WASHINGTON: Long dead but little forgotten, US soldiers who disappeared across the globe during World War II are being reunited with their loved ones in a dogged push to find and bring home their bodies.
From the forests of Germany to the jungles of Papua New Guinea, US experts employed by the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, among them historians, archeologists and forensic experts, are the main sleuths.
When recovery of a body is possible, the Pentagon specialists turn the remains over to an ultra-modern lab in Hawaii for identification and then wait for the ultimate reward: bringing the bereaved back together with their long-lost relatives.
Stephen Johnson, a historian-investigator, recalled how a delighted woman, whose father had been found in a German forest, exclaimed: “You gave me back my daddy.” “I think of her when I work on a case,” Johnson said.
The woman, now a mother and grandmother, “had come to peace” after finding out the exact fate of her father, who died when she was 18 months old, Johnson said.
