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Four U.S. Marine Corps pilots are facing criminal prosecution because of an accident in which their EA-6B Prowler aircraft struck and severed two cable car wires at an Italian ski resort on February 3 this year. The fast moving jet sliced through one cable at 370 feet above ground and the other at 364 feet, causing a cable car to plunge to the ground killing 20 skiers.
The Cherry Point, North Carolina Marine pilots were in Italy as part of a NATO training mission.
In the wake of the tragic accident, the Italians are clamoring for blood. They say the airmen were flying recklessly and should be turned over to the Italian government for criminal prosecution. The Italians claim that reckless flying on the part of U.S. pilots has been going on for some time in Italy and that they want "swift and harsh punishment" for the Marines.
U.S. officials invoked NATO rules stating that whenever an incident occurs, the responsible NATO member, in this case, the United States, is allowed to deal with the problem internally. That action touched off an international diplomatic firestorm which has strained Italian-American relations and has resulted in protests against the United States at the U.S. air base in Aviano.
Clinton administration officials immediately apologized to the Italians and to the families who lost loved ones. He promised Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi (who is leading the demand for the pilots to be turned over to the Italian government) that the United States would "rectify" the tragedy.
The fact that two of the Marines involved in the incident have already faced Article 32 hearings (the equivalent to a civilian grand jury) at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina makes it obvious that the Marine Corps brass do not have the stomach to stand by their men.
It is also obvious that the pilots should not expect any help from their commander-in-chief, President Bill Clinton (a Vietnam War draft dodger). His actions (or lack of support for the pilots) indicate that he is more interested in his NATO agenda than making sure the pilots are treated fairly.
As if to underscore Clinton's stated determination to "rectify" the accident, the Marine Corps allowed the Italian military police to impound the incident warplane with all its top secret electronic equipment.
Then, the brass stood on the sidelines while the Italian police forbade American investigators to go near the aircraft or to interview eye witnesses who claimed they saw the jet flying low and recklessly all along its flight path.
Charges against the crew include 20 counts of involuntary manslaughter, negligent homicide, destroying private and government property and dereliction of duty. Each faces life in prison if convicted.
Captain Richard Ashby, 30, of Mission Viejo, California, the pilot; Captain Joseph Schweitzer, 30, of Westbury, N.Y, the navigator; and Captain Chandler Seagraves, 28, of Nineveh, Indiana and Captain William Raney II, 26, of Englewood, Colorado, their backseaters; all face the same charges.
Military prosecutors claim the backseaters were equally responsible for the plane's course and speed. This charge is in spite of the fact that in the EA-6B, there is no physical or visual contact between the jet's front and back compartments.
Marine investigators determined that the crew violated rules on how fast and how low the plane could fly during the training maneuver.
But Captain Ashby has insisted that he did nothing improper and feels he has been made a scapegoat. He says he is being portrayed as a "cow boy," and he says that is not true. He said he was cleared to fly low and fast, and his flight maps did not show a ski resort or other populated area along the routine training run that the pilots had dubbed "Easy 01."
And while protesters in Italy have cried for the blood of the pilots, at least two Vietnam veterans have protested demanding fair treatment and justice for the pilots.
On May 5 this year, Ted Sampley, publisher of the U.S. Veteran Dispatch, joined former Marine and
long time POW/MIA activist Bill Sullivan to picket at the main gate of Camp Lejeune during the Article 32 hearing for Captains Seagraves and Raney.
"Unfortunately, America doesn't stand up enough for its military," Sampley told reporters while he and Sullivan picketed on edge of the four traffic lanes feeding into Camp Lejeune. The traffic slowed to a bumper-to-bumper jam as passing motorists braked to read the picket signs.
One sign demanded that the Italian politicians not scapegoat U.S. pilots because of the accident. Another challenged the Italian government "to buy its own warplanes, train its own pilots" and then to "crucify" their own pilots when they make mistakes.
Sampley said, "Our objective in being here today is to draw attention to this miscarriage of justice that's going on right now. I'm aggravated with the Marine Corps. Marine commanders should be standing up for their men, threatening to resign if this injustice continues.
