DANIELSON, MARK GILES
Remains Identified 10/21/94
One of three men individually identified -- nine others identified as "group
remains"
Name: Mark Giles Danielson
Rank/Branch: O3/USAF
Unit: 16th Special Operations Squadron (PAF), Ubon, Thailand
Date of Birth: 29 April 1943
Home City of Record: Rangely CO
Date of Loss: 18 June 1972
Country of Loss: South Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 161500N 1071200E (YC343978)
Status (in 1973): Missing In Action
Category: 2
Acft/Vehicle/Ground: AC130A
Other Personnel in Incident: Jacob Mercer; Richard Nyhof; Robert Wilson;
Leon A. Hunt; Larry J. Newman; Gerald F. Ayres; Stanley Lehrke; Robert
Harrison; Donald H. Klinke; Richard M. Cole; Gerald F. Ayres (all missing)
Source: Compiled by Homecoming II Project 15 June 1990 from one or more of
the following: raw data from U.S. Government agency sources, correspondence
with POW/MIA families, published sources, interviews. Updated by the P.O.W.
NETWORK 2002.
REMARKS:
SYNOPSIS: Lockheed's versatile C130 aircraft filled many roles in Vietnam,
including transport, tanker, gunship, drone controller, airborne battlefield
command and control center, weather reconnaissance, electronic
reconnaissance, and search, rescue and recovery.
The AC130, outfitted as a gunship, was the most spectacular of the modified
C130's. These ships pierced the darkness using searchlights, flares, night
observation devices that intensified natural light, and a variety of
electronic sensors such as radar, infared equipment and even low-level
television. On some models, a computer automatically translated sensor data
into instructions for the pilot, who kept his fixed, side-firing guns
trained on target by adjusting the angle of bank as he circled. The crew of
these planes were, therefore, highly trained and capable. They were highly
desirable "captures" for the enemy because of their technical knowledge.
1LT Paul F. Gilbert was the pilot of an AC130A gunship assigned a mission
near the A Shau Valley in the Republic of Vietnam on June 18, 1972. The
crew, totaling 15 men included MAJ Gerald F. Ayres, MAJ Robert H. Harrison,
CAPT Robert A. Wilson, CAPT Mark G. Danielson, TSGT Richard M. Cole Jr.,
SSGT Donald H. Klinke, SSGT Richard E. Nyhof, SSGT Larry J. Newman, SGT Leon
A. Hunt, and SGT Stanley L. "Larry" Lehrke.
During the mission, the aircraft was hit by a surface-to-air missile (SAM)
and went down near the border of Laos and Vietnam. In fact, the first
location coordinates given to the families were indeed Laos, but were
quickly changed to reflect a loss just inside South Vietnam.
Three survivors of the crash were rescued the next day. After several years
of effort, some of the family members of the other crewmembers were able to
review part of their debriefings, which revealed that a bail-out order was
given, and that at least one unexplained parachute was observed, indicating
that at least one other airman may have safely escaped the crippled
aircraft.
In early 1985, resistance forces surfaced information which indicated that
SGT Mercer had survived the crash and was currently held prisoner. Parents
of another crew member, Mark G. Danielson, discovered a photograph of an
unidentified POW printed about 6 months after the crash, in their local
newspaper whom they were CONVINCED was Mark. It was several years, however,
before the U.S. Government allowed the Danielsons to view the film from
which the photo was taken. When they viewed the film, their certainty
diminished.
The hope that some of the twelve missing from the AC130A gunship has not
diminished, however. Since the war ended, over 10,000 reports relating to
Americans missing, prisoner or unaccounted for in Southeast Asia have been
received by the U.S. Government, including over 1,000 first-hand live
sighting reports.
Families who might be able to lay their anguish and uncertainty to rest are
taunted by these reports, wondering if their loved one is still alive,
abandoned and alone. Since a large portion of the information is classified,
it is impossible for the families to come to their own conclusions as to the
accuracy of the reports.
The fate of the twelve missing men from the gunship lost on June 18, 1972 is
unknown. What is certain is that the governments of Southeast Asia possess
far more knowledge than they have admitted to date. A large percentage of
the nearly 2500 missing Americans CAN be accounted for. There can be no
question that if even one American remains alive in captivity today, we have
a moral and legal obligation to do everything possible to bring him home.
[up1021.94 10/22/94]
UPn
10/21
U.S. MIA remains identified in Vietnam
TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif., Oct. 21 (UPI) -- Air Force officials
announced Friday they have identified the remains of 13 servicemen
killed during the Vietnam War, including 12 who were on the same
aircraft when it was shot down over Vietnam's A Shau Valley in 1972.
Tech. Sgt. Patrick McKenna, an Air Force spokesman, said the remains
of the crew were repatriated in 1993 and then identified by military
pathologists.
The remains of Cmdr. Robert Hessom, a Navy pilot from Bloomsburg, Pa.
, were found earlier this year. The Air Force said Hessom was flying his
A-1H aircraft over the Ha Tinh Province in March 1966 when he was shot
down by ground fire.
Hessom's wingman witnessed the crash and reported there was no sign
of a parachute. However, because of heavy ground fighting in the area,
Hessom's remains were not immediately recovered.
