News-Info-Alerts

To: ALL

From: Andi Wolos & Bob Necci

(POW-MIA InterNetwork)

Re: MIA pilot might be alive, held in Iraqi jail

Date: March 14, 2001

"MIA pilot might be alive, held in Iraqi jail
By LON WAGNER, The Virginian-Pilot

A report published Monday claimed that the U.S. government has information suggesting Navy pilot Michael Scott Speicher may be alive in an Iraqi prison.

The Washington Times reported that British intelligence told its American counterparts of an American pilot being held captive in Baghdad, 11 years after the Gulf War.

The British alerted U.S. investigators that an Iraqi source had told them that only two high-ranking Iraqi officials were permitted to see the American pilot, the newspaper reported.

Speicher, of Jacksonville, Fla., was 33 and a lieutenant commander flying an F/A-18 on Jan. 17, 1991, the first night of the air war, when he was shot down. It was first reported that Speicher was hit by a surface-to-air missile, but the Pentagon later reported he was likely knocked from the sky by an Iraqi fighter.

What happened to Speicher after that has befuddled the Navy, intelligence agencies, Congress and his family for more than a decade.


Special report: Scott Speicher: Dead or Alive?
He is the only service member that the government lists as missing in action. He was classified as killed in action/body not recovered from May 1991 until January 2001.

President Clinton made history by changing Speicher's status from KIA to MIA -- missing in action -- based on new information. For example, an Iraqi defector has told U.S. intelligence agents that he picked up an American pilot a few weeks after the air campaign, drove him to Baghdad and turned him over to authorities. The defector was asked to look at photos and selected Speicher, according to government sources.

Clinton's action was the first time that a service member's status had reverted to MIA.

Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf, commander of Allied forces during the Gulf War, said that since Speicher was believed to have been killed in action, his name did not come up during negotiations with Iraq at the end of the war. In fact, Schwarzkopf said he didn't hear that Speicher's case was ongoing until his status reverted to MIA.

``I was assured 100 percent that everyone was fully accounted for and that there was no MIA situation,'' Schwarzkopf told The Virginian-Pilot. ``That was a major consideration in my mind just based on the MIA situation in Vietnam.''

Battle reports from his squadronmates indicated Speicher's jet had been blown to bits and that the explosion was not survivable. Those reports, along with strict guidelines for conducting combat search and rescue missions, meant that no one looked for Speicher. The day after Speicher was shot down, then-Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney said in a media briefing that an American F/A-18 pilot had been killed.

The Navy and Speicher's family held a memorial service for him at Cecil Field in Jacksonville that May. Florida State University named a new tennis center after him. And his name was put on a tombstone at Arlington National Cemetery.

But in December 1993, his F/A-18 was discovered largely intact in the desert southwest of Baghdad.

Military leaders decided not to send a team to covertly search the crash site. Instead, Secretary of Defense William Perry and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff John Shalikashvili decided to work with the International Red Cross and seek the help of the Iraqi government to explore the wreckage.

When a Red Cross-sponsored team finally got to the site, two years had passed and evidence suggested someone had examined the crash before the Americans. The team of military investigators learned enough to conclude that Speicher must have ejected and had about a 90 percent chance of survival.

A report released one year ago by the intelligence community concluded:

``Baghdad's efforts to recover coalition airmen downed over Iraqi-controlled territory were highly successful. . . . We assess LCDR Speicher was either captured alive or his remains were recovered and brought to Baghdad.''

Monday's story was not the first time that information has prompted some to wonder whether Speicher could be alive. In November, The New York Times reported that two defectors who worked in Iraqi intelligence said they worked in an underground prison where 80 Kuwaitis captured during the Gulf War were still being held.

Some speculated that if Saddam Hussein would hold Kuwaitis that long, he might also be holding Speicher.

The Virginian-Pilot in November asked the Iraqi Ministry of Foreign Affairs to account for Speicher's disappearance. Dr. Fahmi El-Qaisy, head of the ministry's legal department, responded by placing responsibility with the U.S. government.

El-Qaisy said that the Iraqi government didn't know Speicher was missing until informed by the Americans in 1995. He said the government did not know about the crash site until told by the U.S. government, and said the Iraqi government did not have Speicher. He offered the following explanation:

``It is believed that the pilot had either perished while he was on the ground or been eaten by ravenous animals in the region or buried by a shepherd at that time and that the elapse of five years before initiating the process of fact-finding makes it difficult to find any trace of him.''

Gulf War and veterans' groups have held up Speicher as an example that the government has not accounted for its missing personnel.

Reach Lon Wagner at 446-2341 or lon1@pilotonline.com "