RULES OF WAR

U.S. Government Must Justify Level Of Engagement

The tragic irony of an ask-questions-later drug policy is that
missionaries, not drug traffickers, would be on a plane suspected of
carrying illegal drugs.

Because the victims shot down by the Peruvian government were, seemingly,
as innocent as they come, a mother and her 7-month-old daughter have
become, in their death, a reason to question our involvement in such
drastic measures.

It's desperate misfortune that the United States government, whose
involvement was merely supplying surveillance information, would supply
what's now clearly deemed catastrophic misinformation.

A CIA-operated surveillance plane apparently informed the Peruvian air
force that the plane carrying missionaries from Michigan was entering the
area to conduct illegal matters. And had the plane filed a flight plan
before setting off from Iquitos to Islandia, as was suspected, this tragedy
could have been avoided.

In hindsight, this could have been avoided, if the flight plan posted on
the missionary organization's Web site had in fact been filed ahead of time.

The obvious follow-up to all these what-ifs is this: What if the Peruvian
government had allowed the suspected plane to land, be subjected to a
search and then its intentions determined?

The face of innocence can go far in determining policy, and the faces of
Veronica Bowers and her daughter Charity could determine how far we won't
go in aiding another country's drug war.

Just passing along information, which is the U.S. government's proclaimed
level of engagement, cannot be our method of washing the blood off of our
hands. Pointing out suspected drug traffickers isn't the same as pointing
the cannon, but the Americans went so far as to place a bull's-eye on the
plane's fuselage.

President Bush, through a White House spokesperson, said the CIA-operated
surveillance plane "did its best to make certain that all the rules were
followed."

The rules of engagement must be to aid a government willing to ask
questions first, to force a suspected plane to land, not pierce the plane
with a single bullet that ends the lives of a missionary and an infant.