WEBVTT 1 00:00:11.599 --> 00:00:16.359 Welcome to Veterans Chronicles. I'm Greg Corumbus. Our guest in this edition has 2 00:00:16.399 --> 00:00:21.280 retired US Air Force Colonel Ed Hubbard. He is a Vietnam veteran and spent 3 00:00:21.399 --> 00:00:26.440 nearly seven years in captivity as a prisoner of war after being shot down in 4 00:00:26.519 --> 00:00:31.199 July of nineteen sixty six. He is also a recipient of the Silver Star, 5 00:00:31.320 --> 00:00:35.280 among many other awards. And Colonel Hubbard, thank you very much for 6 00:00:35.320 --> 00:00:37.479 being with us today. It's my pleasure. Thank you for having me. 7 00:00:37.679 --> 00:00:40.280 Where were you born and raised? I was born and raised in Kansas City. 8 00:00:40.439 --> 00:00:43.920 And was there a history of military service in your family? Uncles were 9 00:00:43.920 --> 00:00:48.560 in World War Two, but not in my immediate family. Why did you 10 00:00:48.600 --> 00:00:50.840 want to join the air I went to fly airplanes. How did you get 11 00:00:50.880 --> 00:00:55.479 that desire? When I was a little kid, on the weekends we outside 12 00:00:55.479 --> 00:00:58.640 of Kansas City, there was a Navy base where they did pilot training, 13 00:00:59.119 --> 00:01:03.719 and on weekends with my parents found me to be too much trouble to handle, 14 00:01:03.759 --> 00:01:06.959 they would take me out and set me out beside the fence at the 15 00:01:07.000 --> 00:01:08.920 airport and let me sit and watch the airplanes all day and come back and 16 00:01:08.959 --> 00:01:15.280 get me in the afternoon. And so I had great idea about flying airplanes 17 00:01:15.319 --> 00:01:18.319 would be the only way I would want to go. And then when I 18 00:01:18.359 --> 00:01:21.000 was at high school and I was dating girls, I used to take them 19 00:01:21.000 --> 00:01:25.040 down to the Kansas City Airport and we would sit on the dike and one 20 00:01:25.040 --> 00:01:26.519 of the airplanes were taken off right over the top of your head. It 21 00:01:26.599 --> 00:01:30.640 was one of my most enjoyable dates was to take a girl down there, 22 00:01:30.799 --> 00:01:36.680 or white blouse and when the seven or sevens take off, this black suit 23 00:01:36.799 --> 00:01:40.879 come down and she covered with black stuff. How many second dates did you 24 00:01:40.920 --> 00:01:44.959 get with that? But it was I loved airplanes. I'd love to go 25 00:01:44.959 --> 00:01:47.480 sit and watch airplanes. I still do that to this day if I have 26 00:01:47.560 --> 00:01:49.879 a chance. And it wasn't long before you became an officer, Well, 27 00:01:49.879 --> 00:01:53.480 it was a little while. When I was seventeen, between my junior and 28 00:01:53.519 --> 00:01:57.760 senior year high school, my brother and I were out driving around Kansas City 29 00:01:57.840 --> 00:02:01.560 trying to find a job and we're not successful. And I heard a guy 30 00:02:01.560 --> 00:02:05.439 on the radio say, joined the Air Force Reserve and see the world. 31 00:02:05.560 --> 00:02:07.919 I said, now there's an interesting thought. So we drove out to the 32 00:02:07.919 --> 00:02:12.800 nearest base and I joined the Air Force that day. And one with that 33 00:02:12.919 --> 00:02:16.159 twenty fourth of June nineteen fifty five five, and what sort of duties did 34 00:02:16.159 --> 00:02:19.639 you have in then? I was. I went through basic training and I 35 00:02:19.680 --> 00:02:22.639 became a flight line mechanic, and I got to go work on airplanes. 36 00:02:23.680 --> 00:02:28.240 And we had a shortage of people who enjoyed flying, and so I applied 37 00:02:28.280 --> 00:02:30.840 and got a waiver and I became a flight engineer. And I flew as 38 00:02:30.879 --> 00:02:35.879 a flight engineer on a C forty six and then for about a year, 39 00:02:35.919 --> 00:02:39.520 and then I transitioned and flew for about five years on a C one nineteens. 40 00:02:40.159 --> 00:02:45.280 And then when they we changed airplanes to the C one twenty four, 41 00:02:45.319 --> 00:02:49.719 the big globe master required a panel engineer, and to be a panel engineer 42 00:02:49.719 --> 00:02:52.639 you had to be at least a staff sergeant, and I didn't hold the 43 00:02:52.719 --> 00:02:55.039 rank, and so I had to find a new job. I became a 44 00:02:55.080 --> 00:03:00.080 loadmaster on a C one twenty four. About six months after that, I 45 00:03:00.080 --> 00:03:05.080 got accepted in the Aviation Cadet program to go to navigators training in Waco, 46 00:03:05.199 --> 00:03:09.240 Texas. Twenty first of August of sixty one, I went on active duty, 47 00:03:09.840 --> 00:03:15.000 and July of sixty two I got my wings in my commission. From 48 00:03:15.039 --> 00:03:19.319 there went flu airplanes and what were you flying? Well? When I was 49 00:03:19.319 --> 00:03:22.960 going through nav training, it was flying T twenty nine, a trainer airplane. 50 00:03:23.360 --> 00:03:27.479 And then I went from there to Sacramento, California, made their Air 51 00:03:27.520 --> 00:03:30.800 Force base and went through navigator or bombardeer training for a year. And when 52 00:03:30.800 --> 00:03:35.360 I left there that I went to Show Air Force Base in Sumter, South 53 00:03:35.400 --> 00:03:39.360 Carolina, went through crew training for the RB sixty six photo reconnaissance airplane, 54 00:03:39.879 --> 00:03:46.159 and I went to Europe, went to Alcanberry RF Alcanberry in about seventy miles 55 00:03:46.159 --> 00:03:50.080 north of London and spent a little over two years flying B sixty six. 56 00:03:50.199 --> 00:03:53.919 Is there that I went from there to Chambla Air Base in northeastern France and 57 00:03:54.039 --> 00:03:59.520 flew for about nine months in the same kind of airplane. And then with 58 00:04:00.039 --> 00:04:03.879 no warning at all, one day I was sent from Chamberle, France through 59 00:04:03.879 --> 00:04:09.120 the United States long enough to drop off my family, straight to Clark Air 60 00:04:09.120 --> 00:04:13.680 Base to go through Jungle Survival school, straight to Tocley Air Base in Thailand, 61 00:04:14.080 --> 00:04:17.560 where I flew combat missions in North Vietnam. On my twenty sixth missis 62 00:04:17.560 --> 00:04:20.560 I got shot down. What kind of missions were you assigned? We were 63 00:04:20.560 --> 00:04:27.319 fine electronic reconnaissance, which is kind of a multifaceted. We were gathering a 64 00:04:27.480 --> 00:04:31.399 limp information electronic intelligence information about the location of the SAM sites, so we 65 00:04:31.399 --> 00:04:34.399 could because they were moving to SAM sites all the time, and so we 66 00:04:34.399 --> 00:04:40.199 would get current information today and we would plaut the sam merns for the flights 67 00:04:40.240 --> 00:04:45.399 tomorrow. And then we were also jamming all the radar sites that came on 68 00:04:45.439 --> 00:04:48.480 the air and anytime missiles were lost, and we were calling the warning out 69 00:04:48.639 --> 00:04:53.680 to all the other fighters that were in the area. Tell them where the 70 00:04:53.720 --> 00:05:00.439 map had a grid on it with letter designators and something like Echo Gulf three 71 00:05:00.480 --> 00:05:02.480 that was a little square on the map, a thirty mile square on the 72 00:05:02.519 --> 00:05:08.279 map, and you say stovepipe red Echo Gulf three and it meant there's a 73 00:05:08.319 --> 00:05:11.800 red, meant the airplane air the missile had been launched and it was in 74 00:05:11.839 --> 00:05:14.759 the route. A time of flight from the missile to the from the ground 75 00:05:14.759 --> 00:05:17.800 to the fighters at fifteen thousand feet was only about ten seconds. So it 76 00:05:17.879 --> 00:05:24.040 was a very crucial call had to be met right now because the missile's already 77 00:05:24.079 --> 00:05:28.120 airborne and the missiles coming at you at Mack three and what altitude did you 78 00:05:28.120 --> 00:05:30.519 say you would do this. We were at thirty thousand feet. We were 79 00:05:30.600 --> 00:05:33.800 orbiting up doing all this from thirty thousand feet. Actually, the day we 80 00:05:33.800 --> 00:05:38.639 were shot down, we were flying around the circle up there, and we've 81 00:05:38.680 --> 00:05:42.800 been up there for over half an hour. When they lost a salvo of 82 00:05:42.800 --> 00:05:46.480 missiles. We'd already been fired at two or three times that day. Nobody, 83 00:05:46.600 --> 00:05:48.720 we thought nobody could hit us. But unfortunately, the time of flight 84 00:05:48.800 --> 00:05:53.879 for the missile to impact for us was only about twenty eight seconds. And 85 00:05:55.680 --> 00:05:58.319 if you had him in sight, you could defeat them. You could turn, 86 00:05:58.439 --> 00:06:00.439 and you can maneuver the airplane and you could defeat the missile because the 87 00:06:00.439 --> 00:06:04.160 missiles going very very fast, and it has very small wings and so it 88 00:06:04.199 --> 00:06:09.800 can't make a real hard turn where your airplane quit. So you just maneuver 89 00:06:09.839 --> 00:06:12.839 the airplane until the missile was on the canopy. You can see it on 90 00:06:12.879 --> 00:06:15.360 the canus spot on the canopy. And if you maneuver the airplane so that 91 00:06:15.399 --> 00:06:19.160 the missile appears to be not moving, that's called the collision course. So 92 00:06:19.240 --> 00:06:23.079 if you hold that position, it's going to fly right through your a canopy. 93 00:06:23.959 --> 00:06:28.040 And so you wait until the missile got too large to beany to let 94 00:06:28.040 --> 00:06:30.800 it get any closer, and he's pull up to a barrel roll you create 95 00:06:30.879 --> 00:06:33.959 a donut in the sky and the missile would go right through the center of 96 00:06:34.000 --> 00:06:36.480 the thing. So if you had him in sight, you could defeat them. 97 00:06:38.160 --> 00:06:42.279 Unfortunately, undercast had come in and so we had clouds below us, 98 00:06:42.279 --> 00:06:45.360 and when the missiles came up, they were well on the way before we 99 00:06:45.360 --> 00:06:48.759 could turn and find them, and then we didn't see them, and so 100 00:06:49.120 --> 00:06:54.079 we didn't get hit directly. We just took some real close missies and very 101 00:06:54.120 --> 00:06:58.319 loud explosion and shook the airplane pretty bad, and within a matter of thirty 102 00:06:58.319 --> 00:07:01.720 seconds the airplane was on fire, and shortly thereafter the airplane started coming apart. 