The ordeal in the jungle didn’t break him. Neither did his North Vietnamese captors. The

Courage of By John T. Correll Lance Sijan

N THE fall of 1967, traffic was surg- He graduated from the Air Force Acad- ing on the Ho Chi Minh Trail, the emy in 1965 and went from there to lifeline by which North Vietnam pilot training, F-4 fighter crew train- sustained the war in the south. ing, and survival school. Da Nang IThe trail ran down the western side was his first duty assignment. of the Annam Mountains, through Sijan was flying as a backseat pi- the Laotian panhandle and Cambo- lot in the F-4C. He was crewed with dia, into South Vietnam. Lt. Col. John W. Armstrong, com- Truck convoys departing from the mander of the 480th Tactical Fighter supply hub at Vinh in North Viet- Squadron, to which Sijan was as- nam gained access to the Ho Chi signed. So far, he had flown 66 com- Minh Trail through the Mu Gia and bat missions. He was looking to up- Ban Karai Passes in the mountains. grade to the front seat of the F-4 The passes were heavily defended before his tour was over. with anti-aircraft artillery. Sijan was big—6 feet 2 inches, Traffic on the trail moved mostly 210 pounds—and athletic. He was at night. During daylight hours, the an all-city football player during trucks hid under camouflage or in high school in Milwaukee. He had concealed parking areas in the jungle. been on the swim and track teams In a renewed effort to interdict the as well. He played two years of flow of troops and supplies, the Air varsity football at the Air Force Force, in November 1967, doubled Academy. the number of attack sorties flown There were other sides to Lance against the trail. The targets included Sijan as well. He had been president not only the truck convoys but also of the student government associa- the choke points, like the passes. tion at Bay View High School. He Among the units taking part in was interested in photography and the intensified operation was the drama. At the academy, he had dem- 366th Tactical Fighter Wing, which onstrated a flair for sculpture. Pho- flew the Air Force’s newest fighter, tos show him as a good-looking, mus- the F-4C. The wing was located at cular young man with a friendly Da Nang, the northernmost of the smile. Air Force’s principal bases in Viet- nam. Ban Loboy Ford First Lt. Lance Peter Sijan, a 25- On Nov. 9, Armstrong and Sijan year-old pilot from Milwaukee, had briefed for a night attack mission. been stationed at Da Nang since July. The target was the Ban Loboy Ford,

