Group Offers $1 Million for Any Live MIA
A group of Americans announced today a plan to pay $1 million to citizens of Vietnam, Laos or Cambodia for the return of any live U.S. serviceman listed as missing in action in Southeast Asia.
The POW Policy Center of the American Defense Institute announced the plan in Charlotte, N.C., in advance of the official posting of the reward on Memorial Day, May 24. ADI describes itself as a pro-defense policy group.
“The $1 million will be paid only to a citizen of Vietnam, Laos or Cambodia who frees an American POW and returns him to a U.S. official at a U.S. facility in Southeast Asia,” said Bill Hendon, a former Republican congressman from North Carolina who is working with the institute.
Hendon said the money will be guaranteed by a group including himself, members of Congress and retired Navy Capt. Eugene (Red) McDaniel, a former Vietnam POW and director of ADI.
The restriction ruling out any American from collecting the reward, according to the group, is to discourage any “Rambo”-type groups from making cross-border forays, endangering themselves and possibly the lives of any prisoners who might be alive.
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