Behind the plane crash that killed Gen Zia and Gen Akhter lurk the specters of sabotage – and cover – up Board of inquiry found no evidence that human error or technical failure caused the crash and concluded that crash “most probably was caused by a criminal act or sabotage “. Its summery stated :” A chemical agent may have been used to cause incapacitate of the flight crew .
U.S law authorizes FBI counter terrorism specialists to investigate terrorist acts against Americans abroad and FBI immediately prepared to dispatch a team to Pakistan. On August 21, the State Department verbally granted clearance , but within hours , revoked it on the basis of ” additional considerations “.
Pakistan literally burred buried potentially critical evidence . Some bodies recovered from the crash , including those of the flight crew , were substantially intact .
The Kabul regime which had tried to kill Zia , and the Soviets also had much to gain by eliminating him and Gen Akhter .
Sabotage could only have resulted from a plot much too sophisticated to be executed by a terrorist organization or the Afghan alone . Somebody in Pakistan had to make the arrangements that led Zia to Bahawalpur and enticed Akhter to accompany him . Somebody had to make sure Zia’s plane landed at a field too small to accommodate two C – 130s . Somebody had to see to it that security was lax enough to permit an agent to slip a device aboard the plane . And somebody had to prevent the autopsies that might have disclosed what silenced the pilots before the crash .
BY JOHN BARRON
After the crash , with troops guarding the area , a Board of inquiry composed of Pakistanis and assisted by U.S Air Force officers began a rigorous investigation investigation. Lockheed safety inspectors and experts in forensic medicine , aircraft structures , flame patterns and explosives joined them . The investigation determined that the pilot and co – pilot were professionally competent and physically fit .The C – 130 was not hit by a missile . There was no fire or major explosion inside the plane prior to the crash . Its fuel was uncontaminated . The plane had been structurally sound . All four engines were functioning normally as were the propellers and electrical system . In Sum , the Board of inquiry found no evidence that human error or technical failure caused the crash .
Chemists did discover in the cockpit and else where abnormal traces of several chemicals , including antimony, PETN , phosphorus and sulfur . From these a Pakistani research Laboratory postulated and later recreated a low intensity detonator , the kind that could pop open a canister or other container The Board concluded that crash “most probably was caused by a criminal act or sabotage “. Its summery stated :” A chemical agent may have been used to cause incapacitate of the flight crew . “
Quite logically , the Board recommended further investigation ” to determine the perpetrators of the criminal act of sabotage . But from the outset , both the Pakistani government and the U.S State Department behaved as if they did not want to find out — or let the world know — what really happened. U.S law authorizes FBI counter terrorism specialists to investigate terrorist acts against Americans abroad and FBI immediately prepared to dispatch a team to Pakistan.
On August 21, the State Department verbally granted clearance , but within hours , revoked it on the basis of ” additional considerations “. For three weeks Executive Assistant Director Oliver Revell repeatedly appealed to the State Department and foreign affairs bureaucracy to allow the FBI to do its duty . All in vain. Says Revell, ‘ To this day , we never have received a satisfactory explanation of why we were excluded to keep us out . ” The day after the crash , according to the FBI , Defense Department investigators at the scene indicated that ” the crash was not the result of mechanical failure.” But subsequent news stories quoted anonymous State Department and administration officials as saying ,” American experts ” believed that the mechanical failure caused the crash . These leaks gave the impression that is was simply an accident . In fact , according to one ranking Pakistani official , the U.S embassy in Islamabad passed along the word to Pakistani authorities that they should not use the crash to embarrass the Soviets , that they should not ” twist the bear’s tail . ” Meanwhile authorities in Pakistan literally buried buried potentially critical evidence . Some bodies recovered from the crash ,including
those of the flight crew , were substantially intact . At the Bahalpur military hospital , doctors removed and refrigerated tissue in anticipation of autopsies and did perform one of the General Wassom . But according to hospital sources , and official order prohibited autopsies , which could have shown if the pilots were affected by disabling chemicals . All remains were interred . Pakistan’s new prime minister , Benazir Bhutto , openly hated Zia because he deposed and later sanctioned the hanging of her father , former socialist Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto . After Zia’s death , she declared , ” It must have been the act of God . The Bahawalpur police who observed peculiar events at the airport were not thoroughly questioned by criminal investigators . Pakistani officers who participated in security arrangement told the Digest that neither they nor anyone else involved had ever been interrogated . in effect , President Zia , Gen Akhter , Ambassador Raphel and General Wassom were written off by the Pakistani and U.S governments . However the FBI did not give up . With the cooperation of Pakistani authorities American counter terrorism specialists pored over the findings of Pakistani Board of Inquiry . Technical experts examined debris taken to U.S labs . Agents interviewed every air force officer who assisted the Pakistanis in the technical investigation . These officers were careful to point out that failure to find evidence of mechanical malfunction does not prove that one did not occur . But all analysts agreed that sabotage remained a distinct possibility . Certainly there were people who had powerful motives to do away with Zia . One was Benazir Bhutto’s brother Murtaza . After his father’s death , he and his younger brother fled to Afghanistan , where , with the help of the communist regime , they formed a terrorist organization called Al – Zulfikar . Murtaza boasted of numerous acts of sabotage against Pakistan . In an interview published by the London Observer , he bragged that ” he had tried to assassinate Zia five times and lamented that someone else succeeded instead of me . ” The Kabul regime which had tried to kill Zia , and the Soviets also had much to gain by eliminating him and Gen Akhter .
Sabotage could only have resulted from a plot much too sophisticated to be executed by a terrorist organization or the Afghan alone .
Somebody in Pakistan had to make the arrangements that led Zia to Bahawalpur and enticed Akhter to accompany him . Somebody had to make sure Zia’s plane landed at a field too small to accommodate two C – 130s . Somebody had to see to it that security was lax enough to permit an agent to slip a device aboard the plane . And somebody had to prevent the autopsies that might have disclosed what silenced the pilots before the crash . Finally early this summer , the FBI was able to reopen its investigation in Pakistan . The shame was that the trail had been allowed to grow so cold . Reader’s Digest
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