Pow Vietnam facts
While investigating facts about Pow Vietnam, I found out little known, but curios details like:
Vietnam War POW Doug Hegdahl pretended to be illiterate to fool his captors, who believed him to be so stupid that they gave him almost free rein of the camp. He was able to secretly memorize the details of about 256 POWs to the tune of "Old MacDonald," which he still remembers.
John McCain, while a POW in Vietnam, was pressured to give the names of his squadron members. He instead gave them the names of the Green Bay Packers offensive line.
In my opinion, it is useful to put together a list of the most interesting details from trusted sources that I've come across. Here are 29 of the best facts about Pow Vietnam I managed to collect.
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Jeremiah Denton, an American POW in North Vietnam, during a televised press conference in which he was forced to participate, repeatedly blinked his eyes in Morse code spelling out "T-O-R-T-U-R-E"
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Vietnam vets have told William Shatner how they'd "keep sane" while in POW camps by re-enacting Star Trek episodes
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A US Navy POW blinked the word 'torture' in morse code during a forced TV interview in North Vietnam to signal his conditions to the Office of Naval Intelligence
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A Japanese man imprisoned after the Fall of Saigon at the end of the Vietnam War said that when he got out in 1988 there were still 5 American POWs in the prison he was in
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An American POW in Vietnam blinked the morse code for TORTURE during a propaganda interview.
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American POWs in Vietnam would check if a new prisoner was American by tapping the first notes of "Shave and a Haircut" on a wall and seeing if they responded correctly.
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US POWs in the Vietnam War used taps to communicate while held in isolation. To initiate conversation, they tapped Shave and a Haircut (dah da-da dah dah). The correct response was Two Bits (dah dah). Captors, unfamiliar w/the jingle, tapped back the five beats--revealing they weren't American.
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Rambo was the first R-Rated film to be made into children's animated tv show. The show did not reference Vietnam, POWs or Rambo's experiences in the films.
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During the Vietnam war, an American POW was forced to appear on a TV press-conference by his captors. Unable to speak freely, he sat deadpan and blinked erratically. In Morse code, his blinks spelled "T-O-R-T-U-R-E" over and over.
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Major James Nesmeth, a POW in Vietnam for 7 years, used golf visualization to stay sane. Every day he played a full 18 holes in his head as if he were actually there. After being released, he tried golf again for real and shot a 74 which was 20 strokes off his previous average.
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Vietnam POW's recieved a lifetime pass to any Major Leauge Baseball game minus the playoffs.
Dr. Ardel Vietti, the only American female POW still unaccounted for from the Vietnam war. She was kidnapped, along with two fellow missionaries, by the Viet Cong while providing medical care as a civilian to Leprosy patients in the jungles of Vietnam. She has not been heard from since. - source
Ernest Brace (POW during Vietnam war) escaped a bamboo cage after a month of imprisonment, got captured again for 7 months (now with his legs in stocks and bolted), escaped again and got buried to his neck for 7 days after being captured again. - source
Late American Senator John McCain flew a Navy bomber in Operation Rolling Thunder beginning in 1965. He was shot down over North Vietnam in 1967 and spent more than four years as POW until he was released in March 1973.
The longest held civilian POW in Vietnam came home after almost 8 years to find his wife had remarried thinking he was dead, and he married the nurse that treated him when he got back. - source
U.S. Senator(1981-87) Jeremiah Denton who was held captive in North Vietnam, when forced to do a televised propaganda interview Morse-blinked the word "TORTURE" letting the Americans know that their POWs were being tortured.
Admiral Jeremiah Denton used Morse Code to signal he was being tortured during a scripted response about POW conditions during The Vietnam War.
Jane Fonda said some pretty digusting things about POWs during the Vietnam War.
About Jeremiah Denton, a POW during the Vietnam war, who used his blinking eyes to send a Morse code message while being forced to participate in a propaganda broadcast. His message, T-O-R-T-U-R-E, was the first confirmation that POWs were being tortured.
Dieter Dengler a Vietnam War POW escapee whose experience has been the subject of a documentry, books, and a Hollywood film, committed suicide because of ALS.
American POWs could still be alive in Vietnam and Laos working as slaves in the remote jungle.