103 00:07:02.160 --> 00:07:04.959 Six of us at the airplane. Five of us got out, five 104 00:07:05.079 --> 00:07:10.680 us ejected. One guy died that day. We don't know exactly what happened, 105 00:07:10.680 --> 00:07:14.000 but he would have been the last guy out of the airplane, so 106 00:07:14.759 --> 00:07:17.319 we don't know. The airplane blew up shortly shortly after we got out, 107 00:07:17.879 --> 00:07:21.439 and he probably was still sitting in the airplane where it blew up. Tell 108 00:07:21.480 --> 00:07:25.839 me about ejecting and what it's different. First thing, you know, it 109 00:07:25.879 --> 00:07:29.560 was the smoke coming in the cockpit and through the air condition around the canopy, 110 00:07:29.959 --> 00:07:33.560 and you're training tells you the first thing you do when you see smoke 111 00:07:33.560 --> 00:07:38.800 in a cockpit you go to one hundred percent oxygen. And when I reached 112 00:07:38.839 --> 00:07:42.480 down to turn the hun percent auction, I the gauge said, we didn't 113 00:07:42.480 --> 00:07:46.360 have any auction. That meant or oxygen can convert her in the belly of 114 00:07:46.360 --> 00:07:49.680 the airplane had been damaged and the oxygen was gone. So at thirty thousand 115 00:07:49.720 --> 00:07:54.720 feet, your time of useful consciousness is not very long, and so you 116 00:07:54.800 --> 00:07:59.279 have to do something immediately. So the first thing after if you don't have 117 00:07:59.319 --> 00:08:03.879 auxy next and you do is dump the pressurization and theoretically that's going to vacate 118 00:08:03.920 --> 00:08:07.839 all the smoke. And that worked for about ten seconds probably, and then 119 00:08:07.879 --> 00:08:11.800 the smoke just kept getting thicker and thicker. The design of the airplane, 120 00:08:11.879 --> 00:08:15.480 beside my seat and the floor, there was a little door. You could 121 00:08:15.519 --> 00:08:18.399 open the door up like this, and there's a outside of the airplane. 122 00:08:18.439 --> 00:08:22.240 You can look at the bottom of the airplane. This door opens up this 123 00:08:22.279 --> 00:08:24.040 way. This door on the outside comes down like that, and that steps 124 00:08:24.040 --> 00:08:26.920 out. That's how you that's how you enter the cockpit of the airplane. 125 00:08:28.319 --> 00:08:31.920 And so when you open the door on the inside, there's a handle there 126 00:08:31.959 --> 00:08:35.039 you pull that in that jettison as the door makes a big, great, 127 00:08:35.039 --> 00:08:37.879 big hole at the bottle of the airplane. And I opened the door on 128 00:08:37.919 --> 00:08:41.279 the inside. The whole inside the airplane was on fire. So I didn't 129 00:08:41.320 --> 00:08:45.240 reach down there and pull the handle. I just closed the door, and 130 00:08:45.799 --> 00:08:48.960 I jettison my canopy to get rid of the smoke and everything. And when 131 00:08:48.960 --> 00:08:50.960 I opened, when the canopy came off, you know, everything and the 132 00:08:52.039 --> 00:08:56.799 cockpit goes out the hole except you until you pull the handle. But the 133 00:08:56.840 --> 00:09:00.320 floor, the door kept came back up. I don't know if I locked 134 00:09:00.360 --> 00:09:03.360 the door and not. Probably didn't. I just put it down, and 135 00:09:03.720 --> 00:09:07.240 so when it opened up, then suddenly I'm sitting in this fireball. And 136 00:09:07.320 --> 00:09:13.159 so I pulled the trigger ejected going about pretty closely straight down six ear a 137 00:09:13.200 --> 00:09:18.480 mile an hour. And it's the wildest thing I've ever done in my life. 138 00:09:18.519 --> 00:09:22.120 It's just absolute chaos because you come out there the winds going six hour 139 00:09:22.159 --> 00:09:26.039 am mint hour when you enter the slip stream, and so you end over 140 00:09:26.159 --> 00:09:30.120 in and flailing and all that and then about one point eight seconds later, 141 00:09:30.240 --> 00:09:35.639 your parachute opens auto banket and go splat and you stop right there. So 142 00:09:35.720 --> 00:09:39.879 you go from six ear a mile or stand still about a heartbeat and then 143 00:09:39.159 --> 00:09:43.600 you hanging your shoot until you get to the ground. It was about twenty 144 00:09:43.639 --> 00:09:48.120 three minutes to the ground coming down. I was ejected somewhere around sixteen thousand 145 00:09:48.120 --> 00:09:50.600 feet twenty three minutes. Yeah, I went a long ride down. I 146 00:09:50.639 --> 00:09:54.919 mean, I'm very small relatively speaking. Everybody gets the same sized parachute, 147 00:09:54.960 --> 00:09:58.320 so depends on how much you weigh and know everything else, and so I'm 148 00:09:58.399 --> 00:10:01.519 kind of small. Just took a long time to get to the ground. 149 00:10:01.559 --> 00:10:03.879 You couldn't believe. And and people are shooting at you the whole time, 150 00:10:03.879 --> 00:10:07.080 and you keep thinking, we'd love to get down a little faster, but 151 00:10:07.320 --> 00:10:11.639 there's nothing to do other than jettison to shoot, which then you're going to 152 00:10:11.720 --> 00:10:13.840 fall seriously and it's going to kill you when you hit the ground, So 153 00:10:15.360 --> 00:10:18.720 you just sit there and hope for the best. Nobody hit me. That's 154 00:10:18.720 --> 00:10:20.639 amazing. What else is going through your mind over those twenty three minutes, 155 00:10:20.679 --> 00:10:26.080 although that's plenty well, I think the primary thing I kept looking around trying 156 00:10:26.080 --> 00:10:28.440 to find the rest of my crew where they were. I know there are 157 00:10:28.440 --> 00:10:31.200 six of us in the airplane. I assume that four guys in the back 158 00:10:31.240 --> 00:10:37.720 of the airplane had downward ejection seats, and so the pilot and the navigator 159 00:10:37.720 --> 00:10:39.320 are going to go up. The four guys back you're going to go down. 160 00:10:41.600 --> 00:10:43.559 Because when I opened the door and the whole inside airplanes full of fire, 161 00:10:45.000 --> 00:10:48.480 and they're back behind that, I assumed they jumped out before I did. 162 00:10:48.519 --> 00:10:50.279 It turns out that wasn't true. I was the first one out, 163 00:10:52.080 --> 00:10:54.080 and we think, we don't know, We'll never know, but we think 164 00:10:54.120 --> 00:10:56.960 the pilot was the second guy out. And suddenly these four guys in the 165 00:10:58.000 --> 00:11:01.120 back are in the airplane, but without any ability to fly the airplane. 166 00:11:01.600 --> 00:11:07.519 And then they apparently got the message and started chat. We lost our radios 167 00:11:07.519 --> 00:11:11.440 and our intercomm immediately when we were hit, so we didn't couldn't talk to 168 00:11:11.480 --> 00:11:13.000 each other. You had to just play it by year. Now when you 169 00:11:13.120 --> 00:11:16.159 hit the ground, well, let's talk about that. How did you hit 170 00:11:16.159 --> 00:11:18.639 the ground? Well, I hit the ground pretty hard. I forgot to 171 00:11:20.039 --> 00:11:24.480 You were supposed to deploy, You had a survival kit under your seat, 172 00:11:24.799 --> 00:11:28.200 supposed to deploy that on a twenty foot lanyard so that it doesn't break your 173 00:11:28.279 --> 00:11:31.320 legs when you hit the ground. But unfortunately, my mental capacity at that 174 00:11:31.360 --> 00:11:35.960 moment seemed to be screwed up, and I didn't deploy it, so it 175 00:11:35.000 --> 00:11:39.039 was still I was still sitting on my seat, or not my seat, 176 00:11:39.039 --> 00:11:43.440 but on the survival kit. Probably in my best interests, as it turns 177 00:11:43.440 --> 00:11:46.879 out, because I came down on a very steep cart of bamboo jungle, 178 00:11:48.200 --> 00:11:50.559 and I mowed down about one hundred yards worth of trees. Was coming down 179 00:11:50.559 --> 00:11:54.639 to that seat. Probably kept me from get a piece of bamboo stuck in 180 00:11:54.720 --> 00:11:58.320 me somewhere. Now, you were able to evade capture at least for a 181 00:11:58.320 --> 00:12:01.360 little while after I was out for about eight hours. I shot down at 182 00:12:01.399 --> 00:12:05.679 eight o'clock in the morning and got captured about five in the afternoon. What'd 183 00:12:05.720 --> 00:12:07.679 you do in those eight hours, Well, the first thing I did is 184 00:12:07.720 --> 00:12:13.120 I got on the ground. I opened my survival kit that I hadn't deployed. 185 00:12:13.159 --> 00:12:15.840 It was right there, and I opened that and had two cans of 186 00:12:15.879 --> 00:12:18.639 water in it, and I took my survival knife and punched holes in the 187 00:12:18.639 --> 00:12:22.720 top of the cans and drank both cans of water, and then I realized 188 00:12:22.720 --> 00:12:26.360 that I got burned on my left arm. My left sleeve was gone and 189 00:12:26.799 --> 00:12:30.960 I had been burned on the back side of my arm. And I didn't 190 00:12:31.039 --> 00:12:35.039 know exactly what I had in the survival kit to put on that for, 191 00:12:35.200 --> 00:12:39.399 you know, burn medicine. It turns out survival kits don't have burned medicine. 192 00:12:39.559 --> 00:12:43.679 And I somebody tried to explain to me one time why, But at 193 00:12:43.720 --> 00:12:46.159 the time all I knew is I'd gone through jungle survival school. They say, 194 00:12:46.360 --> 00:12:50.840 he cuts any abrasions, everything will get infected and you'll regret it. 195 00:12:52.279 --> 00:12:54.720 And so I decided that we don't have to do something rather quick, and 196 00:12:54.799 --> 00:12:58.279 so the only thing I found I had a little bottle of iodine, and 197 00:12:58.320 --> 00:13:03.840 I had a top, a screw top, but it was on there with 198 00:13:03.080 --> 00:13:09.000 paraffin so that it wouldn't leak, and I didn't have the ability to unscrew 199 00:13:09.039 --> 00:13:11.480 it was a tiny little thing. I couldn't get a grip on it unscrewed. 