U.S. using reward, posters in search for pilot

[thedrifter]

Posted on Fri, May. 30, 2003


U.S. using reward, posters in search for pilot
By DAVID GOLDSTEIN
The Kansas City Star


Michael Scott Speicher


WASHINGTON - In their thus-far fruitless search in Iraq for Navy pilot Capt. Scott Speicher, U.S. investigators plan to use two old-fashioned tools: reward money and wanted posters.

Republican Sen. Pat Roberts of Kansas and Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson of Florida backed a "sense of the Senate" resolution urging Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to use his authority to offer rewards for information about missing military personnel.

"We've pretty well hit a dead-end street," Roberts said of the need to try new methods to recover the pilot shot down over Iraq in 1991. "It's a little hard not to be discouraged. We had hoped by this time that we would have had more specific word. That doesn't mean we aren't persevering, that we aren't making every effort."

The Senate provision, included in the defense authorization bill passed last week, calls for publicizing a $1 million reward for information "resolving the fate" of Speicher.

Nelson spokesman Dan McLaughlin said members of the former Iraqi regime, terrorists or others who might have been involved in Speicher's captivity would not be eligible for the money.

The reward also applies to the search for members of the armed forces from the Korean and Vietnam wars still considered to be missing, held prisoner or killed in action, but who remain unaccounted for.

"It might flush somebody out who knew about Scott," said Roberts, a leader in the efforts to recover Speicher. "There were probably three, four or five people who even knew about him. He was more or less a pet prisoner of Saddam."

Former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, his two sons and dozens of other top Iraqi officials are still considered at large, assuming they survived U.S. air attacks.

Roberts, who leads the Senate Intelligence Committee, acknowledged that in a recent closed-door briefing with Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz he had pushed the idea of circulating posters with Speicher's photograph because he wanted "every Iraqi citizen to know exactly what Captain Speicher looks like."

The posters and the prospect of a reward should produce a flood of information, Roberts said, although much of it is likely to be useless. But he said the searchers were starting to run out of options.

Roberts said a new team of investigators would be on the ground soon in Iraq to aid the search, although he said its primary task would be to look for evidence of weapons of mass destruction. The new team is called the Iraq Survey Group and is made up mainly of scientists.

The existing team searching for Speicher is a joint operation of about a dozen persons from the Central Intelligence Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency and other intelligence operations.

Speicher, a Kansas City native, was the first U.S. casualty of the 1991 conflict. Although he was initially declared killed in action, subsequent evidence showed that he probably survived the crash of his fighter jet and was taken prisoner by Iraq.

His status was first changed to missing in action, but reports continued to surface that he was alive. The military now considers him to be a prisoner of war.

Once the latest war ended and military and intelligence teams began roaming Iraq, optimism was high that Speicher -- or at least evidence of his fate -- would be found.

"Obviously as years go by, the possibility of bringing him home alive realistically seems to diminish," said Larry Greer, a spokesman for the Pentagon's POW/MIA office. "But we've got to be vigilant and exercise all the resources we've got."

Expectations rose several weeks ago when investigators found Speicher's initials carved into a wall at the Hakmiyah Prison, a site where an informant reportedly said an American pilot had been held in the mid-1990s.

Amy Waters Yarsinske, a former naval intelligence officer who wrote a book last year about the Speicher case, said she understood that investigators had also found other symbols inside the prison that might have been left by Speicher.

"The symbols he was using are something he was taught in survival training," she said. "The Iraqis would have no idea what they were, even if they noticed. They are the same symbols Scott has left everywhere."

But Lt. Cmdr. Jim Brooks, a spokesman for the Defense Intelligence Agency, cast doubt on whether such symbols had been found, or if they were, that Speicher was responsible. He said the Army was conducting forensic tests.

"In all the prisons they've been through, everyone carves on the wall," he said. "I haven't seen anything definitive. The search continues."

But as more time passes without a clear resolution of Speicher's fate, his friends and supporters grow more anxious.

"The days just go by and we just keep hearing nothing," said Barry Hull, a fellow pilot in Speicher's squadron. "I was flying with Spike that night. I've had this feeling like I've been on this journey and I'm getting close to the end, and the end is going to be absolutely wonderful or just terrible.

"My optimism is fading as the days go by."

To reach David Goldstein, Washington correspondent, call (202) 383-6105, or send email to dgoldstein@krwashington.com.

http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansas...ws/5972367.htm

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Were it not for the brave,
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Remember our POW/MIA's
I'll never forget!



Sempers,

Roger

[Hawk]

see next post

[Hawk]

new article found on 1/15/04 still nothing new but at least their still searching.

Fate of Navy pilot shot down in first Gulf War remains a mystery
RON WORD
Associated Press

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. - Military search crews have returned to the crash site where Navy pilot Scott Speicher's jet crashed 13 years ago, while captured Iraqi officials, including Saddam Hussein, are being questioned about the fate of the Jacksonville fighter pilot.

U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, who has made it a personal mission to get answers for Speicher's family and friends, said crews are actively looking for the pilot, whose plane went down on Jan. 17, 1991, in Iraq, about 100 miles north of the Saudi Arabian border.

Speicher's FA-18 Hornet was the first plane shot down over Iraq in the first Gulf War.

"I am convinced they are doing everything they can," Nelson said. "But I have to stay on the Pentagon and the administration to make sure it remains a priority with them."

Navy officials said crews have checked more than 50 sites, including hospitals, prisons, security archives, homes and the original site where the aircraft crashed, said Lt. Mike Kafka, a Navy spokesman. "The Navy remains extremely interested in information regarding Capt. Speicher."

