Officer urges against court-martial for 'friendly fire' pilots

NEW ORLEANS -- A military hearing officer recommended Thursday that charges be dismissed against two American pilots who mistakenly dropped a bomb in Afghanistan last spring, killing four Canadian soldiers conducting live-fire exercises.

Col. Patrick Rosenow said that although there was enough evidence to court-martial both pilots for the friendly-fire accident, "non-judicial or administrative punishment" would maintain "the interests of good order and discipline."

Rosenow presided over the nine-day investigative hearing in January, and his recommendation is a key step in determining whether Majs. Harry Schmidt and William Umbach will face a military trial on the involuntary manslaughter and other charges that could put each of them in prison for up to 64 years.

The final decision is up to Lt. Gen. Bruce Carlson, commander of the 8th Air Force. There was no immediate indication when Carlson might rule.

Schmidt answered the door at his home in the Springfield suburb of Sherman, Ill., but declined to comment. His mother, Joan Schmidt, said from her home in St. Louis County, Mo., that she was relieved. "It's absolutely wonderful and I'm grateful and I'm thankful," she said.

Umbach's lawyer, David Beck, didn't return calls for comment Thursday.

Relatives of the victims, who have spoken publicly in the past through the Canadian military, had not comment the recommendation, said Jae Malana, a spokesman for the Department of National Defense and Canadian Forces.

The Air Force did not release Rosenow's entire report. But according to Charles W. Gittins, Schmidt's lawyer, Rosenow reasoned the Air Force would have difficulty disproving the pilots' main defense: that Schmidt attacked because he believed the enemy was attacking from the ground.

The case had been closely watched in Canada, where many were outraged by the bombing and the two days it took President Bush to publicly apologize. The bomb also wounded eight other Canadians.

Schmidt and Umbach, of the Illinois Air National Guard, said they thought they were under enemy attack last April 17 and had never been told allied troops might be holding exercises in the area.

Schmidt, who dropped the bomb, blamed the "fog of war" and said he believed he and Umbach had been ambushed.

Defense attorneys also suggested Air Force-issued amphetamines had clouded the pilots' judgment.

But a joint U.S.-Canadian investigation concluded the pilots were to blame. The head of the investigation testified the men showed "reckless disregard" for standing orders against attacking, ignored briefings about allied troop locations and could have simply flown their F-16s out of the area.

Schmidt and Umbach became the first Air Force pilots to face homicide charges as a result of combat when they were charged with four counts of manslaughter, eight counts of aggravated assault and dereliction of duty.

The pilots were returning from a 10-hour patrol, at more than 15,000 feet, when they spotted surface-to-air fire and feared it was from Taliban forces. It turned out to be from Canadians with the 3rd Battalion of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, based near Edmonton.

The troops were at Tarnak Farms, a former al-Qaida training area near Kandahar that allied forces were using as a practice range. The Canadians were firing anti-tank and machine-gun rounds horizontally, not vertically in a way that would have threatened the two F-16s, according to investigators.

On audio and video taken from Schmidt's F-16, a flight controller is heard saying "hold fire" after Schmidt asks permission to fire his 20 mm cannons, thinking Umbach was under attack.

Four seconds later, Schmidt said he was "rolling in, in self defense." He dropped the laser-guided bomb 35 seconds after that, killing Sgt. Marc Leger, Cpl. Ainsworth Dyer, Pvt. Richard Green and Pvt. Nathan Smith.

Less than three minutes after the bomb hit, Schmidt said: "I hope that was the right thing to do."

"Me too," said Umbach, the mission's commander. Schmidt transferred to the National Guard in 2000 after a combat-decorated career as a Navy pilot and an instructor at the Navy's "Top Gun" fighter pilot school. Umbach is a United Airlines pilot who had served in the Air Force.

At the hearing, several F-16 pilots said Schmidt and Umbach had done nothing wrong because airmen are trained to attack if they believe they are under enemy fire.

Defense lawyers cast the men as scapegoats for a military communications breakdown, and said Air Force brass, not the pilots, should be punished.

The angry reaction in Canada recalled the outrage in Italy in 1998, after a Marine jet clipped a ski-lift cable in the Alps during a training flight, sending a gondola plummeting to the ground and killing 20 people inside. Investigators blamed the flight crew, but the pilot was acquitted of manslaughter.

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On the Net

Air Force Tarnak Farms Site: http://www.barksdale.af.mil/tarnakfarms