I was stunned to hear, on Canadian radio yesterday, that a Vietnam-era deserter from the U.S. Marines has been arrested. I'm also surprised to learn, as you'll see below the fold, that Jimmy Carter's (in)famous 1977 amnesty
did not include deserters.
The Canadian AM 980 radio report said he'd lived in Canada since deserting in 1968, and had crossed the border into the U.S. countless times during the past 38 years. They reported (erroneously, as you'll see below) that this is the first known arrest of a Vietnam deserter. (By the way, Canadian radio is vastly superior to U.S. radio offerings. I'm so close to the border, I can hear stations in Victoria, Vancouver, and Calgary, as well as CBC radio.)
Having not seen anything on the blogs about this story today, I just checked Google News. I see no U.S. media reports yet. The Edmonton Sun reports:
1968 deserter nabbed at B.C. border
VANCOUVER -- A B.C. grandfather is languishing in confinement at a U.S. military base - under arrest for deserting the marine corps 38 years ago because he didn't want to fight in Vietnam.
Allen Abney, 56, is in custody at Camp Pendleton near San Diego.
His family in the East Kootenay is anxiously awaiting word on what's next for the father of three who deserted the marines and fled to Vancouver in 1968 at the age of 19.
Charges of desertion can result in what's known as other-than-honourable discharges, a special court martial and sentences of up to one year in military jail, or a general court martial. The maximum penalty is five years behind bars.
"I really cannot conceive that that's a possibility. I really want to stress that," said Lynn Gonzales, who works with the San Diego Military Counselling Project, a branch of the GI Rights Hotline. Gonzales was to meet with Abney yesterday.
Abney, a Canadian citizen since 1977, was taken into custody on Thursday.
He and wife Adrienne were crossing into Idaho from their hometown of Kingsgate, B.C., bound for a holiday in Reno. "They stopped us at customs. I handed over our passports and they called us in. After 20 minutes of sitting there, they took him," Adrienne said.
Adrienne said her husband had travelled into the United States dozens, if not hundreds of times ...
Influencing the case, perhaps, is that "Allen was born in Kentucky but has lived in Canada since he was 10. He had joined the marines voluntarily."
So, he had lived in Canada since he was 10, voluntarily joined the Marines but decided to return to Canada rather than fulfill his service, and has been a Canadian citizen since 1977.
The marine spokesman said, "Abney will be returned to his original unit, where the commander will decide what happens next."
President Gerald Ford -- in 1974 -- "declared an amnesty for Viet Nam deserters and draft evaders whereby they could return to the U.S. and perform two years of public service." (Archer Audio Archives)
Jimmy Carter's pardon in 1977? AMacNeil/Lehrer PBS program in 1977 said:
Just a day after Jimmy Carter's inaguration, he followed through on a contentious campaign promise, granting a presidential pardon to those who had avoided the draft during the Vietnam war by either not registering or traveling abroad.
The pardon meant the government was giving up forever the right to prosecute what the administration said were hundreds of thousands of draft-dodgers.
Some in veterans' groups, like Tip Marlow of the Veterans of Foreign Wars organization, said Carter did too much by allowing those who evaded the draft to come home without fear of prosecution. [...]
Meanwhile, many in amnesty groups say that Carter's pardon did too little. They pointed out that the president did not include deserters -- those who served in the war and left before their tour was completed -- or soldiers who recieved a less-than-honorable discharge. Civilian protesters, selective service employees and those who initiated any act of violence also were not covered in the pardon.
So, does Allen Abney have legal recourse?
Where is his "original unit"?
Can Canada step in to defend its citizen?
Must he perform two years of "community service," as required by Pres. Gerald Ford in his 1974 pardon of deserters?
The Guardian, in a special report, "No more running," published on February 21, 2006, writes:
[A]s time passed, [, Ernest "Buck" McQueen] almost came to believe that the military was no longer on the hunt for him ... until just after breakfast one day, when plain-clothes officers caught up with him at a rundown drive-in burger bar in suburban Fort Worth, Texas, and slipped on the handcuffs.
The mind is a terrible thing," he says over lunch at his favourite Forth Worth restaurant, an all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet. "I had visions of them sending me way back in some dark secluded place of solitary confinement. I had the worst-case scenario figured out for this."
Instead, against his expectations, McQueen is now a free man. Within a few weeks of his arrest on January 12 he was released from military custody at Camp Pendleton, California, and received a less than honourable discharge that has cleared all remaining obligations to the Marine Corps. McQueen says his overwhelming emotion is relief. "I am not wanted by anyone, from what I understand. It's a nice feeling."
Why do they desert? Writes The Guardian:
Most deserters go awol because of family or financial trouble. McQueen says he decided to run when he began to meet marines coming back from Vietnam. Some had gone to war with cameras, and photographs circulated in the barracks. "I saw pictures of ears hanging on belts," he says. In another picture, "This one marine had his leg propped up on half a barrel, and in one hand he is holding a decapitated head from a North Vietnamese soldier. In the other hand, he has got his M-14 and a bottle of Jim Beam and he is smiling. I think that was the image that did it. I just said, 'These people went mad, they went totally crazy.' "
Four days before the young marine walked out of Camp Lejeune, Seymour Hersh broke the story of the My Lai massacre of Vietnamese villagers by US troops. "I just thought, I'm in the wrong business and I really did make a big mistake. I just didn't want to be a part of killing like that. That's not war."
Even now, McQueen is passionate in his opposition to the Vietnam war, and to the present conflict in Iraq. "I really don't know what justification we had for Iraq or Vietnam. Maybe someone can tell me that, or what we benefited from Vietnam - even one benefit." And now, "we are going to lose a lot of people in Iraq".
But for all his espousal of the anti-war cause, McQueen seems strangely hurt that the Pentagon saw his desertion as a criminal act ...
(The
full story of McQueen's desertion is compelling reading.)
I doubt that Allen Abney would mind a less-than-honorable discharge. Let's hope his outcome is like that of Mr. McQueen's.
After all this time, there should be an updated pardon to include deserters. But I doubt that'll happen any time soon, even with a Democrat as president.