FRIENDLY FIRE CASE HAS WIDE IMPLICATIONS

On the face of it, the case of St. Louis native Harry Schmidt and a fellow
fighter pilot in the Illinois Air National Guard is simple:

Did they act rashly over Afghanistan last April 17 when they dropped a bomb
that killed four Canadian soldiers and wounded eight? Or did they simply
act in self-defense against what they thought was hostile gunfire?

But at a hearing that opens Tuesday at Barksdale Air Force Base, La.,
simplicity will almost surely be in scant supply.

Schmidt and fellow pilot William Umbach - both men are majors - stand in
the cross-hairs of a case with wider implications and deeper questions.
Among them:

Did amphetamines warp the judgment of the two men?

Are the pilots being put in legal jeopardy just to mollify Canada?

Must anybody be held legally accountable for the deaths? If so, are Schmidt
and Umbach the right people?

What message will this case send to the Canadian public - and to other
American pilots sent in harm's way?

Tuesday's hearing is the first step in what could be a long legal march.
The stakes are high for both pilots, who live near Springfield, Ill.

If the case goes to a court martial, and if the court-martial panel
convicts the pilots, they could face prison terms of up to 64 years. Some
people think the collateral damage - to all wartime pilots facing
split-second decisions under fire - could be immense.

But the hearing could end in a recommendation to drop the charges. If that
happens, anti-Americanism in Canada would surely turn more tart.

So what seems like a simple case is really a big deal. It brings to mind
the words of Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., who wrote in
a case almost a century ago:

"Great cases, like hard cases, make bad law."

Schmidt and Umbach went to Kuwait in March with their Air Guard unit - the
183rd Fighter Wing, which flies F-16 Falcons out of Springfield. The 183rd
had been federalized to help out with the war in Afghanistan.

Schmidt is a full-time pilot with the unit. He is a Naval Academy graduate
who once taught fighter tactics at the Navy's Top Gun school - a plum
posting. Umbach is a part-timer with the Air Guard; in civilian life, he
flies for United Airlines.

But on the night of April 17, Umbach was the senior pilot in a two-plane
patrol over Afghanistan. In the eighth hour of a long-haul mission, the
pilots were high over an area near Kandahar, circling in case GIs below
needed help.

That's where Schmidt spotted the unmistakable glow of tracer bullets below.
Nobody at the pre-flight briefing had mentioned any nighttime training
exercises by friendly forces. Schmidt and Umbach assumed the bullets were
aimed at them.

Schmidt radioed a nearby radar plane for permission to fire. The response:
"Stand by."

But Schmidt saw more tracer fire that seemed to him to be tracking Umbach's
Falcon. Schmidt radioed the radar plane, "I'm rolling in, in self-defense."
Schmidt dropped a bomb on the source of the fire and said he had scored a
direct hit.

Within seconds, the radar plane radioed back, "Disengage! Friendlies,
Kandahar."

The pilots had hardly touched down back in Kuwait than they became the
focus of a flurry of investigations. One panel included a Canadian officer.

In September, the Air Force said it was charging the pilots with
involuntary manslaughter, assault and dereliction of duty.

On Tuesday, Schmidt and Umbach will go before what military lawyers call an
Article 32 hearing. A hearing officer - in this case, Air Force Col.
Patrick Rosenow, a lawyer - will listen to the testimony and then judge
whether what he heard justifies a court-martial.

Basically, Rosenow will decide which way the evidence points - that the
pilots acted rashly and ignored the rules, or that the perception of peril
let them act in self-defense without first getting the OK.

Rosenow will make his recommendation to Lt. Gen. Bruce Carlson, who
commands the Eighth Air Force from his headquarters at Barksdale. Then
Carlson will decide whether to convene a court martial.

The drug question

While the aim of the Article 32 hearing is like civilian grand jury
proceeding, the military version differs a lot. It will be open to the
press. Schmidt and Umbach will be present, with their lawyers - and their
lawyers can present their side of the story.

