I just got through reading the Wikipedia bios of Stockdale and McCain and while most think “what brave heroes”, my reaction is “what odd people”. You have a choice between complying with the requests of your captors and having your time spent with much less abuse, or refuse as they did and be beaten and tortured for years and left with permanenet damage- all for what? It’s not like a guy flying bombing missions is going to know the entire war plan, right- how much could they have hurt the Americans by at least telling a bit of what they know, and maybe lying about other things? But no, just name rank and serial number. Isn’t it a bit pompous to think the intel they had would cause the war to be lost- not that it wasn’t anyway?
This bit from the Stockdale page is a bit bizarre-
When told by his captors that he was to be paraded in public, Stockdale slit his scalp with a razor to purposely disfigure himself so that his captors could not use him as propaganda. When they covered his head with a hat, Stockdale beat himself with a stool until his face was swollen beyond recognition
What the hell? You rather disfigure yourself than let your captors walk you down the street? What negative does it say about you as person if you allow yourself to be seen, as a captive, walking down the street? It does not compute. Refusing to go on camera and give Anti-American speeches is cornball too, as no one with a brain who sees it would think you really believed what you said, so why not do it to save yourself a few beatings? Is this type thinking a relic of a bygone era? Are there soldiers now who would do this? What positive thing resulted from them subjecting themselves to beatings?
I forgot to add, Stockdale actually tried to press charges against two fellow POW’s for giving “aid and comfort to the enemy”? Someone’s tolerance for torture is not as great as yours, they’ve been imprisoned and tortured, finally get free and get home and have to deal with a court martial or whatever becasue they broke when someone was pounding on their ankles with a sledgehammer? What kind of jingoistic crap is that?
They were in the military, serving their country. Deciding to act as pawns for the enemy is against every code and standard they knew.
All kidding aside, if you can’t understand why they would resist the enemy, and support their fellow countrymen imprisoned with them, I don’t know how anyone is going to be able to explain it to you.
The Vietnamese wanted to show they captured an American and were treating him well. This has obvious propaganda value to them, because it means that American troops they’re up against are more likely to surrender to them. So, by Stockdale beating himself up like that, he loses value as a propaganda piece.
It is their duty to continue the fight even while they are held captive. Embarrassing the enemy (by disfiguring yourself) seems to be in line with that.
I assumed it was their intent to just show the people that they were capturing Americans, period. If the good treatment was the idea, surely he’s got to know there are hundreds if not thousands of others who would comply and be used as propaganda, and thus his not doing so didn’t keep it from being done, it only kept him from being used to do it. And does anyone, even back then, buy the “prisoners are being treated well” line anyway?
This is the modern Code of Conduct. It is essentially unchanged from the one in force during the Vietnam War. It was first promulgated during the Eisenhower Administration.
These are the ethical guidelines that a captured servicemember is expected to remember, mindful that there is only so much an individual can take.
McCain and Stockdale both were guided by this code in captivity, among other things. If you want to understand why they did what they did, understand the code and its purpose - keeping a soldier alive in a stressful situation and allowing him to avoid capture, survive captivity, or escape.
I’ll read that, but it seems to me that wanting a POW to have the chance and mindset to escape, you have to have an able body and mind, which is less of a reality after torture.
John McCain Jr. was a four-star admiral, by the way, so the future Senator did have unique - and, arguably, significant - propaganda value. The Viet Cong definitely did not have thousands of prisoners who were the sons of Navy brass.
Was escaping a realistic option? They were probably miles behind enemy lines, in the middle of a trackless jungle, with no way to know where friendly forces were and no way to get to them even if they knew. (Or so I would surmise.)
If you don’t do something, and you know by you not doing it, it will not get done, that’s one thing, but that’s not the case here, and he knew it as the lawsuit upon release shows. An example out of my ass, its like a death row jailer taking a stance and not turning the switch on a particular guy- its going to get done by someone else, the guys not going to live as a result of your stance. If its an honor thing, I cannot fathom something like that being worth years of abuse.
True for some prisons, but these guys spent most of their time at the infamous Hanoi Hilton. That wasn’t much better, though - escape from there and you’re in the middle of a large city where the only people who look like Westerners are the escaped enemy.
Personally, I’d rather take my chances with the jungle.
And isn’t the propaganda thing pretty overblown anyway? Are there really any Americans who would be swayed by the choppy monotone reading of pro Vietnam tracts by a POW? We’ve all seen these, do they convince anyone of anything other than ‘there is a guy doing what his captors say to avoid abuse’?
It’s about integrity. The philosopher Bernard Williams has written some interesting things about it. If you have a set of values that prohibit your doing something, you might have a good reason not to do it even if someone else will end up doing it anyway. Because in the end, you stayed true to your values; *you * weren’t the one who did it. Obviously, most of us would go in front of the camera, because we don’t have the same values that McCain and Stockdale have. But I don’t find their decision bizarre.
It seems to me that if you’re willing to undergo abuse to avoid being used in enemy propaganda, you’re conceding that the enemy’s propaganda is of value. If I was captured, my view would have been that the whole world knows that their propaganda was worthless and not worth minimizing my chances for survival over. In the final accounting, did McCain’s actions actually enhance American military objectives? Did he make it harder for others to be captured or prolong the lives of those that did? I don’t know if it can be proven either way. He is to be admired for his resolve but I wonder what it accomplished after all.