In December 1991, Congress
enacted Public Law 102-190, commonly referred to as
the McCain Bill. The statute requires the Secretary of Defense
to make available to the public--in a "library like setting"--all
information relating to the treatment, location, and/or condition
(T-L-C) of United States personnel who are unaccounted-for
from the Vietnam War. The facility chosen to receive this
information was the Library of Congress (LoC). The Federal
Research Division (FRD) created the PWMIA Database, the online
index to those documents. The microfilmed documents themselves
are available at the Library of Congress or borrowed through
local libraries.
The mission of the Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO)
is to exercise policy, control, and oversight within DoD for
the entire process for investigation and recovery related
to missing persons; coordinate for DoD with other departments
and agencies of the United States on all matters concerning
missing persons; and establish procedures to be followed by
DoD boards of inquiry. DPMO sends redacted documents to FRD
for indexing and microfilming.
In March 1992, the U.S. – Russia Joint Commission on
POWs and MIAs (USRJC) was established by direction of the
Presidents of the United States and the Russian Federation
to serve as a forum through which both nations seek to determine
the fate of their missing servicemen. DPMO provides direct
analytical, investigative, and administrative support to the
USJRC through the Joint Commission Support Directorate. The
Commission’s objectives are to determine whether American
servicemen are being held against their will on the territory
of the former Soviet Union and, if so, to secure their immediate
release and repatriation; to locate and return to the United
States the remains of any deceased American servicemen interred
in the former Soviet Union; and to ascertain the facts regarding
American servicemen who were not repatriated and whose fate
remains unresolved.
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