Buzz
War often turns into a chaotic and disorienting situation where soldiers are either killed or captured. In many instances, they are left unaccounted for and vanish from historical records. While most soldiers who are declared dead are never seen again, some have resurfaced alive years after their supposed 'deaths.'
10. Mateo Sabog
In 1970, Master Sergeant Mateo Sabog was preparing to return to the United States from Vietnam. He was supposed to travel from Saigon to Fort Bragg, North Carolina, but he never arrived. The Army only learned of his disappearance when his brother, Kenneth, sent a letter inquiring about his location in 1973. Sabog was presumed to be a deserter, but a second letter from Kenneth led the Army to officially declare him dead in 1979.
Then, in 1996, Sabog reappeared as if from thin air. It appears he had simply walked away from the military and started a new life with a woman in California. After her passing, he applied for social security, revealing his true identity. Still considered active military, Sabog briefly held the title of the oldest serving soldier before returning to his family. His only words were, “I’m sorry.” He passed away in Hawaii in 2007.
9. Bakhretdin Khakimov
The turbulent and bloody conflict between the Soviet Union and Afghanistan in the 1980s resulted in both heavy casualties and confusion. One of the victims of this war was Bakhretdin Khakimov, a native of Uzbekistan who was believed to have died in 1980 after being severely injured.
After his official “death,” Khakimov was reportedly treated with herbs by a medicine man. Over time, Khakimov became a healer himself, adopting the name Sheikh Abdullah. He later married an Afghan woman and survived the US invasion in 2001.
Khakimov was discovered by the Committee for International Soldiers in 2013—33 years after his supposed death. While he remembered his family, he struggled with Russian and still had nervous tics from his time in the Red Army. However, Khakimov was otherwise in good health despite his lengthy disappearance.
8. John T. Downey
In 1952, John T. Downey was working with the CIA during the Korean War, collecting vital intelligence. When he and another agent flew a mission over Manchuria to rescue a contact, they were shot down after the contact betrayed them. Downey, despite not being in the military, became the longest-held POW in US history.
Presumed dead, Downey was imprisoned by the Chinese for 20 years. The Chinese revealed his captivity in 1954, sentencing him to life imprisonment. He endured long periods of solitary confinement, some lasting up to six years.
In 1973, President Richard Nixon personally intervened to have Downey brought back to the US. Following his return, Downey was honored with the CIA’s highest awards but preferred to remain out of the spotlight as a prisoner. He later graduated from Harvard Law and worked as a public servant until his death in 2014.
7. Teruo Nakamura
Teruo Nakamura, a conscript from Taiwan, was stationed on the island of Morotai when Allied forces attacked in 1945. Nakamura, along with a small group of Japanese soldiers, hid in the jungles of Morotai and never learned that Japan had surrendered.
After a dispute, Nakamura left his group in 1956 and chose a solitary existence. He constructed a hut and survived on crops he grew himself and supplies he took from a nearby village. Despite villagers attempting to inform him of Japan’s surrender, Nakamura refused to accept it.
In February 1974, another holdout named Hiroo Onoda was found and brought back to society. Later that year, in December, Nakamura was also found when a platoon of Indonesian soldiers disguised as Japanese troops pretended to rescue him. Nakamura returned to Taiwan as the last official Japanese holdout and passed away in 1979.
6. Surjeet Singh
In 1981, Surjeet Singh left India, and his family never heard from him again, assuming he had died. However, Surjeet was alive, being held captive in Pakistan. He had been sent as a spy, but when captured, India disavowed the mission.
In 1985, Surjeet was sentenced to death. After pleading for mercy, his punishment was reduced to life imprisonment. He was kept in isolation and forbidden from communicating with anyone. In 2004, he was permitted to send a letter to his family, letting them know he was still alive.
Finally, in 2012, Surjeet was allowed to return to India, where he openly acknowledged his role as a spy and criticized the Indian government. As compensation, the government provided funds to help improve his family’s farm. Surjeet now advocates for other Indians still imprisoned in Pakistan.
