News-Info-Alerts

To: ALL

From: Andi Wolos & Bob Necci

(POW-MIA InterNetwork)

Re: Missing Sailor Safe

Date: June 09, 2001

"Missing U.S. Sailor Safe in Manila
By ADAM BROWN, Associated Press Writer

MANILA, Philippines (AP) - After fleeing automatic gunfire and hiding for 30 hours on a volcano, a U.S. Navy lieutenant stumbled lost through rebel territory - a dose of luck that prevented his capture.

"I was told that I was in a lot of places," Lt. Scott Alan Washburn said Thursday, hours after he was guided safely back to a Philippine military base.

For three hours Wednesday, he wandered through dense brush and undulating canyons near the ashen slopes of Mount Pinatubo in communist guerrilla territory.

Washburn was among five American servicemen descending the volcano with four armed Filipino military escorts and two tour guides Tuesday when at least 30 armed men fired near them. No one was injured but Washburn hid and got lost in the confusion.

Some 1,300 Philippine soldiers, prepared for a possible fight with rebels, and two helicopters, searched for him.

After 30 hours, Washburn stumbled onto a village late Wednesday and, emanating from one of the palm-branch huts, heard the voices that eventually guided him back to safety.

"I found a house where people were still up," Washburn, tired and unshaven but cracking jokes, told reporters Thursday. "I asked for directions. They were helpful and took me to a police station."

Police said the attackers were from the communist New People's Army, which has a strong presence in the area.

National Security Adviser Roilo Golez on Thursday pledged to hunt the attackers down but said he didn't know they were.

"We will find out and take action," Golez said.

The incident was apparently unrelated to fighting in the south between Muslim extremists and the military.

On the island of Basilan, 560 miles south of Manila, thousands of Philippine soldiers are hunting the Abu Sayyaf rebels who seized 20 hostages from a beach resort May 27, including three Americans.

The rebels, who say they want an independent Islamic state in the southern Philippines, still hold nine tourists hostage. Nine other tourists escaped during intense fighting over the weekend and the bodies of two abducted resort workers were found mutilated Sunday. One was beheaded.

Muslim rebel leader Abu Sabaya told Radio Mindanao Network they would behead American hostages Thursday unless the Philippine government appointed two Malaysian negotiators to mediate their release.

Hours after the noon deadline passed, Sabaya had not called back to say whether he had carried out his threat. Sabaya has made many similar threats with foreign hostages in the past but has never killed any.

The Philippines, a Southeast Asian archipelago of 81 million, is wracked by scattered rebellions.

Elmer Cato, a spokesman for ongoing U.S.-Filipino military exercises in which Washburn took part, said the attackers on Mount Pinatubo fired automatic weapons toward the group Tuesday and shouted that they wanted the guards' weapons.

He said some assailants wore ski masks and carried assault rifles and grenade launchers. After 30 minutes under fire, the Americans' guards agreed to surrender their weapons, Cato said. Five attackers approached the group and seized two M-16s and two pistols.

Cato said the attackers apparently mistook the Americans, who were wearing street clothes, for tourists and let them go.

He said the attackers identified themselves as members of the NPA, which has been fighting a nationwide Marxist insurgency for more than three decades but recently reopened peace talks with the government.

Washburn, 33, from Celina, Ohio was washing his shoes at a nearby creek when the attack began and hid on the 4,740-foot volcano about 55 miles north of Manila.

When the assailants left after about an hour, the Americans and Filipinos searched for Washburn but failed to find him and trekked back to Clark Airfield Base in Pampanga province.

Washburn said he hid about 200 yards away, then holed up for the night when he realized he was alone.

Cato, translating the testimony of the two men who led the lieutenant to safety, said Washburn was several times in areas frequented by guerrilla patrols. He said the rebels were now aware a U.S. serviceman was lost and could abduct him to further their protests against U.S. forces training in the Philippines.

Military spokesman Brig. Gen. Edilberto Adan identified the other Americans as Jeffrey Buschmann, Patrick Harrison, Sean Babbit and William Alston. No details were available on their hometowns.

The five were participating in a joint, 11-day military exercise that began Friday. About 3,000 U.S. and Filipino troops are involved.

Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. Craig Quigley said in Washington that the Mount Pinatubo tour was part of a "very carefully structured" program worked out by the U.S. Embassy and that it was the first time there had been such an incident.

Cato said Washburn was lucky: "If it wasn't for those two guides, he would have had a very big chance of being captured.""