The discovery of the remains of the crew of an AC-130A aircraft
brought back the ironies of war.
The aircraft was on an armed reconnaissance mission in the war's
final days when its No. 3 engine suffered a direct hit by a surface-to-
air missle. A second explosion rocked the plane moments later, throwing
three crewmen free of the craft as it plummeted to the earth.
Those three men survived and were rescused the following day.
Three members of the crew were identified individually. They were
Maj. Gerald F. Ayers, Newcastle, Del.; Capt. Mark Danielson, Aurora,
Colo.; and Senior Master Sgt. Jacob Mercer, Jacksonville, Fla.
Among the nine other members of the crew who were identified only as
a group were two Northern California men -- Tech. Sgt. Donald Klinke,
West Sacramento, Calif., and Tech. Sgt. Richard Nyhof, Fremont, Calif. A
third, Staff Sgt. Stanley Lehrke, was from San Diego.
The others were: Tech. Sgt. Richard Cole, Uniondale, N.Y.; Capt. Paul
Gilbert, Plainview, Tex.; Maj. Robert Harrison, Massapequa Park, N.Y.;
Staff Sgt. Leon Hunt, Pleasure Ridge Park, Ky.; Tech. Sgt. Larry J.
Newman, North Platte, Neb.; and Capt. Robert A. Wilson, Detriot.
All the servicemen had previously been unaccounted for in Indochina.
Their remains will be returned to their families in ceremonies later
this month.
[Distributed through The P.O.W. Network]
[usvd11a.94 11/29/94]
U.S. Veterans Dispatch
November 25, 1994
A Group Burial of Co-Mingled Remains
On October 27, the U.S. Air Force announced they had identified the remains
of 13 servicemen killed during the Vietnam War. including 12 who were on an
AC-130 A shot down over the A Shau Valley on June 18, 1972.
According to a news release from Travis Air Force Base, three of the 12
members of the AC-130 crew (Maj. Gerald F. Ayers, Capt. Mark Danielson and
Senior Master Sgt. Jacob Mercer) had been individually identified and the
nine other crew members (TSGT Richard Cole, Capt. Paul Gilbert Maj. Robert
Harrison, SSGT Leon Hunt, TSGT Donald Klinke. S/SGT Stanley Lehrke, TSGT
Larry Newman, TSGT Richard Nyhof and Capt. Robert Wilson) had been
''identified'' as a group.
On November 17, a group burial of the co-mingled remains of the AC- 130 crew
was held at Arlington National Cemetery. The following is a letter that Ruth
Danielson the mother of Mark Danielson, sent to Secretary of Defense William
Perry, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense James Wold and U.S. Senators
Hank Brown and Ben Campbell prior to the burial.
Editor's Note: Mrs Danielson, who asks that Americans continue to wear
Mark's POW/MIA bracelet and help her fight for an honorable accounting of his
fate, has suffered two heart attacks since the U.S. Government began its
effort to "bury" her son with inconclusive evidence that he is dead In a
related case, although the family of Jacob Mercer accepted the identification
of a back molar as Mercer's tooth, members of the Mercer family have asked
the Last Firebase to continue to distribute his POW/MIA bracelet "just in
case he walks through the door someday."
Ruth C. Danielson
6230 Tuckennan Lane North
Colorado Springs, CO 80918
Nov. 12,1991
I write concerning my son, AF Capt. Mark Giles Danielson, missing since June
18, 1972.
I understand that as part if the Srnith POW/MIA amendment to Clinton's 1995
Defense Authorization Bill, the Secretary of Defense is to submit a
comprehensive list of POW/MIAs to the Congress. Do include Mark's case.
I do believe there is much information that Vietnam and Laos, possibly
Russia. the eastern bloc nations, China and Cuba could add to what my family
has been able to learn of Mark's case. You surely are aware that the bodies
of some returned POWs showed clear evidence of medical work, (skull
surgery), that could only have been done in east European hospitals, not in
SEA battlefield hospitals. As a citizen, I hold our government responsible
for a full accounting of all POW/MIAs and the safe, long overdue return of
the living. As a nation, we cannot afford to bury a handful of unidentified
bone chips and five teeth and think this is the best we could do for the
twelve men from Mark's incident - an their families - who offered their
lives to the service of this once-great nation It would be a sin and a
shame.
As you should be fully aware, Mark was an electronic warfare officer on a
C-130 that was hit over the Laos/Vietnam border. The first coordinated we
were given put the crash in Laos, but that was quickly "corrected" to put
the crash in Viet Nam.
It was well known throughout our military forces in June 1972 that the war
was drawing to a close, and that the North Vietnamese had offered huge
bonuses to anti-aircraft gunners who could shoot down American planes, the
more intact he better, and capture American military personnel. Live
prisoners were the goal!
The three crewmen rescued from this incident all report that well discipline
NVA forces were their targets, and those well disciplined troops were then
the ones coming to find them after the shoot down. They knew they were worth
more alive than dead to the enemy, as well as to us! Their testimony speaks
of several parachutes, beepers, which could allow for and certainly does not
DENY the possibility of other survivors --- otherwise, the other twelve men
would have been declared dead, not missing, from the time of the incident.
