ATTENTION ALL WEBSURFERS!!!

SYNOPSIS:
Scott Speicher was raised in Kansas City. When he was in high school, the Speicher family moved to Jacksonville, Florida.

Scott continued his education at Florida State University, receiving a degree in accounting and management.

Speicher went on to join the U.S. Navy and receive flight training.

During the Mid-East Crisis, Speicher was one of 2,500 airmen assigned to the USS SARATOGA in the Red Sea. Speicher was part of a fighter squadron and flew the F/A-18 "Hornet" fighter/bomber.

On January 18, 1991, Speicher's aircraft was hit by an Iraqi SAM (surface-to-air missile) and crashed during the first Coalition offensive of the war dubbed "Operation Desert Storm." Initial reports by Defense Secretary Dick Cheney stated that Speicher had been killed. One military source said reports indicated the aircraft had "exploded to bits" in the sky, apparently having suffered a direct SAM hit.

Iraqi officials soon announced the capture of American pilots. It was originally believed the chances of Speicher's ejection were slim, but the books were not closed on Speicher.
He was the first American to be listed Missing in Action. Most recent media reports indicate that he was probably "confirmed killed." Although Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney has said Speicher was killed, he is still officially listed missing in action.

The Methodist church in Florida where Scott Speicher has been a Sunday School teacher has held prayer and candlelight vigils for his safety. They have not given up hope that he is still alive.

In the first days of March, 1991, 21 American POWs were released by the Iraqis. Scott Speicher has not yet been released.

Those who recall the abandonment of American POWs in World War II, Korea and Vietnam are watching carefully, determined that men like Speicher will be returned alive, or fully accounted for, before American troops leave the Middle East when hostilities cease.

Scott Speicher and his wife Joanne have two children, a daughter, age 3, and a son, age 1.All live in Jacksonville, Florida. Speicher's father, Wallace Speicher, was a Navy pilot in World War II.

As of May 1997, Michael Speicher is still unaccounted for. His status, Missing in Action, changed to KIA shortly after his incident. Although the United States Government has excavated what they believe to have been the plane's crash site, no remains were found. The United States Government also stated, prior to the excavation, that all men were accounted for.

If you would like to write to families of these missing servicemen, the only way I know is to go to this website, and follow the directions on the website.

When you write the letters to the families, please make sure that you address it in reference to the missing serviceperson's family.

This is how I got in touch with Mrs. Lucy Sennett.
She is the wife of one of my missing servicemen Robert R. Sennett.
I can only imagine what these families like Mrs. Lucy Sennett have been through of not knowing.
This must be hell on earth for them.

Please, let's make their lives easier by taking the torch for them and finding out what happened to their family member, and not accepting anything but the truth, and not subjecting ourselves to the "Presumptive Finding of Death" finding.
As a person of this cause, I can honestly say, that those families expect nothing less. Let's NOT ACCEPT anything less.

==================================
U.S. Veterans Dispatch/1996
Ted Sampley

Lt. Cmdr. Michael S. Speicher: Expendable

"There is no chance Lt. Cmdr. Michael S. Speicher survived", Defense Secretary Dick Cheney assured the American people within hours of the Navy pilot's failure to return to the aircraft carrier Saratoga on the night of Jan. 16, 1991. He was last heard from over Iraqi airspace flying northeast toward Baghdad.

Speicher, 33, of Jacksonville, Fla, was the first U. S. pilot shot down in the Gulf War. He left a wife, a 3-year-old daughter and a 1-year old son.

On Jan. 18, 1991, less than 48-hours after Speicher became missing, the Pentagon said his single-seat FA-18 Hornet fighter bomber was shot down by an Iraqi surface-to-air missile. The plane "exploded to bits" in the sky after being hit.
Could have LCDR Michael S. Speicher been shot down by an SA-2 Guideline Missile like the one below, and where is this brave mans' remains???

Please click on picture to take you to a site on Russian made Surface to Air Missiles like this one used extensively during the Gulf War.

