Conv-Two MP's Killed

From: Rick Frederickson

Dated: January 4, 2015
Subject: Two MPs Killed in Saigon

Jim A. thanks for the expanded story on the two murdered MPs. I was there soon afterwards and it has been a haunting memory for me ever since. That night, I must have been doing the late radio news shift---had been in Vietnam just two months. One of our people had driven me back to the Plaza BEQ in an AFVN vehicle. There may have been another late shift person dropped off with me, I can't remember for sure. The Plaza was across the street, almost, from the Ivory Tower. As we pulled up to the hotel and saw the crime scene, we slowed down and stopped. The ground level of the Ivory Tower had a wide open front entrance and I could see an MP sprawled on the stairs leading up to the second floor. Although it was after curfew, I had my press card out, and asked a few questions. I learned there was a second MP that had been killed. I just stood there for a few minutes and observed before moving on. I knew the wires would have the story. I was a teenager and remember it as a shocking experience, and just so sudden; being dropped off at my hotel in front of a double slaying. Saigon was a wartime capital city, and such an exciting, though tragic, place.

Two MPs Killed Near Plaza BEQ

January 2015

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From: Jim Anderson

Dated: January 4, 2015

Subject: Two MPs Killed in Saigon

Midnight in a Dangerous Place
Sometime after 11pm on June 30, 1969, a call came into the 716th Military Police Battalion about a disturbance involving an American soldier at a downtown Saigon bar. The bar in question, the Ivory Tower (Tour d'Ivoire), was situated on an intersection near the busy central market. Inside the establishment, a winding staircase led past a second floor restaurant and up to a third floor room that held a dance floor, tables, and a small bar. Just before midnight, a Jeep carrying three American MPs and a Vietnamese civilian capital policeman pulled up in front of the nightclub. Leaving one MP to monitor the radio, the other two Americans, along with their Vietnamese counterpart, entered the building to assess the situation, just as MPs had done countless times during their years of service in the city of Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam.
On that night, however, something went terribly wrong. After a few minutes, the sound of gunfire erupted from within. When the shooting was over, the true horror of it all was clear. Sometime before midnight June 30, Sgt. Eugene T. Cox, 21, of Jackson Heights, N.Y., and Pfc. James H. Workman, 21, of Beaver Falls, Pa., both lay dead, Cox in a pool of blood at the foot of the stairs and Workman in the third floor bar. Both soldiers were within a month of completing their tour of duty in Vietnam.
"In any other city, it would have been just another barroom shooting, just another exhausting piece of police work. But the city is Saigon, the dead are two American military policemen, the chief suspect is a much-decorated Vietnamese officer, the investigators are temporarily baffled and ugly rumors run rampant.” (1) With those words, the Pacific Stars and Stripes (the principal newspaper for American soldiers serving in the Pacific Theater of Operations) began its report on the shootings at the Ivory Tower. This was the first chapter of a troublesome story that played itself out slowly like a stubborn ground fire, just when you thought the fire was contained it would flare up anew. Indeed, those embers still burn today in the hearts of the families and friends of Cox and Workman, embers of anger over the deaths of two young American soldiers and dissatisfaction with the events that followed.
And as is usually the case, time and place played a major role in shaping what happened that night in the Ivory Tower bar and in the weeks that followed.