Years after the incident, former NSA analyst Jerry Mooney told us, as he has
since testified to Congress, that he had tracked Mark, by name and rank
electronically (radio intercepts?) for at least 48 hours after the shoot
down. He was moved from place to place. Mark certainly had the training to
be among the hundreds of prisoners that Mooney tracked as "Moscow-bound".
Mooney told us which North Vietnamese commander had responsibility for that
area and would have full intelligence reports about the shoot down and
probable capture of Mark and others. We want to know what the NVA records
tell of this incident. Has this man been debriefed. or are those records
available to us?
Was a Bright Light team sent in to search the site? What were its findings?
When Mr. Huey of mortuary affairs showed us photos of the crash site
excavation last May, we asked, "How could "Mark's" teeth be found at the
crash site (no identifiable bones, only teeth), if he had been captured and
moved to another location? Was he executed elsewhere and the remains "salted
back" at the crash site?" Having heard the testimony before the Senate back
in 197? by the North Vietnamese mortician of his preparation of over 400
sets of remains warehoused on a shelf in Hanoi, you can understand why I
think it plausible that the North Vietnamese continue "selling" remains to
their advantage.
After meeting with Mr. Huey, our family began asking our Congressmen last
spring to look into the original, raw data concerning the incident at NSA,
CIA, DIA, etc. including asking Mossad, to either corroborate or deny Jerry
Mooney's information. The same public laws that forbid individuals selling
or giving military secrets to other countries, also ALLOW Senators and
Representatives to examine classified raw data not available to ordinary
citizens. When we had no response from Senator Hank Brown, my daughter, Judy
Willey. at a Retired Officers' luncheon here in Colorado Springs,
hand-delivered him a copy of the letter she had mailed earlier, asking him
to investigate the Mooney information and to get DNA testing of the bone
chips. Brown's response did not even address the issue of Mooney's
information. Hundreds of men, particularly those shot down over Laos, are,
like Mark, affected by our failure to follow up on this.
If the 300 plus bone chips that were being used to "identify" the twelve
missing men were tested for DNA, perhaps some of the twelve families would
indeed know the fate of their loved one. When we first asked Mr. Huey about
DNA testing, we were told it was not possible because the DNA would have to
be checked against the maternal line. I laughed, with a mother, two sisters
and daughter facing him, our family at least would have no trouble meeting
that criteria. Then we were told, no, it would destroy the chips and there
would be nothing to bury. Is it supposed to be a comfort to bury unknown
chips, and still not know what happened to our sons, brothers, fathers?! If
there aren't enough bone chips to test, how can you rationally pretend there
is EVIDENCE of death, for one, let alone twelve? As to the teeth,
many of us are missing molars and pre-molars. Our dentist, among others,
can verify that we get along with replacements in our living mouths.
You in the Senate and the Department of Defense have had far more
information about live prisoners in South east Asia long after 1973 than we
family members have had access to. If it were your son, brother, father,
friend missing, would you accept as little proof as we have had and call
your loved one dead? We know over 600 men were known alive in 1973 and not
returned to us. Who will accomplish their return? When? Is our nation so
greedy for trade that we will sell these men out? We families yearn for our
men, but the greater sorrow, the greater loss, is not our personal one. It
is the shame and loss our nation will bear if it turns its back on these
men, these warriors it asked to serve. Who will be willing to serve such a
shameful nation in the future?
It is not just for Mark, or myself, but also for our nation, that I ask you
to:
1. have a Senator Brown or Campbell examine the NSA, CIA, DIA and all
related files concerning Mark's incident, particularly the SIGINT the two
weeks following the shoot down.
2. insist on DNA testing of the bone chips.
3. obtain and examine records of the NVA unit in the area at the time.
Sincerely,
Ruth C. Danielson
[Distributed through the P.O.W. Network]
=================================
Rocky Mountain News
Waiting for a sign from God
30 years do little to dim a mother's hope her son will come home
By James B. Meadow, News Staff Writer
May 27, 2002
Today, the nation pauses to honor its fallen soldiers. But for one Colorado
family, today -- like the previous 29 Memorial Days -- has a hollow ring.
This is their story. (note: photo at URL above)
COLORADO SPRINGS -- In the pewter twilight, the old woman sits at the
kitchen table and stares at a black-and-white photograph from a long time
ago. From a time before her government had lied to her, before her God had
angered her, before she found out what it was like to endure 30 years of
hell.
"Oh, you darling doll," she says to the photo of a handsome young U.S. Air
Force captain.
Her eyes moisten. "Oh, you doll," she whispers again.
She looks up at a stranger and says, "Do you know half his life has passed?
He left me when he was 29, and he's been gone 30 years. And most people have
forgotten him. They say, 'Oh, that's too bad,' but they don't remember. But
I haven't forgotten him. I've never forgotten him."
Suddenly, at this moment, Ruth Danielson -- 88 years old, legally blind,
virtually deaf, tethered to an oxygen tank because of emphysema, pacemaker
buried in her chest -- sheds decades of emotional and physical erosion. Her
eyes are glittering, her voice is strong, and some of the old
life-sustaining anger is back.
