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CNN Saturday Morning News

Controversy Over Military "Go Pills"

Aired January 04, 2003 - 09:21   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


HIEDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: In other news, two Air Force pilots face a hearing January 13 to determine whether they'll be court- martialed for killing four Canadian soldiers in a bombing accident. The pilots' lawyer says his clients were on speed, and the Air Force knew it and encouraged it. In fact, he says the Air Force pressures pilots to take what they call go-pills when they go on long missions.
Joining us now with some special insight on this is retired brigadier General David Grange. He joins us this morning from Oak Brook, Illinois.

Good morning to you, sir. Thank you for being here.

BRIG. GEN. DAVID GRANGE (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Good morning.

COLLINS: Let's talk for a moment, if we could, about the pill itself. I know you have taken these pills. And explain to us the go- pill and the no-go-pill. I know there's drugs to be giving you more energy and then to bring you down once again.

GRANGE: Well, yes, and I'll answer the pill question. I think there's some issues that are more significant than the pills, reference the two pilots. However, I have flown helicopters, I never took any pills flying helicopters, but I have taking sleep pills on long flights in the United States, for instance, to parachute into Kuwait and to parachute into Korea.

And they were to give you a rest-sleep cycle. And I -- at one time I took pills to stay awake. They were all during military -- Army ground operations, however. I didn't experience any side effects.

But I don't think that's the significant issue in the case of these two pilots.

COLLINS: And the significant issue would be?

GRANGE: Two things. One is information sharing. Did the pilots know that the coalition force, the Canadians in this case, were conducting a live-fire training exercise on the ground in the area where they were flying? And, second would be the judgment of the pilots to engage a perceived threat. Did they do that too quickly, or did they take the time to check the situation out?

Those, I think, are the two overriding issues in this case.

COLLINS: Absolutely. And we call this the fog of war. What about that sort of defense? We've not heard anything on that.

GRANGE: Well, you know, to charge pilots with a criminal offense during wartime is a significant issue. Other people, friendlies, have died in Afghanistan in the case...

COLLINS: Right.

GRANGE: ... not just Canadian soldiers. And though it's a terrible thing that four were killed and eight were wounded, I think it's very important that our armed forces, the leadership, handles this very carefully, because what would result from this would be possibly hesitation of engaging hostile targets in the future, rules of engagement, when someone is allowed to protect themselves or not, and then just the overarching issues of the International Criminal Court and some other stuff that could come out of this thing.

I think the military justice system is fair, and I think that I have faith, having served under that system for 30 years, that when they had the investigation, Article 32 investigation, to see if they're going to do a court-martial or not, that things will come out where I think we'll see proper decisions made.

COLLINS: And I guess you could look at it a couple of different ways. The politics of it, the pilots possibly feeling like they're in a lose-lose situation, and so maybe that's why they're going with this possible defense of the go-pills. Because as you say, we haven't heard of this before.

Then again, maybe they were concerned about some possible poor airmanship. Do we know, general, of what are we might have been (ph) violated in this specifically?

GRANGE: Well, you know, I really think it's more procedure issues during the operation if there's any violations of anything. You get two experienced pilots, Schmidt and Umbach, and, you know, they're from the state of Illinois, where I'm a citizen. And, you know, Governor Ryan and many others are fighting to support the pilots. They've raised over $150,000 in their defense.

But the issues are going to be, you have two very experienced, seasoned pilots, these aren't new guys.

COLLINS: Right.

GRANGE: And so it's not like you have people that first time behind -- in a cockpit flying a combat mission. So...

COLLINS: Well, because they flew for the Air National Guard. I mean, they had already had an extensive military career even prior to that, right?

GRANGE: Well, exactly. But the -- nowadays, because of the commitments of our armed forces, whether you're a Reserve National Guard or active, you get a lot of experience anyway. So they are experienced pilots. So it really goes back to sharing information. Was it coordinated properly? And second, the judgment of the pilots to engage a perceived threat, was it rational or not?

COLLINS: Any idea how we will learn about that briefing before these guys flew? How are we going to find out for sure whether or not they were briefed in a live exercise?

GRANGE: Well, I think some of the stuff won't come out right away. But as they do the hearing, eventually the stuff will come out in the media, it will be released, obviously. But some things, of course, it won't get hyped because they want to have a fair hearing, and they have to protect that system.

And so I think we'll find out eventually, those issues you're talking about.

COLLINS: All right. General David Grange, we certainly appreciate it, from Oak Brook, Illinois, today. Thank you, sir.

