Buried as a Mystery, Remembered by Name: The Story of Michael Blassie

00:00:10
Speaker 1: And we return to our American Stories. One of our nation’s most symbolic gravesites is in Arlington National Cemetery, just outside of Washington, D.C. The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier honors three unidentified service members today: one from World War I, one from World War II, and one from the Korean War. But it used to be four. Here to tell the story of the Identified Unknown Soldier is Craig Dumay of the Grateful Nation Project. Let’s get into the story.

00:00:46
Speaker 2: On the morning of May 11th, 1972, First Lieutenant Blassie took off from the Ben Hoa Airbase in South Vietnam in his Dragonfly A-37. Just four months after arriving in Vietnam, he’d already flown one hundred and thirty-seven combat missions. On this day, he was targeting an enemy artillery position outside of Anloche, sixty miles north of Saigon. Blassie graduated from high school in Florissant, Missouri, in 1966. He trained as a pilot and qualified to fly the Cessna A-37 Dragonfly, a small, light, jet-powered attack aircraft nicknamed the Super Tweet. These planes were relatively inexpensive, and because they could fly low and slow, they could deliver firepower more accurately than heavier conventional bombers. That accuracy came at a price. The Dragonfly was also more vulnerable to enemy ground fire. Blassie’s flight commander, Major James Connolly, described the attack in a letter to Blassie’s parents. Mike’s aircraft was hit and began streaming of fuel. He must have been killed instantly because he did not transmit a distress call of any kind. The aircraft flew a short distance on its own and then slowly rolled over, exploding on impact in enemy health territory. Mike Blassie, H. Twenty-four, was declared killed in action. One of the consequences of warfare has been large numbers of unidentified dead. Sometimes, unidentified remains resulted from poor record-keeping, the damage that weapons of war inflicted on bodies, or the haste required to bury the dead and mark grave sites in a battlefield environment. While exact numbers are unattainable, estimates indicate that nearly half of the Civil War dead were never identified. Unidentified remains were often buried in mass graves, but in December 1920, New York Congressman and World War I veteran Hamilton Fish, Jr., proposed legislation providing for the interment of one unknown American soldier had a special tomb to be built in Arlington National Cemetery. The purpose of the legislation was to bring home the body of an unknown American warrior who, in himself, represents no section, creed, or race in the late war, and who typifies, moreover, the soul of America and the supreme sacrifice of her heroic dead. On November 11th, 1921, a horse-drawn caisson carried the remains of an unknown soldier through Washington, D.C., and over the Potomac River to Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia. The inscription on the west side of the Tomb sarcophagus reads: ‘Here rests in honored glory an American soldier known but to God.’ Following World War II, some Americans supported the idea of interring and honoring and unknown from that war. In August 1956, President Dwight D. Eisenhower approved the selection and interment of unknowns from both World War II and Korea. Before the Vietnam War ended, Arlington National Cemetery made preparations to add a third crypt. On Memorial Day, May 28th, 1984, remains designated X-26 were interred as the Vietnam Unknown in a ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery.

00:04:50
Speaker 3: Unknown Soldier, who was returned to us today, in whom we later rest, a symbolic of all our missing sons. About him, we may well wonder, as others. Am, did he play on some street in a great American city, or did he work with side his father on a farm out in America’s heartland? Did he marry? Did he have children? Did he look expectantly to return to a bride? We’ll never know the answers to these questions about his life. We do know, though, why he died. He saw the horrors of war, but bravely faced them, certain his own cause, in his country’s cause, was a noble one, that he was fighting for human dignity, for free men everywhere.

00:05:41
Speaker 2: However, at that time, many people believed that advances in technology would mean that all remains from Vietnam could eventually be identified. This brings us to Vietnam Air Force pilot Michael Joseph Blassie. In the early 1990s, reports began to surface that the Vietnam Unknown could possibly be the fallen pilot Mike. Blassie’s family was not informed that the crash site had been accessed or that remains were recovered. The Allied South Vietnamese Army recovered Blassie’s personal belongings and six bone fragments. All were sent to the Saigon Mortuary and finally to Hawaii’s Central Identification Laboratory, with Blassie’s remains being separated from the personal belongings and other items from the crash site. A series of mistakes and flawed procedures led to his remains being reclassified as designated unknown and stored at the Central Identification Laboratory in a file with the label X-26. The Blassie family visited the tomb in the following years, unaware that their son and brother were buried there. After years of political and media pressure from the Blassie family, in the middle of the night, soldiers of the Old Guard stood watch and blocked the view. The Vietnam Unknown would be disinterred and DNA-tested. DNA test results confirmed a perfect match with Michael Blassie’s older sister, Judy. Twenty-six years after his Dragonfly was shot down, First Lieutenant Michael Joseph Blassie’s remains were returned to his family in Saint Louis, where he was laid to rest at Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery. As of today, the crypt that once held the remains of the Vietnam War Unknown is empty. The slab over that crypt has been replaced, changing the Vietnam War inscription. It now reads: ‘Honoring and keeping faith with America’s Missing Serviceman,’ a reminder of the commitment of the United States Armed Forces to the fullest possible accounting for our missing heroes.

00:08:07
Speaker 1: And a terrific job on the production, editing, and storytelling by our own Monte Montgomery. And a special thanks to Craig Dumay of the Grateful Nation Project. To find out more about the great work they do, go to Herocards.us. That’s Herocards.us. And if you’re ever visiting Washington, D.C., make sure you make a stop at Arlington National Cemetery. It’s just outside of Washington, D.C. It’s got its own dedicated Metro stop, and be prepared to stay awhile and be prepared not to speak. What a story was told about First Lieutenant Michael Joseph Blassie. He graduates from a suburban high school in Saint Louis in 1966, qualifies as a pilot, and the next thing you know, he’s flying the Super Tweet, the Dragonfly, low and slow, which of course led to his timely and tragic death at the age of 24, killed in action. And then all the work of the family to find out what they found out: the story of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldiers, known soldier, and that would be Lieutenant Blassie. First Lieutenant Blassie, hear on Our American Stories.