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No Evidence Navy Pilot Was in Iraqi Hands
Investigations in Iraq since the fall of Baghdad have found no evidence that missing Navy pilot Michael Scott Speicher was held in captivity after being shot down on the first night of the 1991 Gulf War, the Navy's top admiral said Tuesday. U.S. officials have been interrogating Iraqis and searching throughout the country for evidence of Speicher's fate since the regime of Saddam Hussein was toppled by U.S. forces in early April last year. Despite having found no evidence that the Iraqis captured Speicher, the Navy is sticking to its position, declared publicly in October 2002, that Speicher is "missing-captured," Clark said. "We have not found out new specific intelligence revelations that have changed our fundamental conclusion," Adm. Vern Clark, the chief of naval operations, told reporters at a breakfast interview.The Iraqi government under President Saddam Hussein maintained from the start that Speicher died in the crash on Jan. 17, 1991, although his body was not recovered. Asked directly whether evidence had emerged to reinforce the theory that Speicher had been taken captive by the Iraqis, Clark said no. He said there is no evidence either for or against it. Other officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Tuesday that prewar assertions by informants that Speicher had been seen in a prison in Baghdad have been discredited. In October 2002 the Navy changed Speicher's status from missing in action to "missing-captured," although it has never said what evidence it has that he was in captivity. In announcing that decision, Navy Secretary Gordon England wrote at the time, "I have no evidence to conclude that Captain Speicher is dead. He also wrote, "While the information available to me now does not prove definitively that Captain Speicher is alive and in Iraqi custody, I am personally convinced the Iraqis seized him sometime after his plane went down." Hours after his plane when down, the Pentagon had declared Speicher killed in action, with no body recovered. But 10 years later, in January 2001, the Navy changed his status to MIA, citing an absence of evidence that he had died. Clark said in the interview Tuesday that resolving the fate of Speicher is a high priority for the Navy. "We do not have new intelligence that adds clarity and definition to what happened to him" after he was shot down, Clark said. "If you think about what I just told you, that tells you something about the discovery or lack of discovery." Speicher was 33 when he was shot down. He held the rank of lieutenant commander at the time; he has since been promoted to captain.
Posted by: Steve White 2004-03-03 |
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