50 AIR FORCE Magazine / July 2004 AIR FORCE Magazine / July 2004 51 corts, O-2 forward air controllers, F-4s, and F-100s. Sijan had ex- pended his flares early, signaling to the fighter aircraft before the Sandys and the Jolly Greens got there. The attempt to locate Sijan and get him off the mountain went on all day. Eventually, 108 aircraft were involved in the rescue operation on Nov. 11. Anti-aircraft guns, some of them as large as 37 mm, were firing from all directions. Nine of the res- cue aircraft were hit by ground fire, and one, an A-1 Sandy, went down in the jungle. Sijan was difficult to find in the triple-canopy jungle. The rescuers couldn’t see him, and he couldn’t see them. They tried homing in on Sijan’s beeper signal as well as having him Air Force Academy cadet Lance Sijan undergoes survival training. He was big— tell them when the aircraft engines 6 feet 2 inches tall, 210 pounds—and athletic. Though badly injured in a crash, sounded loudest. The best chance for he survived in the jungle and eluded the enemy for more than six weeks. success came late in the day when a Jolly Green helicopter got a fix on his a river crossing on the Ho Chi Minh Sijan struck the trees and then the approximate location. Trail, just inside Laos at the Ban granite slope in the darkness. The Sijan told the Jolly to send down its Karai Pass. combination of the explosion, the jungle penetrator cable but not to put It was a two-ship flight. The call ejection, and impact with the moun- a pararescue jumper on the ground, sign for Armstrong and Sijan was tain left him badly injured. He had a where North Vietnamese Army pa- AWOL 01, with the second aircraft, compound fracture of his left leg, a trols were moving. AWOL 02, flying on their wing. It skull fracture, and a concussion. His “There’s bad guys down here,” was dark when they took off from Da right hand was mangled, with the Sijan said. “Just drop the penetrator.” Nang at 8 p.m. fingers bent backward. He lay on the Then: “I see you, I see you. Stay Central Vietnam is narrow. Not mountainside, amid high trees, about where you are, I’m coming to you.” very far inland, the landscape rises three miles northwest of the Ban The helicopter dropped the penetrator to form the Annam Cordillera chain, Loboy Ford. and hovered for 33 minutes, but could which divides Vietnam from Laos. Aircraft circled above, listening not raise Sijan again on the radio. The Ban Karai Pass cuts through the for a signal, but heard nothing. That Finally, with ground fire increasing, mountains close to what was, in 1967, night and all the next day, Sijan was the Jolly Green pulled out. the border between North and South unconscious or delirious. The search and rescue effort re- Vietnam. sumed the next morning, but there Over the pass, the F-4s linked up A Signal From Sijan was no further signal from Sijan. with a forward air controller, who At first light on Nov. 11, however, The rescue aircraft returned to base. marked the Ban Loboy Ford for them F-4s from Ubon and F-100s from Phu Sijan was listed as missing in ac- with flares. Each F-4C was carrying Cat picked up a signal from Sijan. tion for the next seven years. He was six 750-pound bombs. At 8:39 p.m., They made voice contact with him and promoted to captain in 1968, post- AWOL 01 rolled in on the target and were soon joined by other aircraft. humously as it turned out. The Air released the bombs. Sijan identified himself as AWOL Force and his family did not learn Suddenly, the aircraft exploded 01 Bravo. One of the pilots asked what had become of him until the and was engulfed in a ball of fire. It him several prearranged authentica- prisoners of war returned from North plunged into the jungle below. tion questions to be sure it was really Vietnam in 1973. Initial reports attributed the ex- Sijan and not an English-speaking plosion to ground fire, but there is enemy, using his radio to lure the Captured considerable belief now that defec- rescue aircraft into a trap. What we know of Sijan after he tive fuzes caused the bombs to deto- One of the questions, chosen by lost contact with the search and res- nate prematurely, exploding within Sijan ahead of time, was, “Who is cue aircraft is from the reports of 50 feet of the airplane. the greatest football team in the Robert R. Craner and Guy D. Gruters, Neither AWOL 02 nor the for- world?” He knew the answer to that: with whom Sijan spent three weeks ward air controller saw a parachute, “The Green Bay Packers.” in captivity. Today, Gruters lives in but there was a survivor. AWOL The search and rescue team as- Minister, Ohio, and talks often about 01 Bravo—Sijan—had gotten out. sembled rapidly. It included a C- Lance Sijan. Craner died in 1980, Armstrong was not heard from again 130 airborne command post, code- but he was interviewed extensively and is presumed to have been killed named Crown, Jolly Green Giant in 1977 by now-retired Lt. Col. Fred in action. rescue helicopters, A-1 Sandy es- Meurer for Airman Magazine. Meurer

52 AIR FORCE Magazine / July 2004 ter. He subsisted marginally on ferns, cress leaves, moss, grubs, and in- China sects. He obtained water from the dew, rainfall, and occasionally, a North Vietnam mountain stream. He could have attracted the atten- On the night that tion of the North Vietnamese Army Hanoi Lance Sijan disappeared, at any time by firing his handgun, AWOL 01’s target but gaining shelter as a prisoner was was Ban Loboy the last thing Sijan wanted. He was Gulf of Tonkin Ford, a river determined not only to survive but crossing on the also to evade capture. Ho Chi Minh Trail, Laos just inside Laos at The North Vietnamese took him Vinh the Ban Karai to a road camp near the Ban Karai Mu Gia Pass Pass. North Pass and put him in a bamboo hut Vietnam sent with a thatched roof. He lay on a Ban Karai Pass supplies and troops down the bamboo mat. When he regained con- trail to sustain sciousness, the shredded remains of Thailand DMZ Viet Cong insur- his flight suit had been stripped away, gents in the south. and he was dressed in a black cotton Ho Chi Minh Da Nang To interdict the shirt and trousers. The left leg of the Trail flow, the Air Force struck convoys trousers had been cut away to ac- and choke points, commodate his swollen leg. such as Ban His captors gave him rice and Loboy Ford and boiled greens. He drank some water the mountain passes. They were but was not able to eat much. The heavily defended North Vietnamese did not give him with anti-aircraft any of their scarce medical supplies. artillery. Several days after he was cap- Cambodia tured, Sijan noticed a mountain tribesman outside the hut. He took him to be a Montagnard. He had been told in training that if he could South Vietnam make contact with the Montagnards, they might get him into the hands of a US reconnaissance patrol. Saigon Sijan’s account of what happened next was later confirmed by “The Ro- South China Sea dent,” a North Vietnamese officer who talked to Craner and Gruters in Vinh.

