Battleland

Some Wars Never End

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News from the Pentagon Tuesday afternoon:

The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains of a serviceman, missing in action from the Vietnam War, have been identified and will be returned to his family for burial with full military honors. Air Force Capt. Darrell J. Spinler of Browns Valley, Minn., will be buried on June 18 near his hometown. On June 21, 1967, Spinler was aboard an A-1E Skyraider aircraft attacking enemy targets along the Xekong River in Laos when villagers reported hearing an explosion before his aircraft crashed. In 1993, a joint U.S.-Laos People’s Democratic Republic team, led by Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC), interviewed villagers who witnessed the crash.  They claimed Spinler’s body was on the river bank after the crash but likely washed away during the ensuing rainy season.  The team surveyed the location and found wreckage consistent with Spinler’s aircraft…With the accounting of this airman, 1,689 service members still remain missing from the conflict.

News from the Pentagon Monday afternoon:

Nan, Inc., Honolulu, Hawaii, is being awarded a $62,668,102 firm-fixed-price contract for the construction of the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command, Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam. The work to be performed provides for construction of a three-story building, which will provide a central identification laboratory, administrative office spaces, training spaces, and warehouse. Supporting facilities include landscaping, asphalt concrete pavements, chain link fence and gates, connecting utilities, sewage lift stations, electrical and miscellaneous site improvements. The contract also contains three unexercised options which, if exercised, would increase the cumulative contract value to $69,586,092. Work will be performed in Oahu, Hawaii, and is expected to be completed by July 2013.