200 00:13:11.600 --> 00:13:13.320 So I stick my knife, went and just knocked the top off the 201 00:13:13.360 --> 00:13:18.519 thing, pour it on my arm, which rendered me unconscious instantly. The 202 00:13:18.679 --> 00:13:24.720 pain was unreal and I was out for some time, I don't know how 203 00:13:24.720 --> 00:13:30.039 long, when I woke up and there are people shouting and shooting all around 204 00:13:30.039 --> 00:13:33.360 me, and I couldn't see him, but I could hear a lot of 205 00:13:33.399 --> 00:13:37.919 people yelling and screaming all around me. And SORRY grabbed the remainder of my 206 00:13:37.039 --> 00:13:43.159 survival kit and I started climbing up the mountain. In survival school, they 207 00:13:43.159 --> 00:13:45.840 said, when you're on the ground, get to the highest point, find 208 00:13:45.879 --> 00:13:48.120 a clearing and sit down and wait to be rescued. And I thought, 209 00:13:48.000 --> 00:13:52.799 I'll go for that. Turn out, nobody was coming. We had been 210 00:13:52.840 --> 00:13:56.879 briefed if you're shot down north of the Red River, nobody's coming in because 211 00:13:56.919 --> 00:14:01.360 they just couldn't fly in there it's too dangerous. And I was sixty miles 212 00:14:01.399 --> 00:14:05.519 north of the Red River. But when you're on the ground and you're facing 213 00:14:05.600 --> 00:14:11.320 captivity potentially or shot and killed, your brain doesn't allow you to accept that 214 00:14:11.360 --> 00:14:13.799 you're not going to get rescued, and so you do everything to prepare to 215 00:14:13.840 --> 00:14:20.080 be rescued, even though it's not going to happen. So I climbed a 216 00:14:20.279 --> 00:14:24.840 hill of quite a way and I found a clearing about side of this room. 217 00:14:24.879 --> 00:14:28.840 Maybe a little bit in this room that apparently lightning had struck and started 218 00:14:28.879 --> 00:14:33.159 a fire, because there's a burned off area. And then I found some 219 00:14:33.440 --> 00:14:37.840 bamboo that was all fallen down in a big pile, and I got underneath 220 00:14:37.840 --> 00:14:41.440 that and hid. And probably eight or ten times that day I saw the 221 00:14:41.519 --> 00:14:46.159 Vietnamese come through real close to me, but they didn't know where I was, 222 00:14:46.720 --> 00:14:48.519 and they didn't find me, and so I knew it was flying. 223 00:14:48.559 --> 00:14:52.759 The second time that day about one in the afternoon, so I knew the 224 00:14:52.759 --> 00:14:56.600 air all the airplanes are coming back in the afternoon. So at one o'clock 225 00:14:56.600 --> 00:15:01.080 Avenue and I've got my flares and my mirrors and my rock things, my 226 00:15:01.159 --> 00:15:05.840 pistol, I got everything I could possibly carry. And when I started hearing 227 00:15:05.879 --> 00:15:07.799 airplanes coming, then I went out in the middle of this clearing and started 228 00:15:07.840 --> 00:15:11.600 preparing to be picked up. Called him all the radio. Nobody ever answered 229 00:15:11.639 --> 00:15:16.519 me. I think they had probably they had a lot on their hands too. 230 00:15:16.559 --> 00:15:20.559 They were flying into a bombing strike. After I had been standing in 231 00:15:20.600 --> 00:15:22.679 this clearing for a little while, I look around and I'm completely surrounded by 232 00:15:22.759 --> 00:15:26.919 Vietnamese and nobody had seen me. They're all firing their rifles up in the 233 00:15:26.960 --> 00:15:30.559 air trying to shoot down the airplanes, and so now we had seen so 234 00:15:30.600 --> 00:15:33.600 I just kind of melted into the ground and I crawled back back at my 235 00:15:33.639 --> 00:15:37.720 little hiding place, and I was there for about another four hours before they 236 00:15:37.759 --> 00:15:41.639 found me. A little black and white dog came and smelled me and started 237 00:15:41.679 --> 00:15:45.840 barking, and pretty soon a guy would a gun came and he couldn't see 238 00:15:45.879 --> 00:15:48.240 me, and he's probably at least as scared as I was. But because 239 00:15:48.279 --> 00:15:52.080 he didn't know where I was, he couldn't see me, but he probably 240 00:15:52.080 --> 00:15:56.039 assumed I had a gun, but he had a rifle when he kept going 241 00:15:56.200 --> 00:15:58.279 looking all HI around because he got wrong and he was trying to get me 242 00:15:58.320 --> 00:16:03.360 to stand up. Officially, I took my gun, put it in the 243 00:16:03.440 --> 00:16:08.360 mud, and stood up. Was captured, him off to jail. That's 244 00:16:08.399 --> 00:16:14.720 retired US Air Force Colonel Ed Hubbard, a Vietnam veteran who spent nearly seven 245 00:16:14.840 --> 00:16:18.879 years as a prisoner of war. When we come back, Colonel Hubbard explains 246 00:16:18.919 --> 00:16:25.279 what life was like as a prisoner in the so called Hanoi Hilton. That's 247 00:16:25.320 --> 00:16:32.399 straight ahead. I'm Greg Corumbus and this is Veterans Chronicles. This is Veterans 248 00:16:32.480 --> 00:16:36.960 Chronicles. I'm Greg Corumbus. Our guest in this edition has retired US Air 249 00:16:37.000 --> 00:16:41.399 Force Colonel Ed Hubbard, who spent nearly seven years as a prisoner of war 250 00:16:41.919 --> 00:16:45.080 after being shot down in nineteen sixty six. Just before the break, we 251 00:16:45.200 --> 00:16:49.240 learned about how he was forced to eject from his plane, his efforts to 252 00:16:49.279 --> 00:16:55.639 evade capture, and what happened when he was finally taken into custody. Now, 253 00:16:55.799 --> 00:16:59.600 Colonel Hubbard tells us what life was like when he got to the prison. 254 00:17:00.039 --> 00:17:02.679 First thing they did they took everything I had. First I was they 255 00:17:02.679 --> 00:17:04.119 tied me up, and then they realized they want to take me out of 256 00:17:04.160 --> 00:17:07.119 my flight suit and everything, and they couldn't because I was tied up. 257 00:17:07.160 --> 00:17:10.519 So they had to untie me to get my clothes off, and I was 258 00:17:10.559 --> 00:17:12.720 down to my underwear and my socks, and I put a rope around my 259 00:17:12.799 --> 00:17:18.720 neck, tied my arms together behind my back by the elbows, tied my 260 00:17:18.759 --> 00:17:22.920 wrist together, and we walked for probably an hour, most of an hour 261 00:17:23.200 --> 00:17:26.640 back down the hill that I had come up into the village where they came 262 00:17:26.680 --> 00:17:30.480 from, not all the way down. They stopped and they said it's here, 263 00:17:30.759 --> 00:17:33.039 and there were my boot tracks scorn up the hill, so they tracked 264 00:17:33.039 --> 00:17:37.079 me by my boot tracks. You know, who would have ever thought to 265 00:17:37.279 --> 00:17:41.240 turn around and walk backwards up the hill or take your boots off, And 266 00:17:41.200 --> 00:17:44.640 so they knew I was up there. It was just a matter of time 267 00:17:44.640 --> 00:17:48.640 they would eventually find me. Went sat in the village under a thatched hut 268 00:17:51.079 --> 00:17:53.119 in the pig pen, as pig kept coming by and checking me out. 269 00:17:53.160 --> 00:17:56.599 And I was there for about an hour, I guess, and then an 270 00:17:56.680 --> 00:18:00.839 army guy came and looked me over, and he went away, and they 271 00:18:00.839 --> 00:18:03.400 all went and had dinner, left me in the pig pen, tied to 272 00:18:03.440 --> 00:18:07.160 the post with a little kid about ten years old with a great, big 273 00:18:07.200 --> 00:18:12.039 long rifle. It was guarding me. After dark, they took me for 274 00:18:12.079 --> 00:18:15.160 a walk through the general He started probably about eight o'clock at night. Walked 275 00:18:15.200 --> 00:18:19.079 until sun up the next morning. Every time we would across the river, 276 00:18:19.160 --> 00:18:22.039 we would walk across on a log, And every time we walk across on 277 00:18:22.079 --> 00:18:25.960 the log, I'd fall into the river. As you get you don't balance 278 00:18:26.079 --> 00:18:29.480 very well when you're tied up and blindfolded, and so I I was peaking. 279 00:18:29.480 --> 00:18:32.160 I could see out under my blindfold, but I couldn't stay on the 280 00:18:32.240 --> 00:18:34.559 log, and they just dragged me out of the river and we'd go on. 281 00:18:34.799 --> 00:18:40.160 So finally it about five in the morning. I guess I was in 282 00:18:40.240 --> 00:18:42.680 a place and there was another air raid because a lot of shoot and everything. 283 00:18:42.720 --> 00:18:45.160 And then they put me in the back of a truck and we went 284 00:18:45.200 --> 00:18:49.960 for an all day truck ride. And then later that night I got put 285 00:18:51.000 --> 00:18:52.759 into it. The only time in my life in prison, I was in 286 00:18:52.799 --> 00:18:56.440 a bamboo cage, which everybody talks about bamboo cage. I never saw one, 287 00:18:56.440 --> 00:19:02.200 he said once, and it was ibab be six or eight foot square, 288 00:19:02.359 --> 00:19:03.279 was in the middle of a river, and so I was sitting in 289 00:19:03.319 --> 00:19:07.200 the mud and the river. And then they took me off for my first 290 00:19:07.240 --> 00:19:12.039 interrogation about eight o'clock that night. And do you know what a knee knocker 291 00:19:12.200 --> 00:19:15.400 is? You ever been on a ship, a naval ship. The doors 292 00:19:15.440 --> 00:19:18.720 don't go all the way to the floor. They have this thing you have 293 00:19:18.720 --> 00:19:22.839 to step over. Well, that's how bamboo houses are built. They have 294 00:19:22.880 --> 00:19:26.680 a thing that holds the frame of the door. So I walked into my 295 00:19:26.720 --> 00:19:30.240 first interrogation, was tied up blindfold. It tripped over the knee knocker face 296 00:19:30.359 --> 00:19:36.440 down in the mud. And when we had our first discussion, there was 297 00:19:36.440 --> 00:19:38.960 a guy who had bright light shining, just like like this bright light shine 298 00:19:38.960 --> 00:19:42.279 in your face, and he said, the name ranks here on number. 