As everyone now knows, on April 1st a US surveillance P-3 and a Chinese F-8 fighter collided over the South China Sea. The collision resulted in the loss of the F-8 and its pilot and damage to the P-3. The P-3 then made an emergency landing at a Chinese air base on the island of Hainan in Chinese territory.
Much has been written about the incident by our press and with rare exception the emphasis has been the reckless behavior of the Chinese military and the pilot of the lost F-8 in particular. A few days ago the Pentagon trotted out videotape of a similar encounter to again make the emphasis.
The media and the US military seem bent on convincing the public that the Chinese military is aggressive and reckless. The inference being, of course, that they are, we aren't.
The pity of this whole incident is that it did make the news and the politico double talkers got involved, on both sides, most of whom are warmongers anyway.
Among the many articles I read, one in particular caught my attention mostly because of its title: We Lost, appearing in the Washington Post. The author spent an inordinate amount of time on the Chinese harassment of our P-3 as if it were an isolated occurrence. Hogwash.
The harassment of our P-3 over the South China Sea was routine operation. The collision was not intended, by either side. Had the incident not made the papers, there is no doubt in my mind that the P-3 driver would have been disciplined and the F-8 driver, though now dead, would not have been anyone's hero. The military rules being what they are, dent the tin and expect a hearing, and the hearings almost always end in discipline of some type (ask the submarine captain who was doing nothing numerous others before him hadn't done, but you can be assured his career is now over, absolutely dead end).
A few years ago, over the Med, a French "observer" plane was poking around some US ships during an exercise. Two carrier aircraft were launched to investigate and deter, i.e., harass u2018em. According to one of the pilots, they made passes at slow speed within 2 meters (and not 2 meters from the wing tip). They would get in front of him, go as slow as they could so that their jet exhaust was being sucked up by his air conditioning system (jet exhaust stinks, that's for sure), as well as for just general harassment. This was routine procedure for our good friends, not just the French. While that incident made a few European papers, it did not make the US papers. Dozens of similar incidents go unreported.
In my day there was the "cold war" excuse, but the harassment was no different and the proximity was no different. What was and still is different is that we were a couple of thousand miles from our shore harassing them.
The fact is China is not a threat. Yes, I know, there are a lot of people who make their living stirring things up, and who need someone or something in the limelight as the threat. But, the facts are the facts, and China is not a threat. They are a threat to their own people, but not to us. Not socially, not militarily.
The bottom line: No one won. Both lost. For me, the main loss was the loss of the chance to treat this whole thing for just what it was… a collision of two aircraft. A collision neither side wanted. A collision that unfortunately took the life of a pilot. We could have done so much with this incident in a constructive way that the world would have stood in awe of such power of being graceful.
Instead, we were and are being treated to the warmongers polka. Good grief!
April 23, 2001
Charles R. Sebrell, a Member of the Mises Institute, was an airline pilot for 28 years.