Forget Mark? Her only son? Her pride and joy? Let go of the fierce maternal
faith that he is alive, no matter what the military says?
Never. Never in a million years.
Born to fly, and to serve
When they showed up at her home in Rangely on June 19, 1972, and told her
that Capt. Mark Danielson's plane had been shot down the previous night --
Father's Day -- Ruth knew better.
"Oh, no! No!" she told them. "You're wrong. I just talked to him on the
phone last night. It can't be. Not my kid."
In her distress and confusion, Ruth briefly thought her son was still on the
phone, still reassuring her. The way he had the night before; telling her he
had his orders, his tour of duty was up in a month. He'd be coming home
soon.
He'd be coming home and walking through the front door, jabbering away with
his gift of gab; the kind of person, a sister said, "who walked into a room
and everyone felt better."
He was a Boy Scout. A football player. A member of student council at
Rangely High School. A real gentleman, a Galahad-type who would rush to open
a door for a woman, who had actually gotten into a few fights in college
because he heard some guys cursing in front of a female student.
A kid who rarely got into trouble, who was always focused. Even as a little
boy he had been determined to be a pilot, buzzing around the house, making
airplane noises. He had been born in a military hospital and his mother was
sure "that had marked him."
Even when he couldn't become a pilot, when the Air Force discovered his
night vision wasn't good enough, hadn't he taken that in stride? Hadn't he
come home and shared a beer with his mother and told her that even if he
couldn't be a pilot, he'd be happy "if the big boys let me fly with them"?
Hadn't he then gone on to become a damn fine navigator? Hadn't he become the
kind of no-frills officer enlisted men revere? A captain who didn't mind at
all if his men addressed him as Mark?
No, thought Ruth, her boy wasn't dead. He had survived. He's out there
somewhere, and he'll come home.
Mark's younger sister, Judy, shared her mother's sense of denial and shock.
They'll find him in a few days and it'll be OK, she told herself. She grimly
remembered how, just before her big brother left for Southeast Asia, she
warned him to be careful. He'd tossed off a breezy reply she was used to:
"You can't hurt steel."
Meanwhile, Lea Dickinson, the eldest child, living in Germany, was
devastated. She cried a lot, took long walks in the Bavarian hills and shook
her fists at heaven, demanding answers. But still she believed her brother
was alive.
Rod, Mark's father, an Army counterintelligence officer in World War II,
said little. Ultimately, over the years, his daughters came to believe that,
right from the outset, he had been convinced his only son had died. But he
never said so to Ruth. Nobody did. It was, said a family member, a situation
where "everybody walked on eggshells around her."
Except maybe Cheryl Danielson, Mark's wife. They had married in 1966, when
she was 19. Three years later, she bore him a daughter, Lisa, on whom Mark
doted.
When Mark's plane went down, Cheryl was four months pregnant with their son.
For her, letting go wasn't just therapeutic -- it was vital. A year later,
when the Air Force listed Mark as presumed dead, she accepted it. When she
told Lisa, then 3, that Daddy wouldn't be coming home, the little girl,
overcome with grief and rage, ran into her room and cut a photograph of her
father up into "a hundred pieces."
Cheryl pasted the picture back together. Then she tried to start pasting her
life back together.
But for Ruth and Lea and Judy, the glue that kept their lives from
shattering was a mixture of desperate hope and simmering rage.
Aircraft had eyes of a hawk
On the evening of June 18, 1972, the AC-130A Spectre Gunship was on a
mission over the A Shau Valley in South Vietnam. Along with its 15-man crew,
it carried electronic surveillance equipment so sophisticated that, as
crewmen Gordon Bocher explained, "If you were under a triple canopy jungle,
urinating against a tree, from 10,000 feet up we could see the urine leave
your body, and the only thing you'd have to worry about was how much time
you had to live before we fired at you."
In charge of this equipment was Capt. Mark Danielson, the electronics
warfare officer, manning the "Black Crow" position.
At 2355, a surface-to-air missile blew off the plane's right wing. The
AC-130A went into a tailspin, centrifugal force in excess of a crushing 11
Gs pinned most of the men to the interior of the plane. But four parachutes
were seen before the plane crashed and exploded. Three of the men were soon
rescued.
But who was the fourth?
According to Bocher, as he made his way out of the plane, he noticed the
seat that would have been occupied by Danielson was empty. Bocher didn't
know if the captain had made it out alive, but he knew he'd made it out.
Beyond the mystery of the fourth parachute, there were subsequent reports
that military intelligence had tracked Danielson for 72 hours, monitoring
enemy transmissions that identified him by rank and name, and indicated he
was being moved to different prisoner-of-war camps. But after that, nothing
more was heard.
Back home, these snippets were enough to sustain the faith of Ruth, Lea and
Judy that Mark was not dead. That, plus hints from friends in the
intelligence community telling them they had every reason to keep on hoping.
True, as Lea admitted, "We hated the idea that he was in captivity." But
nevertheless, "We were thrilled and excited at the prospect that he was in
captivity and still alive."
