Changing Landscapes: Challenges and Approach to Investigating World War II Casualties in the Southwest Pacific

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "A Decade of DPAA: Challenges and Opportunities to the Accounting Mission", at the 2025 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

Today, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) pursues missing servicemembers and unresolved casualties from past conflicts. Agency efforts have shown a clear need for, and benefit of, an interdisciplinary approach throughout all aspects of case progression, beginning with historical research through an historical archaeological focus, field investigations that can include archaeological fieldwork, archaeological field recovery, and finally forensic assessment at DPAA laboratories in Hawaii and Nebraska. This discussion presents two terrestrial case studies, one from French Indochina and one from Indonesia, demonstrating an approach towards recovery of missing U.S. servicemembers lost during World War Two. Many challenges arise when attempting to interpret historical space today. Both case studies highlight how historical research, with an historical archaeological focus, develops a better understanding of the circumstances of losses and contributes to efforts to account for unresolved U.S. casualties situated within a complex and dynamic landscape.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• A Decade of DPAA: Challenges and Opportunities to the Accounting Mission   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2025

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Nicole Haddow