Per Rasmussen
Danmark
from: jclancy@peg.apc.org
Subject: Nato bomber pilot.Stasi Files, Gen. Jackson
Date: Wed, 9 Jun 1999 OFFICIAL STORY
BOMBER PILOT THOUGHT HE SAW ENEMY FORCES ON RAMPAGE
By JOHN-THOR DAHLBURG and JOEL HAVEMANN in Brussels The United States Air
Force pilot looked down from his F-16 cockpit on the struggling columns of
refugees and the flaming desolation that blotted the Kosovo landscape
4,600 metres below. At the end of a string of burning villages and houses,
the pilot said later, he spotted what he thought were three military
trucks.
"I'm convinced now that's the [Yugoslav Army and police] forces
working their way down ... and they're preparing to set this next
house on fire," he reported. He verified his target with infrared
sensors. He made repeated passes over it. Then he let loose a
450-kilogram laser-guided bomb. He hit a civilian vehicle; NATO admitted a
day after the attack. The fighter pilot also set off the most serious
crisis of confidence in NATO's three-week-old air war.
NATO's scramble to explain what had gone wrong - providing reporters with
a tape of the unidentified pilot's debriefing was part of that effort -
raised as mainly questions as it answered. Exactly where did the attack
occur? How did NATO's account accidental bombing of a single vehicle on a
dirt road square with the video shown on Yugoslav television of many
bodies and wrecked tractors and trucks on a long stretch of paved road?
NATO officials shrugged and promised more answers later.
"What the Serbs are showing is not what we are saying, said military
spokesman, Colonel Konrad Freytga. Wednesday, the pilot told his debriefs,
he lingered over the town of Djakovica, where he spotted what he thought
was a convoy of ethnic Albanians driven from their homes by the Serbs and
clogging the road to the west of the town. "I moved north from there to
look and see what the reason was for the flood of refugees down to the
town of Djakovica," the pilot said. "And what 1 found was a series of
villages set on fire, entire villages set on fire."
Following a road that runs southeast into Djakovica, the pilot said he saw
no villages, only individual homes - "and every house on that road was set
ablaze". To the east of the town, 60 vehicles were stacked up, perhaps
filled with Albanians fleeing or expelled from their homes. Backtracking
north he found a house that had just been set on fire, "and I spot a
three-vehicle convoy moving south-east about a click from the freshest
burning house".
"I talk my wingman's eyes onto the convoy and explain to him what I'm
seeing there," the pilot said. Both aviators looked, and "we see three
uniformly shaped dark green vehicles, look like deuce-and-a-half [2
1/2-tonne] troop-carrying vehicles. They come to a stop at the next house
down the road. "And I'm convinced now the [army and police] forces [are]
working their way down towards Djakovica and the refugees, and they're
preparing to set this next house on fire."
With his infrared sensors, the pilot, said, he made several passes over
the vehicles to be sure they were military. He made two passes, he said,
to further verify "both with my eyeballs and my targeting pod, IR
[infrared]". "I make a decision at that point that these are the people
responsible for burning down the villages that I've seen so far."
Targeting the lead vehicle in the trio, the F-16 pilot fired the
450-kilogram bomb, guided to its target by a laser beam fired from the
plane. By then, his wing-mate was getting low on fuel, and so the two
planes decided to return to their base.
*****************
Subject: Germany FIGHTS FOR STASI SPY FILES ..
Date: Wed, 9 Jun 1999
GERMANY FIGHTS FOR STASI SPY FILES TESTS SCROEDER.
By WILLIAM DROZDIAK in Berlin
When Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder was invited to lunch at the White House
by President Bill Clinton last month, he fervently hoped he would return
home with a special gift: the top-secret archives of East Germany's
foreign spy operations that the CIA spirited away after the fall of the
Berlin Wall.
However, by the time Mr Schroeder arrived in Washington, he had
received disappointing news: his chief troubleshooter, Mr. Bodo
Hombach, sent to Washington in advance to close the deal, had run
into what he later called a barrier of mutual mistrust". Not only
would Mr Clinton not release the files, he did not wait to discuss
the matter.
Mr. Schroeder sought to dismiss the rebuff by declaring that the two
leaders simply did not have enough time to discuss the issue, but senior
aides said privately that he was outraged by Washington's refusal to
surrender files Germany considered its property and was looking at
retaliatory action. German officials hinted that the time might be coming
to curtail operations in Germany of US intelligence agencies that some
Germans suspect are used for commercial espionage, including eavesdropping
facilities such as powerful radar and communications system.