Saigon

Saigon was, at the end of 1968, unlike any other city on the planet. Wars had ravaged the country and its people for decades, and the movement of armed forces and material on the crowded boulevards of the great city was a common sight. The Tet Offensive of 1968 remained fresh in the memories of soldier and civilian alike, and the terror of those battles on the streets of Saigon remained vivid in the minds of the people who had so recently lived through them.
In those years, although it was impossible to assign an accurate number, Saigon boasted a population density that rivaled any city in the world. Indeed, the city was jammed with an oleo of inhabitants, from long-term residents to the dramatic influx of strangers, from the politically connected business leaders to the poor and numerous lower classes, from Vietnamese soldiers and their families to the growing number of refugees in from the countryside seeking shelter from the horror of war. The American presence was at its apex. Added to this mix were the deserters and AWOL soldiers of the South Vietnamese and American Armies, beggars, tailors and tradesmen of every nationality, indigenous French, and more dogs than you could count. Saigon was home to a large ethnic Chinese population, as well as a complex stew of various other Asian ethnic groups that included a myriad of orphaned youths, all of whom were competing for existence in a pitiless environment where life was cheap and official corruption rampant. People filled the buildings, alleyways and shantytowns, lived in cardboard boxes on sidewalks, slept in every type of boat on every canal and waterway, and populated any available bit of shelter such as the dry land beneath small bridges and docks.
My tour of duty in Vietnam began on June 25, 1969. I was an Army PFC, fresh from Intelligence Analyst training at Fort Holabird, Maryland when I processed through Long Binh and found myself assigned to the Capital Military Assistance Command (CMAC), formerly Advisory Team 100, headquartered in Saigon. I arrived at the unit on June 28, two days before the shooting at the Ivory Tower bar. The unit's mission was to work with our Vietnamese counterparts and target the various enemy commando detachments, also known as sappers, which planned attacks against Saigon. We also coordinated and collected all intelligence that related to the city and its environs.
The city of Saigon sat at the center of a circular group of surrounding provinces, around which spread the III Corps area of operations, stretching from the South China Sea in the east to Cambodia in the west, from the central highlands of II Corps in the north down to IV Corp and the delta operations in the south. Dangerous terrain was never far away, due west was part of Cambodia that bulged out into South Vietnam, less than forty miles from Saigon, and home to places with lethal names like the Parrot's Beak and the Angel's Wing. The HoBo Woods and the Michelin rubber plantation had seen fierce battles over the years. During my tour in-country I traveled to many locales in the greater III Corps area of operations surrounding Saigon and visited with many US and Vietnamese military units; I also came to know the great city intimately.
Saigon had a split personality and a face for each, and by the time I left Vietnam in June of 1970, I had learned to recognize both. One face was the Saigon that the American Command championed, the Paris of the Orient with broad tree-lined boulevards, great city of a gallant partner in the war against communism. The other Saigon, the one you read about between the lines, was swollen with a scarred and war-weary populace, bloated and rotten to the core, where corruption in the Vietnamese Government ran downhill through the entire country from the highest office to the lowliest clerk.
Saigon had a lot of money circulating through the system in those years, not all of it legal. Global professionals from many nations came through the city: engineers, construction firms, photojournalists, print media superstars, news organizations, television crews, thrill seekers, and mercenaries all called Saigon home at one time or another. Joining them were the local denizens from the underbelly of society, the Vietnamese drug dealers, pimps, prostitutes, gamblers, black-market hustlers of every conceivable commodity, and money changers, all of whom plied the streets in search of their fortunes. Also on the streets were soldiers, both American and South Vietnamese, searching for a good time, many only hours removed from some unimaginable combat hellhole out in the bush and they were determined to find as much excitement in the joy of being alive as time would allow.
When all of these ingredients came together, Saigon became a living and breathing organism that existed on its own set of rules and dispensed its own brand of justice. The city possessed an appetite of its own and depending on your appetites, Saigon could devour you at anytime. No matter how careful you were, it was easy to stumble into a bad situation, the proverbial wrong place at the wrong time. And if you found yourself in such a position, the shiny black helmet of an American MP was a welcome sight indeed. Saigon was a dangerous place, and in light of the violence and hatred seen in the world today, one can easily forget how rough a place Saigon really was in the late sixties.

The 716th Military Police Battalion

In a metropolis like Saigon, a port city on the Saigon River some 35 miles upstream to the northwest from the South China Sea, a mission such as the one assigned to the 716th MP Battalion proved challenging to accomplish. The battalion arrived in Vietnam in March of 1965 and remained stationed in the Saigon-Tan Son Nhut area for the duration of its time in-country, serving until the unit departed South Vietnam in March of 1973. During those years, the battalion's mission included "the enforcement of military law, order and regulations; to control traffic and stragglers, circulation of individuals and protection of property; to handle prisoners of war; to operate checkpoints and route security; and to fight as infantry as required." (2)
The 716th made a name for itself during the early hours of the Tet Offensive in 1968, when the situation in Vietnam seemed critical as cities and military installations throughout the country found themselves under attack by units of the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) and Viet Cong (VC) guerilla fighters. Nowhere did things look as bad as did the situation in the city of Saigon: the embassy itself was under attack and battles raged around the Tan Son Nhut airbase, the Newport Bridge, and the Cholon area of the city. In the film footage and photographic record that captured the history and intensity of the battle, a common sight is the glossy helmet of an American MP from the 716th. Many credit the battalion's response as being instrumental in stemming the attack and preventing a determined enemy from making wider gains during the critical first hours of the battle. During the second Communist offensive in May of 1968, the unit once again found itself engaged with a resolute foe that, for political and psychological reasons, was eager to bring the fight to the streets of Saigon, a foe willing to pay in blood for the headlines that appeared in newspapers around the world.
This was the post-Tet Saigon of 1968 and 1969, the Saigon where the 716th MP Battalion deployed its forces and carried out its mission.

