Hanoi Jane Fonda
Voted One of Americas’ 100 Greatest Woman

Recently I read that Jane Fonda was selected as one of the “100 Greatest Woman” of this century. Knowing my father had fought in Vietnam while communist sympathizer Jane Fonda visited the enemy that he fought, I asked my dad what thought about the honor and recognition given to Jane Fonda. (I always enjoy stirring things up.) He had quite a bit to say. “I would have to be shot before I would watch any movie with Jane Fonda in it...” “..... I won’t even watch the Braves play because the owner is married to Jane Fonda.........” My dad received the Purple Heart citation for wounds suffered in combat while in Vietnam and thankfully was never taken captive as thousands of others were. He was familiar with the experiences of those who were captured and latter betrayed by this “Great Woman”. Here are two of those recollections for the Trumpet readers.

Jerry Driscoll a former Air Force pilot, was a POW in Ho Lo Prison - AKA the "Hanoi Hilton”: “Dragged from a stinking cesspit of a cell, cleaned, fed, and dressed in clean PJs, I was ordered to describe for a visiting American "Peace Activist", Jane Fonda, the "lenient and humane treatment" I’d received. When paraded, I spat at Ms. Fonda, was clubbed, and dragged away. During the subsequent beating, I fell forward upon the camp Commandant's feet, accidentally pulling the man's shoe off-which sent that officer berserk. As a result of the beating I suffer from double vision (which permanently ended his flying days) from the Vietnamese Col.'s frenzied application of wooden baton.”

Col. Larry Carrigan, another pilot, spent 6 years in the "Hilton". His group, too, got the cleaned/fed/clothed routine in preparation for a "Jane Fonda peace delegation" visit. They, however, had time and devised a plan to get word to the world that they still survived. Each man secreted a tiny piece of paper, with his SSN on it, in the palm of his hand. When paraded before Ms. Fonda and a cameraman, she walked the line, shaking each man's hand and asking little encouraging snippets like: "Aren't you sorry you bombed babies?" and "Are you grateful for the humane treatment from your benevolent captors?" Believing this HAD to be an act, they each palmed her their sliver of paper. She took them all without missing a beat. At the end of the line and once the camera stopped rolling, to the shocked disbelief of the POWs, she turned to the officer in charge...and handed him the little pile. Three men died from the subsequent beatings. Col Carrigan was almost number four. For years after their release, a group of determined former POW's Including Col Carrigan, tried unsuccessfully to bring Ms. Fonda and others up on charges of treason.

Over 30 years have passed since these treacherous acts took place. Jane Fonda is now married to a billionaire. She can be seen in her box seat with Ted at the Braves games, and sadly enough Americans have forgot what a traitor she was. Shame on our country for forgetting.

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