Text: State Official Discusses Report on Plane Shootdown in Peru

02 August 2001

Text: State Official Discusses Report on Plane Shootdown in Peru

Assistant Secretary Beers says report establishes facts of case

A U.S.-Peruvian investigative team has concluded that "communications systems overload" and "cumbersome procedures" played a role in the April 20 accidental shootdown of a U.S. missionary plane in Peru, says Rand Beers, assistant secretary of state for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs.

Beers spoke to journalists August 2 upon release of a report on the accidental downing of the plane, which resulted in the deaths of Baptist missionary Veronica Bowers and her 7-month-old daughter. The pilot, Kevin Donaldson, was seriously wounded. Donaldson's plane was initially mistaken for a drug-carrying aircraft by a surveillance plane operated by the Central Intelligence Agency; a Peruvian military jet subsequently fired on the missionary plane.

Beers said the report did not conclude that any individual was responsible for the tragedy. In fact, he said, the charter of the joint investigative team specifically did not authorize the team to examine misconduct or fix blame. Beers emphasized that the team did not conclude that Donaldson was at fault. The procedures involved by both the U.S. and Peruvian governments in identifying the plane, Beers said, "should have been robust enough to prevent such an accident."

Speaking behalf of the investigative team, Beers said: "We regret the tragedy of April 20 and especially the deaths of Mrs. Bowers and her daughter, Charity. We hope our report will help in the understanding of the events of April 20, and we hope it will contribute to preventing any similar recurrence."

Following is the text of Beers' opening statement:

(begin text)

OPENING STATEMENT

The plan for today is to open with some brief remarks, to take your questions, to show the video for those of you who wish to stay and to take additional questions after the video.

The documents which we are providing are the report and the video transcript. The report, in the main, presents background, the sequence of events on April 20, 2001, and our conclusions. The transcript, which is in English, is essential to listen to the tape. It records what is, in some cases, multiple conversations in two languages at the same time.

Let me say now for those of you who leave and seek to use the transcript and/or the tape, the tape and transcript can be misleading.

First, it is possible for more than one conversation to be going on at the same time. There are four (4) communication channels and a cockpit intercom, all of which nay be recorded simultaneously. That said, the recording is at the sensor operator's station in the rear of the plane, and some conversations we know took place are not recorded or fully recorded because the sensor operator may have overridden them with his own conversations.

Second, not every conversation recorded was heard by every, or even any, crew member. Everyone wore headsets. Everyone could "deselect" any channel and not hear them. Some individuals who were highly focused on their tasks, particularly at the high stress period at the end, could have mentally tuned out some of the conversations. And anyone who was transmitting overrode all other conversations at his station.

Finally, the English-Spanish language differences caused many or most non-native language conversations not to be understood or fully understood. Even a "yes" acknowledgement may have indicated only that a conversation was acknowledged, but not understood.

The sequence of events is a significant document beyond the video because it benefits from additional information derived from interviews of participants. It is, therefore, more complete than the transcript, as a melding of various pieces of information.

The report is the product of a joint U.S.-Peruvian accident investigation. It is the product of an examination of documents, interviews of participants and other relevant individuals, and field visits to Iquitos and Pucallpa. It was jointly drafted by several team members and was reviewed by all members of both teams. It suffers in some cases from somewhat opaque language -- the result of a committee draft in two languages. That said, the conclusions are fully shared by both Peruvians and Americans.

Since we will be going through the sequence of events when we look at the tape, let me conclude my remarks by focusing on the conclusions and what we did not conclude.

The report has several conclusions:

1) that, over the lifetime of the program, references to the full range of intercept procedures became less detailed and explicit in joint official documents implementing the program;

2) that joint training used an abbreviated set of procedures and was very much focused on safety of flight, especially following a collision between the surveillance and interceptor aircraft in 1999;

3) that key participants involved in the April 20, 2001 incident narrowly viewed their respective command and control roles;

4) that the characteristics, of the flight of OB-1408 generated suspicion within the Peru-US counternarcotics aircraft interdiction system;

5) that the language limitations of participants played a role in reducing the timely flow of information on April 20, 2001; and,

6) that communications systems overload and cumbersome procedures played a role in reducing, timely and accurate compliance with all appropriate directives.

The report did not conclude that any individual was responsible. In fact, the charter of the Joint Investigative Team specifically did not authorize the team to examine misconduct or fix blame. Rather, the team was charged with establishing the facts and circumstances surrounding the April 20 interdiction of the US missionary floatplane and the death of two US citizens.

Finally, let me specifically say, because there have been some press reports suggesting otherwise, the team did NOT conclude that the floatplane pilot Mr. Donaldson was at fault. The intercept procedures followed by both governments should have been robust enough to prevent such an accident.

Mr. Donaldson, Mrs. Donaldson, and Mr. Bowers were kind enough to meet with us in mid-May to answer our questions, at a time when the events of April 20 were still immediate in their minds and when Mr. Donaldson was still in the very early stages of recovery from his very painful injuries. We deeply appreciate their participation.

And lastly, and I know I speak for all of the team, we regret the tragedy of April 20 and especially the deaths of Mrs. Bowers and her daughter, Charity. We hope our report will help in the understanding of the events of April 20, and we hope it will contribute to preventing any similar recurrence.

(end text)