Any person without combat experience should never be allowed to judge combat veterans (“2 pilots at center of storm,” Page 1, Oct. 27).
Those who do will come up with idiotic statements such as this one from the American and Canadian investigators who were quoted as saying:
“Under the rules of engagement . . . the pilots should have flown away from the perceived threat.”
Yes! Of course.
Guess what, brilliant investigators?
The tailpipes of jetfighters are very hot.
You say the pilots should have turned tail to the perceived ground fire and just hope that there weren’t any heat-seeking missiles there.
For all of you non-combat-experienced critics pulling “rules of engagement” out of your back pockets, there is only one rule of engagement to survive in combat: Kill or be killed.
I survived 353 combat missions in fighter planes in two combat tours in Vietnam.
I certainly didn’t survive by turning my tail to the enemy. These pilots did absolutely nothing wrong. To charge them with involuntary manslaughter, aggravated assault and dereliction of duty, with the possibility of 64 years of imprisonment, is absolutely insane.
They were sent to a hostile area, they perceived that they were being fired at and they fired back according to the only valid rules of engagement in combat.
Things happen very fast in combat situations, instantaneous communication is not always possible, and friendly fire accidents will happen. If the new rules of engagement are that fighter pilots will spend 64 years in jail for a friendly fire accident, I highly recommend that all fighter pilots refuse to go to combat.
There is only one question to be answered:
Why weren’t the pilots briefed on the Canadian live-fire exercise?
The pilots should be exonerated immediately.
And the person or persons who “intentionally removed” the information from the mission data given to the pilots should be sent to jail for 64 years.
