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File: 120596_aaczf_21.txt
Page: 21
Total Pages: 22

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 I believe it's called, from Bahrain to Andrews, where we
 were welcomed by the Secretary of Defense and the Chair-
 man of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and our families. So
 that was quite a welcome home and certainly I don't think
 anyone could've dreamed about a better one. There was
 a big crowd there and we had to endure some speeches.
 (laughter) But other than that it was quite nice. It
 was obviously great to be back in America. From there
 we stayed at Andrews for five days, in the mornings we
 got a bunch of medical tests, and in the afternoon there
 were intelligence debriefings trying to find out if we
 knew the whereabouts of any more prisoners. They were
 still trying to locate some of the guys who were MIA.
 And basically finding out what we knew, what we had seen,
 and about what had gone on while we were prisoners.

 Q: Was that of some concern to you when they hauled you into
 Jordan, King Hussein's stand being pro-Iraqi?

 A: Like I said, we didn't have much choice. We were with
 the Red Cross and the driver was Swiss. He had worked
 in the region for a long time and since we were under
 their protection....it was obvious they (the Jordanians)
 didn't want us there but they were going to let us be
 there for as short a time as possible. I wasn't con-
 cerned that they were going to hold us prisoner, or
 detain us or anything. They wanted to get rid of us as
 quickly as they could. The press was more of a concern.
 We were at this camp that had a bunch of photographers,
 hundreds of them, and they tried to restrain them. As
 we were getting in these jeeps to drive to the helicop-
 ters, one of the photographers broke loose and they were
 like a pack of wolves. I've never seen anything like it
 before. They're after the picture, no matter what, it
 doesn't matter who they run over in the process.

 Q: I'm just curious...did you ever come in contact with the
 CBS crew, did you ever have any contact with them?

 A: The night the prison was bombed, we were in Baghdad, like
 I said, we had steel doors and little windows in them.
 A lot of the windows blew open and two of the guys' cell
 doors were open so they went around and opened every-
 body's window so we were able to talk, find out who was
 there. Bob Simon (CBS journalist) was in the cell next
 to me and the other three CBS guys were also in the
 prison. That was the first I knew they had been in
 there. They were having a rough time. They obviously
 had not received training and so he was saying things
 like, "Well, they told me ...." And I would say, "Yes,
 they say that to everyone." It was kind of comforting
 to him, I think, to find that out. For me, I expected
 them to give me propaganda and tell me the President had

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