[color=royal blue]In 1969, Fors family identified him in pictures of
captured servicemen. The military first ruled that the photo as unrecognizable, then agreed with an Air Force POW who, after his release in 1973, said it was a picture of himself.
In 1972, a Pathlet Lao defector reported that he had seen someone who looked like Captain Gary H. Fors chained near a limestone cave in Laos. A photograph of a POW in captivity was correlated to Fors by CIA in 1973.
In 1980, a Seattle refugee resident named Boukeva Phavavout said that in 1976, after his own capture by communist soldiers the year before, he saw five Americans imprisoned in a cave near the site where Fors was shot down. Fors is one of nearly 600
Americans who were left behind in Laos. Even though the Pathet Lao stated publicly that they held "ten of tens" of American prisoners, these men were not negotiated for in the Paris Peace Accords which
resulted in the release of 591 Americans from Viet Nam. Nearly 10,000 reports such as those on Gary Fors have been received by the US Government since American involvement in Indochina ended in 1975, yet US policy continues to be that there is not
actionable evidence that any Americans are still alive. Many authorities disagree, believing that there are hundreds of Americans still alive and being held
unjustly and against their will in Southeast Asia. Gary Fors could be one of those thought to still be alive. If so, what must he be thinking of us?[/color]
(Robert Dunaway once told me that there was a story in a local paper in the Seattle area that Gary at one point was seen trying to leave with his Laotian family but was turned back at the border.) God Bless Him. And Robert too.
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