Hilbrich

These candles will burn until
Captain Barry W. Hilbrich
comes home

Barry Wayne Hilbrich
O3/US Army Special Forces
Born June 25, 1947
Lost June 9, 1970
South Vietnam

Air Force 1Lt. John L. Ryder was the pilot of an O1F spotter aircraft on which Special Forces Operations Officer Capt. Barry W. Hilbrich was serving as observer. The two departed Pleiku Airbase on a visual reconnaissance mission on June 9, 1970, south of Ben Het in South Vietnam with the ultimate destination of Camp Dak Saeng.

The aircraft was located just north of Pleiku and was in radio contact with tactical air control center. Their next scheduled radio contact was at 1327 hours, but no further communication was established. Ryder and Hilbrich were reported missing.

No immediate visual search could be initiated because of incliment weather, and an electronic search conducted produced no trace of the aircraft or the crew. During the period of June 10-19 an extesive search was carried out extending from Plieku north to the I Corps boundary and west of the Cambodian border, with no sightings of either aircraft or its two officers. The two were officially classified Missing In Action. It cannot be determined whether the enemy knew their fates.

It was thought by the families of most of the men that even though they got no word of their loved one, there was every chance thay had been captured. When the war ended in 1973, and 591 American's were released in Operation Homecoming, military experts expressed their dismay that "some hundreds" of POW's did not come home with them. Many families were devastated.

John Ryder's mother went to see the Vietnamese in England in 1976. While they were very cordial to her, she says, "they repeated over and over again, they will give out no information on the missing men until the U.S.A. has rebuilt Vietnam."

Reconstruction aid promised by Nixon and Kissinger to Vietnam in 1973 has not been appropriated by Congress, and no aid has been given. Since 1973, the Vietnamese continue to link the issue of aid to that of the American POW's, although the U.S. continues to insist it is a seperate, humanitarian issue.

Tragically, thousands of reports continue to flow in reguarding the American's still prisoner, missing, or unaccounted for. Some of them specifically refer to an American by name and location, yet no solution for bringing these men home has been found.

Those of us who remember that talks between nations can be tied up indefinitely over the shape of the negotiating table wonder how long our captive servicemen will be able to endure.