the cia file on mccain as p.o.w.

totally “Manchurian Candidate” stuff, honestly:
http://cryptome.org/cia-mccain-pow/cia-mccain-pow.htm
released under a FOIA request. Here’s a good bit:

Interview with McCain

Hanoi VNA International Service in French 1339 GMT 9 Nov 67 B

(Interview of American POW LT CDR John Sidney McCain published in 9 November Nhan Dan)

(Excerpt) Hanoi 9 November –/Passage Omitted on circumstances behind McCain’s transfer from carrier Forrestal to Oriskany and his capture on Truc Bach Lake on 26 October 1967)

To a question of the correspondent, McCain answered: ‘My assignment to the Oriskany, I told myself, was due to serious losses in pilots which were sustained by this aircraft carrier (due to its raids over North Vietnam territory–VNA) and which necessitated replacements. From 10 to 12 pilots were transferred like me from the Forrestal to the Oriskany. Before I was shot down we had made several sorties. Altogether I made about 23 flights over North Vietnam.’

McCain admitted that he participated five or six times in the attacks on the Haiphong sector.

Fear still clearly showed on his face when he recalled his disastrous sortie on 26 October against Hanoi. ‘The briefing was held in the morning,’ he said. ‘That’s right. I remember that it was the morning that they told me of the situation and the plan of the raid, which should take place about noon. A reconnaissance officer explained this plan to me. They showed me photographs of my target marked out the paths to be followed by the Oriskany at this point. They pointed out to me a number of antiaircraft positions near Hanoi and a number of possible rocket positions, the position of our rescue ships, the radio frequency, the composition of the flight, and so forth. Upon arrival near the target, our formation with six bombers, would mount the attack according to the following order: I would be number three, and the chief of the formation, number one. Each pilot would have to approach the target from a different direction, the choice of which would be left to [undecipherable].

‘While moving toward the target, we stumbled over a very dense network of fire, a very powerful riposte. A few rockets were seen. Our chief turned to approach the target and I followed him at a distance. At the time when I was preparing to drop my bombs–I did not know whether or not I could drop them because things were happening too fast–I heard a terrible explosion which shook my plane and sent it toward the ground. It was hit so violently that I was thrown on my back and went straight toward the ground in this posture. I tried to pull the direction-stick

[Image] I do not know at what [undecipherable]

Naturally I felt buffeting because my bailing out was made at the time when the plane was falling too fast. When the parachute opened I looked down and found out I was going to fall into a lake. I was really lucky to be able to fall into a lake. All around me bombs were exploding while rockets and antiaircraft shells were streaking through the sky. I hit the lake and went to the bottom. While trying to return to the surface, I was seized by Vietnamese and pushed to the bank of the lake. They disarmed me and brought me to prison.’

‘What do you think of Hanoi’s fire barrage?’ asked the Nhan Dan Correspondent.

McCain cried out: ‘Very intense, very accurate. When a fire barrage is so accurate, one has to reckon with it. You are excellent artillerymen. Naturally, I have never seen such a fire network, because it was the first time I flew over Hanoi.’

‘Were the pilots who had flown over Hanoi afraid of the firepower from the ground?’

‘Yes, certainly!’ McCain said, ‘How lucky are those who do not have to come often to the Hanoi Sector. Very dangerous! Because they could very well be shot down, hit, something that no one wants! When I arrived near my target I saw two rockets streaking by my side, and it was terrible to see. They flew very fast, very strongly.’

Suddenly the air pirate was silent as if still obsessed by the memory of his disasterous sortie.

‘For me,’ he concluded, ‘there is no longer any doubt. Things are taking place in a favorable opinion. The United States at present seems to be standing alone, so much is its isolation.’