National POW/MIA Recognition Day 2026

Today's Pentagon ceremony for POW/MIA Recognition Day was the largest and most elaborate on record. Also unlike in the past, it was more celebratory than solemn. DOW Secretary Pete Hegseth gave a spirited speech emphasizing that the U.S. leaves no man behind, no matter how long it takes. He highlighted the cruelty of Communist regimes toward our POWs. Head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff spoke of retrieval of remains from Pacific Battles and the sinking of a hellship off Subic Bay (Oryoku Maru).  Japan was prominently mentioned. Both Hegseth and Caine used the term "hellship" for Japanese ships that carried POWs. Not long ago, the administrators of the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Hawaii objected to the inclusion of this historical term on a memorial to the Enoura Maru.  VIEW THE CEREMONY HERE. 

And as legislated, the White House issued a proclamation for National POW/MIA Recognition Day. Like the statements made at the Pentagon the emphasis was on the American obligation to recover of POW/MIAs. This seemed like a deviation from past statements. It noted:

The name, story, and fate of each POW/MIA are integral to America’s legacy of valor, and my Administration will spare no effort or resource to fulfill our promise to those who answered the call to serve and paid an extraordinary price on battlefields and in captivity around the world.

Hegseth, Caine Honor Nation's POW/MIAs

Sept. 18, 2026 | By Matthew Olay, Pentagon News, DOW

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth and Air Force Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, hosted a group of approximately 300 former prisoners of war, family members of POWs and those missing in action, service members and other guests today on the Pentagon parade field as part of National POW/MIA Recognition Day.

During their remarks, the two leaders shared stories of service members from past and present conflicts who were POWs or MIAs, emphasizing the country's commitment to never leaving anyone behind.

"That's why we're here this morning: because the United States military leaves no man behind; never before, and never — still — to this day," Hegseth said.

"We refuse to forget the warriors from whom our nation demanded the ultimate and most agonizing sacrifice; not just in sacrifices of life — in some cases, of course — but the sacrifice of identity, the sacrifice of a grave," he added.

Speaking just before Hegseth, Caine also emphasized the military's relentless commitment to leaving no one behind.

"Today, my brothers and sisters, who are here from those families — the families of our missing and our prisoners of war — thank you. We owe you and your families an incredible debt of gratitude, and we owe those that are still missing and their families who continue to wait for them our fullest and continued effort to bring every single one of them home," Caine told the guests, adding that the obligation to bring everyone home doesn't fade with time or lessen with distance.

"Our duty does not end until every missing American is accounted for and brought home to a grateful nation. This is our nation's debt, and we will always continue to repay it," Caine said. 

Hegseth and Caine also took time during their remarks to praise the work of the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, which was formed in 2015 to account for missing service members from past conflicts.

One anecdote Hegseth used to point out the work DPAA is doing was the story of a group of World War II-era U.S. service members who were captured by the Japanese and put into the hold of a "hell ship" in 1944.

"When the ship [Oryoku Maru] was sinking in Subic Bay [Philippines], and our men tried to swim to safety, the enemy [Japan] shot them. But today we're finding their ID bracelets, broken eyeglasses, and American military shoes – and we're bringing them home at last," Hegseth said.

To date, DPAA has identified more than 1,000 sets of remains and accounted for thousands of others.
Among the guests attending the ceremony was the daughter of an American World War II POW who was forced to participate in the Bataan Death March and ultimately was imprisoned on one of the hell ships Hegseth mentioned in his remarks.

"It was nice to hear someone else mention [the ships] because I've just heard my dad talk about them … so that was nice," the woman, who traveled across the country from Northern California to attend the ceremony, said.

"It's nice that [National POW/MIA Recognition Day is] still recognized – it gives hope for other people," she added.

First observed in 1979, National POW/MIA Recognition Day is observed annually on the third Friday of September.

Fathers Found, Fathers Honored

unknowns no more

On Wednesday, August 15th at 1:00pm at the Courts of Honor in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific (Punchbowl), Honolulu, Hawaii the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society (ADBC-MS) will dedicate a long over-due memorial stone.

