THORNE, LARRY ALAN

Name: Larry Alan Thorne
Rank/Branch: O3/US Army
Unit: HQ MACV SD5891
Date of Birth: 28 May 1919 (Viipuru, Finland)
Home City of Record: Norwalk CT
Loss Date: 18 October 1965
Country of Loss: South Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 152558N 1074744E (YC895105)
Status (in 1973): Killed/Body Not Recovered
Category: 3
Acft/Vehicle/Ground: CH34
Other Personnel in Incident: none missing, all others, remains recovered
Refno: 0174

REMARKS:

Source: Compiled in 1989 from one or more of the following: raw data from
U.S. Government agency sources, correspondence with POW/MIA families,
published sources, interviews. Updated by the P.O.W. NETWORK 1998.

SYNOPSIS: Larry Alan Thorne was born Lauri Allan Torni on May 28, 1919. As an
adult in Finland, he joined the Finnish army where he attained the rank of
Captain. His valor earned him the equivalent of the Congressional Medal of
Honor, the Mannerheim Medal. He was so successful as a ski troop commander that
the unit patch carried his initial "T" with a lightning bolt through it.

At the end of the Winter War, Torni joined the German "SS" to fight the
Russians. When the Continuation War began, he returned to Finland and again
commanded his ski troops.

Following Finland's second defeat to the Russians, Torni was imprisoned by the
communists as a war criminal. He escaped prison three times and made his way to
the United States where he enlisted in the U.S. Army as a private.

Throughout the late 1950's, the budding U.S. Army Special Forces had been
building a controversial force to conduct unconventional warefare. These
unconventional warfare warriors had to be able to master critical military
skills needed to train and lead guerrilla warriors, to be inserted anywhere in
the world by any means of transportaion, to survive the most hostile
environment, and to take care of themselves and others under the pressures of
harsh combat conditions and isolation. At the same time, these individuals had
to be independent thinkers, able to grasp opportunities and innovate with the
materials at hand. In order to control and lead irregular fighters, they had to
understand people, languages, and foreign cultures. Most important, the Special
Forces warriors had to posses the intelligence, knowledge, tact, and acumen to
successfully transform ordinary civilians into an effective military threat to
a strong and cunning occupation army.

In addition to recruiting rugged individuals possessing these attributes from
regular army formations, the Special Forces attracted a proven lot of hardy,
versatile volunteers from Finland and other European countries through the
Lodge Act, Public Law 957 of the 81st Congress, sponsored by Henry Cabot Lodge,
Jr. Regardless of his background, each SF volunteer underwent strenuous
physical conditioning, including paratrooper training, and was extensively
tested to determine his best skills and abilities. He then received
comprehensive instruction in his specialty area.

Thorne was selected for the Special Forces and ultimately led an important
mountain rescue mission to a crashed USAF plane in the middle east. The plane
was carrying classified equipment and three earlier attempts to reach it had
failed. Next, he went to Vietnam, he and his 7th Special Forces A-734
established the camp at Tinh Bien in April 1964 near the Delta's Seven
Mountains area, which bushwacked so many Viet Cong that it becamse a serious
thorn to the VC lifeline into Cambodia.

In a second tour of Vietnam, attached to Headquarters Company, MACV, Special
Detachment 5891, the Vietnamese Air Force CH34 helicopter on which Thorne was a
passenger crashed about 25 miles southwest of Da Nang. When rescue workers went
to the site, they recovered the remains of the Vietnamese crew, but found no
sign of Larry Thorne. He had simply disappeared.

Thorne's photo is maintained in a pre-capture photo group shown to defectors
for POW/MIA identifications purposes, yet Thorne was classified killed in
action the day after the crash. His remains were never found. Men who served
with him believe that Larry is still alive. They gather to toast his health
every year. No one, they say, is better equipped to survive than Larry Thorne.

In Finland, Lauri Torni is a national hero. In the United Sates, Larry Thorne
is forgotten by all but a few. His family believes he is still alive, even
considering he was 70 years old this year (1989). Lauri Torni hated the
threat of communism so much that he was willing to join any army to fight it.
We must never forget men like Thorne. It is to them that we owe our freedom. We
also owe them theirs.

UPDATE 1998
In June of 1998, the book THE SOLDIER UNDER THREE FLAGS was made available
by Pathfinder publishing. The author, H.A. Gill, III is a graduate of the
Citadel. He served as an infantry offcier in the U.S. Army and currently
works for an aerospace corporation. The book about Larry Thorne has 208
pages and 37 photographs, and is available for 14.95.
ISBN : 0-934793-65-4

Pathfinder Publishing
1-800-977-2282
458 Dorothy Avenue
Ventura, CA 93003

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