Customer Reviews

Left Alive to Die

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This is a must read for any Viet Nam vet, it shows how

the U.S. Gov. and John Kerry left to die hundreds of prisoners.

Took all the information relating to sightings of these men

and had it destroyed, all by the orders of John Kerry and his

committee. I had served under Capt. Harley H. Hall, and it really

hurts to know our own goverment left these fine men to die.

James Rice

Left Alive to Die by Susan Keen is the story of Harley H. Hall, an American pilot who was shot down in the hours before the cease fire in Vietnam. His fellow pilots saw him safely parachute down and run into the woods, but what happened to him then is a mystery that has haunted his wife, Mary Lou for nearly forty years. Keen, a personal friend of the Halls, tells the story of their romance, life together, and then Mary Lou's struggle to carry on after the love of her life disappeared. The drama of the story comes from the government's refusal to follow up on intelligence about Hall's whereabouts, indeed the actual suppression of evidence that Hall and other POWs lived in Vietnam long after the war. The tragedy of this story is that the same country that Hall would have proudly died for turned its back on him. Hall, and the other POWs were not just Americans, but American heroes who gladly fought to protect the very same freedoms that they were then denied by our government's refusal to acknowledge them and bring them home. Senator Kerry and others put profit above soldier's lives. This story should outrage any American who reads it. It should also give them a twinge of fear at wondering just how far this government will go to bury its secrets and who will be collateral damage. I wish that this book had been written by a major author like Stephen Ambrose or Walter Isaacson so that it could receive the kind of attention it deserves.

Left Alive to Die is one of those riveting books that, once you open it, you can't put it aside. I sat down to read one evening and didn't get up again until I finished it about 1:30 AM the following morning. I should have been more than ready for bed by then, but the tragic story of Harley Hall weighed so heavily on my mind that I found it impossible to sleep.

This is the story of a true American hero. A Vietnam era military pilot who did everything right, only to be wronged by his government in the name of political expediency. It meticulously documents the struggle waged by his wife, and other wives like her, for the truth of what happened to their husbands. The callous attitude of bureaucrats and politicians, both Democrat and Republican, toward our MIA's frankly amazed me.

The book is a real eye-opener. If, like me, you think you've heard it all, you haven't. The truths this book exposes are shocking beyond belief. It is a must read. Get it, read it, and pray for the families and the men like Harley Hall who have been Left Alive to Die.

Grand tribute to Harley Hall. An interview with the wife of Al Kintzler would have been valuable ... whe's the widow of Harley's RIO that sad day in 1973.

Excellent "fast reading" book. I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in the forgotten vets left in Vietnam after the war.