HERTZ, GUSTAV CRANE

11/2005
Family states Middle Name is CRANE, not Grane as noted in records and news
articles.

Remains Returned. I.D. announced 03/16/01

Name: Gustav Grane Hertz (name as in records)
Rank/Branch: U.S. Civilian
Unit:
Date of Birth: 10 May 1918
Home City of Record:
Date of Loss: 02 February 1965
Country of Loss: South Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 105051N 1064631E (XS940996)
Status (in 1973): Killed in Captivity
Category: 1
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: Honda

Other Personnel in Incident: (none missing)

Source: Compiled by Homecoming II Project 01 April 1990 with the assistance of
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 May 1997.

REMARKS: 670924 DIC - ON PRG LIST

SYNOPSIS: Gustav G. Hertz was a U.S. civilian working in Southeast Asia. On
February 2, 1965, Hertz was riding a Honda motorbike about 5 miles northeast of
Saigon near Thu Duc when he was captured by the Viet Cong. Hertz spent the next
2 1/2 years as a prisoner of war.

On June 15, 1967, the Viet Cong Liberation Radio, broadcasting from Hanoi,
announced that Gustav Hertz had paid his "blood debt to the Vietnamese people."
Hertz, according to the report, had been executed.

When 591 American prisoners were released by the Vietnamese in the spring of
1973, the Vietnamese supplied a list to the U.S. of those captives who had died
in captivity. Gustav Hertz name was on the list, and the Viet Cong stated that
he had died on September 24, 1967. (Note the unexplained date-of-death
descrepancy.)

Through the years following the war, the U.S. has held tentative talks and
meetings with the Vietnamese on many issues, including that of resolving the
POW/MIA issue. In the face of nearly 10,000 reports relating to Americans
missing in Southeast Asia to date, it doubtless has been difficult to keep a
politely diplomatic attitude in these dealings. The result of recent series of
talks has yielded over 300 sets of American remains. Few of these have been
identified thus far.

Critics of U.S. Government efforts complain that U.S. efforts are not adequate.
They fear normalization with Vietnam before the POW/MIA issue is fully
resolved. Most of all, they fear that hundreds of Americans are still alive in
Southeast Asian prisons, and that these men will be abandoned in diplomatic
expediency.

Gustav Hertz was not a soldier ordered to Southeast Asia by the military.
Indeed, public records do not state his occupation or reason for being in
Vietnam at all. Information on civilians is difficult to get. But Gustav Hertz
is an American citizen, and his government has an obligation to him to see that
he is returned -- dead or alive. It's time we brought our men home.

The book "Pacific Stars and Stripes, VIETNAM Front Pages" published in 1986
states:

Five-Star Edition
Vol. 21, No. 98
Fraiday, April 9, 1965

U.S. Aide Faces Death, VC Warn

Toyko (AP) -- The communist Viet Cong warned Wednesday that a high-ranking
American civilian captured in Saigon two months ago will be shot if Republic
of Vietnam authorities execute one of its men.....

==================================
Last Friday, March 16, 2001, the Department of Defense informed the League
that the remains of one American, listed as  KIA/BNR in North Vietnam since
August 30, 1967, had been identified and returned to his family.  The
remains were jointly recovered on August 4, 1993 and accepted by the NOK as
identified on October 21st of last year. DOD has not yet announced the name
of this Navy officer from Wisconsin.  The remains of Warrant officer 2nd
Class Howard B. Comer, missing since November 24th, 1969, were turned over
to US officials on December 14, 1993, during joint field operations in South
Vietnam. Remains of the third, also US Army, were jointly recovered and
repatriated June 27, 2000, but his name was not publicly announced at the
request of his family. The fourth American, Mr. Gustav G. Hertz, was a
civilian employee of the US Government.  Now identified, his remains were
unilaterally repatriated by the government of Vietnam in 1989. The
accounting for these four Americans brings the number still missing and
unaccounted for in Vietnam to 1493; 418 in Laos, 67 in Cambodia and 8 in the
territorial waters of the PRC. Over 90% of the 1,986 Americans still missing
and unaccounted for from the Vietnam War were lost in areas under Vietnam's
wartime control.

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01/2020

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