Mission Statement:
Rolling Thunder®, Inc.'s major function is to publicize the POW/MIA issue, to educate the public of the fact that many American prisoners of war were left behind after all past wars, to help correct the past and to protect future veterans from being left behind should they become prisoners of war/missing in action. We are committed to helping homeless and disabled veterans from all wars.
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From the Desk of Lou Garcia,

We have not quit working, but winter has taken a chunk on what we can do. Another new season of riding weather is soon in coming. We are already busy planning so that we can get ahead of the curve on our event schedules. 2005 promises to be an exciting year.

I am proud of the chapter’s involvement, especially in Veterans affairs. This past year the chapter donated 2,077 hours of services for veteran related events; most of those at the Louisville VA Hospital. A great big thanks is in order to all of you for your unselfish and generous support. Only eternity will tell how much you affected the lives of the men and women as we visited them. We have not been a big chapter in numbers, but it is obvious that we have a big heart. You have yourselves to thank for that.

Now, it is time to move ahead. Some lose sight of the mission, and move on, and some move on with it. That is just the nature of folks in general, but that is what makes us unique, and that is what makes our country so great to live in.

As I previously stated, we are planning. We are looking at flag raising events, and a run that will be dedicated to honor our countries heroes. Rolling Thunder XVIII is scheduled for May, and that is not far off. We also plan to have our second annual weekend campout. Last year’s event at Jellystone Park was a huge success so we will be doing that again. Already, other chapters are wanting in on it. The dates will be announced in the near future.

I want to encourage everyone to especially remember the POWs and MIAs. It is my understanding that status reports have been changed, even since the beginning of the war in Iraq. I do not know all of the details, but it is my understanding that those who have been captured have had their status changed from POW to missing or captured. I encourage everyone to contact your legislators so that we can get an official confirmation on this. If their status has been changed, what is the reason, and how does that filter down to their loved ones who are anxiously waiting for a word? If we do not become more involved, the casualties of this war will be as forgotten as those that we left behind in Vietnam and other past wars. That is just not acceptable!

If you wish for our numbers to grow, I encourage each member to invite your friends and family members. We are about families being involved. We are about our POWs, MIAs, and their families who feel and have to live out an unclosed chapter of their lives. We are about Veterans who so unselfishly give of themselves, and not just them; but their families also. Get in and let’s get busy!
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AMERICAN POW'S LEFT BEHIND
By David S. Sullivan

Recently retired Senior Professional Staff Member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, and Personal Staff Member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Armed Services.

There are ten bodies of evidence showing clearly that scores of American POWs were left behind in Indochina, especially in Laos and also in the former Soviet Union.

I will describe these ten bodies of evidence briefly as follows:

FIRST - There is important but still mostly secret White House and diplomatic evidence, involving Dr. Henry Kissinger's "BACK CHANNEL" negotiations with the North Vietnamese, and also President Nixon's "WATERGATE TAPES", showing that they knowingly left behind at least "87" POWs, especially in Laos.

SECOND - There is voluminous evidence of American POWs left behind in Indochina from hundreds of human sources, including the thousands of "LIVE SIGHTING" reports of varying credibility about U.S. POWs in Indochina by refugees, defectors, and Americans.

THIRD - There is important and reliable "HUMINT" (human intelligence) evidence from recruited and paid CIA and DIA espionage agents on the ground in Indochina.

FOURTH - There is credible evidence, from the highest ranking defector from a communist country we have ever received, that many American POWs were transferred to Eastern Europe and to the former Soviet Union during the Vietnam War, were interrogated there on strategic subjects, were then used inhumanely for chemical and biological weapons experiments, and WERE NEVER RETURNED.

FIFTH - There is extensive hard, physical evidence from aerial and satellite imagery, of unique emergency signals associated with SPECIFIC downed U.S. pilots, laboriously etched into the ground by probable American POWs left behind in Indochina.

SIXTH - There is extensive, conclusive evidence from signals intelligence intercepts concerning American POWs held captive in Indochina after 1973.

SEVENTH - Because of all the converging evidence listed already, a U.S. covert action reconnaissance mission into Laos was mounted in 1981, and while this mission was botched and compromised, there are credible reports that even this aborted CIA mission detected at least one American POW held in Laos.

EIGHTH - There is evidence, NOT discussed in the Select Committee Report, from 1967 State Department cables that American POWs captured in Indochina who never came home were held under Soviet control in Eastern Europe. For example in East Germany and in Czechoslovakia, consistent with the high level Czech defector's testimony (Major General Jan Sejna)

NINTH - There is evidence, NOT discussed in the Select Committee Report, from a credible Soviet fighter-bomber pilot who defected in 1989, that American POWs were assembled and kept in the Soviet Union during the Vietnam War.

TENTH - There is evidence, NOT discussed in the Select Committee Report, from a sensitive CIA source that as many as 700 American POWs, similar to at least 300 French POWs surviving from the First Indochina War, were kept behind in Vietnam as late as 1975, and even into the 1980's. Counting the new Russian Archival Document (Morris Document), and the then-secret, official U.S. POW Accounting documents from after operation homecoming in 1973, and the ten bodies of evidence I have listed, there is a total of at least twelve bodies of converging, hard evidence on the question of whether American POWs were left behind.

In particular, the most compelling evidence is the many emergency markings on the ground, probably etched by desperate men, almost begging to be repatriated. These emergency ground signals, going back as far as to 1975, and some as recent as 1988 and even June of 1992, are tragic. And even more tragic has been the U.S. failure to promptly follow-up on them, and return our men home. Many of these signals are unique "Authenticator" codes and distress signals specific to individual pilots known to have been shot down over Laos.

To repeat, the evidence for cases eight, nine and ten is new, recently un-covered evidence, which was NOT available to the Senate Select Committee, so it deserves some more detailed examination.

PERHAPS SOME OF THIS INFORMATION SHOULD BE LOOKED AT A LITTLE MORE CLOSELY, DON'T YOU THINK?
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"If your are able, save for them a place inside you and save one backwards glance when you are leaving for the place they can no longer go. Be not ashamed to say you loved them, though you may or may not always have. Take what they have left and what they have taught you with their dying and keep it with your own. And in that time when men decide and feel safe to call war insane, take one moment to embrace those gentle heroes you left behind".
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"God and soldier we like adore, in times of trouble and not before. The trouble over and all things righted, God is forgotten and the soldier slighted."