On February 26, 1966, Newton and Wills were members of a long range reconnaissance patrol (LRRP) and had orders to conduct a road reconnaissance about 250 meters from the patrol base a few miles west of the city of Tuy Hoa. Newton and Wills served as pointmen; the two left the base at 0745 and were never seen again.

Search teams searched for two days for Newton and Wills, but no trace of them was ever found. They were listed Missing in Action. The Defense Intelligence Agency further expanded Newton's and Wills' classification to include an enemy knowledge ranking of 2. Category 2 indicates "suspect knowledge" and includes personnel who may have been involved in loss incidents with individuals reported in Category 1 (confirmed knowledge), or who were lost in areas or under conditions that they may reasonably be expected to be known by the enemy; who were connected with an incident which was discussed but not identified by names in enemy news media; or identified (by elimination, but not 100% positively) through analysis of all-source intelligence.

In 1984, a private citizen obtained a lengthy document through the Freedom of Information Act that had been received by Da Nang Regional Intelligence in 1969. The report included a very detailed description of a POW camp near the city of Hue (specific enough that a rescue mission had been planned) and lists of names of POWs positively and possibly held at the facility.

When the citizen contacted the family of one of the men listed, he learned that this family had never been informed of this report. The report was shown to Larry Stark, a former civilian POW captured at Hue. Stark had not been shown the report during his debrief in 1973 for verification, and identified several on the lists as men he had been held with.

After this report gained media attention, the U.S. Government began contacting the families of the men listed, impugning the reliability of the informant and the information. Donald S. Newton's name was on the list of "possible" identifications.

Intelligence reports surfacing over the years during the war and following build a strong case for a well-organized second prison system, and a well orchestrated plan to keep prisoners within systems from intermingling. As it is widely believed that the Vietnamese withheld the release of many prisoners until peace agreement terms were met (specifically reconstruction aid), it is logical to assume that one prison system's inmates were released while another were held back for possible release at a later date. It is also logical to assume that the scenario might be played to its fullest, including convincing each man in a two man crew that had been separated, that the other was dead.

No one really knows what happened to Donald S. Newton and Francis D. Wills on February 26, 1966. Although the U.S. has administratively declared both men dead based on no specific information that they are still alive, the USG has also declared those dead on whom live sighting reports continue to be received by the intelligence community and private sector. It is impossible to know, from USG information, who is alive and who is not.

Since the war ended, over 10,000 reports comprising "several million documents" and over "250,000 interviews" have poured in to the U.S. related to Americans prisoner, missing, or unaccounted for in Southeast Asia. The lengthy report of the POW camp near Hue is only one of them. Many authorities who have reviewed this information are convinced that hundreds of Americans remain alive in captivity today.

Whether Newton and Wills survived and were captured and are perhaps still alive is certainly not known. However, what is clear is that there can be no "Peace with honor" or end to the war in Vietnam until our men are brought home.