"Terrible Tragedy"

By Charles P. Alexander

At first, the incident seemed like another deadly confrontation in the Persian Gulf between the armed forces of the U.S. and Iran. But the affair quickly developed into something far worse. On Sunday morning the Navy cruiser U.S.S. Vincennes, while battling several Iranian speedboats in the Strait of Hormuz, mistakenly shot down an Iranian commercial airliner. Iran said the Airbus A300 "exploded in the sky," killing all 298 people on board. Officers on the Vincennes had believed the aircraft was an Iranian F-14 fighter jet that was attacking the U.S. ship. The tragedy immediately invited comparison with the 1983 downing by the Soviet Union of a Korean Air Lines Boeing 747, a disaster that killed 269 people and stirred outrage around the world.

The Iranian Airbus was apparently hit by an SM-2 Standard Missile from the Vincennes at about 10:54 a.m. (2:54 a.m. Washington time), but more than eleven hours passed before what had happened became clear. At midday the U.S. was sticking to its contention that the ship had defended itself against an F- 14. Finally, at 1:20 p.m. Washington time, White House Spokesman Marlin Fitzwater read a statement from President Reagan, who had been awakened at Camp David at 4:52 a.m. and told of the new fighting. "I am saddened to report," said the President, "that it appears that in a proper defensive action by the U.S.S. Vincennes this morning in the Persian Gulf, an Iranian airliner was shot down over the Strait of Hormuz. This is a terrible human tragedy. Our sympathy and condolences go out to the passengers, crew and their families." At 1:30 p.m. a tense and obviously tired Admiral William Crowe, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, strode into the Pentagon briefing room to deliver the shocking details to the waiting reporters. He explained that the Vincennes had fired on the plane only after giving it several chances to identify itself. Crowe defended the actions of the Vincennes and its commander, Captain William C. Rogers of Fort Worth, as entirely proper, and said a full investigation would be conducted by Rear Admiral William N. Fogarty.

The incident seemed certain to escalate the confrontation in the gulf between the U.S. and Iran. Declared Radio Tehran: "America's crime today in downing an Iranian Airbus is . . . new evidence of American crimes and mischiefs, crimes which expose America's nature more than ever before."

According to Admiral Crowe, the action began when a helicopter from the Vincennes was fired upon at 10:10 a.m. local time by Iranian surface vessels. Before long the Vincennes was in combat with at least three armed Iranian speedboats, two of which were sunk and a third damaged. During that battle, the radar aboard the Vincennes detected an aircraft heading toward the ship at high speed -- approximately 520 m.p.h. The plane was at least four or five miles away from any air corridor normally used by commercial jets. Crowe insisted that the Vincennes had tried to communicate with the aircraft seven times. "But the aircraft neither answered nor changed its course," said Crowe. The admiral reported that "electronic indications" aboard the Vincennes suggested that the plane was an F-14, but he would not elaborate. At 10:54 a.m. the ship fired two surface-to-air missiles, at least one of which hit the plane at an approximate range of six miles. Because of poor visibility, the jet was not visually sighted until the missile hit. The plane turned out to be Iran Air Flight 655 en route from the Iranian coastal city of Bandar Abbas to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.

Crowe dismissed parallels between Sunday's accident and the Korean Air Lines disaster. The Iranian jetliner, he pointed out, had flown into a combat zone, unlike the KAL plane, which merely strayed into Soviet airspace. The admiral emphasized that the tragedy had to be viewed against the background of the growing hostilities in the gulf over the past two years. He cited the May 1987 engagement in which an Iraqi missile hit the U.S.S. Stark and killed 37 American seamen and the subsequent incidents in which the tanker Bridgeton and the U.S.S. Samuel B. Roberts, a frigate, were damaged by Iranian mines. Those attacks made U.S. commanders in the area determined not to be caught with their guard down. Said Crowe: "A decision was made early in the commitment to give our commanders sufficient latitude to protect their people . . . They do not have to be shot at before responding. Throughout our involvement in the Persian Gulf, the Iranian government has repeatedly threatened and fired upon U.S. forces."

Yet disturbing questions remain. Why was the Vincennes, which has some of the most sophisticated radar available, unable to tell an F-14 fighter from an % Airbus wide body? Crowe explained that while the system is accurate in gauging the number, range and altitude of approaching aircraft, it is "difficult" to identify the type of aircraft "from a radar blip." One reason the ship mistook the Airbus was that it was descending from an altitude of 9,000 ft. to 7,000 ft. What it was doing at that level is a mystery, according to one Pentagon official, since commercial jets flying that route normally cruise at 25,000 ft.

All the facts of the tragedy may not emerge for weeks or months. But one thing seemed certain: the conflict in the Persian Gulf had once again claimed hundreds of innocent lives.

With reporting by Bruce van Voorst/Washington