January 18, 2003	Saturday	Ziqa'ad 14, 1423

BARKSDALE AIR FORCE BASE (USA), Jan 17: A US fighter pilot who mistakenly bombed Canadian troops in Afghanistan defended his actions and never blamed Air Force-sanctioned amphetamines that his lawyers say were at fault, a fellow pilot said on Friday at a military hearing.

Maj. Harry Schmidt did what he thought necessary to stop what later turned out to be an imagined attack from ground troops, said Maj. John Milton, a member of the Illinois Air National Guard unit in which Schmidt and co-defendant Maj. William Umbach are based.

“Our discussion has been that he did what he believed he had to do,” Milton testified in an “Article 32” hearing to consider whether the two pilots should be court martialed for the incident that strained US-Canada relations and embarrassed the US military.

“In their mind set they are being fired on ... and they believe they are in danger and need to invoke self defense,” said Milton, who was a reluctant, at times argumentative, witness.

Four Canadian soldiers died and eight others were wounded when Schmidt, 37, dropped a 500-pound laser-guided bomb on them while they conducted a night live-fire exercise near the city of Kandahar on April 17.

He and Umbach, returning in their separate F-16 fight jets from an uneventful air cover mission, saw the flash of guns and believed they were under fire from the enemy in the war against al Qaeda and the Taliban.

The Air Force has charged them with involuntary manslaughter, aggravated assault and dereliction of duty, saying that they did not follow proper procedures that might have prevented the tragedy.

USE OF AMPHETAMINES: Their lawyers have said the men’s judgment was affected because they took Dexedrine, or “go pills,” the Air Force gives it pilots for long flights.

But, under questioning from Air Force lawyer Lt. Col. Gregory Graf, Milton said Schmidt had made no such excuse.

“Has he (Schmidt) told you that he believes that what he did was tactically sound?” Graf asked.

“Yes, he has told me that,” Milton replied.

“Then ... the go pills didn’t affect him?” Graf continued. “He never talked about it,” Milton said.

On Wednesday, physician and pilot Pete Demitry from the Air Force Surgeon General’s office held a press conference outside the hearing to say that the use of “speed” by pilots flying F-16 fighter jets in combat situations was safe.

Witnesses in the hearing, which began on Tuesday at Barksdale in the northwestern Louisiana town of Bossier City, have raised doubts about how much threat Schmidt and Umbach actually felt because videotapes from their jets show they made no defensive radio calls or flight maneuvers in the three- minute-long incident.

Canadian soldiers wounded in the attack testified they had done little firing before the bomb was launched and that none of it was aimed skyward. The pilots said they had come under “continuous fire” in their direction.

On Thursday, Graf used the videos to make the point that Schmidt quickly usurped Umbach’s role as flight leader, making radio calls to air controllers and taking decisions that should have been left to Umbach.

Umbach, 43, is a United Airlines pilot who flies part-time for the Air National Guard, while Schmidt is a “top gun” pilot from the Navy flying school.

His lawyers said earlier in the week that some news reports suggested Schmidt was a “cowboy” with an itchy trigger finger, which they said was not true.—Reuters