Dear
We recently shared this story about the underwater flag that 'flies' on our website. We are re-sharing today in memory of all of our fallen heroes, where honor meets sacrifice.
Sometimes the full impact of our MIAs' final mission is invisible until it makes itself known in some profound way. Project Recover 'flies' a flag from the Arnett B-24 MIA Recovery Mission, 2008, on our website every day.
Chief Petty Officer Jules McManus was a Navy diver on the MIA Recovery mission at that time. He was selected to be in the photo because his family has an MIA who was repatriated.
Their family's MIA, Chief Petty Officer Roland R. Pineau, was MIA from the Vietnam War. JPAC, the precursor to DPAA, located, identified, and returned CPO Pineau to his family and country in 2007.
The underwater flag has been a part of Project Recover's imagery for five years. It has taken our partnership with
Legion Undersea Services to bring the stories behind it into the light again.
However, Jules McManus and his second cousin, Roland Pineau, have been there all along. They. reflect the gifts our MIAs give to family and country in their final mission home.
The gratitude, love, unity, and hope our MIAs inspire in us today is their living legacy. It is their final mission, and it is our mission, too.
Jules McManus is in a wheelchair now due to service-related injuries; an intersection of honor and sacrifice. He is no longer able to dive independently. His brothers-in-arms are still his brothers. Nick Zaborski and John Marsack, Legion Undersea Services co-founders and former Navy divers, look forward to setting up a dive for him this fall.