But then the POWs started coming home, and Mark wasn't among them. Then the
war was over, and still Mark wasn't home. Why?
The U.S. government said he was dead. But the Danielsons had heard rumors
that some captured U.S. servicemen were sent to Russia, North Vietnam's
ally. Some were reportedly forced to teach English and American culture to
Soviet spies. Others were coerced into assisting the Russian military.
"Look, I don't want to speculate about what happened to Mark (the night the
plane went down)," Bocher said. "But I'll tell you this: Of all the guys on
the crew, he would be the first one the enemy would want. He knew all about
the Black Crow, and the Soviets would be very interested in learning what
our systems could do."
But, to the chagrin of Ruth and her daughters, their government seemed
dismissive of the idea that any American soldiers were being held in Russia,
skeptical of Mark's chances of survival -- and impotent at trying to gain
the release of an estimated 2,000-plus POWs and MIAs, 39 of them from
Colorado.
Ruth didn't know why her government insisted her son was dead. All she knew
was, "They just kept lying to us about Mark."
So they turned elsewhere. They joined organizations designed to keep the
POWs and MIAs in the public consciousness, groups like The Live POW
Committee and Task Force Omega Inc. and the POW-MIA Coalition of Colorado.
According to Vietnam veteran and Omega mainstay Dennis McCormack, "Ruth has
been the matriarch of our organization for a long time."
Other organizations were drawn to her, like a local Harley Davidson group
who made her an honorary member. At one rally, to the delight of everyone,
Ruth dubbed herself, "Hag of the hogs."
Meanwhile, Lea and Judy were immersed in their brother's cause. Judy
organized a POW symposium at Colorado State University, attended by 800. She
and Lea were always juggling their families' schedules in order to attend
rallies; their kids were weaned on protests.
"The United States government is embarrassed because it can't account for
all those men," was the verdict of Rod Utech, president of the POW-MIA
Coalition of Colorado, and a man who, like the Danielsons, refused to accept
Mark's death. Who, like the Danielsons, resolved to wear a bracelet with
Mark's name on it in remembrance.
"Insisting on Mark's death just makes things tidy for the government,"
McCormack said.
"I don't believe Mark's dead," said Sidney Terry, a gunner who was bumped
from Danielson's flight that fateful night and a walking encyclopedia of
facts and theories about POWs and MIAs. "He's in Russia, just as much as I'm
in Kansas -- and he's alive."
Ruth, convinced the government wasn't telling her the truth, felt "terribly
shot down." Then, in 1988, Rod died of a heart attack and that was another
dagger. "My husband was patriotic as you could be, but the government let
him down, too. They lied to us, and that really hurts."
But it wasn't just the government that angered Ruth.
From the start, "I'd asked God for some sign. Poke me in the back, give me a
flashing light, let me know." If Mark were dead, God would let her know --
she was sure of that. And when God gave no sign, she took that as a reason
to keep hoping.
But as one year melted into another and her boy's fate remained a mystery,
Ruth could feel her soul begin to boil. "After so many years of praying
hard, I got mad at God."
By now, her feelings toward Cheryl weren't so warm, either.
It wasn't that Cheryl had remarried and become a successful real estate
broker.
"Every person in the family had to do what they had to do, and what Cheryl
had to do for herself and her children was get on with her life, and that's
OK," Judy said. "But at that point, I couldn't do it, we couldn't do it."
Lea recognized that, too: "I'm his sister, and I'll always be his sister. So
will Judy. And Mom will always be his mom. But we aren't always wives
forever."
Mark's sisters and mother were always grateful that Cheryl never severed the
family's ties to Lisa and Mark Jr., even as she remarried and moved to Estes
Park. And when Cheryl divorced and then married a third time and wound up in
Virginia, the bonds with the children remained strong.
But Cheryl's ability -- her need -- to bury Mark and move on did, in the
words of Judy, "definitely create differences in the family."
"Mark's disappearance took a toll on everybody in the family," said Lea. "It
took a toll on the children who were born afterwards and didn't even know
him. But they did know that the whole family dynamics were skewed because of
the pain."
The "differences" created a tug on Lisa, who would remember, "On one side,
there was Mom, saying, 'We have to move on,' and on the other, there's my
grandma. Not exactly pressuring me or my brother, but definitely wanting the
dream to be kept alive."
Treading ever-so-lightly on those eggshells, Lisa was the dutiful
grandchild, never openly doubting her grandmother's conviction that her
father was alive. When she was 14, at Ruth's request, she wrote a letter to
President Reagan, requesting he investigate her father's disappearance. That
tore at Lisa because, "Writing that letter made me want to believe he was
alive even more."
And she always wanted to believe. Sweet 16, high school graduation, college
graduation, marriage and the changing of her surname to Corboy, the birth of
her children -- there were so many moments she wished her father were there.
If it was hard on Lisa not having a father, it was doubly difficult for his
namesake. Mark Jr. was a handful: He was frequently in trouble at school. He
ran away from home. And, once he joined the Coast Guard, he served a
20-month term in the brig for going AWOL.
Meanwhile, from the house in Colorado Springs that she and Rod had chosen
for their retirement, Ruth kept waiting for something that would let her
know, once and for all, if her son was alive or dead.