GRANGE: My pleasure.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired January 4, 2003 - 09:21   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
HIEDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: In other news, two Air Force pilots face a hearing January 13 to determine whether they'll be court- martialed for killing four Canadian soldiers in a bombing accident. The pilots' lawyer says his clients were on speed, and the Air Force knew it and encouraged it. In fact, he says the Air Force pressures pilots to take what they call go-pills when they go on long missions.
Joining us now with some special insight on this is retired brigadier General David Grange. He joins us this morning from Oak Brook, Illinois.

Good morning to you, sir. Thank you for being here.

BRIG. GEN. DAVID GRANGE (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Good morning.

COLLINS: Let's talk for a moment, if we could, about the pill itself. I know you have taken these pills. And explain to us the go- pill and the no-go-pill. I know there's drugs to be giving you more energy and then to bring you down once again.

GRANGE: Well, yes, and I'll answer the pill question. I think there's some issues that are more significant than the pills, reference the two pilots. However, I have flown helicopters, I never took any pills flying helicopters, but I have taking sleep pills on long flights in the United States, for instance, to parachute into Kuwait and to parachute into Korea.

And they were to give you a rest-sleep cycle. And I -- at one time I took pills to stay awake. They were all during military -- Army ground operations, however. I didn't experience any side effects.

But I don't think that's the significant issue in the case of these two pilots.

COLLINS: And the significant issue would be?

GRANGE: Two things. One is information sharing. Did the pilots know that the coalition force, the Canadians in this case, were conducting a live-fire training exercise on the ground in the area where they were flying? And, second would be the judgment of the pilots to engage a perceived threat. Did they do that too quickly, or did they take the time to check the situation out?

Those, I think, are the two overriding issues in this case.

COLLINS: Absolutely. And we call this the fog of war. What about that sort of defense? We've not heard anything on that.

GRANGE: Well, you know, to charge pilots with a criminal offense during wartime is a significant issue. Other people, friendlies, have died in Afghanistan in the case...

COLLINS: Right.

GRANGE: ... not just Canadian soldiers. And though it's a terrible thing that four were killed and eight were wounded, I think it's very important that our armed forces, the leadership, handles this very carefully, because what would result from this would be possibly hesitation of engaging hostile targets in the future, rules of engagement, when someone is allowed to protect themselves or not, and then just the overarching issues of the International Criminal Court and some other stuff that could come out of this thing.

I think the military justice system is fair, and I think that I have faith, having served under that system for 30 years, that when they had the investigation, Article 32 investigation, to see if they're going to do a court-martial or not, that things will come out where I think we'll see proper decisions made.

COLLINS: And I guess you could look at it a couple of different ways. The politics of it, the pilots possibly feeling like they're in a lose-lose situation, and so maybe that's why they're going with this possible defense of the go-pills. Because as you say, we haven't heard of this before.

Then again, maybe they were concerned about some possible poor airmanship. Do we know, general, of what are we might have been (ph) violated in this specifically?

GRANGE: Well, you know, I really think it's more procedure issues during the operation if there's any violations of anything. You get two experienced pilots, Schmidt and Umbach, and, you know, they're from the state of Illinois, where I'm a citizen. And, you know, Governor Ryan and many others are fighting to support the pilots. They've raised over $150,000 in their defense.

But the issues are going to be, you have two very experienced, seasoned pilots, these aren't new guys.

COLLINS: Right.

GRANGE: And so it's not like you have people that first time behind -- in a cockpit flying a combat mission. So...

COLLINS: Well, because they flew for the Air National Guard. I mean, they had already had an extensive military career even prior to that, right?

GRANGE: Well, exactly. But the -- nowadays, because of the commitments of our armed forces, whether you're a Reserve National Guard or active, you get a lot of experience anyway. So they are experienced pilots. So it really goes back to sharing information. Was it coordinated properly? And second, the judgment of the pilots to engage a perceived threat, was it rational or not?

COLLINS: Any idea how we will learn about that briefing before these guys flew? How are we going to find out for sure whether or not they were briefed in a live exercise?

GRANGE: Well, I think some of the stuff won't come out right away. But as they do the hearing, eventually the stuff will come out in the media, it will be released, obviously. But some things, of course, it won't get hyped because they want to have a fair hearing, and they have to protect that system.

And so I think we'll find out eventually, those issues you're talking about.

COLLINS: All right. General David Grange, we certainly appreciate it, from Oak Brook, Illinois, today. Thank you, sir.

GRANGE: My pleasure.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com