| U.S. faults China pilot in collision Aggressive pattern cited 04/13/2001 By Charles Ornstein / The Dallas Morning News WASHINGTON – Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld accused Chinese fighter pilots Friday of harassment and aggressive maneuvering against U.S. reconnaissance flights in Asia.
Such behavior, he said, caused the April 1 midair collision between a Navy EP-3E surveillance plane and a Chinese F-8 fighter jet. The fighter jet pilot died after his plane split in two and plunged into the South China Sea.
"It is clear that the pilot intended to harass the crew," Mr. Rumsfeld said. "It was not the first time that our reconnaissance and surveillance flights flying in that area received that type of aggressive contact from interceptors."
His comments, coupled with President Bush's remarks a day earlier, reflect the administration's harsher tone since the 24-member American crew was released Wednesday after an 11-day detainment in China, foreign policy specialists said.
Meanwhile, the American crew spent its second day of freedom being debriefed by military personnel in Hawaii. Crew members will return to their home base in Washington state Saturday.
The president will not attend the celebration, spokesman Ari Fleischer said. "What is important is that everyone come home without a lot of hoop-de-la," he quoted Mr. Bush as saying. "These people should be entitled to privacy."
Mr. Rumsfeld largely stayed out of sight during the standoff, leaving the public statements to Secretary of State Colin Powell and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice. On Friday, Mr. Rumsfeld said he wanted to correct the Chinese version of events.
"For 12 days, one side of the story has been presented," he said. "It seemed to me that, with the crew safely back in the United States, that it was time to set out factually what actually took place."
The defense secretary took exception to the Chinese Foreign Ministry's position that the U.S. plane "rammed into and destroyed" the Chinese fighter.
Mr. Rumsfeld said the Chinese fighter pilot made two passes at the U.S. plane – one within three to five feet – before bumping into the propeller of the outer engine.
The U.S. plane, which was guided by autopilot, had maintained a straight and level path until it was hit, Mr. Rumsfeld said. Then, it made a steep left turn and plunged 5,000 to 8,000 feet as the crew attempted to regain control.
The plane, which carried electronic eavesdropping gear, suffered serious damage to its nose cone, two engines, a propeller, elevators and ailerons. Pieces of metal also pierced the fuselage.
January incident
Mr. Rumsfeld showed a video taken on Jan. 24 in which a Chinese fighter pilot came within 20 feet of an unarmed reconnaissance flight. The Chinese craft also flew underneath the American plane, creating turbulence.
"We got bumped. We got thumped," an American pilot said on the tape.
The defense secretary also said that Chinese planes have intercepted U.S. flights 44 times in recent months off the coast of China. Six of those came within 30 feet of Navy planes and two came within 10 feet.
"The Chinese pilots have been maneuvering aggressively against our pilots for months," Mr. Rumsfeld said.
Representatives of the U.S. and Chinese governments will meet Wednesday –probably in Beijing – to discuss the incident and ways to prevent such occurrences. A top issue for the Americans is to recover the $80 million plane, which was seriously damaged in the collision.
Returning from a three-day visit to Europe, Mr. Powell said he's sure the Chinese have searched the plane extensively.
"I have to assume that they've been all over it, in it. But it's our plane, and we expect it would be returned," he said to reporters aboard his plane.
Apology, or not
Mr. Powell rejected assertions that the United States apologized to China for the collision. In a letter Wednesday, officials said they were "very sorry" for the death of the Chinese pilot and for entering Chinese airspace without permission.
"The Chinese are characterizing that as an apology. We should not be fooled by Chinese propaganda that says they got an apology," Mr. Powell said.
One former government official, who specializes in Asia affairs, said he doesn't know how the Chinese will react to the new American assertiveness.
"The chances that the Chinese will say, 'Oops, we made a mistake and you are right' are zero," said Ken Lieberthal, a former senior director at the National Security Council and a professor at the University of Michigan.
"Some of this depends on what the Chinese leader really believe occurred – and frankly, there is no way to know that from the outside."
The Chinese have consistently blamed the U.S. crew for the midair collision, and government-controlled media outlets have declared their pilot, Wang Wei, a national hero.
"This incident is not concluded yet," the Chinese Foreign Ministry said in a statement Thursday. "The Chinese side demands that the U.S. side give [a] convincing explanation to the Chinese people concerning this incident, stop sending aircraft to China's coast to conduct reconnaissance activities and take effective measures to prevent such [an] incident from happening again."
Flights to continue
State Department spokesman Philip Reeker said the surveillance flights would continue. Six countries, including China, conduct surveillance flights in Asia, Mr. Rumsfeld said.
"They're part of the national security strategy," Mr. Reeker said. "We carry out reconnaissance flights as part of our strategy that helps maintain peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region and in our world more broadly."
Initially, American officials were concerned that Chinese officials would be able to recover sensitive information stored on the plane that would offer details of our surveillance work. But Mr. Rumsfeld said Friday that the crew did an "excellent job" of destroying that information.
Mr. Rumsfeld said the U.S. crew made about 25 to 30 attempts to broadcast Mayday and distress signals "and to alert the world, as well as Hainan island, that they were going to be forced to land there." Another Chinese F-8 fighter plane, flying nearby, followed the plane in to the airfield.
Armed Chinese military personnel greeted the plane when it landed and invited the crew to leave the plane. But Mr. Rumsfeld said, "I don't know that their guns were ever taken out of the holsters."
Staff writer Terri Langford in Crawford, Texas, and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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