In 1992, a sign came to her from, of all people, Russian President Boris
Yeltsin. A Russian commission looking into the prospect of Vietnam vets
being held in Russia found it was "very possible that there are a few of
them still left alive, even on our own territory."
This news catapulted Ruth's hopes to delirious heights. Then, two years
later, those hopes were yanked back to earth.
'We don't care about bones'
The word came in March. The year before, there had been an excavation at the
site where Mark's plane had gone down. The remains that had been exhumed
were examined by military forensic experts. The family was to convene at
Judy's house in Fort Collins, where a government representative would
explain all.
On April 29, 1994 -- what would have been Mark's 51st birthday -- Ruth, Lea,
Judy and Lisa were presented with a thick blue three-ring binder. On the
cover was printed "Search and Recover / Refno 1879, Thua Thien-Hue Province,
Socialist Republic of Vietnam." Inside were charts and photos of the crash
site, a narrative explaining the search procedures -- and photos of 350 bone
chips, the longest of which was little more than an inch long.
The bone chips, said the government, represented the remains of the 12 men
who had gone down 22 years before. The government also had recovered five
teeth, two of which they said were Mark's.
Ruth, Judy and Lea couldn't believe it. This handful of bone chips, this
paltry number of teeth -- all found after more than two decades of monsoons
and mudslides -- this was proof positive to the government of Mark's death?
What about the rumors that similar sites had been salted with bones and
teeth and bogus dog tags because these excavations were a cash cow for the
anemic Vietnamese economy?
What about DNA testing? Had the government done that? We need to have the
maternal line to do that, they were told. The women stared in disbelief.
"I'm his mother, these are his sisters, that's his daughter -- how maternal
can you get?" asked Ruth.
The government rep then said that DNA testing wasn't done any more. And,
anyway, even if it were, the testing would destroy the bones and then "you
won't have anything left to bury."
That's when Lea, in her own words, "blew my stack."
"This guy was saying we should be grateful for this handful of bones. I
said, 'We don't care about bones. We care about the truth. Not something
that is possibly the truth, but the absolute truth.' "
Even when the government allowed a local forensic anthropologist to examine
the two teeth, and he concluded the teeth were Mark's, Ruth and her
daughters were unconvinced.
"We weren't sure those teeth were at the excavation site, or whether they
were salted back into the site later on," argued Lea.
The meeting ended badly, tension and anger filling the room. Two months
later, Ruth suffered a massive heart attack. She was in the hospital for 2
1/2 months; ultimately, her heart would only work at 12 percent of normal
capacity. Her daughters were convinced their mother's heart attack was
directly related to the stress produced by the meeting.
On Nov. 17, there was a memorial service for Mark Danielson and his 11 mates
at Arlington National Cemetery in Washington, D.C. It was a stirring
ceremony, replete with a 21-gun salute and the slow, thunderous overhead
flight of an AC-130A gunship. In attendance were Danielson's widow and his
two children.
Afterward, Cheryl said, "For me, putting those remains in the ground at
Arlington means completion and a certain kind of peace."
But for his mother and two sisters -- who didn't attend -- the ceremony was
more shameful than honorable.
"No, I didn't go to the burial, or whatever it was," Ruth explained. "I
didn't go because I didn't believe the government. If I were to go I would
be giving my blessing to a damn lie, wouldn't I?"
Three years later, she was giving vent to her anger at yet another betrayal.
In 1997, President Clinton normalized relations with Vietnam. To Ruth --
still grasping at the hope that Mark might still be a prisoner there -- it
was an act of colossal treachery, a sign that something was terribly wrong.
So she went out to the flagpole in her front yard and turned the American
flag upside down, the international symbol of distress.
Some neighbors were confused. Some were irate. For those who knocked on
their door -- including two police officers -- Ruth and Lea explained their
motives. Most went away in sympathy, if not approval. Then, a year later, in
the dead of night, someone cut down the flag.
Awaiting a tap on the shoulder
More sad than angry, Ruth Danielson shakes her head at the memory. It's just
one more painful episode in her 30-year quest for the truth.
"You wanna know what it's been like?" she says, her voice just above a
whisper. "It's hell."
She excuses herself to go to her room. When she returns, she apologizes for
taking so long. "I don't move so good anymore," she says. When Lea, who
lives with and cares for Ruth, explains her mother's litany of health
problems, Ruth cracks, "I kinda went downhill, didn't I?"
Yet she's still waiting restlessly for a sign. And, if you ask some people,
one of the reasons she's still alive is because her determination has
sustained her.
"She still believes my father is still alive," says Lisa, "and, God help
her, if that's what helps to keep her alive, then I say, 'Think what you
want to think.' I want her with us as long as possible."
Still, Lisa, now 32 and living in Louisville, acknowledges, "Part of her
drive to keep going every day is because she wants to find an answer. But if
she finds an answer she doesn't agree with, she'll discard it.
"I think my aunts will have closure one day, but it won't be until my
grandmother's not with us any more."
Both Lea, 61, and Judy, 54, now tap-dance around the issue, not wanting to
say publicly whether they believe their brother is dead or alive.