Recently, crews revisited the crash site, where Speicher's plane had pancaked in the desert, for the first time since 1995. At that time they found the canopy, wings, unexploded ordnance, but the cockpit was missing.

Nelson said he could not comment on what, if anything, was found in the second search. Earlier, Donald Black, a spokesman for the Defense Intelligence Agency, said the search team was hoping to find Bedouin tribesmen who might have witnessed the crash.

The current search for information about Speicher's fate has been complicated by the security situation in Iraq, Nelson said. "They have to make sure they don't get ambushed."

Nelson, a Florida Democrat, said he was heartened when he heard Hussein and other high level Iraqi officials had been questioned about Speicher. Kafka said all detained officials and hundreds of lower-level officials, civilians, defectors and refugees have been questioned and will continue to be questioned.

"Sooner or later, somebody is going to talk," said Nelson, who believes Speicher could still be alive. "I hope so. With each passing day, it diminishes that possibility."

Kafka said the search has yielded thousands of documents from the Iraqi intelligence and security services that are being examined for evidence about Speicher.

Over the years, various theories have been floated about what actually happened in the darkness over Iraq.

Some believe Speicher was killed when a surface-to-air missile knocked his jet fighter from the sky on the first night of the first Gulf War. There was evidence that he ejected from his damaged aircraft.

Amy Waters Yarsinske, author of "No One Left Behind. The Lt. Cmdr. Michael Scott Speicher Story," believes Speicher could still be alive in Iraq. She believes Bedouins may have rescued Speicher and cared for him for four years, until Hussein's agents spotted them with Speicher. According to her book, sources told her that Speicher was taken away and every man, woman and child in the tribe were executed.

A report to the Senate Intelligence Committee said, "We assess Lt. Cmdr. Speicher was either captured alive or his remains were recovered and brought to Baghdad."

Unless Speicher or other evidence are found in Iraq, the answers may never be known.

Speicher's cousin, Teresa Engstrom, of Minneapolis said in an e-mail, "We hold out hope that Scott is still alive. Failing that, I would hope that the family and all those wonderful supporters can at least know what happened."

"When Saddam was captured, we were so encouraged that at least the question about Scott was asked. I am still hoping that an answer will be forthcoming."

Craig Bertolett, Speicher's squadron mate, who now lives in Vienna, Va., said he believes Speicher survived the shoot down.

"While I concede there is a remote possibility that Scott survived and is still alive, the possibility still exists. So long as that possibility exists, we should pursue his repatriation with the utmost voracity," Bertolett said.

Yarsinske, a former reserve Navy intelligence officer, said she's heartened by efforts to find him. She became interested in the Speicher case while working on a series of stories about him for the Virginia Pilot.

Yarsinske said there are reasons Hussein would not want to tell U.S. investigators what he knows about Speicher. "He's a living war crime," she said in a telephone interview from her home in Norfolk, Va.

Speicher, who was 33 when he was shot down, was first declared missing in action. Later his status was changed to killed in action. A marker was placed on an empty grave at Arlington National Cemetery. In 2002, his status was changed to missing-captured.

In the past 13 years, Speicher's rank has been increased from lieutenant commander to captain. His wife, Joanne, has remarried and his children are now teenagers. They live in the Jacksonville area.

Yarsinske said she hopes Speicher's case will be resolved for the sake of his family and supporters. Search crews "are going to go the extra mile," she said. "They wouldn't be pressing this hard if he was dead."

[Hawk]

another news article 1/30/04

U.S. hunts for missing Gulf War pilot
From Barbara Starr
CNN Washington Bureau
Friday, January 30, 2004 Posted: 0059 GMT ( 8:59 AM HKT)


WASHINGTON (CNN) -- U.S. military officials said Thursday a desert nomad in Iraq might be the last hope to learn what happened to Navy pilot Scott Speicher, shot down the first night of the Persian Gulf War 13 years ago.

The Iraq Survey Group, which in addition to searching for unconventional weapons is charged with hunting for Speicher, plans to send experts in the next day or so to the area where Speicher crashed to search for the Bedouin tribesman.

It is believed this is the time of year the tribe regularly moves through the area.

Several U.S. military officials confirmed the essential details of this latest search to CNN.

Sources said the hope is the tribesman will be able to provide details about intelligence gathered since Speicher's F/A-18 was shot down January 17, 1991.

The information indicates a Bedouin might have recovered and buried the body of an American, and has a pistol that might have belonged to Speicher.

The sources emphasized this information has been circulating for several years but they have not been able to get into the region to look for the man until now.

Intelligence officials are split, however, on whether the man will have details that could actually lead to Speicher's body.

At least one senior intelligence official told his staff he is "hopeful" because the Bedouin are not likely to lie, even to Americans. But others are more skeptical, according to sources.

In January 2003, a report from the Navy was made public indicating reasons Speicher might be alive. The report focused on these factors:

? Analysis of the wreckage concluded Speicher survived the initial damage to the aircraft and ejection.

? The flight suit found near the wreckage and turned over by the Iraqis showed no signs of a crash impact, as it would have if the pilot had been in the plane when it hit.

? The Red Cross team that investigated the wreckage reported the cockpit had been expertly dismantled.

? Cumulative information received since Speicher was shot down continues to suggest strongly that the Iraqi government could account for him.

There have been numerous reports about the fate of the pilot, but there has been no solid evidence to indicate what happened to him.

Initially the Navy declared Speicher the Gulf War's first combat death and his status was listed as "killed in action." Eventually his status was changed to "missing in action."

In October 2002, Navy Secretary Gordon England signed an order to change Speicher's status a third time from "missing in action" to "missing-captured." Speicher was promoted to captain that same year.