WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon Tuesday identified the remains of three American pilots shot down during the Vietnam War and turned over to the United States by Hanoi two weeks ago -- a development that reopened old wounds for some families, angered others.
The pilots were Navy Cmdr. Ronald Dodge of Olympia, Wash., downed May 17, 1967; Navy Lt. Stephen Musselman of Texarkana, Texas, downed Sept. 10, 1972, and Air Force Capt. Richard Van Dyke of Salt Lake City downed Sept. 11, 1968.
A picture of Dodge, which appeared in the French magazine Paris Match four months after he was shot down, was used as a symbol by U.S. groups seeking an accounting for those who vanished without a trace in Indochina.
A Pentagon expert on prisoners of war and Americans missing in action said Musselman was killed outright and Dodge and Van Dyke died while prisoners of war.
The expert, Air Force Col. John Fer, said the Vietnamese also should know the whereabouts of more than 160 other servicemen of the 2,456 unaccounted for in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. There are 56,000 known dead in the Vietnam War.
The remains of the three pilots were turned over to U.S. authorities in Hanoi July 7. They will be flown from Hawaii to Travis Air Force Base, Calif., for transshipment and burial.
Dodge's son, Brad, 17, said his father will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery Friday.
'Today, I'm just very angry at the Vietnamese for using my husband the way they did,' Janice Dodge of San Diego, Calif., said. She was in Washington to attend meetings of the National League of Families of Americans Missing in Action in Vietnam.
'After he was dead, they kept his body there,' she said in a telephone interview. 'They thought it was to their advantage to send his body home. I am very angry for my children's sake. I don't think the people of the United States will stand for this gross deception.'
Ethel Musselman said she had mixed feelings about the return of her son's remains.
'I know I should be a thrilled parent,' Mrs. Musselman said at her home in Texarkana. 'So many parents would give anything to know the whereabouts of their missing sons.
'But all this just opens up old wounds. We had a beautiful memorial service for Steve years ago. Now he comes back into our lives -- after nine years.'
Nevertheless, Mrs. Musselman said, 'I'm glad that uncertainty is over.'
Kay Van Dyke, said she had been told by returning prisoners of war in 1975 that her son had died in a prison camp.
'I was satisfied that he was dead,' she said. 'But we were forever holding out for an accounting. We wanted the details and we hope now the other men who are not accounted for will be.'
Fer told Pentagon reporters Van Dyke was held with other prisoners in a cave and had an infected broken leg. He said the pylot died in a hospital afte0the lef wRmputathe three servicemen were returned because of the efforts by the National League of Families to learn the whereabouts of the missing.
'Very frankly,' she said, 'I think because of the National League of Families, I have my husband's body back. For the last couple of years and particularly the last couple of months, we pushed. For six months we've been doing this -- and all of a sudden they send the body back.
'Maybe if others come out and yell and scream about this more will be sent back.'
Lt. Gen. Eugene Tighe, director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, told a congressional committee recently he believes some Americans might be alive and held against their will in Indochina. But the consensus of the Defense Department and other U.S. agencies is that little hope remains that any of the missing are alive.