5. Lee Soon-Sang
Lee Soon-sang fought in the Korean War and was captured in 1953, just two days before the armistice agreement was signed. He spent the next three and a half years as a POW, enduring forced labor in the harsh Aoji coal mines of North Korea. Losing all hope of ever seeing his wife and family again, he even came to believe that his wife had passed away. He remarried, but his thoughts never strayed far from his first family.
In 2004, a “broker” – a person who helps smuggle people to and from North Korea – told Lee that his wife was alive in China and that he should fetch money from her and return with it. Lee had accumulated a small sum of $150 by selling cigarettes and gave it to his North Korean family before traveling back to reunite with his first wife. She was astonished to learn that Lee was still alive, but they eventually rekindled their relationship. Lee chose never to return to North Korea and has refused to discuss his former life there.
4. Ishinosuke Uwano
In 1958, Ishinosuke Uwano was stationed on Russia’s remote Sakhalin Island, only to vanish without a trace for decades. His family declared him dead in 2000, unaware that he was alive in an unexpected corner of the world. In 2006, Uwano was found living in Ukraine.
The details of his life between 1958 and 2006 remain unclear, but it is believed that in 1965, he traveled to Kiev and was forbidden by the Soviet Union from contacting his family in Japan. He eventually married, became a Ukrainian citizen, and started a family, abandoning all hopes of ever returning to Japan.
When officials searching for missing soldiers in the former Soviet Union stumbled upon Uwano, they were stunned to learn that he was still alive. He was allowed to visit his family after so many years apart. Although he felt joy in returning home, he chose to remain in Ukraine, where he had created a new life for himself.
3. Ho Van Thanh
Ho Van Thanh’s tale is nearly unmatched. While presumed dead, Thanh was actually living in the jungle with his son, Lang. After his village was bombed in 1972, Thanh, believing his family had perished, fled with his one-year-old son deep into the jungle. Cut off from the outside world, he raised Lang in isolation, convinced the war was still ongoing.
Unbeknownst to Thanh, one of his other children, a son named Tri, had survived. After hearing rumors about two men living in the jungle, Tri set out to find them. Ten years before they left the forest, Tri made contact. Lang quickly bonded with him, but a frail Thanh was reluctant to accept Tri as his son. In 2013, at 82, Thanh’s deteriorating health compelled him to return to civilization, bringing with him a remarkable story of survival.
2. Andras Toma
In 2001, Andras Toma returned to Hungary after being missing for 55 years. His journey began in the closing years of World War II when he was captured by the Soviet Army in 1944, having been drafted into the joint Hungarian/German forces. He was taken to a prison camp near Leningrad in 1945.
By 1947, the camp was closed. Toma, who spoke little Russian, was sent to a psychiatric hospital where he was effectively forgotten for over 50 years. When he was finally discovered, Toma was elderly and toothless, with only fragmented memories of his past life.
With no official records to help, investigators could only rely on Toma’s fading recollections. Over 80 families claimed him as a lost relative. Through painstaking investigation, enough clues were gathered to lead him back to his village in Hungary, where he was swiftly recognized by his family.
1. The Soldier In The Forest
In 2015, a Russian soldier, previously presumed dead for over a decade, was found alive in an unexpected location after his disappearance in 2004. He had been stationed on the remote Kamchatka Peninsula and conscripted due to ‘family problems.’ His family mistakenly identified another body as his own, leading to his declaration of death and the burial of the wrong corpse.
The soldier had been surviving by building a rudimentary shelter in the Kamchatka wilderness and taking on various odd jobs. His discovery came only after local residents reported a ‘suspicious inhabitant’ living in the woods. After 11 years, his return was met with confusion. Given the long passage of time and the belief that his situation was a result of ‘psychological issues,’ he was treated with leniency.