299 00:19:42.319 --> 00:19:45.799 I gave him that, and he asked what kind of airplane I flew? 300 00:19:45.880 --> 00:19:48.599 And I told him, sorry, I'm not allowed to tell you that. 301 00:19:48.200 --> 00:19:51.319 You can't tell me, or you won't tell me. I said, it 302 00:19:51.319 --> 00:19:53.400 doesn't make difference. I'm not going to tell you. And so he took 303 00:19:53.400 --> 00:19:57.000 a gun of some kind and stuck it right up against my four It says, 304 00:19:57.359 --> 00:20:00.799 now, tell me what kind of airplane you I got to blow your 305 00:20:00.799 --> 00:20:03.200 head off. And I said, I won't tell you. What I said 306 00:20:03.279 --> 00:20:07.839 it was impolite to say the least, which led to about an hour beating 307 00:20:07.920 --> 00:20:11.119 by about ten guys, and they took me out, tied me up, 308 00:20:11.119 --> 00:20:14.640 and tied me to the wall of a truck, and then rode in the 309 00:20:14.640 --> 00:20:17.240 truck for the next Actually turns out I thought it was one day. It 310 00:20:17.319 --> 00:20:22.359 was actually two days. I lost complete knowledge of where I was or how 311 00:20:22.359 --> 00:20:26.559 long I'd been there, so I thought I arrived in Hanoi at the Hanoi 312 00:20:26.680 --> 00:20:33.240 Hilton prison on Friday morning, and it was actually Saturday morning. But I 313 00:20:33.279 --> 00:20:37.000 had a lot of hallucinations and everything, and I continue to have those until 314 00:20:37.319 --> 00:20:40.960 an American and settled across the hall from He spoke to me, and it 315 00:20:41.000 --> 00:20:45.279 was like throwing the lights, which all of a sudden hallucinations went away. 316 00:20:45.680 --> 00:20:48.799 And he told me where I was, and he said, don't be standing 317 00:20:48.880 --> 00:20:51.400 up kicking the door. That don't give them any more reason to beat you, 318 00:20:51.440 --> 00:20:56.720 because they're going to beat you anyway. And so that was my first 319 00:20:56.759 --> 00:21:00.759 contact with another American. Who was that prisoner, Jerry Coffee, Navy commander. 320 00:21:00.880 --> 00:21:03.680 What did they do to you once you were there? Oh, they 321 00:21:03.720 --> 00:21:07.839 tie you up, beat you, put your leg irons and put your arms 322 00:21:07.839 --> 00:21:12.240 behind your back. And I have a scar on my left elbow where they 323 00:21:12.279 --> 00:21:15.480 tied me that day. It was tied so tight they cut all the way 324 00:21:15.480 --> 00:21:19.640 down to the bone. Took it over a year to heel. My arms 325 00:21:19.640 --> 00:21:23.680 were completely paralyzed for the first seven months I was there from the elbows down. 326 00:21:23.880 --> 00:21:26.559 How often did they do this? For the first two weeks they did 327 00:21:26.599 --> 00:21:32.400 almost every day until you wrote what they were asking for. And unfortunately, 328 00:21:32.559 --> 00:21:34.920 eventually I couldn't write much because I couldn't hold I couldn't hold a pen in 329 00:21:36.000 --> 00:21:41.079 my hands between the two hands. But it was it was a pretty routine 330 00:21:41.119 --> 00:21:45.720 occurrence for the first few weeks, and they would have you write something about 331 00:21:47.000 --> 00:21:49.799 the wonderful bet of these people and the horrible Americans, and then they would 332 00:21:51.039 --> 00:21:53.920 to ask you to write something saying that you weren't forced to write that, 333 00:21:55.519 --> 00:21:57.640 and they say, I said, well, that's ridiculous. Don't you think 334 00:21:57.680 --> 00:22:00.599 you did force me? And they said, would you want to force you 335 00:22:00.599 --> 00:22:03.240 again? We were going to do that too, And so it was kind 336 00:22:03.240 --> 00:22:10.319 of a It was kind of a weird experience that you couldn't quite comprehend that 337 00:22:10.440 --> 00:22:14.480 humans were doing this to you. But after you've been there for a short 338 00:22:14.519 --> 00:22:18.160 period time, you found out this is kind of routine and you learned to 339 00:22:18.200 --> 00:22:22.880 deal with it. You mentioned how Jerry Coffee kind of snapped you back into 340 00:22:23.000 --> 00:22:27.279 what your reality was at that point. But what are you draw on to 341 00:22:29.599 --> 00:22:37.039 deal with this ongoing I think the thing that I kind of stuck in because, 342 00:22:37.079 --> 00:22:42.400 probably because of my personality, it pissed me off to be treated that 343 00:22:42.440 --> 00:22:48.519 way. I resented it. They tried to belittle you, They made bow 344 00:22:48.599 --> 00:22:52.640 every time you saw Vietnamese and it's a very very difficult thing for Americas to 345 00:22:52.799 --> 00:22:57.079 be put in that position, and you don't respond very well, and you 346 00:22:57.200 --> 00:23:03.640 realize eventually the the more belligerent you become, the more you're going to get 347 00:23:03.680 --> 00:23:06.440 beaten, and so you kind of try to back off as much as you 348 00:23:06.480 --> 00:23:08.240 can, but at the same time, you didn't want to do what they 349 00:23:08.240 --> 00:23:12.720 wanted you to do, and so it's a tricky balancing act that we learned 350 00:23:12.759 --> 00:23:18.759 to deal with. For me for years, as we used to call that 351 00:23:18.839 --> 00:23:21.319 sitting on the fence. That means you don't want to do anything that they 352 00:23:21.359 --> 00:23:23.160 ask you to do, but you don't want to get beaten in the process. 353 00:23:23.680 --> 00:23:27.480 And sometimes you'd fall off and you'd write something or say something that you 354 00:23:27.519 --> 00:23:30.119 wish you hadn't and then you get back up on the fence, and then 355 00:23:30.359 --> 00:23:36.359 you'd fall off on the other side. And it was a very challenge being 356 00:23:36.400 --> 00:23:41.240 in prison. I would say, from my perspective, once you've been beaten 357 00:23:41.279 --> 00:23:44.400 a few times and you recover. So when my arms came back, the 358 00:23:44.799 --> 00:23:47.559 feeling came back in my arms and I could move my hands again. It 359 00:23:47.559 --> 00:23:51.599 took seven months, but I realized how amazing the human body is and how 360 00:23:51.640 --> 00:23:56.000 it can recover from terrible brutality. So once you realize you can be beaten 361 00:23:56.079 --> 00:24:02.240 severely and still recover, that changes the way you play the game mentally. 362 00:24:02.680 --> 00:24:07.880 It's a really real difficult situation. You have to mentally talk yourself into knowing 363 00:24:08.440 --> 00:24:12.480 when you take this stand, they're probably going to beat you, and you 364 00:24:12.519 --> 00:24:15.480 had to be prepared for that, and you have to be willing to live 365 00:24:15.519 --> 00:24:18.200 with that. And if you write something that they want that you don't want 366 00:24:18.240 --> 00:24:22.279 to write, you have to live with that to the kind of a guilt 367 00:24:22.319 --> 00:24:26.599 feeling that you didn't do enough, which is harder. Probably the guilt. 368 00:24:26.640 --> 00:24:30.799 We worried about that a lot more than we did. The beatings, you 369 00:24:30.839 --> 00:24:33.839 know, became almost routine to the point that you didn't you didn't dread them 370 00:24:33.839 --> 00:24:37.880 as much. They were never fun, but but it wasn't that big a 371 00:24:37.920 --> 00:24:41.559 deal. The mental anguish wondering if you were going to get court martial for 372 00:24:41.640 --> 00:24:45.759 what you had done in prison when you got home, that that trouble us 373 00:24:45.799 --> 00:24:48.079 for a long time. Took us a long time to learn to deal with 374 00:24:48.160 --> 00:24:51.119 that. We've heard a lot about the tap code. Also, how much 375 00:24:51.119 --> 00:24:53.160 did that help to help you mentally, and then just for me, it 376 00:24:53.240 --> 00:24:56.200 was that was the be all and end all, and I learned. I 377 00:24:56.279 --> 00:25:00.519 learned the tap code the first week I was there, and I was in 378 00:25:00.599 --> 00:25:03.000 charge of communications every cell I lived in the whole time I was in prison, 379 00:25:03.720 --> 00:25:07.920 and it was important to me to be able to talk to other people, 380 00:25:07.920 --> 00:25:10.960 to know what was going on and who was being beaten and why, 381 00:25:11.480 --> 00:25:15.359 to know what lies they had told so you could support their positions and stuff 382 00:25:15.359 --> 00:25:19.079 like that. So I probably spent one average, probably spent eight to ten 383 00:25:19.119 --> 00:25:25.119 hours a day tapping on the wall. And then we got more proficient, 384 00:25:25.119 --> 00:25:27.559 we learned better ways to communicate, but the tap coat was always kind of 385 00:25:27.559 --> 00:25:32.720 the basis for everything we did. Did you learn how to tap the shortest 386 00:25:32.759 --> 00:25:37.720 possible sentences you could think of? We we abbreviated the English language everything you 387 00:25:37.720 --> 00:25:42.119 know, T Y was they every word you, letter you was u y 388 00:25:42.160 --> 00:25:48.559 o U. But we learned how to I would call it prison shorthand. 389 00:25:49.160 --> 00:25:56.160 And then you know some things t T was that we reduced everything down to 390 00:25:56.200 --> 00:26:00.000 two letters or three letters the most he said there were upgrade in this communication. 