made his interview tapes available for this article. The next 46 days were painstak- ingly reconstructed by Malcolm McConnell in his book, Into the Mouth of the Cat (Norton, 1985). Shortly after dawn on Dec. 25, a North Viet- namese truck convoy—able to move in daylight because of a bombing halt for Christmas—found Sijan lying in the road. He was three miles from where he went down Nov. 9. Somehow, he had survived and had eluded the enemy for more than six weeks. He had lost his survival kit. His radio batteries had run down. He was intermittently unconscious or delirious and able to move only Sijan was flying in the backseat of an F-4C. It was armed with 750-pound by crawling. bombs, as are these Phantoms. Many now believe AWOL 01 was destroyed by He had no real food and little wa- the premature explosion of the bombs, caused by bad fuzes.

AIR FORCE Magazine / July 2004 53 him in one of the end cells, directly across from Craner. Gruters’s cell was on the same side of the hallway as Sijan’s, but there was an empty cell between them. It was night when Sijan arrived, and the prison was unlit, except for the interrogator’s flickering lamp. Craner couldn’t see him through the partitions, but at a distance of 10 feet, he could hear everything. The Rodent pressed Sijan for mili- tary information. Sijan’s voice was weak but determined. “Sijan! My name is Lance Peter Sijan!” He gave his name, rank, and service number, but refused to answer questions, even when The Rodent twisted his injured arm. “The whole affair went on for an hour-and-a-half, over and over again, USAF launched a massive effort to recover Sijan. Here, four A-1 Sandys escort and the guy just wouldn’t give in,” an HC-130P refueling an HH-3E Jolly Green Giant on a typical rescue mission. In Craner said. “He’d say, ‘All right, all, some 100 aircraft searched for Sijan. One Sandy was lost. you son of a bitch, wait till I get better, you’re really going to get it,’ Sijan waited until a single soldier was a wood and frame structure, with and giving him all kinds of lip but no was left to guard him. He lured the dirt floors, bamboo partitions, and information.” guard close, then overcame him and small cells on either side of a hallway Repeated attempts at Vinh to force rendered him unconscious with a left- that ran down the center. Sijan to talk did not succeed. handed chop to the base of the skull. Craner and Gruters were interro- Sijan had a cast on his left leg, He tied the guard’s shirt around his gated and tortured by an English- reaching from his thigh to his ankle. swollen leg, took his carbine, and speaking rat-faced officer they called It had been put on at the Ban Karai crawled into the jungle. “The Rodent.” (All American POWs Pass, not for medical reasons but to He was recaptured within half a were tortured, both locally—as immobilize him. The Rodent told day. Craner, Gruters, and later Sijan, were Craner they had found Sijan on the in Vinh—and with more sophistica- road and given him medical aid, and The Bamboo Prison tion in the prisons around Hanoi.) that Sijan struck and injured a guard Maj. Bob Craner and Capt. Guy Lance Sijan was brought into the and ran away. “You must not let him Gruters, flying an F-100F from the Bamboo Prison on Jan. 1, 1968. His do this any more,” The Rodent said. Misty forward air control wing at weight was down to 100 pounds, and Sometimes, Sijan was conscious and Phu Cat, were shot down over North he was covered with sores. They put clearheaded, sometimes incoherent and Vietnam on Dec. 20. Craner was paraded around the local villages, where he was put on display. The villagers were allowed to yell at him and hit him with sticks and their fists. He was astounded at the number of trucks he saw, espe- cially on Christmas Day. “They were lined up, bumper to bumper, as far as the eye could see,” he said. Although US intelligence would not realize it until later, the heavy traffic on the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Novem- ber and December 1967 was part of the buildup for the assault on Khe Sanh, which began Jan. 1, and for the Tet Offensive, which began Jan. 30. Eventually, Craner and Gruters were brought together again, put on a truck, and taken on Dec. 26 to a holding point in Vinh. It was a North Vietnam- ese Army facility known variously to Sijan was held at Hoa Lo prison, the notorious “Hanoi Hilton” where many POWs POWs as the “Bamboo Prison,” “Bao were tortured. Already badly injured, Sijan developed pneumonia in his cold, wet Cao,” or “Duc’s Camp.” The prison cell and was frequently delirious. Up until his death, he planned escape.

