Page images
PDF
EPUB

that he had a prescription and it was legal, and I observed enough to feel that they were telling me the truth.

Senator HUGHES. Excuse me interrupting, but perhaps I can be helpful. Did you get any help out of the military police or the military to find your son?

Mrs. JONES. Not until I asked for it. I became so desperate, I went to the Red Cross asking them to put out an alert saying Bill is somewhere in Germany, please contact the Red Cross immediately. They advised me they could not do anything like that. He asked me to contact a colonel who was a community leader, and I did so.

I went to his office but they were having-this was ironic-it was German-American week, and he was at a garden party, so I called him that night at home, and he came over and picked me up and carried me to his home, and he had been entertaining the German police, so he contacted them and asked if they would help to search two places that I had learned of. I had already been to one place.

Please let me backtrack. Two AWOL soldiers had carried me to an apartment they heard my son was in and shoved me in the door and stated that they were traitors, and ran. They have a group between the German young folks and our young folks on the base.

At that time, the colonel got the German police to go with their MP's to search the building and they went in the front and the occupants went out the back.

At another time, the German hippie told me he might be in this business establishment, which is a type I call a "joint." They might be hiding him there. So, I called the colonel and told him I had this news and would he please contact the German police and ask them to go again. The boy already told me this proprietor had. a sawed-off shotgun behind his counter, because I was going in myself. In fact, I sat there all morning one day observing everybody come in and going out, and giving them messages trying to get one to my son.

The colonel said, well, if you are afraid to go in, what do you think they will do to the boys? But they did go that night because I told them I was going, and they searched, but they didn't find anybody.

Could you ask me more questions?

Senator HUGHES. Well, yes, I would like to ask you, Mrs. Jones: Is your son now listed as a deserter?

Mrs. JONES. Yes, sir.

Senator HUGHES. Did you receive any figures from the officers over there as to how many deserters there were on that small base? Mrs. JONES. No, sir, I didn't receive any figures. I just observed the ones that I saw.

Senator HUGHES. How many did you see in total?

Mrs. Jones. Between 15 and 20. Three boys-two boys came back in about the second day I was there, and before I left, one boy from Macon, Ga. came and told me he had come back in after I talked with him.

Senator HUGHES. You didn't have any difficulty finding these boys, did you?

Mrs. JONES. No, sir.

Senator HUGHES. Doesn't it seem strange that the military polic couldn't find them if a little lady from America could go to Germany as a stranger and find all kinds of them wandering around!

Mrs. JONES. Yes, sir. They just look the other way. They knew he was there, but the only help they were trying to give himSenator HUGHES. Could we pause for a moment while the reporter changes his paper.

(Pause.)

Senator HUGHES. All right, you were responding to the question that you find it strange that the military police couldn't find these young men when you found so many with relative ease. Mrs. JONES. Yes, sir.

The only help they were trying to give these sick boys were their buddies who were also on drugs, but still able to communicate and go back to the base and then back to the river, was to get those boys to talk with the AWOL soldiers to come in. They had no military patrol--our boys could sign off the base at 5 or 6 p.m., when they are off duty and walk over to this little town where they are exposed to all the drugs without any protection at all. Senator HUGHES. Did your son and the other boys indicate to you what sort of drugs they were using?

Mrs. JONES. Yes, sir. The other boys told me they were using marijuana and hashish, and LSD and opium. They took little white pills in front of me that they said was LSD and opium combined, and usually they were homemade things.

Senator HUGHES. Did you ever see your son again after that one contact?

Mrs. JONES. No, sir.

Senator HUGHES. You were not able to find him again?

Mrs. JONES. No, sir.

Senator HUGHES. Did he indicate to you what he intended to do?

Mrs. JONES. He intends to save the world. He is going to be as Christ and he loves everybody and is going to help people and he is going to save the world.

Senator HUGHES. You would say he is a very sick young man! Mrs. JONES. He was very sick. I have the two letters to prove that. I will just never forgive myself for not going before I did. Senator HUGHES. Mrs. Jones, I don't want to extend the questioning. I know the pain and agony that this is to you.

Mrs. JONES. No, sir. Ask me anything you like because I want to help the other boys. I dream about them at night.

Senator HUGHES. Do you think the program such as you have heard described here today will reach many of these young men! Mrs. JONES. No, sir, not unless they can be-I hate to say apprehended, but really that is what it is. After they are on drugs to a certain extent, they are not rational enough to come in for amnesty.

I beg to disagree with the gentlemen who said that a drugridden soldier or civilian even would not do petty larceny and

so forth to how can you separate the two? A sick person on drugs will at first go to petty larceny or anything to support their drugs, and then later it might be something bigger, because they aren't rational.

