vin/020315.html
It seems to fall into a different category from the persistent, cherished rumors -- fodder for uncounted Chuck Norris movies -- of surviving American POWs still being held in tiger cages somewhere in Southeast Asia.
The Chicago Tribune describes as "unprecedented" the May, 2001 decision of the Pentagon to re-list Lt. Cmdr. Michael Scott Speicher -- the first American pilot shot down over Iraq during the Gulf War of 1991 -- from "killed in action" to "missing in action."
The crash site of Speicher's shattered F-18 Hornet was not discovered until 1993 -- by the party of a Qatari general hunting for rare falcons in the isolated Iraqi desert -- or examined by U.S. agents until 1995. (A proposed 1994 covert mission to the site was scrapped by Joint Chiefs Chairman John Shalikashvili.) At that time, no human remains -- or other evidence that Speicher had died -- were found.
The Pentagon had originally reported that his single-seat fighter bomber "exploded to bits" in the sky over Iraq after being hit by an Iraqi surface-to-air missile. But that report hardly jibes with the fact that the search mission -- led by the International Committee of the Red Cross and undertaken with the approval of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein (though only after a predictable nine-month delay) found the wrecked plane virtually intact and upside down.
Old U.S. satellite imagery of the crash site reportedly shows Speicher's ejection seat located on the ground several miles away and the canopy also separated from the rest of the wreckage -- both indications the pilot may have tried to eject. There are even reports that analysts found the image of a two-letter Escape-and-Evade symbol used by downed pilots to indicate they are alive and want to be rescued, though Defense Department spokesmen merely reply, "The Pentagon does not discuss intelligence reports."
All this, however, has piqued interest in new accounts by a onetime high-ranking military adviser to Saddam Hussein, who defected earlier this year, that a captured American pilot was still alive and being held in Iraq as of January.
The defector, who did not know the pilot's name but said he had facial scars and walks with a limp, told interrogators the pilot was moved to a military facility on Sept. 12, the day after the World Trade Center attack by Islamic terrorists, because the Iraqis feared reprisals from the United States.
In a seven-page declassified version of the facts released last year, the CIA asserts Speicher probably survived the shootdown, and "If he survived, he was almost certainly captured by the Iraqis."
Why would Speicher not have triggered the radio beacon all U.S. pilots carry -- and which they are continually reminded is their main key to rescue?
Minutes before Speicher took off, pilots on the U.S.S. Saratoga had been given new radios, larger than their previous models, which didn't fit in the vest pocket that had held the earlier models, leading to concerns the pilots might lose their radios if forced to eject. (In subsequent launches, the problem was remedied with the installation of a new and larger flap.)
And more significantly, why would Iraqi authorities have held onto an American captive for a full decade -- just the provocation and casus belli the Bush administration might now need to move its "War on Terror" into Iraq -- while keeping it all a secret?
Who can know the minds of those operating in a hermetic medieval terror state and cult of personality such as that imposed on Iraq by former professional assassin Saddam Hussein? Perhaps the dictator thinks a final captive could be his last-ditch "Get-Out-Jail-Free" card. The Iraqi response to date has been limited to the somewhat pathetic assertion of Iraqi Air Force commander General Khaldoun Khattab that "It's possible he (Speicher) was seriously injured after he ejected from the plane, and there are lots of wolves in the area."
Yeah.
Lt. Cmdr. Speicher, son of World War II Navy pilot Wallace Speicher, left behind a family in Jacksonville, Fla. -- wife Joanne and two children: a daughter now aged 13 and a son, now 11. The Methodist church where Scott Speicher had been a Sunday School teacher has continued to hold prayer and candlelight vigils; they have not given up hope that he is still alive.
We can certainly add our prayers and hope that Michael Scott Speicher, somehow and against all odds, may still walk out of Baghdad alive.
But meantime, the foot-dragging must end. If the intelligence about a surviving U.S. pilot appears credible, then all leads must be pursued aggressively. The time for a settling of accounts has come; if Saddam Hussein has secretly held a U.S. officer captive for more than 10 years, there should be hell to pay.
Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, a monthly contributor to "Shotgun News," and the author of "Send in the Waco Killers." For information on his monthly newsletter, "Privacy Alert," or on his new book, "The Ballad of Carl Drega," dial 775-348-8591; e-mail privacyalert@thespiritof76.com; or write 561 Keystone Ave., Suite 684, Reno, NV 89503
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Vin Suprynowicz, vin@lvrj.com
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