Instead, Lea says, "Closure? I don't want closure. I don't need closure. I
need truth. Whether that's good news or bad news, I want it."
Across the table from her, Ruth shakes her head and says, "Closure. I hate
that word."
But she is not a woman given to hate.
"I have some good news for you. Two weeks ago, I told Lea, 'I'm not mad at
God anymore.'
"But now, let's have him decide he's not mad at me anymore. Let him come to
me in a dream, tap me on the shoulder. Let a voice come out of the wall and
say, 'Ruth, you can put him down. You'll see him when you get to heaven.' "
Then she looks up.
She is smiling as she picks up that black-and-white photograph she can
scarcely see. The photograph of a handsome young Air Force captain whose
mother will wait forever for his return.
Contact James B. Meadow at (303) 892-2606 or meadowj@RockyMountainNews.com
============================================
Another POW/MIA Mother has found the answers.
It is my sad duty to report that Ruth Danielson, mother of Capt. Mark G.
Danielson, USAF passed away today, July 15, 2002. Members of her family
were with her at the time. Ruth was 88.
Mark was the electronic warfare officer aboard an AC-130A gunship that was
shot down near the A Shau Valley, June 18, 1972. He was tracked for 48
hours afterward by analysts at NSA as he was being moved from location to
location. In May, 1994, a crash site investigation turned up 300 bone
fragments and five teeth, two of which were identified as Mark's.
Although Ruth refused to accept these remains as sufficient evidence of
death, on November 17, 1994, a group burial of co-mingled remains was held
at Arlington National Cemetery. Ruth insisted that we all continue to wear
Mark's bracelet. Although in poor health for the last few months, she never
gave up hope that her son would return. As recently as Memorial Day, she
was interviewed in the Rocky Mountain News about her faith and Mark's story.
She was an adopted mother to all of us, especially here in Colorado. Ruth
was an active member of Task Force Omega-Colorado and a favorite when Run
For The Wall came through headed for Rolling Thunder. She was active in the
pursuit for the truth about Mark and all missing men and women for over
thirty years.
One of my fondest memories of her was our first meeting. Years ago, we were
at a dinner honoring Eugene "Red" McDaniel and I was seated next to this
sweet little lady. As I placed my hand on the table I noticed her glance at
the bracelet on my wrist. She leaned and whispered in my ear, "Thanks for
wearing my son's bracelet". Ironically, we had just moved to Colorado and
his bracelet was the first one I ever wore.
Details for any services have not been announced at this time. I will
forward this information as it becomes available.
Rod Utech
303-278-2628
"Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of
chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God!" Patrick Henry, 1775
========================
Rocky Mountain News
Devoted mother never lost hope
By James B. Meadow, Rocky Mountain News
July 23, 2002
It took Ruth Danielson 30 years to forgive God, but the U.S. government was
never given the same courtesy.
Mrs. Danielson, 88, died July 15, more than 30 years after her only son,
U.S. Air Force Capt. Mark Danielson was reported missing in action in
Vietnam.
The government later ruled her son was killed in action, but Mrs. Danielson
never believed there was irrefutable proof and spent three decades holding
steadfast to the belief that somehow, somewhere, her boy was a prisoner of
war.
If only God would give her a sign, "a poke in the back, a flashing light,"
she said many times, she would have been willing to believe her child was
dead. But after years of prayer and still no sign, she admitted "I got mad
at God."
She retreated from her Catholic faith and focused her energy on helping
organizations dedicated to keeping prisoners of war and MIAs in the public
consciousness.
Despite her anguish and what her youngest daughter, Judy Danielson, called
"a feisty, go-getter attitude," Ruth never surrendered to bitterness.
Her prominence as a force for POWs and MIAs led a local motorcycle group to
make her an honorary member and give her a ride on the back of a
Harley-Davidson. In thanking the group, Mrs. Danielson declared, "In my
youth I aspired to be the belle of the ball, but now I am thrilled to be the
hag of the hogs."
Ruth Collette Keefe was born March 6, 1914, in New Rockford, N.D., a town
that, daughter Lea Dickinson said, "was small when she grew up there and
isn't much bigger today.''
In 1937, she married Rod Danielson. Eventually, the couple and their three
children moved to Rangely. After her husband retired from the oil business
in 1978, the couple settled in Colorado Springs.
A memorial service was July 19, with burial at Fort Logan National Cemetery.
Besides her two daughters, Mrs. Danielson is survived by sister Pat Hanson,
nine grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.
==============================
Sent: Sunday, October 12, 2003 1:21 PM
Subject: MARK DANIELSON TO BE RE-BURIED
THERE IS AN ARTICLE IN TODAYS DENVER POST ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS THAT STATES
THE REMAINS OF CAPT. MARK DANIELSON MIA 18 JUNE 1972 WILL BE LAID TO REST
WITH HIS MOM AND DAD AT FT. LOGAN NATIONAL CEMETARY NEXT SATURDAY HERE IN
DENVER. THE FUNERAL PROCESSION WILL LEAVE FROM HORAN & MCCONATY AT 3101 S
WADSWORTH BLVD AT 8:30 AM. THERE WILL BE A FLY OVER BY THE 120TH FIGHTER
WING. PLEASE LET ROD UTECH KNOW OF THIS SO HE CAN GET IT ON HIS SHOW TODAY.