391 00:26:00.119 --> 00:26:03.240 What were those? Well, when we first found out we could make 392 00:26:03.519 --> 00:26:07.759 you could tap on the wall, but you didn't always have a common wall 393 00:26:07.839 --> 00:26:10.839 with the guy that you wanted to communicate with. He might be in in 394 00:26:10.880 --> 00:26:14.359 a different building. And we found out that you could get up on your 395 00:26:14.400 --> 00:26:17.440 if you depend on how the configuration of your room. If you had a 396 00:26:17.480 --> 00:26:19.559 slat at the top of your window, that was they had bars in the 397 00:26:19.559 --> 00:26:22.640 windows, and then they bricked the windows up. Sometimes they left a brick 398 00:26:22.640 --> 00:26:26.000 out at the top, so you had a little space there. Many of 399 00:26:26.000 --> 00:26:30.160 the rooms had a vent hole that was up even higher, and you could 400 00:26:30.359 --> 00:26:33.279 if you had two guys in the room, you could stand on the guy's 401 00:26:33.319 --> 00:26:34.960 shoulders and you could get up to the vent hole. And so you get 402 00:26:36.039 --> 00:26:37.720 up to the vent hole. And there are a lot of things that happened 403 00:26:37.759 --> 00:26:45.640 in prison that are the origin and why Americans do things is unknown, but 404 00:26:45.720 --> 00:26:52.640 it worked. You know what shaven haircut sounds like. That's how we call 405 00:26:52.720 --> 00:26:53.440 the guy. If you wanted to talk to the guy in the next cel, 406 00:26:53.559 --> 00:26:59.720 you go into the wall, and if he didn't do then you knew 407 00:26:59.720 --> 00:27:03.400 it in an American and so he didn't tap on the wall anymore. But 408 00:27:03.559 --> 00:27:08.400 we found out if you climb up your vent hole, put your mouth up. 409 00:27:11.039 --> 00:27:15.319 Within a matter of seconds, faces would pop up in the vent holes 410 00:27:15.359 --> 00:27:21.200 in the building next door, because everybody knew that cough was an American looking 411 00:27:21.240 --> 00:27:25.000 out a hole somewhere, and sometimes it was under the door, sometimes it 412 00:27:25.079 --> 00:27:27.119 was through the vent hole, sometimes the crack in the window, through the 413 00:27:27.160 --> 00:27:33.279 shutters, but everybody knew that. So you can send tap code silently by 414 00:27:33.319 --> 00:27:37.599 just sticking your hand up in the vent hole and going, that's an age, 415 00:27:37.680 --> 00:27:41.400 that's an eye spells high. That's how simple it is. And we 416 00:27:41.440 --> 00:27:45.599 could send that one hundred yards across the courtyard to the other side of the 417 00:27:45.680 --> 00:27:48.759 camp. Yeah, all you had to do was make contact with a guy 418 00:27:48.880 --> 00:27:55.079 once and then every day he knew to look at this little black hole in 419 00:27:55.119 --> 00:27:59.240 the wall of a white building across the courtyard one hundred yards away, and 420 00:27:59.359 --> 00:28:03.839 he knew at noon when because we I don't know if you are a where 421 00:28:03.960 --> 00:28:08.319 they had a propaganda radio played twenty four hours a day, and every three 422 00:28:08.400 --> 00:28:14.119 hours there was a b B B beep beep, And that's how we set 423 00:28:14.160 --> 00:28:18.240 our mental watch. That was at six o'clock, twelve o'clock, three o'clock 424 00:28:18.759 --> 00:28:22.559 around the clock. You know, we knew plus or minus a few minutes 425 00:28:22.559 --> 00:28:25.640 of what time of day it was, and we reset our watch every day 426 00:28:26.039 --> 00:28:30.240 with that sound. And so from noon till two o'clock roughly, we had 427 00:28:30.480 --> 00:28:33.160 what we called the cista, and that was a period of time when the 428 00:28:33.160 --> 00:28:37.440 guards all took a break and went to eat and everything, and we were 429 00:28:37.519 --> 00:28:40.400 left alone to take a nap or do whatever you wanted to do. We 430 00:28:41.200 --> 00:28:44.880 used that two hours to communicate, as that was the most important part of 431 00:28:44.880 --> 00:28:48.279 our day. And so at noon you get up to your vent hole and 432 00:28:51.799 --> 00:28:55.599 a guy one hundred yards away would come up in the vent hole wave to 433 00:28:55.680 --> 00:29:02.720 you, and then you send tap good for two hours and you would get 434 00:29:02.759 --> 00:29:07.039 all the information from his side of the camp and where from where I was 435 00:29:07.119 --> 00:29:08.880 for a long time, I could see all the way across the camp. 436 00:29:08.880 --> 00:29:11.559 I could get it. And then there's another building right over the wall, 437 00:29:11.720 --> 00:29:15.480 right here, and there's another building over here. This is at the camp 438 00:29:15.519 --> 00:29:19.319 we called the zoo. I could see the guy that lived in the garage, 439 00:29:19.640 --> 00:29:22.599 I could see the guy that lived in the pool hall, and I 440 00:29:22.599 --> 00:29:25.480 could see the guy that lived in the pigstye, all from the same window. 441 00:29:26.039 --> 00:29:29.359 And so I would get this news and I would pass it to this 442 00:29:29.400 --> 00:29:33.000 guy. He'd give me his news. I'd pass it to that guy and 443 00:29:33.079 --> 00:29:36.240 he'd give me his update. And I pass it to this guy and he'd 444 00:29:36.240 --> 00:29:38.119 passed me his news, and I'd pass it this guy and he'd passed me 445 00:29:38.200 --> 00:29:41.480 his new news, and I passed it this guy. We needed to have 446 00:29:41.559 --> 00:29:45.920 for hours and hours and hours, and so we weren't. We weren't. 447 00:29:45.519 --> 00:29:48.640 I wouldn't say we weren't bored, but we really weren't. The first three 448 00:29:48.680 --> 00:29:53.119 years before the beating stopped, you were never bored. You always had something 449 00:29:53.200 --> 00:29:59.039 going on. Then later when things changed, we learned new, but we 450 00:29:59.160 --> 00:30:03.039 learned all kinds of So I had a work program for a short period of 451 00:30:03.039 --> 00:30:07.480 time and we were breaking up bricks with a sledgehammer out the courtyard. Was 452 00:30:07.039 --> 00:30:11.559 every time you do, go ding ding ding ding ding, and a guards 453 00:30:11.599 --> 00:30:14.480 are standing right there watching it. I have no clue. You're to communicating 454 00:30:14.480 --> 00:30:19.279 with everybody in the camp through tap coat on breaking up bricks. So when 455 00:30:19.319 --> 00:30:22.759 you had to go out and sweep the street, everybody we never figured out 456 00:30:22.839 --> 00:30:26.240 why they did that. But I had a little bamboo broom. You go 457 00:30:26.240 --> 00:30:33.799 out and sweep the streets, go you said, hide everybody in the camp. 458 00:30:34.480 --> 00:30:37.720 As we got there longer, we found out that it took too long 459 00:30:37.759 --> 00:30:41.799 to do that, and we invented a handcoat. A guy named Tom Browning 460 00:30:41.920 --> 00:30:45.200 was in a cell over and the pigsty, and one day I got up 461 00:30:45.200 --> 00:30:52.839 and peeking out the window. He got up and he went and it didn't 462 00:30:52.839 --> 00:30:56.400 take a giant mental giant to figure out that's ABCD, and so we started 463 00:30:56.440 --> 00:31:00.359 doing the handcoat. Well. In order to be up on the you had 464 00:31:00.400 --> 00:31:03.400 to stand on this little narrow window ledge and hold onto the bar with your 465 00:31:03.480 --> 00:31:07.680 arm, and if the guard came unannounced, you couldn't get your arm back 466 00:31:07.680 --> 00:31:11.400 in the window quick enough to keep from being caught. We invented our version 467 00:31:11.480 --> 00:31:18.240 of the deaf mute code that was a one hand code is ABC through the 468 00:31:18.279 --> 00:31:22.200 alphabet, and you could do that and hold onto the bars with your hand 469 00:31:22.599 --> 00:31:26.440 and send code with the other hand. And then after we'd been there for 470 00:31:26.480 --> 00:31:27.759 a long time we got a lot smarter. We found out we all had 471 00:31:27.759 --> 00:31:32.799 a little porcelain cup that we drank out of. And if you took the 472 00:31:32.799 --> 00:31:34.400 bottom of the cup and put it against the wall, put your mouth in 473 00:31:34.480 --> 00:31:38.200 the cup, put your hands like this, you could talk in the cup, 474 00:31:38.559 --> 00:31:41.960 and you could guy on the other side of the wall has his cup 475 00:31:41.000 --> 00:31:45.880 with the flat end all the ends of the wall, with his open end 476 00:31:45.920 --> 00:31:48.559 against his ear, around his ear, and you can talk through eighteen inches 477 00:31:48.599 --> 00:31:52.839 of concrete just as clear as you're talking and I'm talking to you. So 478 00:31:52.920 --> 00:31:56.960 we learned a lot. The longer we were there, the smarter we got. 479 00:31:56.720 --> 00:32:00.960 And so what I tied first time I tried to teach a tap cod 480 00:32:01.000 --> 00:32:04.839 to a guy that didn't know it. I tapped on the wall and I 481 00:32:04.920 --> 00:32:07.240 went dump tump, dump ump, and he tapped back, and I said, 482 00:32:07.240 --> 00:32:08.359 who are you? And he tapped back, who are you? I 483 00:32:08.400 --> 00:32:12.079 said, I asked you first. Well, turn out the guy didn't know 484 00:32:12.119 --> 00:32:15.559 the tap code at all. He was mimicking what I was doing. And 485 00:32:15.640 --> 00:32:20.640 so in order to teach him the tap code, I tapped once and he 486 00:32:20.759 --> 00:32:22.000 tapped once. That I tapped twice, that I tapped all the way up 487 00:32:22.039 --> 00:32:25.079 to twenty six. And when I did that, he banged on the voice 488 00:32:25.119 --> 00:32:29.880 as I understand what you're doing. And in three days I taught him the 489 00:32:29.920 --> 00:32:35.400 tap code using that incredibly difficult method. Four years later, I could have 490 00:32:35.440 --> 00:32:40.519 put my cup against the wall and explained it to it. So it's called 491 00:32:40.519 --> 00:32:45.359 the evolution of communication. Absolutely, that's absolutely fascinating. We didn't have a 492 00:32:45.359 --> 00:32:49.200 whole lot else to do. Quite honestly, were you mainly talking about what 493 00:32:49.240 --> 00:32:51.920 was happening in the camp? Were you talking about your lives back home? 494 00:32:52.240 --> 00:32:55.480 Yeah, we talked about everything. We had twenty four hours a day with 495 00:32:55.599 --> 00:32:59.480 nothing to do, and so we talked about everything. We talked about. 496 00:32:59.519 --> 00:33:02.599 We had camp rules, we had our own created our own regulations. As 497 00:33:04.039 --> 00:33:07.079 as we got more and more guys and we got more senior guys, they 498 00:33:07.119 --> 00:33:13.359 created We created a wing, an air force and a non service wing of 499 00:33:14.000 --> 00:33:19.119 organization. Each building was a squadron, and we talked about the rules. 