54 AIR FORCE Magazine / July 2004 rambling. Even when he had to struggle to get the words out, he asked, “How are we going to get out of here?” He dwelled on the point that he had es- caped once, at the Ban Karai road camp, and could do it again. He did not talk about pain, and when asked, he minimized the importance of it. After several days, Craner and Gruters were taken to Sijan’s cell to help him to a truck that would trans- port the prisoners to Hanoi. “We were both tall men,” Gruters said. “When we had him upright and saw that he was taller than we were, I said, ‘This guy is pretty big.’ He had a large frame, but he was just skin and bones.” Sijan looked at Gruters and said, “Aren’t you Guy Gruters?” “I was taken aback, for I could not Guy Gruters speaks at a 2003 memorial service for Sijan. Gruters, a POW recognize Lance, even though he had imprisoned with Sijan, helped tell the story of how his cell mate survived and been a squadron mate of mine at the evaded, escaped, and resisted his captors. Air Force Academy just three years before this date,” Gruters said. “I said, plex, and that’s where we met ‘The off in space somewhere,” Craner ‘Yes,’ and then I asked, ‘Who are Bug,’ the most infamous English said. you?’ He said, ‘Lance.’ I said, ‘Lance speaker in Hanoi.” Often, though, Sijan was lucid, who?’ He said, ‘Sijan, Lance Sijan.’ ” The Bug was short and fat, with a aware, and focused. “It was always, The trip north from Vinh was mis- cataract in one eye. As an indication ‘How secure is this place? How are erable. The prisoners were shackled of his specialty, some of the POWs we going to get out of here?’ He and rode in the back of an open truck. called him “Mr. Blue,” after the color tried to do some arm exercises so he They were continuously buffeted by of the torture rooms at one of the would be ready to take part in the the shifting of two 55-gallon drums, prison camps. escape,” Craner said. in which the driver carried fuel for The Bug took Craner and Gruters “He really, really kept the faith, the truck. The roads were potholed to a cistern and told them to wash under horrific punishment,” Gruters from bombing and rutted by the mon- Sijan. “We did the best we could said. soon rains. Even when the truck moved with cold water,” Craner said. Sijan developed pneumonia Jan. at slow speeds, the prisoners and the Initially, they were taken to the “New 18 and was removed from the cell on fuel drums bounced around. Guy Village” section of the Hanoi Jan. 21. Gruters and Craner screamed at Hilton, where the North Vietnamese He died Jan. 22, but it was awhile the driver to slow down, at no avail. made a special effort to break the before Craner and Gruters knew that. One of them would cradle Sijan while Americans early in their captivity. The They were transferred to “The Plant- the other tried to keep the fuel drums prisoners were kept apart except at ation,” a smaller prison camp a couple from rolling on them. They traveled meal time, twice a day, when Sijan of miles away. Craner encountered at night and hid in villages under was brought to Craner and Gruters so The Bug in the courtyard there and camouflage during the day. they could help him eat. It was diffi- asked him about Sijan. Once Craner was convinced that cult to get him to take food. “Sijan spend too long in the jungle,” Sijan was dead. “Then he stirred,” After a few days, the three were The Bug said. “Sijan die.” Craner said. “Whenever he was lu- put in the “Little Vegas” section of When the POWs came home in cid, he was caught up with going the Hoa Lo in a triple cell with three 1973, Craner nominated Lance Sijan ahead—what are we going to do next, board bunks. There was standing for the Medal of Honor. “He was how are we going to get out of this water on the cement floor, and the what the military hopes it can pro- situation? He was full of drive.” cell was cold and dank. duce in every man but very rarely A medic they called “Camp Doc- does,” Craner said. The Hanoi Hilton tor” came in periodically, wearing The truck rolled up to Hoa Lo, the a Red Cross armband. Camp Doc- Medal of Honor downtown prison the POWs called tor would “look and cluck, walk Lance Sijan’s remains were re- the “Hanoi Hilton,” in the middle of back out,” Craner said. Eventually, turned to the United States in 1974, the night on Jan. 13. he cut the cast off Sijan’s leg and along with the headstone used to “We got Lance off the truck,” gave him shots of a yellow fluid mark his grave in Vietnam. He is Craner said. “They brought out a presumed to be an antibiotic. He buried at Arlington Park Cemetery wooden pallet used as a stretcher, also set up an intravenous feeding in Milwaukee. just four boards nailed together. We apparatus, but Sijan pulled the He was awarded the Medal of carried him into the Hoa Lo com- needle out at night “when he was Honor, posthumously, March 4, 1976.

