Viet Nam Reds Execute Yank

June 25, 1965 - The Hanoi radio reported today that Sgt. Harold George Bennett of the United States had been executed in Vietnam, local radio monitors reported.

A similar announcement was made by the so-called Liberation Radio, the mouthpiece of the Viet Cong Communist rebels in South Vietnam, the monitors said. The sergeant had been a prisoner of the Viet Cong.

The execution was assumed to be in reprisal for the execution of a Viet Cong terrorist in Saigon this week.

The reported execution of Sgt. Bennett, of Perryville, Ark., comes three days after the South Vietnamese government executed by firing squad a Viet Cong terrorist, Tran Van Dong, in the marketplace of Saigon. Dong was sentenced to death on charges of having attempted to blow up a U.S. officers’ billet last March.

South Vietnam’s new military government ordered the execution of Dong to demonstrate that terrorism and war profiteering would be firmly dealt with.

A spokesman for the U.S. State Department said: “The shooting of the American, if the Hanoi radio broadcast is confirmed, would be a wanton act of murder. This matter is one of very serious concern for us, quite obviously, because it concerns the lives of American citizens.”

The department believes the Viet Cong hold 19 American prisoners, including five civilians, and fears for their safety.

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