Lost, then found: Sister of Vietnam unknown soldier tells his story

Jul. 30—MARIETTA — Visitors to the Cobb Civic Center were treated to a story Thursday that was as remarkable as it was somber — Col. Patricia Blassie's quest for closure after her brother, Lt. Michael Blassie, was killed in the Vietnam War.

Michael Blassie was 24 years old when he was shot down while flying his A-37 Dragonfly in the Battle of An Loc in 1972. His remains and a few artifacts were recovered, and the remains were initially believed to belong to Michael Blassie. But upon further analysis, the remains were classified as belonging to an unknown soldier, culminating in their interment in the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery in 1984.

Thus began what Cobb County Commissioner JoAnn Birrell described as an "incredible journey ... in the recovery of her brother's identity," when introducing Col. Blassie at the Civic Center.

Col. Blassie, a retired career U.S. Air Force veteran, was born into a lower middle-class family in St. Louis. Over the course of her career she worked in Georgia, including at Robins Air Force Base and Cobb's Dobbins Air Reserve Base. Col. Blassie also worked for a time for the Cobb County government as the director of operations.

But before all that, she was a teenager when her brother, a U.S. Air Force Academy graduate, left for Vietnam. His death was witnessed by a major, who recalled Michael's plane, hit by enemy fire, streaming fuel as it inverted and crashed in the distance.

When Michael was killed, it was "just as you would see in the movies," with a handful of U.S. Air Force personnel turning up at her parent's home to deliver the news, Col. Blassie said. The Blassies were told Michael had been killed and that his body was unrecoverable.

"It's hard to describe because of the way we looked at Michael ... We looked up to him. He was a great man," Col. Blassie said, calling her late brother athletic and hard-working, the eldest child she and her siblings wanted to emulate.

She later learned Michael had written a letter to his girlfriend asking "Why am I trying to live if I'm just living to die? I'll keep on living to fight as long as there's a fighting reason to live, or for others to live."

Michael's ID was recovered at the crash site, along with artifacts from the plane. His remains ended up in Hawaii, where they were examined by doctors tasked with identifying the remains of soldiers. But this was before the advent of DNA testing. An "anthropological formula" was used to estimate the height and age of the man, which didn't quite match Michael's description. A small amount of body hair recovered wasn't a match either. Despite the remains being originally believed to be Michael, the soldier was labelled "X26" and classified as unknown.

In the early '80s, veterans' groups were pressuring the government to add a Vietnam warrior to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, which already contained unknowns from World War I, World War II and the Korean War. X26 was chosen, and on Memorial Day 1984, President Ronald Reagan presided over the interment of the remains.

"A Missing Plane," a book about a missing World War II bomber published in 1986, mentions Michael Blassie's deadly crash and the bones and artifacts recovered. Col. Blassie read from the book, which included a passage that read, "putting X26 in the tomb of the unknowns was politically expedient." The book called the remains "unidentified, not unidentifiable."

As the years passed, however, activists and journalists began researching the X26 case and contacting the Blassies. First, In 1994, was Ted Sampley, an advocate for prisoners of war and missing in action U.S. soldiers, who was convinced X26 was Michael Blassie. Col. Blassie was told there was no evidence to support that, so she didn't pursue it further. Then in 1997, investigative reporter Vince Gonzales came calling. Col. Blassie agreed to work with Gonzales to gather documents related to the case via Freedom of Information Act requests, which revealed the ID and artifacts recovered, details of the anthropological analysis and more.

Col. Blassie discussed the findings with her family, which had up to that point been wary of reopening old wounds — "we didn't talk about it," the Colonel said of her brother's death. But by then, there was enough evidence for the family.

The story began to be reported in the media and the military set up a task force to reexamine X26. In 1998, with the Blassies' blessing, the remains were disinterred and tested to see if the DNA matched. The results came in weeks later and confirmed the identity as Michael.

Michael Blassie's remains were moved to a new gravesite in St. Louis, and the Vietnam tomb of the unknown has remained empty ever since.

Col. Blassie still has the artefacts from the crash and plans to donate them to a planned POW-MIA museum that has yet to open.

The tomb remains empty, Col. Blassie said, because at the time her brother's remains were interred, the government didn't have a single other case that qualified for the tomb, considered a true unknown. The errors of Michael Blassie's case and the quality of identification technology means the memorial is not likely to receive more remains, she said.

"I don't believe, due to DNA, that there will be another unknown soldier, ever ... I think it would be hard to justify or say that anyone really is unknown ... it's hard to imagine that there could be somebody ... meeting the criteria," Col. Blassie said.

Col. Blassie's father died before her brother's remains were identified. Her mother Jean, however, did live to see that day. The Colonel recalled her mother's part in the fight to identify the remains, and how her "maternal instinct" knew they were her son's.

"When we were going through this, some Vietnam veterans came up and said, 'What are you doing? Why are you doing this?' Col. Blassie said. "And I said, 'Because it's Michael. And my mother wants to bring her son home."