GALANTI, PAUL EDWARD
Name: Paul Edward Galanti
Rank/Branch: O3/United States Navy/pilot
Unit: VA 216
Date of Birth: 11 July 1939
Home City of Record: Lodi NJ
Date of Loss: 17 June 1966
Country of Loss: North Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 191500N 1054600E
Status (in 1973): Returnee
Category:
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: A4C #149528
Missions: 97
Incident No: 0364
Other Personnel in Incident: none
Source: Compiled by P.O.W. NETWORK March 1997 from one or more of the
following: raw data from U.S. Government agency sources, correspondence with
POW/MIA families, published sources, interviews.
REMARKS: 730212 RELEASED BY DRV
SOURCE: WE CAME HOME copyright 1977
Captain and Mrs. Frederic A Wyatt (USNR Ret), Barbara Powers Wyatt, Editor
P.O.W. Publications, 10250 Moorpark St., Toluca Lake, CA 91602
Text is reproduced as found in the original publication (including date and
spelling errors).
UPDATE - 09/95 by the P.O.W. NETWORK, Skidmore, MO
PAUL E. GALANTI
Lieutenant Commander- United States Navy
Shot Down: June 17, 1966
Released: February 12, 1973
"My nearly seven years of captivity could be summed up in the space of a
postage stamp. But I learned a valuable lesson in appreciation."
The years of zero in Commander Galanti's life began when he was shot down on
June 17, 1966 near Vinh, North Vietnam. His A-4 Skyhawk was hit after an
attack on a railroad siding and, although he could see the rescue destroyers
off-shore, his plane went out of control before he could reach them.
He ejected from his plane, was captured, taken North to Hanoi and paraded in
the infamous "Hanoi March". "This was ostensibly a 'spontaneous demonstration'
on the part of the Vietnamese," says Galanti. "However, as we left the park,
the blindfolds were removed, we were handcuffed in pairs and marched into the
street. The first thing I saw was a bunch of political cadres with megaphones
inciting the people. At the end of the first block there was a big truck with
movie equipment in it to play this spectacle up. A man came running up from
the side, gave me a soccer-like kick in the groin and I went down in a heap.
There was so much yelling it sounded like Notre Dame scoring a touchdown at
South Bend. It lasted about forty five minutes. They finally got us to a
soccer stadium, where they had trucks waiting, then took us back to the
prison."
In addition to the physical tortures, Commander Galanti was subjected to an
agonizing session after "violating the prison regulations." Having received
two letters and a package from Phyllis, he assumed it was a special deal to
make him look bad in the eyes of his fellow POW's. In order to show that such
was not the case, he threw a package of Lifesavers to one of the other cells
in the bath-house. A guard saw and reported it. For this he was made to sit on
a small stool in an interrogation room during the coldest part of the year. He
sat there for ten days and nights, drugged and deprived of sleep, before being
forced to apologize to the camp commander.
Although these and other individual torture stories often seemed the result of
individual North Vietnamese actions, Galanti warns Americans not to forget
that the overall goal of Communism is world domination. "It often got blackest
just after they started smiling," he says.
Optimism helped Galanti most in surviving his ordeal. "I think it s human
nature . America human nature any way. The fact that they stopped the sleep
deprivation period and let me go on living was a good sign that I'd
probably be going home someday. When the bombing stopped that would be a
good sign. When it started up again that would be a good sign. I
sincerely believe that optimism is the basis of all faith and without
it I'd probably have gone crazy.
"I was born in New Jersey and raised in an Army family. I graduated from
Valley Forge Military Academy in 1957 and the U.S. Naval Academy in 1962.
Phillis and I were married in August 1963 and I received my Navy wings shortly
after that.
My Dad taught me that you must have goals-an overall goal and smaller goals in
between. My lifelong goal was to be a pilot; the smaller ones were to finish
elementary school then high school then enter college and finally to finish
flight training. During captivity the Code of Conduct was my goal. Sometimes
pretty tough to live up to the Code was the standard the goal to strive for."
Galanti finished flight training refresher in Noxember 1973. He served a tour
in Navy Recruiting in Richmond, Virginia pushing optimism in over 200
presentations to schools churches and civic groups. He is currently attending
Graduate School at the University of Richmond. Paul and Phyllis Galanti
reside a few miles from the University in Richmond's scenic West End.
December 1996
Paul Galanti retired from the United States Navy as a Commander. He and his
wife Phyllis reside in Virginia. They are active in the ex-pow organization
NAM-POWs, Inc.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
Sunday, February 15, 1998
COMMENTARY
AN EX-POW REFLECTS, A QUARTER CENTURY OUT Paul Galanti of Richmond spent 6
1/2 years in North Vietnamese prison camps. He reflects here on his
experiences on the 25th anniversary of his release from captivity.
"This can't be happening to me," thought this cocky young Navy jet pilot
as his A-4 Skyhawk was blasted from the hostile skies of North Vietnam 32
years ago. My next 2,432 days were spent in the various POW camps in North
Vietnam collectively called the "Hanoi Hilton" by their residents. It wasn't
supposed to happen - but it did. Here with the story of a small number of
American servicemen who were forced to endure significant adversity, but who
emerged personally victorious from the experience on February 12, 1973 - 25
years ago this past Thursday.
With a quarter-century of hindsight, I think some truths are evident. Some
of those truths were the unintended consequences of ill-conceived actions
taken in haste, but all raise questions in the present, when truths are,
apparently, whatever one wants them to be.
