# Missing POWs WW2



## time expired (17 Jul 2007)

Saw an interesting program on German TV last night, it concerned the disappearance
of up to 125000 Brit.,US,French and Canadian POWs held in POW camps that ended
up behind the Russian front at the end of the war.Being that it was on German TV
it had, a to be expected, an anti American tone blaming the US administration for
staging a huge cover up,firstly to not jeopardise the Russian entry into the war against
the Japanese,and latter not to antagonise the USSR and cause WW3. Witness were
produced who had meet said POWs and even a American who had been for some
reason been released from a Siberian death camp.The program also went on to claim 
the same thing had happened after the Korean war.Does anyone know any more 
particularly concerning Canadian POWs?.
                             Regards


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## 3rd Herd (17 Jul 2007)

Just to get things started:

Beginining with the US:

World War II Accounting History  

World War II ended on August 15, 1945 . Nearly 406,000 of the 16 million Americans who served in the war died. At the end of the war, the USG was unable to recover, identify, and bury approximately 79,000 as known persons. They include those buried with honor as unknowns, those lost at sea, and those missing in action. That number also includes the 1,100 sailors entombed in the USS Arizona Memorial in Pearl Harbor. Today, more than 78,000 Americans remain unaccounted-for from WW II. 

Following the war, the USG had full access to most of the former battle areas. This significantly assisted the recovery of the war dead. The U.S. created two Army identification laboratories, one each in Japan and Germany. Those laboratories worked only World War II cases and made recoveries on both sides of the globe from 1945 to 1951, working until all known leads were exhausted. 

In 1976, the Department of Defense established the U.S. Army Central Identification Laboratory, Hawaii (now part of the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command or JPAC), as a permanent group. One of its assigned missions is to recover and identify all U.S. Service members killed in past wars. Their initial World War II program focused on Papua New Guinea, due to the large number of sites known to be there and the fact that the sites were accessible. Today JPAC investigate and excavate World War II sites worldwide. http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo/worldwarII/worldwar_history.htm


World War II Working Group 
The World War II Working Group of the U.S.-Russia Joint Commission on POW/MIAs is co-chaired on the American side by Dr. Timothy K. Nenninger, Chief of Modern Military Records at the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration in College Park, Maryland.  The position of the Russian co-chair has been vacant since the Russian side began a thorough reorganization in June 2004.  The Working Group has exchanged and examined thousands of documents dealing with the fates of American and Soviet POWs during and after World War II.

Through its investigative efforts, the World War II Working Group has confirmed that there were about 28,000 American Prisoners of War held by the Germans and their allies in camps on the Eastern Front.  These prisoners came under Soviet control in the war’s final days, when the Red Army liberated the camps and occupied this territory.  U.S. records show that about 25,000 of these POWs returned directly across the lines to U.S. military control.  More than 2,800 others were returned to U.S. military control through the Soviet Black Sea port of Odessa (now Ukraine).

The World War II Working Group is investigating the possibility that some American POWs who remain unaccounted for from the Eastern camps may have been transferred to Soviet labor camps and were never repatriated.

The working group has also helped the Russians clarify the fates of more than 300,000 former Soviet POWs and displaced persons.
http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo/sovietunion/worldwar_working.htm

Edit to Add:

The best article on this subject is 'United States Prisoners of War and the Red Army, 1944-45: Myths and Realities'
Timothy K. Nenninger The Journal of Military History, Vol. 66, No. 3. (Jul., 2002), pp. 761-781. Although primarly examining the US issuses there are a couple of pages which cover both British and other commonwealth. The only link I have for it requries a university/college access.
http://www.jstor.org/view/08993718/sp030003/03x0009i/14?frame=noframe&userID=889fd138@ucalgary.ca/01cc99331f00501c31320&dpi=3&pageJump=1&config=jstor


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## time expired (17 Jul 2007)

3rd.Herd,thanks for the info. however I think that part of this programs thrust
was calling this organizations finding into question,basically calling it 
part of the cover up.It showed part of a congressional hearing,in which
Senator McCain was involved investigating this subject.As I inherently
distrust TV journalism I would hope that this laid the POW question to 
rest.Have you any information concerning this investigation?.
                                         Regards


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## 3rd Herd (17 Jul 2007)

Time Expired
As I said in the above post that article is very good, I just cannot find an open link to it. However again using US sources trying to get anything here is just about impossible. So I head south and then back track.