Young Men in Uniform

James Workman was born on September 17, 1948 in Girard, Ohio, the son of Dock and Nettie Workman. Many called Dock a true cowboy; he was an accomplished guitar player and he loved to rodeo. The family included nine children and all of them were attracted to music. Sadly, though, Dock had a problem dealing with personal and medical issues after World War II; he had frequent nightmares and went in and out of VA hospitals. James's mother, Nettie, was very poor, and Jim spent a good part of his childhood with his aunt and uncle, John and Gay Nuskievicz. Gay was Dock's sister. Occasionally, feuds would erupt over Jim and one time the Nuskievicz returned him to Nettie who lived out of state, only to have Jim run away and hitchhike back to Pennsylvania. When Jim turned 14, he could speak to the court for himself about where he wanted to live. A local attorney, R. Clifton Hood, represented John and Gay during custody hearings and this attorney became a friend to the family, serving them loyally over the years. The courts granted John and Gay Nuskievicz custody of James and they became his fulltime foster parents. Carolyn Shadd, Jim's cousin, said that, "Aunt Gay and Uncle Johnnie worshipped the ground James walked on and he wanted for nothing" when he was with them. James graduated from High School in 1966 and enlisted in the Army in July of 1967.
Larry DeFuria met Jim Workman at the US Army Military Police School at Fort Gordon in Georgia in 1967. Larry, a current resident of Pompano Beach in Florida, recalled how they enjoyed a unique personal bond and became immediate fast friends. Larry and Jim endured the hard times of training together and shared many laughs along the way. Once they had a weekend pass and went to Augusta where they planned to visit several popular night clubs that featured live music played by up and coming rock bands. But they were not yet twenty-one years of age so the bouncers working the doors of those clubs did not let them enter. Later, they paid a stranger to purchase them a six-pack of beer and spent that Saturday night together in the bus station drinking from cans cloaked in paper bags, telling stories about where they were from and where they saw the future taking them.
They ended up in Korea together, arriving around the time that the North Koreans had attacked and seized the US Navy ship, the USS Pueblo. Assigned to the 249th MP detachment, they worked at the main stockade for the American Eighth Army in ASCOM. The duty assignment was rough and stressful, and they celebrated their free time together by exploring the bars and alleyways of the ville, experiencing firsthand the time honored pastimes sought by most soldiers stationed in distant and exotic locales. In May of 1968, Jim received a transfer to the 716th MP BN in Vietnam. Larry felt sure that he would soon follow but the Army had other plans for him. The two soldiers and friends found themselves separated now, forging separate careers in the Army on their own.