I really didn't expect to be held long. My estimate of my release to the
"Old Guys" upon arrival in Hanoi was six months to a year - at the most. The
reason? I'd seen the plans for the total destruction of North Vietnam in
1965, but waited in vain for them to be carried out. Instead, there were
"cease-fires" of various durations, usually to appease domestic
constituencies in the U.S. In March, 1968, peace talks began. They dragged
on for nearly five years while the Communists built up their strength, and
their allies in the U.S. - witting and un- - helped the Communists' cause by
weakening U.S. resolve.
I spent more than a year in solitary confinement with the hours broken
only by infrequent communications (tapping through 18a of concrete) with
other Americans and a quarterly miserable re-introduction to the "Camp
Regulations for Captured American Criminals." A twice-daily English language
broadcast provided a version of the war as seen by the Communists (and their
too-many American supporters) and gave us deep insights into a government of
lies, deceit, and perfidy - theirs, not ours, or at least that's what we
thought at the time.
I lived in 10 camps scattered all over North Vietnam - several in Hanoi,
the capital; a couple in the countryside, including the Son Tay camp raided
by U.S. Special Forces in November, 1970; and one near Lang Son, a few
kilometers from the Chinese border. The camps were similar, consisting of
small cells that held from one to four POWs each. Attempts to communicate
with other Americans or other rooms were punished by a month in leg irons
with one's hands handcuffed behind his back and a torture session to force
the POW to apologize for "breaking the camp regulations" and "committing
crimes against the 'Vietnamese people.' "
Despite all efforts to break the POWs, we remained as unified as possible
under the circumstances. Our excellent leadership (Colonel Robbie Risner and
Commander Jim Stockdale) held us together under those difficult
circumstances, and we came out - most of us - better men than when we went
in. Stockdale, tortured many times for his efforts to unify us, received the
Medal of Honor. Seven Vietnam POWs received the Medal of Honor - three for
heroism prior to their being captured - an incredible percentage for a group
that totalled 801, including civilians.
After the Son Tay raid in 1970, the North Vietnamese hastily moved all
American POWs to camps in the Hanoi area. Because there were too few of the
small rooms, they were forced to move up to 50 POWs into each of several 60'
by 20' cells. During solitary confinement, many of us had relived our lives,
going back in time to each of the classrooms where we had learned while
growing up and in college. Now that we were together at last - for the
longest held, Everett Alvarez, it had been more than six years - we formally
organized a structured learning environment.
While each room was slightly different, mine held classes on every
conceivable topic. I taught French from my Naval Academy courses and learned
Spanish and German. Russian was taught, as were math, architecture,
engineering drawing, and even music. Classes taught without benefit of
books, A-V equipment, or teaching certificates were so effective that three
of our enlisted men who'd had no college training prior to capture passed
more than 100 semester hours of college-level validation exams on their
return.
We were proud to be serving our country and openly ridiculed our North
Vietnamese captors, who proclaimed that they were going to drag the war out
so their allies in the United States would force the American government to
withdraw. We discounted trips to Hanoi by various American personalities
such as Jane Fonda, Ramsey Clark, and a few anti-war no-names who were
referred to as "comrade" by the Vietnamese.
When President Nixon mined the harbors of Vietnam in 1972 and unleashed
the very heavy bombing of the country that had been planned in 1965, we POWs
knew that the war would be over within weeks. We had known seven years
before the missions were actually implemented what it would take to force
the North Vietnamese to negotiate seriously.
And, indeed it was so. The North Vietnamese agreed to release the
prisoners of war. The U.S. agreed to go home, and the North Vietnamese
agreed to stay out of South Vietnam. We were going to resupply the South
Vietnamese and give that country support in the event of further Northern
aggression. The POWs were released, and many happy scenes occurred
throughout the nation when families were reunited after many years of
separation.
What has happened in the 25 years since then? Amid the turmoil
surrounding Watergate, an indifferent Congress pulled the plug on the
Republic of Vietnam, and we observed the Soviet- and Chinese-supplied North
Vietnamese invade the South while an unequipped South Vietnamese army was
impotent to repel the invasion.
And so now, 25 years later, these questions: Had the press not reported
total defeat at the hands of the North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong
following the devastating (to them) Tet offensive in 1968, would the war
have ended in 1968 rather than in 1973 and 40,000 lives later? Do those who
manned the barricades to protest the war realize the part they played in
costing some of those lost lives? Had Watergate not distracted President
Nixon, would we have intervened in 1974 to save the Republic of Vietnam?
And these further questions, extrapolated to the pres- ent day: Does the
disgraceful conduct of the Commander-in-Chief amidst his incredible
popularity polls similarly render impotent any foreign policy initiative to
contain Saddam Hussein? Or will that conduct result in a McNamara-type
sacrifice of American lives as a distraction? Does the President's apparent
personal absolution by the public in the polls render it okay for mere
military personnel to engage in similar debauchery? Is there any cause the
American public thinks worthwhile enough to judge on its merits? Is there
anything sacred?
Tough questions. From those heady days of finally being free again in 1973
to having to ask these questions today is a stretch I never thought I'd have
to make. I don't know the answers, but I do know the questions will not be
answered by the current Washington power-elites. I'm not sure whether I want
to get mad about it or to cry. I do know this anniversary is not as happy as
it should be.
But I also know that when my fellow ex-prisoners of war and I reunite in
Dallas later this year, we will rejoice in the personal friendships and
experiences gained under fire. We'll pray for the country, because it
appears to be navigating rocky shoals without a moral compass or a leader
who commands respect. And we will hope that, somehow, our children will be
spared the kind of amoral actions taken by our political leaders in the
'60s.
Use your Browser's BACK function to return to the PREVIOUS page