Phillip N. Butler


Phillip N. Butler was the eighth-longest-held U.S. Prisoner of War held in North Vietnam during the Vietnam War. Butler, a Navy pilot, who was forced to eject after a mid-air explosion on April 20, 1965 and served as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam until his release as part of Operation Homecoming in 1973. Butler was one of the four POW's credited with establishing the tap code. The code enabled the prisoners to communicate with each other.
After his release Butler earned a PhD in sociology and used his communication skills to provide leadership training in military and civilian life. Butler provided community service as President of Veterans for Peace. In October 2019 Butler was inducted into the .

Early life

Phillip N. Butler was born on August 11, 1938 in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Butler attended Lanier Elementary, Wilson Jr. High and Will Rogers High School in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He logged enough flying hours to receive a commercial pilots license two months after his high school graduation. Butler attended the University of Oklahoma with a Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps scholarship and then accepted an appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis.

Military career

Navy training and early career

Phillip Butler graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in 1961 from the U.S. Naval Academy. Butler received his officer's commission and married Karen Olsen the day after graduation. On assignment in Texas, Butler flew the single-seated fighter airplane, Grumman F-11 Tiger, during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Butler was assigned to Naval Air Station Lemoore in California.

Capture

During his second West Pacific cruise, on the night of April 20, 1965, Butler launched from the in his A-4C Skyhawk. His mission was to fly from the Gulf of Tonkin to Highway 1, the major transportation route that the North Vietnamese used to carry military supplies to their troops in the south. The bombing run was at night because that was when the North Vietnamese moved material. According to Butler's report his aircraft exploded due to a malfunction of the electrically-fused Mark-81 VT experimental fuses on the 250-lb bombs.
After ejecting, he covered over in four days with nothing to eat or drink other than what he could find on the jungle floor. On the fourth day, the North Vietnamese, using dogs, were able to track him down and capture him. Butler went down near the North Vietnamese city of Vinh.
Butler was moved around to ten different prisons in North Vietnam over the next seven years and ten months.
Butler was first reported missing and then mistakenly reported killed in action. The erroneous news of his death was published in his home town of Tulsa, Oklahoma.
In 1965 Butler was placed in the same cell with Carlyle "Smitty" Harris, Lieutenant Robert Peel and Robert H. Shumaker. Harris taught the others a special code that he had learned at a survival training. This tap code enabled the prisoners to communicate with quiet taps on the walls of the cells.
After the death of Ho Chi Minh in September 1969 the treatment of the US POW's improved.

After release

After recovery from his injuries and a difficult divorce Butler attended graduate school while in the Navy. Butler earned a Ph.D. in Sociology at UC San Diego and worked as a Navy Organizational Effectiveness consultant and a professor of management at the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, CA. Butler retired from the Navy as a Commander in 1981.

Medals

Business

Butler had a consulting and management company, Camelot Enterprises 1981–2000, specializing in executive team building, interpersonal skills, planning, personal coaching and mentoring.

Personal

Butler married Barbara Baldock in 1980 and moved to Monterey, California.

Veterans for Peace

Butler served as president of Veterans for Peace Butler opposed the candidacy of fellow former POW John McCain in the 2008 US presidential campaign, supporting Barack Obama. "John McCain is not somebody I would like to see with his finger near the red button"

Community service