Joe Biden claims his uncle was possibly eaten by cannibals during the Second World War, conflicting with military records of the event.
The U.S. president suggested twice on Wednesday that Ambrose Finnegan’s death was at the hands of a flesh-eating tribe in New Guinea after his plane crashed during the war 80 years ago.
“He got shot down in an area where there were a lot of cannibals at the time,” Biden, 81, told reporters after visiting a war memorial in Scranton, Pa.
“They never recovered his body, but the government went back when I went down there and they checked and found some parts of the plane.”
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However, according to Pentagon records for missing military members, 2nd Lt. Ambrose J. Finnegan died in a plane crash in the Pacific Ocean near New Guinea.
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Biden brought up his uncle’s war death in response to Donald Trump not visiting a military cemetery near Paris in 2018 after calling the dead servicemen “suckers” and “losers.”
“Suckers and losers? The man doesn’t deserve to have been the commander in chief of my son,” Biden told the Pittsburgh audience.
A special counsel’s report in February described the current president as a “well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory” and “diminished faculties in advancing age.”
Im not saying biden has the story right I don’t see a conflict in what is listed. New guinea check, ww2 check, plane crash check. sure the cannibal part is conjecture but the report says they found no trace:
"However, according to Pentagon records for missing military members, 2nd Lt. Ambrose J. Finnegan died in a plane crash in the Pacific Ocean near New Guinea.
On May 14, 1944, Finnegan was a passenger on a military plane that departed from Momote Airfield on Los Negros Island and was headed to Nadzab Airfield.
“For unknown reasons, this plane was forced to ditch in the ocean off the north coast of New Guinea,” the military record says.
The report said both engines failed and the plane nosedived into the water.
“Three men failed to emerge from the sinking wreck and were lost in the crash. One crew member survived and was rescued by a passing barge. An aerial search the next day found no trace of the missing aircraft or the lost crew members.”"