AIR FORCE Magazine / July 2004 55 the force and covered again in sur- vival training, part of helping those going into combat to know what to expect and how to respond if they are captured. Former POWs have said it gave them something to hold onto during their captivity. Lance Sijan embodied the Code of Conduct, particularly three articles of it. They read: Article II: “I will never surrender of my own free will.” Article III: “If I am captured, I will continue to resist by all means available. I will make every effort to escape and aid others to escape.” Article V: “When questioned, should I become a prisoner of war, I am bound to give name, rank, service number, and date of birth. I will evade answer- Lance Sijan was awarded the Medal of Honor in 1976, the only Air Force ing further questions to the utmost of Academy graduate thus far to be so honored. This memorial, dedicated in my ability. I will make no oral or 2003, is at Arlington Park Cemetery, in his hometown of Milwaukee. written statements disloyal to my coun- try and its allies or harmful to their It was presented to his parents, Syl- F-4, pointing straight upward. His cause.” vester and Jane Sijan, at the White parents, his sister, Janine Sijan Rozina, The North Vietnamese routinely House by President Gerald R. Ford. and his brother, Marc Sijan, were ignored the Geneva Convention and “During interrogation, he was se- joined for the event by a host of dig- tortured POWs. In part, they were seek- verely tortured; however, he did not nitaries. Speakers included Lance ing military information, but equally divulge any information to his cap- Sijan’s cell mate from Vietnam, Guy important were written and oral state- tors,” the citation said. “During his Gruters. ments they could broadcast as propa- intermittent periods of conscious- There are other remembrances. ganda to undercut allied morale, buck ness until his death, he never com- There is a Sijan Circle at Langley up the North Vietnamese home front, plained of his physical condition, AFB, Va., a Sijan Street at Whiteman and feed the anti-American movement and, on several occasions, spoke of AFB, Mo., and, in Colorado Springs, around the world. future escape attempts.” Colo., home of the academy, the John McCain is now a US Senator, Also in 1976, Sijan Hall, a new Lance P. Sijan Chapter of the Air but in 1967, he was a prisoner in the dormitory at the Air Force Acad- Force Association. Air Force ROTC Hanoi Hilton. He was a naval avia- emy, was dedicated in Lance Sijan’s cadets at Boston University have tor, shot down over Hanoi on Oct. memory. A large portrait of Sijan, formed the Lance Sijan Squadron of 26, a few weeks before Lance Sijan’s painted by Maxine McCaffrey, hangs the Arnold Air Society. last mission on Nov. 9. in Sijan Hall. The Air Force presents the Lance McCain wrote in Faith of My Lance Sijan is the only Air Force P. Sijan Award to four people each Fathers (Random House, 1999): “I Academy graduate thus far to re- year for outstanding leadership. This never knew Lance Sijan, but I wish I ceive the Medal of Honor, and he is year, the awards were presented at had. I wish I had had one moment to remembered there with special honor. the Pentagon on Sijan’s birthday, tell him how much I admired him, The academy library displays a col- April 13. His parents attended, as how indebted I was to him for show- lection of Sijan memorabilia, in- they have every year except one since ing me, for showing all of us, our cluding the headstone from Viet- 1981, when the awards were first duty—for showing us how to be free. nam. It is marked with Sijan’s initials given. “Few of us ever seriously contem- in English and the date of his death. plated escape, and our senior offi- He is also well remembered in his The Code of Conduct cers never encouraged it. A few brave hometown. Jane and Sylvester Sijan The Code of Conduct for the US men tried. All were caught and tor- are members of the Air Force Com- armed forces was adopted in 1955 in tured. Neither did every prisoner re- munity Council at General Mitchell response to the use of American pris- frain from providing information Airport in Milwaukee, where the oners for political propaganda in the beyond the bare essentials sanctioned 440th Airlift Wing has placed a rep- Korean War, induced “confessions,” by the code. Many of us were terror- lica of Sijan’s F-4 at the base en- and the collaboration with the en- ized into failure at one time or an- trance and where the dining hall is emy on the part of some POWs. other. But Captain Sijan wasn’t. He named after him. It was taught to every member of obeyed the code to the letter.” ■ In June 2003, a Lance Sijan memo- rial was dedicated at the Arlington John T. Correll was editor in chief of Air Force Magazine for 18 years and is now Park Cemetery. It is a 10-foot marble a contributing editor. His most recent article, “Basic Beliefs,” appeared in the monument in the shape of a stylized June issue.

56 AIR FORCE Magazine / July 2004