Night in Saigon

Some of the older soldiers I knew had served as military advisers in South Vietnam during the early 1960's, and they spoke warmly and wistfully about the Saigon of those years. Yes, some degree of corruption existed in government but that seemed to be the rule in the poor countries of Southeast Asia. The countryside was unspoiled, the pace of life was slow, the Vietnamese treated the Americans with warmth and friendship, and we repaid the Vietnamese in kind. A dead American combat soldier was not yet a common occurrence. After the Tet Offensive, the days of warmth and grace between the allies were over, replaced by a sense of foreboding and toleration at best, of mutual mistrust and dislike at worst. Unchecked political power and the destructive and corrupting influence of the war had removed all sense of honesty from the civilian government. American politicians were already talking about Vietnamization and many of the South Vietnamese leaders, as well as those in the military, probably knew in their hearts what that really meant for the future of their country.
There was a time in Vietnam where you could go into a bar and buy a Saigon Tea, the price of which allowed you to sit down and chat with a bar hostess. Or you could go to a hall and purchase tickets to dance with a Vietnamese girl. But that was then, the bar scene of Saigon after Tet had gone beyond cliché to some strange film noir caricature as some Vietnamese women attempted to act as the loose floozies seen in any number of American gangster films, sometimes with comical results. One night, as I enjoyed a drink with my commanding officer at a rooftop function held above an officer's billet, a Vietnamese bar girl sat on my lap and said in broken English, "My name's Baby-doll, what's yours?" That was a hard question to answer while maintaining a straight face at the same time.
Yet not every female working in a bar was a prostitute. Many were, but a majority of the women working as bartenders and waiting on tables at the many bars in Saigon supported their families on the largesse of American soldiers looking to let off some steam and escape the long grind that the war had become for so many. The women knew how to comfort and cajole, and how far they could press the situation. Most bar women knew how to look good, act friendly, and work the room for tips without resorting to the oldest profession.
Some Americans did not recognize this distinction and treated all bar women as if they were whores. These Americans did not understand that this was home to these people, that Vietnamese girls fell in love with Vietnamese men, supported parents, and raised families behind the facade of the nightlife that existed in the Saigon bar scene. Some girls did everything in their power to entice an American into marrying them as a ticket to escape the world of war, the rest went on with their lives, for better or for worse, and did the best they could to survive as the war raged on around them. This lack of understanding by many Americans led to various incidents that resulted in embarrassment and anger, as well as the occasional fight. But in a city like Saigon, such a volatile mix could escalate the issue at any time.

The Stars and Stripes on the Ivory Tower Bar

The Pacific Stars and Stripes ran its first article on the Ivory Tower shootings on July 10 in an article titled "Joint Probe Continues into MP Slayings". The investigation into the shootings was complicated: the Vietnamese officer suspected of the killings, Lt. Col. Nguyen Viet Can, wounded in the incident, was the brother of a Vietnamese Army general, and an American sergeant thought to have first-hand knowledge of the incident was missing. Newspaper accounts had suggested that an American sergeant was "probably drunk" and was "shouting dirty words" at a group of Vietnamese officers when one American adviser "went out to search for MP intervention." Two witnesses allege a Vietnamese girl was involved in the incident. Others say Can was upset when the American brushed against Can's Vietnamese girlfriend. Can punched the sergeant on the shoulder and threatened to shoot him if he did it again. At this point, another American sergeant left the bar and went to find a phone to call the police. Lt. Col. Nguyen Viet Can had been wounded in action five times and often decorated for valor by his own government, and he was about to receive his third citation for valor from the US armed forces that served alongside his unit. Different versions of the incident appeared in the Vietnamese newspaper reports. Some alleged the MPs tried to handcuff Can, and asked the American sergeant "to follow them to headquarters." Other witnesses said differently, that the MP in the bar advised the sergeant to leave and began walking with him to the door. Can stood in the doorway with his arms outstretched and insisted the sergeant join him in a drink. Witnesses report that, as one MP stood with the sergeant near the doorway, a Vietnamese Army captain appeared and brandished a pistol in the face of the MP, who grabbed at the weapon. One witness says the pistol held by the captain was the only drawn weapon. At the sight of the pistol, people began to flee the bar and from that point forward, no witness accounts appeared in the public news media. After the shooting, American MPs outside saw Can, assisted by several Vietnamese soldiers, helped into a Jeep, which left the scene. The Jeep was tracked by American MPs to a Vietnamese hospital where Can was treated for a gunshot wound in the thigh. Inside the Ivory Tower, the two American MPs lay dead. The joint investigation by Vietnamese and American personnel produced an autopsy which according to U.S. military authorities, indicated Workman was shot more than once in the legs and may have been shot in the chest as he lay on the bar floor. They also said that Cox was shot in the back at least once before he died at the foot of the stairs. Authorities recovered no weapons at the scene, including the pistols of both MPs. Another newspaper reported that Can, who was subsequently relieved of command of the llth Vietnamese Airborne Bn., admitted in two and a half hours of testimony that he fired at the MPs after they tried to arrest him and shot him in the left leg. "Cox and Workman were topflight MPs," said their commander, Capt. Hulon A. Allen of B. Co., 716th MP Bn. "Each was experienced and well-trained in how to handle himself in such situations." One of Cox's roommates, SP-4 Don Klecak, was upset by newspaper reports alleging the two MPs had tried to handcuff Can. "If there's one thing drummed into our heads over and over," said Klecak, "it's how to treat foreign nationals. We don't touch them and we don't have the power to arrest them. None of us would try to handcuff one of them." (3)
On November 27, 1969 the Stars and Stripes reported that three Vietnamese officers would face trial over the deaths of the two MPs. Lt. Col. Can would face trial for involuntary manslaughter and two other Vietnamese officers, identified only as captains, would face murder charges. The Vietnamese court set December 17 as the trial date and a critical witness formerly identified as "missing", American Staff Sergeant Calvin Yates, would testify. American legal officers say that the delay in getting the trial set and opened was common. "In fact," said one legal officer, "the ARVN have been right on top of it (the case) from the start. I don't think I could have gotten one to trial that quickly." (4)
On Friday, December 19, the Stars and Stripes reported the bad news. The trial of the three Vietnamese officers accused of slaying the two American military policemen in a Saigon nightclub on June 30, was adjourned indefinitely. That Wednesday, December 17, a five-man tribunal had deliberated for two hours and 15 minutes before deciding the panel had insufficient evidence to reach a verdict. They ordered further investigations that could lead to a new trial at a future date. Lt. Col. Nguyen Viet Can, former commander of the 11th ARVN Airborne Bn., and Capt. Do Ngoc Nuoi and Capt. Pham Van Bach, both of the llth Airborne Bn., had escaped prosecution from all of the charges. (5)
On Thursday February 19, 1970, the Stars and Stripes ran a last brief article stating that the trial "might be resumed sometime in March or April." First, the investigators "would have to determine how many weapons were involved, and how many rounds were fired during the gun battle." (6)
The Pacific Stars and Stripes did a credible job in reporting the facts when the story first broke in July of 1969. But when it became apparent that the South Vietnamese courts were not going to prosecute Can and the two captains, and that the US Command was going to go along with that decision as if it was business as usual, then it was over for Workman and Cox in the military press. The Stars and Stripes ran the last piece in February stating that the South Vietnamese courts might prosecute the three officers again sometime in the future; after that, the story and the names disappeared. The Stars and Stripes returned to their core mission, not investigative journalism, but in publishing harmless feel-good stories for the American soldier, stories with pictures of our troops finding hidden caches of enemy weapons that ran beneath headlines like, "Sorry About That, Charlie". Or interviews with Generals and Admirals who informed all of us that we were winning the war, and to tell everyone back home how important this war really was. The Command did not want to upset the American public, nor give them cause to doubt the partnership with the South Vietnamese. The Tour d'Ivoire was now just a footnote to history, a glitch in the program, a story that would go just where the US Command wanted it to go, and that was nowhere.

