Son of Korean War MIA on a mission

Search for details on his dad’s fate all-consuming
by David A. Markiewicz

John P. Zimmerlee doesn’t remember his father. He was only 2 1/2 when 1st Lt. John H. Zimmerlee Jr., an Air Force B-26 navigator, went missing during a night bombing raid over North Korea on March 22, 1952.

More than a half-century later, the east Cobb marketer is still searching for the dad he lost that day. “It’s always in the back of your mind, and you always wonder what happened,” he said.

Zimmerlee’s pursuit led him to create a Web site, the Korean War POW/MIA Network. The site provides information about the 8,100 servicemen still missing from that conflict. Surviving family members often know little about what happened to them.

Now, thanks to recent negotiations between the United States and China, they hope to get some answers. The Chinese are considering granting American officials access to documents that could reveal the fate of many POW/MIAs.

It is believed that the Chinese have important information because they ran POW camps in North Korea after 1950. The Chinese have previously insisted they had no information about the fate of U.S. servicemen…

Zimmerlee cautions family members that whatever the news is about their loved ones, it is not going to be good. Death may have come from frostbite, or followed extensive torture and inhumane treatment.

“None of these guys died in a country club,” he said.

In Zimmerlee’s case, his father either was killed when his plane went down in the mountains or survived impact, probably to be captured, tortured during interrogation, then worked to death in a labor camp.

Still, “I want to know what happened to my dad, no matter how painful it might be,” he said.

Through research, Zimmerlee knows when and where his father went down. He can only speculate about the rest.

Although Zimmerlee can’t recall anything about his father, he has followed his path in various ways.

Like his father, he studied architecture at Georgia Tech. Like his father, he learned to fly. His plane is painted with POW/MIA insignia in tribute.

“You don’t know if it was inherited,” he said, “or because I want to replace that father figure, or try to get closer to him.”

Zimmerlee first began pursuing Korean War POW/MIAs in earnest about 10 years ago. He said he had become frustrated with the assistance offered by the U.S. government in finding missing servicemen.

His efforts intensified with the creation of his Web site. It has become an exhausting and costly effort.

On several occasions, Zimmerlee has spent a week at a time holed up in the National Archives in College Park, Md.

There, he pours over thousands of pages of military records, looking for the rare scraps of information that might help somebody find a MIA; that might help him find his dad.

“The research he shares with other families is excellent,” said Larry Greer, spokesman for the Pentagon’s POW/MIA office. “We have the greatest respect for the work he does. It’s credible. He’s very professional.”

Zimmerlee copies files, takes them back to Georgia, then digs deeper into them, cross-checking information and often working past midnight. When he finds something worthwhile among volumes of mundane reports some mention of crewmen being taken prisoner, for example he enters it on his Web site.

He estimates that he’s been able to help in some way most of the 2,500 or so POW/MIA families he’s talked with since beginning the site. He said he gets 25 to 30 inquiries a week from family members of servicemen who are missing.

He has won much praise for his efforts.

“His work is critical. He’s so focused on helping people,” said Robin Piacine, president of the Coalition of Families of Korean & Cold War POW/MIAs, an organization for which Zimmerlee is the information manager.

Zimmerlee’s labors have cost him time away from his family and business, as well as money, however.

“You get involved in the documents,” he said. “It’s

10:30, 11 at night and there’s another folder that you wonder if you should tackle. You do, then, pretty soon it’s 2 in the morning and you have to work the next day. It’s hard to turn loose of it.”

His wife, he said, “worries sometimes if this is taking me over.”

The research, Zimmerlee said, “takes you to a very dark place. You’re dealing with stuff that’s a real downer. But it’s something you feel needs to be done.”

Zimmerlee hopes someone with a researcher’s skills eventually will take over the arduous task of sifting through the documents and entering them in the database.

He frets that he may be missing details buried in the documents because he is not a researcher by trade. “I’d like to turn it over,” he said, “but no one’s come forward.”

He’s not giving up his pursuit of his father, however.

“When you’re told your father is missing,” he said, “to a youngster, if it’s missing, you go look for it.”