500 00:33:19.160 --> 00:33:22.240 We memorized the rules that everybody memorized everything. We passed the names of everybody 501 00:33:22.240 --> 00:33:30.599 in the camp. Something that's never been officially sanctioned to be told, but 502 00:33:30.640 --> 00:33:35.680 it's true. We communicated in coded messages in our letters to our family, 503 00:33:36.640 --> 00:33:43.240 and it was done. They re challenge the people at this end, military, 504 00:33:43.319 --> 00:33:46.160 the DoD, the CIA, whoever was operating this end of the coding 505 00:33:46.559 --> 00:33:51.559 was doing with a computer. We were doing our head and you didn't know 506 00:33:52.119 --> 00:33:54.599 when you're going to get the right but you knew someday you were going to 507 00:33:54.720 --> 00:34:00.119 probably and so you would figure out what piece of small piece of information you 508 00:34:00.119 --> 00:34:02.799 can put as a seven line letter form that you had to write on. 509 00:34:04.000 --> 00:34:06.759 And if you wrote really small, you could get about one hundred and forty 510 00:34:06.759 --> 00:34:12.400 words on the seven lines, and you encoded a message in there, and 511 00:34:12.440 --> 00:34:15.760 then you memorize the message, and then you had to keep it in your 512 00:34:15.440 --> 00:34:21.000 memorize and it be absolutely verbatim. And you might wait six months before you 513 00:34:21.039 --> 00:34:23.079 got to write, but when you got a chance to write, you had 514 00:34:23.119 --> 00:34:27.000 already written a letter in your head, and you know exactly what to put 515 00:34:27.039 --> 00:34:30.960 on the paper. And when the messages came in from the other end to 516 00:34:31.079 --> 00:34:36.440 us, then we had to decode them as you sat there. The guy 517 00:34:36.559 --> 00:34:39.199 sit there with a gun watching you reading your letter, and you'll probably only 518 00:34:39.199 --> 00:34:43.239 see the letter one time in your life, and so you have to decipher 519 00:34:43.280 --> 00:34:47.119 the message while you're sitting there, and you get one tray, and we 520 00:34:47.199 --> 00:34:51.400 learned how to do that. Everybody had their own method of doing it, 521 00:34:51.440 --> 00:34:55.400 but it was a very very complex thing that it would take me an hour 522 00:34:55.480 --> 00:35:00.639 to explain to how it even worked. But that's been class a fight up 523 00:35:00.679 --> 00:35:04.159 until just a couple of years ago that we did that. Retired US Air 524 00:35:04.159 --> 00:35:08.400 Force Colonel Ed Hubbard, a Vietnam veteran and a prisoner of war. In 525 00:35:08.440 --> 00:35:13.840 just a moment, Colonel Hubbard tells us what it was like to regain his 526 00:35:14.039 --> 00:35:21.119 freedom. I'm Greg Corumbas, and this is Veterans Chronicles. This is Veterans 527 00:35:21.199 --> 00:35:24.960 Chronicles. I'm Greg Corumbas. We're speaking with retired US Air Force Colonel Ed 528 00:35:25.039 --> 00:35:30.039 Hubbard. He's been telling us about how his plane caught fire over Vietnam, 529 00:35:30.480 --> 00:35:35.159 forcing him to eject. He soon became a prisoner of war for nearly seven 530 00:35:35.280 --> 00:35:38.960 years. Hubbard now picks up his story by explaining how at first he did 531 00:35:38.960 --> 00:35:44.039 not expect to make it out of the prison alive, and then he tells 532 00:35:44.119 --> 00:35:46.199 us how he was finally freed. First five months I was there, I 533 00:35:46.280 --> 00:35:52.239 knew I was going to die there, and then one day A convinced myself 534 00:35:52.280 --> 00:35:57.920 otherwise, Meg turned the corner and never ever thought about it again. We've 535 00:35:57.920 --> 00:36:04.760 heard from some other veterans who were there that Operation Linebacker two in late nineteen 536 00:36:04.800 --> 00:36:08.639 seventy two seemed to be the best indication that you might be going home soon? 537 00:36:08.800 --> 00:36:13.559 Is that how you saw it as well? Well? The bombing started 538 00:36:13.599 --> 00:36:16.480 in April of seventy two. Then they started coming north the first time since 539 00:36:16.599 --> 00:36:22.639 nineteen sixty eight. They came north of the Mekong to bomb Hanoi or bob 540 00:36:22.920 --> 00:36:25.519 North Vietnam. So we knew there was something going on, we didn't know 541 00:36:25.559 --> 00:36:30.280 what it was. On the thirteenth of May, twitter nine of us were 542 00:36:30.320 --> 00:36:32.519 bundled up and tied up and blindfolded and putting trucks and driven up to the 543 00:36:32.599 --> 00:36:37.280 Chinese border. And we were up there for almost a year, and so 544 00:36:37.320 --> 00:36:40.920 we missed Linebacker. When did you find out that you would be free? 545 00:36:42.000 --> 00:36:45.400 At about ten o'clock in the morning the day I got released. We knew, 546 00:36:46.039 --> 00:36:49.480 we knew the Peace Tree had been signed, we knew that there were 547 00:36:49.679 --> 00:36:52.360 rules had been laid out for our release and everything. The first one hundred 548 00:36:52.360 --> 00:36:58.920 and fifteen guys were released on the twelfth of February of seventy three. I 549 00:36:59.000 --> 00:37:00.639 was in that group because was the early shootdown. I was in that group 550 00:37:00.719 --> 00:37:05.119 until the night before they left. They took two of us out and put 551 00:37:05.199 --> 00:37:07.039 us across the camp, and we actually wound up staying there for another twenty 552 00:37:07.119 --> 00:37:12.320 days the day we were supposed to be every fifteen days, we're going to 553 00:37:12.360 --> 00:37:15.440 release another group. When it came our turn to be released, they brought 554 00:37:15.480 --> 00:37:20.519 the food that morning in a big bucket and the guy and I another guy 555 00:37:20.519 --> 00:37:22.320 and I were in charge of the food that day, and we poured the 556 00:37:22.360 --> 00:37:25.320 food in the ditch, said we're not eating that crap going home today, 557 00:37:27.000 --> 00:37:30.079 and later found out we weren't going home today, And so we had one 558 00:37:30.119 --> 00:37:34.159 hundred and thirteen guys in the camp that weren't very pleased with us throwing their 559 00:37:34.199 --> 00:37:37.119 food on the ditch. But four days later, Saturday, we started seeing 560 00:37:37.119 --> 00:37:44.079 indications of just in the personalities of the guards that things were changing favorable in 561 00:37:43.639 --> 00:37:45.840 our light, and actually four of us set up. We had a little 562 00:37:45.840 --> 00:37:50.280 miniature cards we made out of scraps of paper. We sat up and played 563 00:37:50.280 --> 00:37:54.119 bridge all night and Saturday night and Sunday morning everything came and we ate the 564 00:37:54.159 --> 00:38:01.159 food as from we learned earlier not to throw the food. But somewhere around 565 00:38:01.159 --> 00:38:05.039 ten or eleven o'clock in the morning, the guard came and opened their door 566 00:38:05.079 --> 00:38:08.039 to our cell and Air Force Lieutenant colonel and his little blue suit walked in 567 00:38:08.119 --> 00:38:12.400 he says, and you guys want to go home today. And two hours 568 00:38:12.480 --> 00:38:15.519 later we were at the airport getting on the airplane when it happened. It 569 00:38:15.599 --> 00:38:19.800 was all of a sudden, after almost seven years. What's that feeling like, 570 00:38:20.199 --> 00:38:22.519 Well, it's the first thing is you don't believe it's happening. You 571 00:38:22.599 --> 00:38:27.360 know they're going through the motions, but you're sure because they'd already four days 572 00:38:27.360 --> 00:38:30.199 earlier. They had screwed it up somehow, and we didn't go anywhere, 573 00:38:30.199 --> 00:38:32.519 and so we weren't really convinced that it was real. But they did take 574 00:38:32.599 --> 00:38:36.760 us out of this prison and take us and put us on the bus and 575 00:38:36.880 --> 00:38:42.119 take us to Geelam Airport. And we were standing there and we had all 576 00:38:42.119 --> 00:38:45.079 these rules that we had made up. Things you will do and won't do. 577 00:38:45.159 --> 00:38:47.239 One of the things you wouldn't accept any gifts from the Vietnamese on the 578 00:38:47.239 --> 00:38:52.199 way out. You couldn't take flowers or anything. And so we all got 579 00:38:52.199 --> 00:38:54.119 off the bus, that were twenty of us on the first flight, and 580 00:38:54.159 --> 00:38:58.840 they gave all of us a bottle of beer and we all put it down 581 00:38:58.880 --> 00:39:01.039 by our right foot when we marched off to go around the building to the 582 00:39:01.039 --> 00:39:05.960 flight line. There's the twenty balls of beer standing there in formation very neatly, 583 00:39:06.480 --> 00:39:08.719 and we went around the building and there was a pretty good sized crowd, 584 00:39:08.800 --> 00:39:14.119 and there was a white stripe on the tarmac and while we were standing 585 00:39:14.159 --> 00:39:17.239 there, this beautiful big airplane comes floating down out of the clouds onto the 586 00:39:17.320 --> 00:39:22.440 runway. Its first time I'd ever seen a one forty one because they were 587 00:39:22.719 --> 00:39:27.519 built. After we were gone, they read your name and when you stepped 588 00:39:27.559 --> 00:39:30.639 across the line, you saluted the general and shook his hand and you were 589 00:39:30.639 --> 00:39:35.960 free. They turned and it was when I got to the head of the 590 00:39:36.000 --> 00:39:37.760 line. I was the second guy in the line, so when I got 591 00:39:37.880 --> 00:39:43.760 up to the saluted the general. Then there was a lieutenant colonel and I 592 00:39:43.840 --> 00:39:47.519 was a lieutenant, a first lieutenant where I was captured. So this lieutenants 593 00:39:49.000 --> 00:39:51.280 we had a little a wall bag, you know, with these little bitty 594 00:39:51.360 --> 00:39:53.159 bags, and he said, let me carry your bags, sir, And 595 00:39:53.199 --> 00:39:55.679 I thought, this guy's a lieutenant car he's called me sir. I wondered 596 00:39:55.719 --> 00:39:59.960 what rank I am, because we didn't know. I turned out I was. 597 00:40:00.360 --> 00:40:02.880 I had been promoted to major. So most of us that were there 598 00:40:02.920 --> 00:40:07.320 for a long time got promoted twice while we were there. So anyway, 599 00:40:07.360 --> 00:40:10.639 we walk out and got an airplane and closed the door and took off, 600 00:40:10.679 --> 00:40:15.320 and once we were across the coast, the guy said, we're feet wet, 601 00:40:15.400 --> 00:40:17.599 and if we lose all four engines, we're not going back, and 602 00:40:17.639 --> 00:40:22.159 then everybody went kind of a zerk. It was. I don't remember how 603 00:40:22.199 --> 00:40:24.199 far. It was a couple of three hours flight over to the Philippines, 604 00:40:24.760 --> 00:40:30.679 and of course when we landed at Clark, we were met by ten thousand 605 00:40:30.719 --> 00:40:34.519 people and nobody, but nobody would have ever known that was going to happen. 