The stone recognizes the 400 prisoners of war (POWs) of Imperial Japan who died January 1945 aboard two Japanese hellships, Enoura Maru and Brazil Maru, docked in Takao Harbor, Formosa [Taiwan]. These servicemen and mariners are now buried as “Unknowns” among 20 graves in the Punchbowl.

This will be the first time for the men to be named and honored.

The POWs in the graves, in addition to Americans, include servicemen from Australia, Canada, Great Britain, Norway, and what is now the Czech Republic. They were among thousands captured by the Japanese in the Philippines in 1942. These men were being transported to Japan as hostages or slave laborers in the holds of unmarked ships whose conditions were so abysmal that they were known as “hellships.”

On January 9, 1945, planes from the carrier USS Hornet bombed the freighter Enoura Maru unaware of the Allied POWs aboard. The bombing killed approximately 300 POWs; another 100, aboard both hellships, died of starvation and disease. These 400 were buried in a mass grave near the harbor.

click to order

In 1946, the U.S. military retrieved the remains and sent them to Hawaii for re-interment. Unfortunately, the families of the men who were thought to be in these graves were never informed of either the retrieval or interment. In 2001, the son of one of the dead, Duane Heisinger, discovered in the National Archives the fate of his father and the 400.

He wrote about his journey in a 2006 book, Father Found: Life and Death as a Prisoner of the Japanese in World War II.

It has taken until now for the families and friends of these fallen to fully acknowledge and memorialize their service and deaths.

The new stone on the Memorial Walk at the Punchbowl thus reminds us of the sacrifice made by these POWs, while establishing that they have returned home to American soil.

Governor of Hawaii David Y. Ige has proclaimed August 15, 2018 Pacific Heroes Day in their honor.

The Memorial ceremony will be live-streamed on the ADBC-MS Facebook page.

The program will end with a fly-over of a Globe Swift by Honolulu’s Vintage Aviation. A former POW of Japan, Dan Crowley, who fought on Bataan and Corregidor and survived a hellship to Japan plans to attend the event.

The ADBC-MS welcomes everyone in Hawaii to join in the memorial service.

Remembering the Oryoku Maru

Oryoku Maru sinking off Subic Bay

Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 20 (Tuesday, January 30, 2018)] [
Extensions of Remarks] [Page E120]

REMEMBERING THE VOYAGE OF THE ORYOKU MARU
HON. MIKE BOST (R-IL)

Mr. BOST. Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to pause to remember the American POWs who arrived in Japan 73 years ago today. These heroes were survivors of the infamous "death cruise" of the Oryoku Maru. The men were prisoners since the American territory fell to the Japanese in the spring of 1942. Of the over 1,600 soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines, and civilians who left Manila on December 13, 1944, barely 400 arrived at the port of Moji, Japan on January 30, 1945. "Hell Ship"' is simply the only way to describe the vessels and conditions the POWs endured. These men were packed in dark holds of freighters, usually with coal or animal waste. They were given little water, food, or fresh air. Sanitation was non-existent. Men driven insane were quickly and brutally quieted. I became familiar with this story by assisting my constituent, Ms. Jan Thompson, who is the daughter of a survivor of the Oryoku Maru journey and is the President of American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society. Her father, Robert E. Thompson, was a Navy Pharmacist's Mate who had been assigned to a submarine tender in Manila Bay, the USS Canopus. He was surrendered on Corregidor. It has been my honor to help preserve the memory of the American POWs of Japan and of their experience aboard the Hell Ships to Japan. The 400-plus men who died during the stop at Takao Harbor, Formosa are currently buried in 20 graves marked simply as "Unknowns" at Hawaii's National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific. Soon there will be a memorial plaque on the Memorial Walk at this Cemetery to these men who died aboard the Enoura Maru in Formosa on January 9, 1945, which was one of the Hell Ships that took part in the Oryoku Maru journey.