I DO NOT HAVE HIS PHONE OR E-MAIL ADDRESS. IF YOU DO PLEASE E-MAIL ME AND I
WILL GIVE HIM THE INFO.
REGARDS
ROCK
========================
A man's death, a family's pain
31 years after airman's plane shot down in Vietnam, closure slow to come
By Claire Martin
Denver Post Staff Writer
Sunday, October 12, 2003 - Exactly 31 years and four months after he was
shot down in Vietnam, Capt. Mark Giles Danielson will be formally laid to
rest Saturday in Fort Logan National Cemetery.
Danielson was 29 on June 18, 1972, the day that a surface-to-air missile hit
the AC-130A gunship that was carrying him and 13 others over Vietnam's A
Shau Valley.
Three of the men were blown out of the plane and managed to deploy their
parachutes and drift to safety. Centrifugal force from the spinning fuselage
pinned Danielson and the others still inside the aircraft, according to
Staff Sgt. William Patterson, one of the survivors.
According to the witnesses flying on the same mission, and to the official
Air Force report, the plane lost its right wing and tail in an explosion,
burst into flames and exploded before it hit the ground. The three survivors
were rescued the next day.
Danielson was 6 feet tall and husky, with a clear, level-eyed gaze. He had
longed to fly since he was a boy in Rangely in northwestern Colorado. He
lifted his eyes above the dry washes and rugged mesas, dreaming about
flying. Years after his plane was shot down, his mother, Ruth Danielson,
still enjoyed showing visitors how a young Mark pretended to fly, whirling
his arms like propeller blades.
He idolized his father, Rod Danielson, who served as an Army intelligence
officer during World War II. After graduating from high school, Mark
Danielson trained in Sacramento, Calif., as an electronics warfare officer
specializing in jamming enemy missile tracking. (Impaired depth perception
prevented him from becoming a pilot.)
He graduated in 1966 with a degree in journalism from the University of
Northern Colorado and got married. Mark and Cheryl Danielson's daughter,
Lisa, was born in 1969.
A year and a half later, shortly after Cheryl Danielson became pregnant with
their second child, Danielson reported for active duty at an air base in
northeast Thailand.
He was confident and optimistic. The day before his plane went down, he
called his mother to reiterate his promise that he would come home again.
("You can't hurt steel," Danielson had reassured his worried sister, Judy,
when they said goodbye before his deployment.)
Hours after the plane went down, the Air Force chaplain and sergeant stood
at Cheryl Danielson's door in Aurora, bracing themselves to tell his
pregnant wife and almost 3-year-old daughter that their husband and father
was missing in action.
Nearly a year later, on June 15, 1973, the military announced that Mark
Danielson had been reclassified as killed in action.
Ruth Danielson refused to accept that.
For years, she told grandchildren Lisa and Mark Jr., who was born six months
after his father's plane went down, that their father would come home
someday. Despite the 1994 findings of the Armed Forces Review Board, which
positively identified two teeth as Danielson's, Ruth was certain that her
son was alive. She died cherishing that belief.
Cheryl Danielson accepted the news that her husband was dead. Although she
remarried, she took Lisa and Mark Jr. on frequent visits to their paternal
grandparents and aunts. The children often felt confused at the disparity
between what their mother told them - that their father would never return -
and what their grandparents and aunts believed.
On Oct. 6, 1993, when both children were in their 20s, the Socialist
Republic of Vietnam returned their father's remains, along with the remains
of others who died when the plane went down.
After genetic tests, Danielson's remains were buried with those of the 11
other crewmen in a 21-gun- salute ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery in
November 1994. His widow and children attended the Arlington ceremony, but
his mother and two sisters refused to go.
"Two teeth isn't his body," sister Judy Willey said at the time in a People
magazine article. "When you hear 'remains,' you're thinking a skull and arms
and legs. You're not picturing two teeth in a box."
About two months ago, an officer with the Air Force office of casualty
affairs called Lisa Danielson Corboy, asking what she wanted to do about the
rest of her father's remains.
"I hadn't pushed the issue before, out of respect for my grandmother,"
Corboy said.
Ruth Danielson died last year and is buried with her husband in Fort Logan
National Cemetery. Corboy decided that her father belonged there with his
parents, and she arranged plans for a final burial. Her aunts, she said,
seemed relieved at the prospect for closure.
A police-escorted motorcade leading the burial procession will begin at 8:30
a.m. Saturday at Horan & McConaty, 3101 S. Wadsworth Blvd. War veterans are
welcome to join the motorcade and procession. The 120th Fighter Wing will
perform a flyover at the burial.
Survivors include widow Cheryl Danielson Bush of Commerce City; a daughter,
Lisa Danielson Corboy of Loveland; a son, Mark G. Danielson Jr. of Los
Angeles; and two sisters, Lea Danielson Dickinson of Colorado Springs and
Judy Danielson of Fort Collins.