606 00:40:34.559 --> 00:40:38.000 The entire base, all the families, everybody on the base was out 607 00:40:38.039 --> 00:40:42.920 on the flight line with flags and signs and posters everything. It was a 608 00:40:43.039 --> 00:40:46.559 really, really, really strange experience. You stepped up to the door of 609 00:40:46.599 --> 00:40:50.280 the airplane, they read your name, You walked down the rant, saluted, 610 00:40:50.320 --> 00:40:52.599 the four star generals met you there, went got on the bus. 611 00:40:52.679 --> 00:40:58.440 They took you off to the hospital. So we were quarantined and the hospital 612 00:40:58.440 --> 00:41:01.679 on the fifth floor. I was there for four days, and then on 613 00:41:01.760 --> 00:41:06.440 the morning the fifth day, we took off from Clark forty one. They 614 00:41:06.480 --> 00:41:10.719 were four guys, six guys and his airplane to carry four hundred troops or 615 00:41:10.719 --> 00:41:15.119 six of us in their flight, nurses and stuff, and we flew from 616 00:41:15.480 --> 00:41:17.920 Clark to Honolulu and then landing on Holloluluh in the middle of the night in 617 00:41:17.960 --> 00:41:27.079 a rainstorm to refuel and flew nonstuff from from Honolulu to San Antonio, Atlanta. 618 00:41:27.119 --> 00:41:30.719 At Kelly Air Force Base. Three guys got off there, we're going 619 00:41:30.760 --> 00:41:34.760 to the hospital in Texas, and three of us continued to Saint Louis to 620 00:41:35.159 --> 00:41:37.119 Scott Air Force Base where we were going to be in the hospital. What 621 00:41:37.199 --> 00:41:42.559 was the family? Young and like a little strained, a little strange. 622 00:41:43.760 --> 00:41:45.800 First thing, we got off the airplane, my wife and my son. 623 00:41:45.960 --> 00:41:50.400 My son was two when I was shot down. He was nine now, 624 00:41:50.599 --> 00:41:53.239 so he's a big kid. And they came running out on the flight line 625 00:41:53.280 --> 00:41:55.519 and we hugged and everything, and then they put us in a staff car 626 00:41:55.559 --> 00:42:00.639 and took us to the hospital. Because nobody knew what our condition was physically 627 00:42:00.880 --> 00:42:05.440 or mentally, nobody knew what to do with us. We were quarantined in 628 00:42:05.519 --> 00:42:08.400 our room and you can only see one person time. So my wife came 629 00:42:08.400 --> 00:42:10.239 in and talked to me a while, and then my son came in and 630 00:42:10.239 --> 00:42:13.719 talked to me. Then my mother came in, Then my father came in, 631 00:42:13.800 --> 00:42:16.400 Then my mother in law came in, Then my father stepfather in law 632 00:42:16.440 --> 00:42:20.199 came in, and then my older brother came in, and finding my younger 633 00:42:20.199 --> 00:42:23.280 brother came in. So you get just a few minutes with each person. 634 00:42:23.719 --> 00:42:28.079 And it's about eight or nine o'clock at night, so it didn't take them 635 00:42:28.119 --> 00:42:30.199 long, and they ushered everybody out except my wife. My wife was allowed 636 00:42:30.199 --> 00:42:35.079 to stay for about an hour and then she left. And then you have 637 00:42:35.159 --> 00:42:39.119 to remember we left hand Away on Sunday morning, and this is Thursday night, 638 00:42:39.639 --> 00:42:45.840 and I hadn't been asleep yet since last Sunday, and we were running 639 00:42:45.920 --> 00:42:47.719 on such a high level of a drum and we just you couldn't go to 640 00:42:47.719 --> 00:42:52.320 sleep. No matter what they gave us sleeping pills on the airplane, nobody 641 00:42:52.320 --> 00:42:55.519 could go to sleep. So I'm up on and around in my hospital room, 642 00:42:55.519 --> 00:42:59.559 and I'm in my underwear, and I'm shaving, and I've got half 643 00:42:59.599 --> 00:43:01.400 my face shaved. And there was a knock on the door, and I 644 00:43:01.440 --> 00:43:05.880 opened the door and there were five four star generals standing there, the Chief 645 00:43:05.920 --> 00:43:08.480 of Staff of the Air Force and his entourage, and they came by at 646 00:43:08.480 --> 00:43:12.559 three in the morning and said, I'm sorry. We were supposed to be 647 00:43:12.559 --> 00:43:15.599 here when you were playing Landed last night. We didn't get here, and 648 00:43:15.639 --> 00:43:16.760 we just want to see how you're doing. I said, I think I'm 649 00:43:16.800 --> 00:43:19.760 doing pretty darn good. I said, you know, I'm half shaved. 650 00:43:19.760 --> 00:43:22.480 I'm sorry about that. So I walked down the hall of hospital to lounge 651 00:43:22.480 --> 00:43:25.400 and got up, eat a cup of coffee, and set And the only 652 00:43:25.440 --> 00:43:29.400 time my life ever been in a room full of generals, and we're sitting 653 00:43:29.400 --> 00:43:31.639 there in my underwear with shavings up on one side of my face. It 654 00:43:31.719 --> 00:43:35.159 was it was a little different. But they stayed for a little while, 655 00:43:35.159 --> 00:43:38.159 and then they went checked on somebody else, But it was it was a 656 00:43:38.239 --> 00:43:42.679 different I was in the hospital there for ten days, had a couple of 657 00:43:42.679 --> 00:43:46.960 surgeries while I was there, and then came home to where my family had 658 00:43:46.960 --> 00:43:51.559 been. Do you have lingering injuries? No, man, nothing. I 659 00:43:51.599 --> 00:43:57.880 had a broken wrist, and beyond that had I'd had many, many, 660 00:43:57.920 --> 00:44:00.880 many boils, but pretty much everything had cleared up by the time I got 661 00:44:00.880 --> 00:44:06.239 home. I was medically grounded for a year for a variety of odds and 662 00:44:06.400 --> 00:44:08.920 ends. But nothing critical other than my left wrist had been broken, and 663 00:44:08.960 --> 00:44:13.920 I did a bone graph on my wrist. Most Americans will never know what 664 00:44:13.960 --> 00:44:17.480 it's like to lose their freedom. You have lost it, and you obviously 665 00:44:17.519 --> 00:44:22.440 got it back. How do you describe what that's like? Well, did 666 00:44:22.480 --> 00:44:24.119 you know I was just in Vietnam? No, I did last month. 667 00:44:25.159 --> 00:44:29.719 About a year ago. I got wind of a tour that was going to 668 00:44:29.840 --> 00:44:35.119 Vietnam for the fiftieth anniversary of our captivity or release. And so when I 669 00:44:35.159 --> 00:44:38.840 got the itinerary and I looked at it, I realized the tour ended in 670 00:44:38.880 --> 00:44:44.079 Hanoi on the fourth of March, which is fifty years to the day from 671 00:44:44.079 --> 00:44:46.400 the day I was released. And so my wife and I went on this 672 00:44:46.440 --> 00:44:50.440 tour, and there were two of us, a guy named Wayne wit L 673 00:44:50.480 --> 00:44:52.960 who lives up in Atlanta, who he and I were both released on the 674 00:44:52.960 --> 00:44:57.960 fourth of March, and so we went, and there were seven former prisoners 675 00:44:58.039 --> 00:45:01.400 on this tour was an eighteen eighteen day trip. Bill Shanko was shot down 676 00:45:01.480 --> 00:45:06.159 in the day before Christmas of sixty five. He was on the trip. 677 00:45:06.239 --> 00:45:08.360 I was shot down in July of sixty six. Wayne was shot down in 678 00:45:08.440 --> 00:45:12.639 July of sixty seven, and then the other guys were all part of a 679 00:45:12.719 --> 00:45:16.000 linebacker, so it was a very interesting group of people. So we went 680 00:45:16.039 --> 00:45:20.239 to Saigon and spent four days, and we went up the Mekong River on 681 00:45:20.280 --> 00:45:23.679 a boat into Cambodia and went to Anger Watt did. Then we flew over 682 00:45:23.679 --> 00:45:27.480 to Hanoi for four days, and then on the fourth of March, fifty 683 00:45:27.559 --> 00:45:30.239 years to the day from the first time we walked down in prison, we 684 00:45:30.400 --> 00:45:36.800 walked out the front door of the prison again. And so everybody I knew 685 00:45:36.960 --> 00:45:40.519 said that has to be incredibly emotional experienced, and it actually, in my 686 00:45:40.639 --> 00:45:45.519 mind it wasn't as emotional as I thought it might be what I did, 687 00:45:45.800 --> 00:45:51.599 as I spent the whole day thinking about how much I have done in the 688 00:45:51.679 --> 00:45:54.199 last fifty years that I would have missed if I hadn't got out of jail. 689 00:45:54.960 --> 00:45:59.639 And so it's kind of a look back and say, you're the luckiest 690 00:45:59.639 --> 00:46:01.480 guy world because I've been all over the world. I've been the eighty four 691 00:46:01.559 --> 00:46:07.159 countries since I got out of jail. I've been to Africa and photos faris 692 00:46:07.239 --> 00:46:13.079 nine times millions of things that I've been able to do that I would not 693 00:46:13.199 --> 00:46:15.239 have gotten to do if I had got out of jail. So it's it's 694 00:46:15.239 --> 00:46:17.960 a pretty important day in my life. That's the day I was born the 695 00:46:19.000 --> 00:46:22.000 second time, as I see, so I just turned fifty last March in 696 00:46:22.119 --> 00:46:25.400 my second life. That's right, that's right now. You stayed in the 697 00:46:25.400 --> 00:46:30.199 Air Force, of course, and from what I understand, you became well 698 00:46:30.239 --> 00:46:39.039 known for improving different things on a grand scale, basically productivity and performance. 