"Evidently, pieces of the plane were strewn all over the Iraqi landscape and Speicher's wing mates saw it happen," the official said.

So, if Speicher and his aircraft "exploded to bits" all over the Iraqi sky in 1991, why, in December 1995, did a Pentagon team go to Iraq on a "secret mission" to look at the wreckage of Speicher's fighter end to search for his remains?

The search mission, which was led by the International Committee of the Red Cross and undertaken with the approval of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, found the wreckage virtually intact and upside down.

Pentagon spokesman Bev Baker said the U.S. team, which conducted a week long excavation and search of the site, found "no human remains" in the wreckage or around the crash site.

Evidence is now surfacing indicating that Speicher parachuted from his plane, landed safely, was alive on the ground and later captured. These revelations have the Pentagon scrambling for cover. Naval intelligence is now saying they were never sure why Speicher's plane disintegrated in midair. They now conclude he either had a freak midair collision with an Iraqi MIG-25 or that the enemy plane shot him out of the sky.

**Note: This is a Russian MiG 25 PD1. The Russians had sold the Iraqis some of these aircraft before the start of the Gulf War.**

Pentagon officials told the press in December that a parry of hunters discovered the crash site of Speicher's Navy FA-18 two years ago and that as a result, a U.S. spy satellite photographed the crash site. Intelligence officials conveyed the images to the POW/MIA office at the Defense Department. Secretary of State Warren Christopher contacted the Red Cross in Baghdad and requested its assistance.

"Not exactly," a Capitol Hill source familiar with the case told the U.S. Veteran Dispatch.

"A couple of years ago, Naval Intelligence picked up a story that Speicher had survived the shoot down and was captured by the Iraqis," the source explained.

"As a result, Pentagon intelligence went back and looked at old satellite imagery of the Speicher crash site which was in a wasteland far from civilization. Beside Speicher's ejection seat located on the ground several miles away from the wreckage of the aircraft' the analysts found the image of a two-letter Escape and Evade (E and E) symbol used by downed pilots to indicate they are alive and want to be rescued.

They also checked the debriefs of other pilots who had been shot down and released from Iraq. They may have even reinterviewed some of the former prisoners. One pilot said he was told by his Iraqi captors that "the guy in the F/A-18 shot down on the first day is on the run and we're going to catch him," the source said.

When asked if it was true that the Pentagon had satellite imagery of Speicher's ejection seat and E and E code, Baker said "The Pentagon does not discuss intelligence reports."

She said it was still the position of the Department of Defense that Speicher was killed in action, body not returned, and that pilot observation remained the basis of that conclusion.

The U.S. government's rush to declare Speicher dead is a glaring example of the Pentagon's secret policy of writing off military personnel who become captured or missing during a conflict as "expendable."

As servicemen and women start falling into the hands of an enemy, the Pentagon simply declares them missing in action and denies all knowledge of Americans being captured. If some of the missing are resumed alive at the end of hostilities, it is a plus for the Pentagon. For those who are not returned, it is easier for the Pentagon to close the book by declaring them killed in action, body not returned.

Even after Cable News Network (CNN) reported Iraq's minister of information saying that American pilots had been captured and that reporters would be allowed to meet with them, the Pentagon denied knowledge of any Americans being captured.

"We know of no American prisoners of war," Lt. Gen. Thomas Kelly, operations director for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said when asked by reporters if Iraq were holding any U.S. prisoners of war.

Only after video interviews of allied POWs were broadcast on Iraqi television and later in the United States did the Pentagon officially declare that the Iraqis were holding U.S. prisoners. It was nearly two weeks after 20-year-old Army Spec. Melissa Rathbun-Nealy and 23 year-old Army Spec. David Lockett disappeared before the Pentagon officially declared them missing in action.

The Pentagon had held the two absent without leave (AWOL) despite eyewitness accounts from American servicemen who saw them being captured and reports that a captured Iraqi soldier had said he helped transport two Americans, a white female and a black male (Nealy is white and Lockett is black.) to Basra, a key Iraqi command center north of Kuwait.

