by Xinhua writer Liu Yanan
NEW YORK, Nov. 12 (Xinhua) -- Efforts to recover the remains of U.S. airmen have rekindled shared memories of Americans fighting alongside the Chinese against Japanese invaders, said a U.S. Air Force veteran involved in U.S.-China exchanges.
Chinese and U.S. representatives held a ceremony on Tuesday in southwest China's Chengdu to hand over the remains of U.S. airmen who went missing during World War II (WWII) along the Hump Route during WWII.
Among the remains were eight bone fragments recovered from a glacier more than 5,000 meters above sea level in southwest China's Xizang Autonomous Region.
"I'm very, very happy to hear this," Jeffrey Greene, U.S. Air Force veteran and chairman of the Sino-American Aviation Heritage Foundation, told Xinhua upon learning the news in advance.
The remains were recovered in areas along the Hump Route, which was established after Japanese forces occupied Myanmar in 1942, cutting off the Yunnan-Myanmar road, China's last major overland supply link to the outside world.
More than 1,000 Chinese and American aircrew members lost their lives along the route. The air corridor across the Himalayas became a vital lifeline for Allied supplies supporting China's resistance against Japanese aggression from 1942 to 1945.
As next year marks the 85th anniversary of the Hump Route, Greene said, "This is very important that they're doing this now."
"We want to recover those because their families are waiting. They have been waiting a long time," he said.
Greene said he keeps in touch with about 20 families of missing U.S. airmen.
The more people hear about the Flying Tigers, the more it stirs memories, said Greene, voicing hope of finding more threads on Americans missing in action through word of mouth.
"That's the way history works," he added,
Founded in 1998, the primary goal of the Sino-American Aviation Heritage Foundation is to promote friendship and understanding between the United States and China by fostering practical dialogue about their shared aviation history.
"We're doing important things in telling the story on a continual basis," said Greene. "That's what our foundation does. We keep all these stories alive. "
The foundation brought over 500 U.S. students to China in the last two and a half years, Greene said.
"More and more American students will come here and they will learn these stories. They take them home and share them with their families and their friends in school," he said.
"So, we have a very important network to keep the story of Flying Tigers and the Hump alive for the next generation," Greene added.■
