Hope Lives : Families Insist Photo Proves Three MIA Fliers Are Alive

Families of three Vietnam War MIAs believe a photo shows that the aviators are alive, and they asked Wednesday for America’s help in reuniting them with the men, who were given up for dead by their government.

“We are here to tell you these men are heroes and we want them back,” said Albro Lynn Lundy III, whose father’s jet was shot down in Southeast Asia nearly 25 years ago. “We think God is really moving here.

“We are making a plea to the American people.”

Intelligence analysts in Washington say they cannot conclude whether a photo of three men purported to be American prisoners in Southeast Asia is authentic, even after nine months of analysis.

But relatives say there is no doubt the photo shows Air Force Maj. Albro Lynn Lundy Jr., Navy Lt. Larry James Stevens and Air Force Col. John Leighton Robertson. A man in the photo is holding a sign dated 1990.

“There’s no doubt in anyone’s mind that they are who they are,” the younger Lundy said during an emotional news conference at St. Paul the Apostle Parish, the Los Angeles church where his mother and father were married in 1956.

“They came on Christmas Eve to tell me my husband was shot down,” Johanna Lundy told reporters as her six grown children looked on with teary eyes. “Two days later they told me he was dead, and I believed it.”

Lundy’s A-1 jet was shot down Sept. 16, 1966, over Laos. The Sherman Oaks man would be 58 if alive.

For decades, Mrs. Lundy’s friends have been telling her to get on with her life and even remarry. But something just wasn’t right, she said, adding, “Apparently God didn’t plan that for me.”

“People are full of good advice,” Mrs. Barbara Robertson said, noting that she too was urged to move on with her life. “All my friends said, ‘Johnny wouldn’t want you to wait.’ But I just had to.”

The Robertson home was in Seattle when the flier was shot down Sept. 16, 1966, in an F-4 Phantom over North Vietnam. His wife now lives in Orange County. He would be 60 years old if alive.

Gladys Stevens Fleckenstein, whose son was shot down in an A-6 jet over Laos on Feb. 14, 1969, said she never gave up hope her son was alive. Stevens, of Canoga Park, would be 50 if alive.

“I do have a great fear for these men. We are very much afraid it will be a long, hard battle to get these men out,” said Fleckenstein, who lives in Big Bear Lake.

A large American flag and two black POW-MIA flags with the words, “You are not forgotten,” hung behind the families during the hourlong news conference. There were also photographs--poses with warplanes and a wedding picture--as well as military medals awarded the men.

The photo’s release came as Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Hank Brown (R-Colo.) announced that their Foreign Relations subcommittee would hold hearings to try to get to the bottom of the question of whether Americans taken prisoner during the Vietnam War are still being held.

The State Department had urged the families to keep quiet for two more weeks while the mysterious photograph is analyzed further, said MIA son Lundy. But the photo was shown on network TV Tuesday, and the families decided to meet reporters in a “united front.”

Mrs. Lundy was asked about Kerry’s comment that some Vietnam POW-MIAs may be staying in Vietnam voluntarily.

“I know that my husband was a man, is a man, of absolute integrity,” she said. “There is absolutely no way he could stay away from me and my children.”

Her son said he learned of the photograph last November, but he was skeptical and didn’t tell his mother until he investigated and found “corroborative information.” He wouldn’t elaborate, but said it was convincing.

“I told her a week and a half ago that a man who was dead is living,” said the younger Lundy, adding he “went after it specifically to disprove it” before uncovering the evidence he needed to go to his mother.

“We are utilizing every single avenue available to us,” he said.

Asked what he’d say if he could relay a message to his father, Lundy said, “We love you Dad. You know we love you.”

Mrs. Robertson said her message would be: “We’re coming to get you.”