Nealy's father, Leo Rathbun, took matters into his own hands and appealed directly to Saddam Hussein asking him to acknowledge his daughter as a prisoner of war.

Rathbun told The Grand Rapids Press that he did not want his daughter forgotten if a peace plan calling for the release of all prisoners was to be signed.

"The Army has not recognized Melissa as a POW and if the war ends, I believe the Bush administration would ignore the problem of MlAs and POWs just as previous administrations ignored the MIAs and POWs still thought to be held in Vietnam," Rathbun said in the interview.

Neither the U.S. or Iraqi governments officially acknowledged that Nealy and Lockett were prisoners of war until they were released in February 1991.

Is Speicher alive? There certainly is evidence that he was alive after being shot down and in the absence of credible evidence proving him dead, all Americans must demand his immediate release.

Dozens more like Speicher are missing as a result of the war with Iraq and only the Pentagon knows exactly how many.

The Pentagon has always lied to the American people about U.S. servicemen known to be captives of an enemy. The lying is as deadly for the captured and missing as an enemy bullet and it is time for it to stop. We must demand that our government be absolutely honest and accurate in accounting for our missing servicemen.

Otherwise, those brave men and women now serving our country in Bosnia will also be treated as expendable, abandoned to the enemy and allowed to disappear.

That is exactly what happened to Lt. Cmdr. Speicher and many unfortunate U.S. servicemen captured in Korea, the Cold War, Vietnam and in the Gulf.
======================================

LATESTon Captain Michael S. Speicher.
CLICK HERE TO SIGN A PETITION DEMANDING HIS RELEASE FROM HELL!

It is time, We, as Americans demand from our government ANSWERS, not questions into how and when. Remind them that they work for us, the taxpayers. The biggest thing that a politician fears the most is not being re-elected. Voting is your right, and it speaks volumes to the politicians. You all must let your voice be heard, and it is heard through voting every election year. I would highly recommend that you vote for someone who will make a change in D.C. and vote out the "losers", or the status quo politicians. Voting is your bullet.

IT IS TIME TO LOCK AND LOAD!!!

Please pass on the following information about the POW/MIA issue. I have recently received a letter about a pilot, Lt Cmdr Michael Speicher, who was shot down in the Gulf War and is believed to be captured and held prisoner by Iraq. If any one has any information and documentation on personnel that may be POW/MIA during the Gulf War please contact the appropriate Senator on the Senate Armed Services Committee and Personnel subcommittee or Roger Hall, who will make sure it gets to the proper Senators. Roger Hall can be contacted:
8715 First Ave., Apt 827 C
Silver spring, MD 20910
(301)585-3361
(301)587-5055


Original Message:

To All concerned on America's POW:
The 2001 Senate Intelligence Act included POWs coverage on cases going back to 1990. The Senate Intelligence bill originally included coverage of Vietnam era POWs, but the DOD fought this; when time ran out the Intelligence Committee had to settle on the 1990 limit. The limit does cover new live sighting reports on Vietnam cases received after 1990.

It was pointed out that the Senate Armed Services Committee and Personnel subcommittee have not been getting any support, positive feedback, or pressure on the Lt. Cmdr. Michael Speicher case from the veteran's organizations. There is a feeling among some Senator's that there is little interest being shown in the Speicher case or the POW issue. Some Senators see the Speicher case as the best possibility of a live POW, but there is no veteran support. Furthering the Speicher case is a goal itself, but doing so will also bring needed support for Vietnam era cases.

Without continued pressure on the Senate by the Legion and other veteran's groups nothing will be done. They need to hear Veteran's demands to do more, to account on what is being done for the return of Lt. Cmdr. Michael Speicher. Any help the Legion can bring to this important matter will help assure positive action by the committee for his safe return and not another remains case.


Sincerely,
Roger Hall
8715 First Ave., apt 827C
Silver Spring, MD 20910
301/585-3361
301/587-5055

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