army so total Force Quot concept of close Active duty Reserve affiliations. Beyond their physical strengths Abrams was convinced the reserves were the essential Bridge Between the Active army and the american people. In Thunderbolt Simon amp schuste Lewis Sorley a masterful new biography of Abrams former head of the army a operations directorate Gen. John Vessey later chairman of the joint chiefs of staff tells that on Many occasions he heard Abrams say a a they re not taking us to War again without calling up the  a Vessey saw this As coming out of Abrams appreciation for the kind of nation America was. He thought about that an awful lot a lets not build an army off Here in the Corner someplace. The armed forces Are an Extension of the nation. If you take them out of the National context you arc Likely to screw them  that was his lesson from Vietnam. He Wasny to going to leave them in that position Ever again. And part and parcel of that was you  go to War without calling up the  Abrams used to say that it took a monumental Effort to move the army one degree. But unless that Effort was made the system would never change. Before his untimely death in office in september 1974, his own monumental efforts had pulled the Post Vietnam army out of the Slough of despair and set it on a path that would culminate in its stunning victories in the Gulf victories led appropriately enough by my Abrams tanks. In these a times that try menus souls our military leaders should certainly continue to guard against any future task Force Smiths. But they should also continue Abrams efforts to improve our defences by nudging the system one degree at a Lime