699 00:46:39.519 --> 00:46:44.480 They kind of gave you some of the more struggling areas of the Air Force 700 00:46:44.519 --> 00:46:46.079 and you turned them around. What was the key to that? Well, 701 00:46:46.079 --> 00:46:50.920 the key to that is to believe that there's a solution to the problem and 702 00:46:51.000 --> 00:46:53.679 then be willing to do whatever's necessarily. Actually Ted and I were just talking 703 00:46:53.719 --> 00:46:58.320 about some of the problems in Fort Wall and Beach that could have been solved 704 00:46:58.679 --> 00:47:01.920 thirty five forty years ago if somebody would have listened. I used to be 705 00:47:02.360 --> 00:47:07.239 head of the transportation committee for this Chamber of Commerce, and at the time 706 00:47:07.280 --> 00:47:10.519 I suggested a way to solve the traffic problem here was to build an elevated 707 00:47:10.599 --> 00:47:15.480 highway over this town so people could go through here at seventy miles an hour. 708 00:47:15.840 --> 00:47:20.960 The idea was turned down by the Florida Department Transportation because they said, 709 00:47:20.960 --> 00:47:23.800 we already have three potential plans. If you add a fourth, it take 710 00:47:23.880 --> 00:47:28.760 us another fifteen years to implement all the plans. Well, it turns out 711 00:47:28.840 --> 00:47:32.000 now we're down the road forty years to the month almost and they still haven't 712 00:47:32.039 --> 00:47:37.320 implemented the plan. And so in the Air Force, I had a better 713 00:47:37.360 --> 00:47:42.239 position because I didn't have to ask permission to do things that were more intelligent. 714 00:47:42.280 --> 00:47:45.760 I just did them. And if I offended somebody along the way, 715 00:47:45.840 --> 00:47:49.719 like my two star commander, I would explain to anybody, said, this 716 00:47:49.800 --> 00:47:52.159 is a problem we've had in the Air Force. I know how to fix 717 00:47:52.199 --> 00:47:55.199 it, and I will show you how to fix it if you'll just let 718 00:47:55.239 --> 00:48:00.639 me try. And so I was allowed to try. Sometimes I didn't ask 719 00:48:00.679 --> 00:48:06.599 for permission because I'm a firm believer in the adage that it's easier to get 720 00:48:06.400 --> 00:48:09.320 forgiveness than it is to get permission. And so if I had something I 721 00:48:09.360 --> 00:48:14.880 thought needed to be done, I invented hands on motorcycle training. We were 722 00:48:15.159 --> 00:48:20.360 killing a number of people airman crashing and motorcycles at Egglin, and so we 723 00:48:20.440 --> 00:48:25.159 implemented a mandatory hands on training for a week and when the general said, 724 00:48:27.159 --> 00:48:29.440 how did you get authorities to do that? And I said, I just 725 00:48:29.559 --> 00:48:31.880 made it up, as nobody's challenged it. And so it's working, and 726 00:48:31.920 --> 00:48:37.639 we reduced the loss of lives by a significant number. And we were crashing 727 00:48:37.800 --> 00:48:43.480 government vehicles through stupidity, and we found a way to make that painful. 728 00:48:43.960 --> 00:48:49.400 And we used at one guy as an example by rule by Air Force rules, 729 00:48:49.760 --> 00:48:52.760 I can take his pay if he's out doing something not very smart and 730 00:48:52.800 --> 00:48:57.039 it crashes the vehicle and destroys it, I can make him pay for it. 731 00:48:57.119 --> 00:48:59.480 And so I did that, and I put it on the front pages 732 00:48:59.480 --> 00:49:02.719 of the bait based newspapers. So everybody on the base understood the severity of 733 00:49:02.719 --> 00:49:07.519 the punishment if you did something stupid, and we were able to reduce the 734 00:49:07.840 --> 00:49:15.880 mishapperate in government vehicles by about ninety five in one year. And so it 735 00:49:15.920 --> 00:49:19.679 was a belief that we developed in prison. We knew we had problems to 736 00:49:19.719 --> 00:49:23.000 solve in prison. We knew problem solving in prison was not optional. If 737 00:49:23.000 --> 00:49:25.960 you didn't solve problems, you're going to die. And so we learned how 738 00:49:27.039 --> 00:49:30.760 to step up and say this is a problem we have to find a solution, 739 00:49:31.199 --> 00:49:36.360 and we became very, very creative. Watching the Vietnamese make things out 740 00:49:36.360 --> 00:49:38.599 of bamboo is probably one of the most fascinating things that were done. You 741 00:49:38.639 --> 00:49:43.000 find out that you can make virtually every single thing you need in the world 742 00:49:43.079 --> 00:49:46.480 out of a piece of bamboo with a machete. And so we just watched 743 00:49:47.000 --> 00:49:52.880 and we observed, you know, how things got done. Given your long 744 00:49:52.920 --> 00:49:55.320 and distinguished career and all you went through as a prisoner of war, what 745 00:49:55.400 --> 00:49:59.000 are you most proud of from your time in the service? I think the 746 00:49:59.079 --> 00:50:06.800 realization that what we learned in prison was remarkably important and to not do something 747 00:50:06.840 --> 00:50:12.360 to utilize that is a terrible waste of that seven years. And so about 748 00:50:12.519 --> 00:50:16.480 thirty five years ago I started speaking to Air Force events and over the time 749 00:50:16.519 --> 00:50:21.639 I've talked over four million people in the last thirty five years about how to 750 00:50:21.760 --> 00:50:28.239 solve the issues that face our country. And so, I guess the one 751 00:50:28.280 --> 00:50:31.440 thing I gained prison most important thing ever happened in my life. It taught 752 00:50:31.480 --> 00:50:36.119 me how to learn to deal with the world as it is, not as 753 00:50:36.159 --> 00:50:39.360 you wish it was, and find out what the problems are and then seek 754 00:50:39.400 --> 00:50:44.960 a solution and don't be afraid. If somebody challenges you, don't be afraid 755 00:50:45.000 --> 00:50:49.159 to show them how it works. My favorite quote is, you can't do 756 00:50:49.239 --> 00:50:52.760 that because I wrote a book one time. For a year, the guy 757 00:50:52.800 --> 00:50:55.039 that was my boss told me every day something I couldn't do, and I 758 00:50:55.280 --> 00:50:58.679 logged it into my book and at the end of the day, I would 759 00:50:58.679 --> 00:51:01.199 write when I got finished, and I gave him the book as a farewell 760 00:51:01.199 --> 00:51:04.920 president when I left, I said, this is a book I wrote on 761 00:51:04.960 --> 00:51:07.119 your watch. All the things you said couldn't be done that have all been 762 00:51:07.159 --> 00:51:13.400 done. And so it's a level of confidence. Some people that used to 763 00:51:13.440 --> 00:51:15.760 work for me said, you're the most arrogant person I ever met, And 764 00:51:15.800 --> 00:51:19.239 I said, but I get a lot done, and so I don't know. 765 00:51:19.519 --> 00:51:22.000 I'm not here to win a personality content. I'm here to accomplish what 766 00:51:22.039 --> 00:51:25.760 we came here to do at a better cost. God said, you know, 767 00:51:25.840 --> 00:51:30.639 at a nutshell, every day I see things that are being done that 768 00:51:30.679 --> 00:51:34.880 I think are ignorant, and so I take time out to explain to people 769 00:51:35.119 --> 00:51:37.320 why I think it's ignorant and how I think they might approach it. It's 770 00:51:37.320 --> 00:51:44.480 been very, very successful in talking in industry about why do you do it 771 00:51:44.559 --> 00:51:50.920 this way? And I created a seminar called Adult Conversations, and that means 772 00:51:51.000 --> 00:51:53.840 every single person that works here is an adult, and every one of them 773 00:51:53.880 --> 00:51:58.519 has an idea or opinion, and if you're not listening to that, you're 774 00:51:58.599 --> 00:52:00.679 wasting their time. You're paying him for physical labor, but you're not paying 775 00:52:00.719 --> 00:52:05.800 him for their mental capacity. And when you start doing that and bringing people 776 00:52:05.840 --> 00:52:09.280 in and say tell me how you would solve this problem, and everybody knows 777 00:52:09.360 --> 00:52:13.639 everybody's got an opinion, and if you don't listen to him, you're wasting 778 00:52:13.800 --> 00:52:17.079 your time. You're spend a lot of energy not solving the problem. Thank 779 00:52:17.119 --> 00:52:20.920 you, sir for your time, and most of all, for your service 780 00:52:21.000 --> 00:52:23.079 and your sacrifice for this great country. I always say it's my pleasure. 781 00:52:23.079 --> 00:52:27.039 It wasn't something I'd care to do again, but it's probably the most important 782 00:52:27.079 --> 00:52:30.320 thing ever happened to be getting shot down. So I had to go learn 783 00:52:30.400 --> 00:52:34.440 how to deal with the world. And it's changed my world forever, and 784 00:52:34.480 --> 00:52:38.039 I've changed you four million people. Retired US Air Force colonel and Hubbard it's 785 00:52:38.039 --> 00:52:43.800 a Vietnam veterans spent nearly seven years in captivity as a prisoner of war after 786 00:52:43.800 --> 00:52:46.880 being shot down in July of nineteen sixty six. He's also the recipient of 787 00:52:46.880 --> 00:52:52.760 the Silver Star, among many other honors. I'm Greg Columbus. This is 788 00:52:52.840 --> 00:53:06.239 Veterans Chronicles. Hi, this is Greg Corumbus, and thanks for listening to 789 00:53:06.320 --> 00:53:09.800 Veterans Chronicles, a presentation of the American Veterans Center. For more information, 790 00:53:09.880 --> 00:53:15.000 please visit American Veterans Center dot org. You can also follow the American Veterans 791 00:53:15.039 --> 00:53:21.280 Center on Facebook and on Twitter. We're at AVC update. Subscribe to the 792 00:53:21.280 --> 00:53:24.800 American Veteran Center YouTube channel for full oral histories and special features, and of 793 00:53:24.840 --> 00:53:30.599 course, please subscribe to the Veterans Chronicles podcast wherever you get your podcasts. 794 00:53:30.920 --> 00:53:34.719 Thanks again for listening, and please join us next time for Veterans Chronicles