Senator HUGHES. Is it your opinion that the military hadn't given any priority at all to this problem over there?

Mrs. JONES. Yes, sir. They acted as if it didn't exist. The only reason I knew of the problem was because my son wrote. There is always an exception to the rule. The captain notified me that he was AWOL and I feel that he did that because I had-we had written to ask of John's welfare after he wrote us the letters, and I received a letter in January, January 31, I believe it was, telling us that John was doing fine.

Senator HUGHES. You think young men like this should be offered amnesty if they would come back and report in, even though they are presently listed as deserters because they probably wouldn't be if they weren't drug infected?

Mrs. JONES. Well, yes, sir, I think they should. They would not be in the situation if they weren't sick.

Senator HUGHES. Well, do you, as a nurse, look at a drug dependent or addicted person as a sick person, or as a behavioral problem?

Mrs. JONES. I think they are sick.

Senator HUGHES. Is this a mother's instinct, or do you base it on something professional?

Mrs. JONES. I would speak untrue if I didn't say that my first instinct is motherly. However, being in the nursing profession for 25 years, I have worked as an office nurse for three different physicians. I know that their medical opinion is sick, and from this experience, my opinion is anyone who is on drugs, or alcohol even, over a certain amount of time is sick. I would like to say here that in growing up as a girl I was exposed to alcohol, so I realize that problem, too, and I think drugs is the most terrible thing that can happen to an individual, and with as many of our boys that are having this problem and becoming sick, it is bound to hurt our country from within.

Senator HUGHES. Mrs. Jones, I thank you very much for your willingness to come forward. I know the staff has indicated to you that there are not only hundreds of others like you, but thousands of parents who are writing, who are concerned, who are desperate, who don't know what to do. I want to assure you that we are working desperately to create programs and ways that these young men can be brought back, can be recovered, can be helped to adjust themselves back into a way of life that is acceptable to society. Our prayers go with you as a mother that your son does find his way back, and that we can be helpful to him.

Thank you very much.

Mrs. JONES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman?
Senator HUGHES. Yes?

Mrs. JONES. May I say one more thing?

Senator HUGHES. Please do.

Mrs. JONES. The day I left Germany, and I went down to see the hippies one last time, one last hope, there was a strange gentle

man waiting to see me. I didn't realize it, but he was waiting to see me and when I started to leave the children, he followed me, and he had on a turban, black beard-in other words, I thought he was Turkish. He said he asked me if I had found my son, and I said, no, sir. I sat down to converse with him and he assured me that my son was all right and for me not to worry, that I would see my son within 6 months. He made me feel as if he knew where he is and would not tell me. It made me feel as if some strange power or-maybe communist or what have you, was working within that group, within our ranks. He said he was psychic and he could guarantee me I would see my son within 6 months.

Senator HUGHES. As I understand it, your son has been involved with some sort of religious group or cult there as near as you could determine, is that right?

Mrs. JONES. Well, from the way he talked and the way this man talked, I don't know. I just don't know. In fact, I was afraid thatI am afraid that he is dead.

Senator HUGHES. Thank you very much, Mrs. Jones.

Mrs. JONES. Thank you.

Senator HUGHES. I am going to read a letter I received from a soldier in Vietnam.

"11 JUNE 71.

"DEAR MR. HUGHES: I am a soldier in Vietnam. I have been for 9 months. Since Sept. 9th. About Nov. I started using heroin and I really got bad for a while. I am a grunt in bush and I need help. Our amnesty program is not sufficient over here. I need help! I am losing my family. I have a little boy about 7 months and wife. I have been married a little over 2 years now and have been in the army since March 1970. Please Mr. Hughes, you are my last resort. If you can get me out of Nam, I can break the habit. But as long as I am over here, it's impossible. I tried! I really want to get off the stuff, but it's just impossible while I'm over here. Too many people do it and it's too readily available. Besides there is nothing to do with my free time except hit the smack. I am begging you sir. Please get me out of here if you can. My little boy doesn't deserve this. Thank you. I am from Manson, Iowa. Please hurry, everything is falling in on me.”

At this point I order printed all statements of those who could not attend and other pertinent material submitted for the record. (The material referred to follows:)

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]
[blocks in formation]

For comparison purposes, the Navy and USMC data for
CY 69 is not included in the CY 69 total column. Navy
data is not included in the FY 70 total column.

Total column (CY 69 and 70) includes Dishonorable,
Bad Conduct Discharges and Officer Dismissals for
all types of offenses resulting from courts-martial.

65-419 O 71 18

« PreviousContinue »