Usually, the defense stays quiet, with the affair cut-and-dried. "Normally,
these hearings are a preview of the prosecution's case," says a retired
Army colonel who spent 19 of his 27 years in uniform as a military lawyer.

"The defense tries to ascertain the government's case without tipping its
own hand," said the ex-colonel, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

But this case is hardly usual. Schmidt's civilian lawyer plans to make his
own case, and the hearing could last two weeks or more, Saturday and Sunday
sessions included. The ex-Army colonel said, "It sounds as if the lawyer is
trying to blow this case out of the water before it can come to a court
martial."

Schmidt's lawyer is Charles W. Gittins of Winchester, Va., who got his law
degree while serving as a Marine aviator. Gittins said last week, "The
defense will present evidence and call witnesses - you bet."

Among the witnesses he wanted to call were a pair of high-ranking Air Force
officers, Maj. Gen. Stephen Wood (he ran the air operations center in
Kuwait) and Brig. Gen. Stephen Sargeant (he ran one of the investigations).

Presumably, Gittins wanted to pepper the generals with embarrassing
questions. "But the Air Force wouldn't give them to us," Gittins said, "for
obvious reasons."

If the case goes to a court martial, Gittins can ask again for the
generals. And at this week's hearing, Gittins can still make the Air Force
squirm by raising the drug issue.

An hour before the fatal bombing, Schmidt and Umbach had popped
amphetamines. An Air Force spokeswoman, Maj. Stephanie Holcombe, described
the pills as "a fatigue-management tool" and said that their use "is
completely voluntary at the discretion of the aircrew member."

But former military pilots have been quoted as saying they felt pressured
to take such pills, all to stay on flight status and keep their careers on
track.

At any rate, spokesman Joe Hopkins of Umbach's own United Airlines said
that United "does not allow pilots to fly after taking medication that has
amphetamines."

And a fact sheet from the St. Louis office of the federal Drug Enforcement
Agency calls amphetamines "highly addictive and toxic." It says, "Chronic
abuse produces a psychosis that resembles schizophrenia and is
characterized by paranoia." It adds:

"Violent and erratic behavior is frequently seen among chronic abusers."
"The extra mile"

The bombing has many Canadians up in arms.

Among them is Ottawa's Scott Taylor, who publishes a military magazine
called Esprit de Corps. In a phone interview, Taylor said Schmidt was
guilty of "a tremendous misjudgment. He did not have to engage that night,
and he knew it."

Taylor's verdict on Schmidt: "He was looking for action, and he found it -
and now, four Canadian soldiers are dead."

The editor-in-chief of Canada's most prestigious newspaper concedes that
the bombing "was a huge story in Canada and engendered a phenomenal
outpouring."

But the editor - Ed Greenspon of the Toronto Globe and Mail - said by
e-mail, "I don't think Canadians are out for blood. They want justice done,
if appropriate."

History Professor Jack Granatstein runs the Canadian War Museum in Toronto.
He said by phone, "This has fed into Canadian anti-Americanism, which is
endemic here." He added, "On the one hand, Canadians feel that the United
States is all-powerful. On the other hand, they feel that friendly fire is
endemic in the American military - the American gun culture carried over."

In Washington, Detroit native Chris Sands runs the Canada Project for a
think tank called the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He
agreed with Granatstein's view of Canadian anti-Americanism and said, "That
chip on the shoulder plays into this story and gives it legs. The story
becomes a gigantic symbol."

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said in an interview from Washington that in
charging the pilots, the United States had "decided to go the extra mile"
to maintain its extraordinarily close relationship with Canada.

"But as a result," he said, "two of our pilots - two of our finest pilots -
now have their reputations, and more, at stake. That worries me and
troubles me."