Old Embers Burn Red

I am not certain what motivated me to write this story now, in December of 2009, forty years after the killings. Perhaps some ember of anger or resentment still burned within, or maybe an external stimulus struck me, some jolt, a word or an image that sent my mind reeling backwards through the decades. Yet I suspect that it was just the passage of time. I recently looked at my collection of photographs taken during my year in Vietnam and what I found was faded pictures that have merged with the paper of the album, rendering them impossible to remove without destroying them. Young faces, many of people whose names I have forgotten, look back at me through plastic covers grown cloudy with age. The time to write this story was now, before those that knew Eugene Cox and James Workman were gone.
I was lucky enough to contact a member of James Workman's family, a cousin named Carolyn Shadd, who along with her son Larry Feltner provided me photographs, as well as copies of the family's old newspaper clippings taken from the local papers that reported on the shootings at the time. She also told me about James and his family, and I am deeply indebted to her. The clippings provide the chilling details of the murder as well as insight into the pain and heartbreak that the family suffered and endured.
I also contacted a friend of Jim's that served with him in the States and in Korea, Laurence DeFuria. What I found in Carolyn and Larry was an undying love and respect for Jim Workman, along with an ember that still burned inside each these many years later, still hot and red over the loss of a man, how he met his end, and what had transpired after his death.

Murdered

The details of the shootings that appeared in the local newspapers, details obtained, I am sure, through the efforts of attorney R Clifton Hood, were particularly disturbing, particulars not made available to the reading soldier in the Pacific Stars and Stripes. James Workman and Eugene Cox went to the third floor bar and ordered the American Army sergeant to leave because it was past curfew. Can blocked the door and offered to buy drinks but that offer was refused. "As Cox started down the winding staircase, Can pulled a pistol and shot him four times in the back and head. Workman was coming from the bar when he was reportedly shot 10 times by the colonel and at least one other officer."
This was it, the definitive statement; time had finally revealed the answer I had been seeking for so long. Forty years after the death of Workman and Cox in the Ivory Tower, the words on the page before me brought closure to what actually happened in the bar that night; it was a slaughter.