The campaign to recover the "crown jewels" of the East German state
security apparatus has now escalated into an emotional test case for Mr
Schroeder's Government as it seeks to reassert the full sovereignty of a
reunited Germany and establish a more equitable partnership with
Washington. The files are said to contain the identities, code names and
other vital data of thousands of Stasi foreign agents, the vast majority
of whom worked in West Germany.
The US has refused to return the files at the insistence of the CIA, which
says that doing so would jeopardise Western agents, still at large.
However, many Germans believe the US attempt to protect Germans and
other Westerners implicated in the files - some of which are believed to
still hold powerful political positions - is preventing their nation from
settling its accounts with history.
The coordinator of US-German relations for the German Foreign
Ministry, Mr Karsten Voigt, said it was ironic that in the eyes of
many Germans the US - as a champion of free speech - was aligning
itself with former communists and their sympathisers who have been
trying desperately to cover up the truth about their past. Senior
German officials suspect the US is hiding information on the
Stasis penetration into West Germany. During the 40year history of East
Germany, between 20,000 and 30,000 West Germans are believed to have
worked for the Stasi.
With language posing no obstacle, it easily infiltrated almost every
sector of West German society, including business, politics,
academia, trade unions and the media." JC
******************
subject: Lieut.General Mike Jackson
[SMH Home] [Text-only index]
THE BALKANS Whisky-drinking tough has final say
Date: 12/06/99 By SIMON MANN Herald Correspondent in Skopje
The clause in the military agreement that marks Belgrade's surrender to
the NATO allies - and underscores the unrivalled power of the
whisky-drinking, "tough as nails" commander heading the Kosovo
peacekeepers - lies on page five. The "final authority" regarding
interpretation of the agreement with Yugoslav generals, signed this week
after marathon talks in a camouflage tent near the Kosovo-Macedonia
border, unequivocally rests with the craggy-faced Lieutenant-General Mike
Jackson. "His determinations are binding on all parties," it reads.
Last night, the General, referred to by his junior officers as "Darth
Vader" and the "Prince of Darkness", made it clear that he would stand no
nonsense as he dispatches the 50,000 troops at his command, Kfor, into
Kosovo. With the Yugoslav withdrawal under way, he sent a warning to Serb
para-militaries and the Kosovo Liberation Army: "If they are there and
they continue their activities they will suffer the consequences." The
55-year-old veteran British paratrooper, in his first news conference
since Tuesday's peace accord was signed, outlined his twin priorities for
Kfor - security and the return of the ethnic Albanian refugees.
"We shall be off quite quickly," he said. "We shall be robust and
even-handed. We will deal firmly and directly with anyone who seeks to
disrupt our progress. Violence or non-compliance, wherever it may come
from, will not be tolerated."
Those remaining in - and returning to - Kosovo, Serb and Albanian alike,
could expect "utter even-handedness" from Kfor, "regardless of their
ethnic background", he said. "All people in Kosovo have a right to lead as
normal a life as possible," he added. General Jackson's military CV gives
a hint about why he is considered to be Britain's toughest soldier. He
spent three winters in Norway on Arctic training and faced assignments in
several of the world's trouble spots, including a key role with UN
peacekeepers in Bosnia.
He speaks fluent Russian and is a member of Mensa. "He's not just bloody
hard, he's actually very intelligent," says an officer working with him in
Macedonia. The legend is moulded, too, by tales of long drinking bouts,
cheroot-smoking and a fearsome temper. "When the occasion demands he can
drink absolutely anyone under the table," wrote his colleague, and
long-time career rival, Lieutenant-General Sir Roderick Cordy-Simpson,
recently.
General Jackson, now facing the task of having to pick up the pieces
for Kosovo, says the process he faces "has a long way to go before we
get things better". "I'm aware of the refugees' impatience to get
home. I understand that entirely. But their return will not happen
overnight.
In the meantime, his soldiers face the prospect of inspecting, first-hand,
evidence of a savage conflict. "Throughout the last few months it's been
very difficult to know precisely what's been going on in Kosovo," he says.
"My soldiers are extremely anxious about what they might discover. It's
inevitable that some unpleasantries will greet them."
The news conference is drawing to a close. Its the signal for his
three bodyguards to draw near and the Kosovo liberationist, with his
trademark swagger, is spirited out of Skopje's Continental Hotel into
the summer humidity and on his way, ultimately, to the heat of
Pristina itself. [SMH Home] [Text-only index]" JC
(JC..He seems to be even-handed so far- better than any US general)"