"International politics, in particular Italian politicians, are clamoring for blood; they're looking for a scapegoat. And unless there are voices of opposition, our president will deliver those four Marines as scapegoats," Sampley added. "This was a terrible accident. These Marines do not deserve to go to jail for the rest of their lives for an accident. I'm not taking anything away from the victims _ my heart goes out to them. But what is done can't be changed. There is no reason to pile one tragedy on top of another, and I'm worried that that is exactly what is about to happen."
Also standing up for the pilots is a military rights group called Citizen Soldier, based in New York and headed by Tod Ensign. The group has called for the criminal hearings to be suspended or at least for new evidence to be examined.
According to Ensign, two Italian magistrates have reported that low-level military flights were routine in the months leading up to the accident. He said the hearing officer should disregard the criminal prosecutors' claims that the accident was an isolated incident caused by "a few renegade flyers."
A copy of the investigation report obtained by the U.S. Veteran Dispatch shows plenty of room to doubt the government's allegations of negligence. Here are some of the findings in the report:
n The incident crew and 15 others in the squadron said that, prior to the accident, they were not aware of a 2,000 foot restriction that the Italian government claimed to have set in that region.
n Just before the accident, Captain Ashby, with almost 800 flight hours, and his navigator Captain Schweitzer, said visibility was hazy although it did meet the five-mile visibility requirement for flying low-level flights.
n Both Captain Ashby and Captain Schweitzer said they had been unaware of any ski areas or ski cables on the route, and that those items did not appear on the flight map.
n All of the crew members on the incident aircraft reported hearing no radar alert warning tones prior to the accident.
n After the Italian police impounded the warplane, the Marine Corps investigating board's access to the aircraft was blocked. This unprecedented action effectively denied U.S. investigators further access to the aircraft's electronic flight recorders.
n U.S. investigators were also denied direct access to eyewitnesses who claimed they saw the plane flying "too low and too fast."
n In the U.S. investigators' opinion, the crew kept the aircraft above 1,000 feet when flying over populated terrain.
n The American investigators reported that there did not appear to be any pattern of reckless attitudes or lack of flight discipline in the squadron prior to the accident.
How then, after admitting these circumstances, could the Marine investigating board declare the cause of the accident to be "reckless" flying and "negligence?"
"According to reports, Italians have complained about U.S. planes flying low routes there for some time," Sampley said. "Their government knew about the complaints, the U.S. military leaders knew about the complaints, but the only people on trial is this one crew.
"The Italian politicians and U.S. military officials who knew about the complaints but did nothing are the same people who are now setting the Marines up as scapegoats. If there is going to be criminal prosecution, then there needs to be some Italian politicians and the U.S. Marine Corps generals on trial for dereliction of their duty."
Sampley wrote a letter to Congressman Walter Jones, Jr. (R-N.C.) stating that he believed the Marine pilots were about to be tried in a "kangaroo court" and asked Jones to investigate.
Sampley stated in the letter to Jones: "The Marine Corps appears to have drawn the conclusion that the Marnes were flying recklessly fast and low, based primarily on eyewitness accounts of several Italian civilians. I don't know about you, Congressman, but I cannot look at a jet fighter and tell you whether it is flying at a legal 450 knots or an illegal 550 knots. I would also be unable to tell you exactly at what altitude the aircraft might be flying, and I spent 10 years in the Army. Those Italian civilian eyewitnesses can't do it either."
He also questioned why the Marine Corps allowed the Italian police officials to impound a highly classified United States warplane.
So far, Congressman Jones has not responded to Sampley's letter or his request for an investigation.
Sampley said he is not trying to exonerate the aircrew of all responsibility for the accident, but to prevent them from being sacrificed as pawns in international strategy.
The Article 32 hearing for Captains Ashby and Schweitzer is set for June. Sampley expects to protest at that time, too.
" This is just a pebble being tossed into the pond," he said. "Hopefully by the time the ripple hits the shore of public opinion, Americans will see the injustice that is happening to these Marines."