POW/Missing/Database(just WW2 but links off to other era's Korea, Vietnam, Gulf war) and worth the visit
http://www.aiipowmia.com/wwii/

I will keep poking around

Edit:

INDEPTH: CANADIAN PRISONERS OF WAR Behind barbed wire http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/cdnpows/

and

A.1.6. Maj. “Andrew Robert Makken” (Canadian)
In Operational Summary No. 00341 from the Headquarters of the 64th IAK in Andung to Moscow on December 6, 1952, an addendum to Operational Report No. 00340 for December 5, 1952 is included. The addendum reads, “On 5 December, our fighters shot down the leader of a group of four from the 51st Air Group made up of Canadian VVS trainees. The commander of the squadron, Major Andrew Robert Makken, parachuted and landed in the area of Supkhuni near the 51st anti-aircraft battery. Prior to the approach by our personnel, Maj. Makken opened fire with a pistol. He surrendered after we retaliated. He was turned over to the Chinese authorities.”

A Canadian F86 pilot, Squadron Leader Andrew Robert MacKenzie, 39th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron, 51st Fighter-Interceptor Group, was shot down on December 5, 1952. MacKenzie, the most publicized Canadian POW of the Korean War, was held as a political prisoner in China until 1955. MacKenzie's casualty record states, “Lost while on combat mission over NK. Sq. leader MACKENZIE was last seen at XE 4767 (6135- III),” near Uiju, North Korea. MacKenzie claimed, upon repatriation, that he had been shot down by an F-86. 45 A board of inquiry examined MacKenzie's claim after the Korean War, but the results of this inquiry are not known. 

Conclusion: 1) The Soviet version and UN version are consistent with the capture of Squadron Leader Andrew Robert MacKenzie, a Canadian F-86 pilot who lives in Canada today. 2) The MacKenzie case confirms the direct participation of Soviet forces in the pursuit and capture of UNC air crews. MacKenzie's casualty status is POW/repatriated. http://www.aiipowmia.com/koreacw/mockbacole02.html


Edit to add:

The eleven U.S. "political prisoners," were not the only U.S. servicemen the Chinese held after the Korean War. The New York Times,reported Communist China is holding prisoner other United States Air Force personnel besides the eleven who were recently sentenced on spying charges following their capture during the Korean War. This information was brought out of China by Squadron Leader Andrew R. MacKenzie, a Canadian flier who was released today by the Chinese at the Hong Kong border. He reached freedom here two years to the day after he was shot down and fell into Communist hands in North Korea...Held back from the Korean war prisoner exchange, he was released by the Peiping [sic] regime following a period of negotiations through diplomatic channels... Wing Comdr. Donald Skene, his brother-in-law who was sent here from Canada to meet him, said guardedly at a press conference later that an undisclosed number of United States airmen had been in the same camp with Squadron Leader MacKenzie...Wing Commander Skene said none of the Americans in the camp was on the list of eleven whose sentencing was announced by the Chinese November 23 [,1954].[11]http://www.nationalalliance.org/vietnam/ovrvw05.htm

Edit to add+add:

Objects of Concern: Canadian Prisoners of War Through the Twentieth Century 
http://books.google.com/books?id=j7yJM6mG1PoC&pg=PA236&lpg=PA236&dq=canadian+prisoners+korea&source=web&ots=KbRm1z7Q0b&sig=pw3Jx3EtckwICYxjDModNS5TdUc#PPA235,M1


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