DNA milestone may move US to disinter unidentified Pearl Harbor victims
Enough family reference samples collected to identify at least 60% of disinterred USS Arizona crew members
The United States government could move to disinter the remains of unidentified USS Arizona crew members who were killed in the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 after the clinching of a key DNA-related milestone, officials recently announced.
Before that announcement, officials determined enough family reference samples had been collected for comparison with DNA taken from remains – along with medical and dental records – for the individual identification of at least 60% of the battleship crew members to be disinterred, said a statement on Friday from the agency tasked with identifying US military personnel who are unaccounted for after past conflicts.
It was not immediately clear precisely when the disinterments might begin, the statement from the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) said. According to the DPAA, they first still require approval from the Pentagon.
Nonetheless, the DPAA’s statement said that reaching what it called the 60% threshold allowed it “to formally request and begin planning” the disinterments – a key breakthrough for the ongoing project to conclusively establish the identities of USS Arizona crew members who were killed at Hawaii’s Pearl Harbor but not readily recognizable.
Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor killed more than 2,400 American military members, including 1,177 USS Arizona crew members. Hundreds still are entombed inside the Arizona, which lies where it sank and is one of the most hallowed sites in the US, which entered the second world war in the attack’s aftermath.
Meanwhile, many of those who could be pulled from the Arizona’s wreckage were burned beyond recognition, and buried as “unknowns” in nearby cemeteries, information from the National World War II Museum in New Orleans shows.
In 1947, 170 of those unknown US military service members were exhumed, and more than 100 were identified. But dozens were declared “unrecoverable” and were reburied at the national memorial cemetery of the Pacific in the Hawaiian capital of Honolulu.
Among those on the Arizona who were killed but unaccounted for was Robert Edwin Kline, a US navy gunner’s mate second class. His grandnephew Kevin Kline in 2023 founded Operation 85, a civilian-led and privately funded organization that dedicated itself to identifying the Arizona’s remaining unknowns.
It hoped to replicate the success of a prior effort that identified more than 360 crew members who died on the USS Oklahoma during Pearl Harbor and had previously been unaccounted for, the National World War II Museum noted.
The DPAA’s statement on Friday specifically thanked Kevin Kline and his Operation 85 team, citing “their devoted efforts over the past three years to locate and connect enough USS Arizona families to help reach this important milestone”. Accomplishing that, the agency added, brought closer the disinterment of “potentially 141 unknowns currently buried in multiple [possibly] commingled graves at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific”.
The DPAA also asked any family member who might be related to a missing Arizona crew member to assist the unknowns’ identification effort by contacting Operation 85.
In a New Year’s Eve 2025 statement published on social media by Operation 85 and attributed to Kline, he referred to identifying the Arizona’s last unknowns as a “calling”. Kline on Friday then reposted the DPAA’s announcement, writing: “Well, it’s about time!” and punctuating the message with a smiley-face emoji.
A separate statement from Operation 85 thanked families, volunteers and military officials involved with the effort that produced Friday’s DPAA announcement.
Operation 85’s statement said Friday’s developments materialized “because families stepped forward … people believed the mission mattered, and … [the organization] refused to accept that identifying these heroes was ‘impractical’”.
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