https://nypost.com/2021/05/15/honored-at-last-the-heroes-of-flying-tiger-line-flight-739/

Honored at last: Remembering the heroes of Flying Tiger Line Flight 739
By Jane Ridley

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The Sargent family, including Judith (from left) and Clifton and daughter Jennifer Kirk, lost Clifton’s brother, Donald, when Don’s military flight disappeared.Six decades after their loved ones vanished into thin air, relatives of the victims of Flying Tiger Line Flight 739 — 93 soldiers aboard a secret-mission flight chartered by the US Army in the buildup to the Vietnam War — want answers.

They gathered together Saturday for a ceremony in Columbia Falls, Maine, organized by the non-profit Wreaths Across America at a memorial to honor the fallen.  

“The memorial ceremony offers some closure,” Marie Mull, 82, told The Post of her brother, Sgt. Clarence Ganance of Rensselaer, NY. “We’ve always wondered what happened . . . probably always will.”

Nobody knows exactly what happened on the morning of March 16, 1962, because no bodies nor debris — not even a single piece — have ever been recovered.

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Some sources claim the elite team of Rangers aboard Flight 793, mostly communications specialists, had been hand-picked by President John F. Kennedy as part of a covert operation involving the CIA. It has since emerged that in early 1962 — three years before American ground troops “officially” entered the Vietnam conflict — the US had advisors training indigenous tribes in Laos and Cambodia. As the agency was trying to determine if America should join the ongoing war in Southeast Asia, the situation was politically sensitive.

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Repeat demands from legislators, including Maine Senator Susan Collins, led to Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) requests and the release of heavily redacted military documents — but that has only caused dissatisfaction among bereaved family members frustrated by the absence of clarity.

“It’s called the runaround,” concluded Crumpler. “Nobody [in the political system] has an answer so they just keep sending us elsewhere.”

Neither the government nor military has taken an official stance on the mission or what might have happened to the flight. A report by the Civil Aeronautic Board released after the crash merely stated that “the board is unable to determine the probable cause.”

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Right now, she said, “It’s as if James and the other men never existed.”

The appeals have so far been thwarted by the Department of Defense which claims those aboard Flight 739 were not participating in an “official” combat mission.

She, along with the other grieving families, believes the unveiling of the Maine memorial is a step in the right direction.

“The Rangers’ creed says ‘Leave no comrade behind,’ but these men were left behind,” pointed out Monica Young, whose father, John C Wendell, Sergeant First Class, disappeared the day before her 15th birthday. “Thanks to this [Saturday’s] remembrance, they’ve no longer been left behind.”

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Sorry, but the Gooferment’s “official mission” is just bureaucratic “new speak” for “we don’t give a s#$%”!

I think as part of every vet’s “celebration” — Independence Day, Decoration Day, and Veterans’ Day — we should take the opportunity to demand that “our representative” account for the Gooferment’s past actions that cost good men and women their lives, happiness, and posterity.

Argh!

I will; will you?

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