ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with a discussion of the historical foundation for the rights POWs have slowly attained and next demonstrate that these rights were routinely violated by all parties in Vietnam. It examines three important related issues: whether or not Vietnam veterans fundamentally differ with their peers on the nature of POW rights, whether they feel, given the character of the war, that guerrillas were entitled to the same protection as regular soldiers, and how Vietnam veterans perceive what happened to certain captives. The treatment of prisoners of war during the Vietnam conflict was a profoundly disturbing part of the war. Given the ferocity of the Vietnam War, the issue of the rights of prisoners of war was a matter of considerable concern to Americans in general and the Vietnam Generation in particular. A majority of Vietnam veterans considered international rules important and insisted that the rights of POWs must be protected.
