American POWs in the Vietnam War endured the longest captivity of any group of US wartime prisoners. One of them was Navy Lt. Paul Galanti, shown here in an East German propaganda film, sitting under a sign that reads "Clean. Neat."
   
                   
 
In 1967, the propaganda war continued as USAF Lt. Col. James Hughes was paraded through Hanoi visibly injured the day after his capture. Such scenes backfired, resulting in international revulsion at the prisoners' mistreatment.
 
                   
 

Navy Lt. Cmdr. Hugh Stafford broke his arm, collarbone, and ribs when his A-4 was downed by a SAM over Haiphong in August 1967.

After three days without water, he was then subjected to the rope torture.

Despite his injuries (damage to his left arm is evident in this photo), he became what the study's authors call "a spark plug in the resistance."
 
                   
 

Navy Lt. Cmdr. John McCain (now a US senator) suffered severe injuries in 1967 from bailing out of his A-4 over Hanoi and being beaten by a mob.

A prize hostage because of his prominent father, he rejected offers of quick repatriation.
 
                   
 

As a 19-year-old Air Force Academy cadet, Lance Sijan learned survival skills that he later used to elude the North Vietnamese for 46 days.

He received a Medal of Honor posthumously for his heroic fight for freedom and determined resistance.
 
                   
 
USAF Maj. Roger Ingvalson, an F-105 pilot captured in May 1968, reads what was called Christmas mail in a propaganda photo.
 
                   
 
Navy officers (l-r) Lt. j.g. David Everett, Lt. Carroll Beeler, and Lt. Cmdr. Theodore Triebel and USAF Maj. James Padgett were among the POWs brought forward to meet an American who traveled to North Vietnam in fall 1972.
 
                   
 

Operation Homecoming brought back 600 POWs, including then Maj. R.E. "Gene" Smith, who was among the jubilant group repatriated in March 1973 and who went on to become an AFA president and board chairman.

He had been a POW since 1967.
 
                   
     
     
We will NEVER forget you brother!