Final Thoughts

The events of that night, the deaths of two military policemen in the Ivory Tower bar, occurred more than 40 years ago in a city that now carries a different name and in a country that no longer exists. The past constantly falls away from us, and like the ever-expanding universe, the more distant events are from today the faster they seem to recede. Yet I remember those killings in Saigon and the many rumors that swirled around the events of that night, as well as the numerous conversations about the shooting that I shared with other MPs and soldiers in the year that followed. I am grateful to read the newspaper clippings about the murder that appear in the links below, clippings supplied by Carolyn Shadd, and I am certain we should be grateful to the family's attorney, R Clifton Hood, for his efforts to ensure that those details were made known to the American public.
John and Gay Nuskievicz cried for James Workman on the day he died and they shed a tear for Jim every day for the rest of their lives. They remained tireless in their efforts to bring his killers to justice, to make them stand accountable for their actions in a court of law. But terms like 'the law' mean different things in the courts of different countries. Time and circumstances conspired against the Nuskievicz in their quest to see justice done for their boy. Plans were already underway to phase out the use of American ground combat forces in Vietnam and the ruling government may have been less likely to appease the Americans who were leaving the South Vietnamese to make the fight with the North on their own. Lt Col Can had a lot going for him, as the brother of an ARVN general he stood well connected politically, and as a decorated soldier, honored by the Americans multiple times for valor, he was a rare find indeed. I am sure the South Vietnamese government thought it better to have Can in the field with his troops than locked away in prison, seeing no need to placate the American public any longer, or soothe the ache felt by a grieving family so far away. The Nuskievicz family and their lawyer did what they could, but with no real political advantage, those responsible for the death of James Workman and Eugene Cox did not face the scales of justice.
It is painful to see that attorney Hood and the family felt ill-treated by the 716th MP Battalion, the storied unit that performed so bravely during the Tet Offensive of 1968. They felt that the replies made by the 716th to requests for information by Hood did not meet his expectations. "Hood was especially irate over the stereotyped letter from the company commander of the MP group of which both boys were members." Who knows now, forty years later, what really happened? Perhaps Command had passed the word to the 716th not to be forthcoming with information, or maybe their actions were unplanned. And in all honesty, nothing sent by the 716th would have made the Nuskievicz family or Hood feel any better in light of the failure of the South Vietnamese government to prosecute the three ARVN officers involved, that and the fact that the US Government seemed willing to stand aside and do nothing in response. Yet, in hindsight, especially after reading what actually transpired in the bar that night, I believe James Workman and Eugene Cox deserved better than they got from those soldiers that they considered their own.
John and Gay Nuskievicz loved their foster son unconditionally. And although they are now deceased, the light of that love shines in the hearts of the family and friends still alive who saw the depth and devotion that was a part of that love, and appreciated it for what it was; the light of that love lives on in them.
Larry DeFuria, fellow MP who went on to a distinguished career in law enforcement after the Army, summed up his thoughts about the circumstances surrounding the death of James Workman this way. "So many times over the years I have thought back to those days, wondered about the direction my life took and wondered what would have become of Jim. What career would he have had? Marriage? Kids? These thoughts are triggered on military holidays, any discussions with friends about our time in the service, certain movies, etc. I still get blurry and choked, raging internally about the injustice of our troops fighting for an alleged cause and then being brutally cut down by field grade commissioned representatives of the same sorry bunch we were there to help. How can we ever reconcile the balance of the ones we lost to any benefit for having been there in the first place. When I was young and stupid, I was all for the war and very certain that we had to be right. God help me, I'm just not sure at all anymore."
On June 30, 1969, just before midnight, Eugene Cox and James Workman walked into a dangerous place. They entered the Ivory Tower bar, armed and on duty, searching for an American that needed assistance. They performed this act bravely, secure in their training, faith in each other, devotion to duty, the mission, and to the uniform they wore. That night, both paid the ultimate price for that act of bravery. Instead of receiving honors for their actions, they were discarded. History has not been kind to the memory of their names; the honor they deserve has eluded them.

NB: The footnotes were not received. Webmaster