International lawProfessor Francis A. Boyle of the University of Illinois
put the same thought in blunter terms: "In my opinion, the Bush
administration wants to keep Canada on board for military action in
Afghanistan and Iraq. As a result, I think the Pentagon has offered these
two guys up."

Others seem less certain. Toronto's Granatstein said he thought that after
the United States gave a slot on one investigating panel to a Canadian
officer, Canada "was prepared to allow the U.S. process to see itself through."

And Sands, of the Washington think tank, said, "I think there would have
been some disciplinary proceeding, no matter what. But the diplomatic angle
has added to and colored the process."

Accident, or crime?

In publishing his Canadian military magazine, Taylor brings his own
experience as an enlisted man in the 1980s with the Princess Patricia Light
Infantry - the regiment that included the Canadians killed and wounded in
April.

"We need to see some accountability," Taylor said. "Soldiers know that
there are no accidents - that's what the military tells you. If something
goes wrong, somebody's accountable."

Novelist Frederick Chiaventone of Weston, Mo., spent 20 years as an Army
armored cavalry officer. He knows about accidents and accountability.

"The general military attitude is, 'There's no such thing as an accident,'"
he said. "Not that the attitude is correct, but it's widespread."

The thinking: If no individual is to blame, the system must be to blame -
and the system cannot tolerate being blamed.

"The leadership doesn't want a public crisis of confidence in the system
and the leaders," Chiaventone said. "There's often a scramble to find
somebody accountable. And the lower down the ranks that person is, the
better they feel at the Pentagon."

The University of Illinois' Boyle said from Urbana, "There has to be some
kind of show trial to satisfy the Canadian government and people." He
added, "There is responsibility for these deaths and injuries. But in my
opinion, the responsibility lies further up the chain of command."

"A chilling effect"

In an interview two months ago, Schmidt's wife, Lisa, said the specter of
legal charges might cause other pilots to hesitate before acting under
fire. "I hope it doesn't hurt them," she said. "Or kill them."

Opinion among pilots seems to be divided.

Air power historian Walter J. Boyne flew jet bombers before retiring from
the Air Force. He called the charges against Schmidt and Umbach "a big
mistake that will have a chilling effect on pilots.

Boyne said from his home in Virginia, "The message they're sending is, 'If
you make a mistake and drop a bomb on the wrong people, we'll court-martial
you.'"

But retired Air Force Gen. Walt Kross feels otherwise. Kross flew 157
fighter-bomber missions in Vietnam. In an interview from Florida, he said,
"I saw many cases of 'short rounds.' Some pilots were grounded or otherwise
punished - but it never changed the behavior of the rest."

Somewhere in between is John Snyder of Louisville, Ky., a former naval
aviator who flew F-14 Tomcats in Desert Storm.

"It's a tragic thing,' Snyder said. "But will pilots question whether they
have the right target? No. It won't be part of the thought process. You
just don't have time."

He said: "If the court martial goes through, and if the guys were just
doing their job and not being cowboys, a conviction will upset pilots more
than it will make them second-guess themselves."

The family feelings

For all of the large and sweeping issues, the case is intensely up close
and personal for the families of the men involved - the American pilots,
the Canadian victims.

Joyce Clooney of Bridgewater, Nova Scotia, lost her grandson, Pvt. Richard
Green, 22, of Mill Grove, Nova Scotia.

Joan Schmidt of south St. Louis County fears that she may lose her son
Harry to a prison term.

Each woman was asked what she wanted to see come out of this week's hearing.

From Canada, Clooney said, "I certainly don't want the airmen to go to
prison. I don't want to destroy their families.

"But I want better safety rules. And if only the pilot had waited a few
minutes before dropping his bomb. (Pause) I don't want to see him flying
airplanes any more."

From her suburban home, Schmidt said she wanted to see two results:

"First, I want my son and Maj. Umbach to be cleared of any wrongdoing.

"And second, I want to make sure that the Canadian dead and wounded are
never forgotten. They were brave men."