Banner Graphic, Volume 15, Number 255, Greencastle, Putnam County, 20 June 1985 — Page 2
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The Putnam County Banner-Graphic, June 20,1985
Hijackers fire at reporters
BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) One of the Shiite Moslem hijackers of a TWA jet fired over the heads of reporters at the Beirut airport terminal today after a Lebanese reporter tried to sneak aboard the plane by posing as an airline attendant. The hijackers and members of the Shiite Amal militia are holding 40 Americans hostages in Beirut, seeking to exchange them for 700 Shiites being held by Israel. Gunmen hijacked the plane last Friday on its way from Athens to Rome, and since have released most of the 153 passengers and crew. They killed U.S. Navy Petty Officer Robert Dean Stethem of Waldorf, Md. “Trick, journalist,” hijackers screamed when they spotted the Lebanese reporter’s camera this morning. The reporter rode onto the tarmac in a food van and carried fruit up the steps to the plane. He ran down the staircase as a gunman appeared at door of the plane and shot over his head. The gunman then turned his AK--47 assault rifle on other journalists and photographers on the tarmac and fired a few shots over their heads. Some sprinted indoors and others dived for cover. There were no injuries. “What is this? Are you playing tricks with us?” an angry hijacker later asked the control tower. “I want all newsmen out. One has filmed me shooting. I want that film confiscated and sent to the plane.”
IMo deals: Reagan
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Reagan says his administration is using “all credible influence” to free 40 Americans captured in Beirut, but his chief spokesman says there is “no unsaid, unspoken deal” for their release. From Reagan on down, administration officials continued to emphasize Wednesday that the United States is dead set against making concessions to the terrorists holding hostages seized last Friday in the hijacking of a TWA jetliner. The president, addressing the national Jaycees convention in Indianapolis, said, “We are continuing to do everything that we can to bring all credible influence to bear to get our people freed and returned home safe and sound.” But he added, to cheers from the delegates, “We must not yield to the terrorist demands and invite more terrorism. We cannot reward their grisly deed; we will not cave in.” The Navy diver killed by the hijackers, Robert D. Stethem, 23, of Waldorf, Md„
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On Wednesday state-run Beirut radio quoted a government official as saying “there is no danger to the lives of the hostages for the time being,” but that a solution must be reached “before things deteriorate.” The American hostages, excluding three crew members, have been taken off the Boeing 727 and spread out in Shiite neighborhoods of Beirut. Robert McFarlane, President Reagan’s national security adviser, said Wednesday that while most of the hostages were under the control of the Amal militia, about six with Jewish-sounding names “are held by more extreme elements” the fundamentalist Hezbollah, or Party of God. On the ABC News program Nightline, Israeli Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin said the hostage situation is primarily the United States’ problem. “I believe that the problem is an American problem. The hostages are American. They were caught on board of an airline that carries the United States flag. The United States government has to make up its mind. What do they want to do?” he said. “If there is a desire, if there is a request on the part of the United States that this (release of the Shiite prisoners) has to be done in relation or a part of deal for the release of the hostages, please, come up and say it,” he said.
was to be buried today at Arlington National Cemetery. Following Reagan’s speech, White House spokesman Larry Speakes told reporters aboard Air Force One that “There are things in motion that could bring some benefit.” Speakes would not elaborate except to say the United States had been in touch with several governments and factional elements in the Middle East and had received “positive responses from most.” But, he said, “There is no unsaid, unspoken deal ” Reagan, following his talk to the Jaycees at the Indiana Convention Center, spent eight minutes backstage with the parents of one of the hostages, James Hoskins Jr., 22, of Indianapolis. They had asked to see him. Regan, the chief of staff, told reporters Mrs. Hoskins pleaded with the president not to do anything that would cause hostile acts against the hostages. The president replied that he was very mindful of the safety of the hostages.
Off the beam Space shuttle 'star wars' laser experiment grounded by navigational error
c. 1985 N. Y. Times News Service CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - Pentagon scientists Wednesday tried to bounce a laser beam off the space shuttle Discovery but failed because ground controllers sent instructions to the shuttle in feet instead of nautical miles, twisting it out of position for the experiment. The test had been scheduled as the first shuttle experiment to help develop arms for President Reagan’s proposed defensive shield against enemy missiles. The error in the Discovery’s navigational instructions caused the winged spaceplane to be turned 180 degrees in the wrong direction. The laser beam struck the craft, but on the opposite side from the mirror meant to bounce the beam back to an Air Force ground station atop a mountain on the Hawaiian island of
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An armed militiaman runs toward the hijacked TWA jetliner at the Beirut Airport, carrying newspapers to the Shiite extremists who hijacked the plane last Friday. One of the hijackers Thursday morning
world
Car bomb injures 150
75 killed in explosion at Tripoli
BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) A red Volvo car packed with explosives blew up outside a candy store in the northern port of Tripoli where Moslems had gathered to buy sweets for a feast, killing 75 people and wounding 150, state radio said today. Rescue workers searched through the rubble of the building all night for more victims and divers scoured the nearby Mediterranean Sea for bodies thrown into the water by the blast. Police earlier reported the explosion late
Maui. Several critics quickly cited the failure as evidence of bigger problems to come. They said this mistake, a simple human error capable of upsetting a complex technological effort, was the type that could be the ultimate undoing of the proposed anti-missile shield. “It’s obvious we’re not pointing at the ground,” said Capt. Daniel C. Brandenstein of the Navy, the shuttle’s commander, as the Discovery passed 220 miles above Hawaii. “We can see the light,” he added as the winged spaceship went through the laser’s extremely low-powered beam. There was not enough time for him to reposition the shuttle for the test, which has been rescheduled for Saturday. “All we can do is try again,” said Capt. Marty
Navy to court-martial surgeon in deaths
WASHINGTON (AP) - A Navy surgeon, hired despite suspect credentials and poor eyesight, has been implicated in the deaths of four patients and will stand a general court-martial on four counts of involuntary manslaughter, the Navy says. Moreover, 10 ranking naval officers, including a one-star admiral, have received or are facing disciplinary sanctions for their roles in the hiring or oversight of Dr. Donal M. Billig, the former chief of cardiac surgery at the Bethesda Naval Medical Center, the Navy disclosed Wednesday. The one-star admiral, Commodore James J. Quinn, was the commander of
Suspect sought in Frankfort bombing
FRANKFURT, West Germany (AP) - Police said today they were searching for a young man seen running from the terminal shortly before the bomb blast that killed three people at Frankfurt airport. Police spokesman Franz Winkler said the man was seen jumping into a dark blue Mercedes sedan Wednesday afternoon and speeding away from continental Europe’s busiest airport.
fired shots over the heads of reporters when a Lebanese writer tried to board the craft by posing as an airline attendant delivering food. (AP Wirephoto).
Wednesday killed 33 people, wounded 95. They could not immediately confirm the radio’s higher casualty figures. Also Wednesday, Red Cross workers evacuated 103 wounded Palestinians from Beirut refugee camps under a cease-fire that ended an assault by Shiites trying to oust Palestinian guerrillas. Police said the car rigged with more than 250 pounds of explosives leveled the four-story building that housed a candy store. The store was crowded with scores
Hauser of the Air Force, the Pentagon’s public affairs officer at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. “Essentially there’s nothing we can do about it. It’s unfortunate and we’ll try again on Saturday.” The ultimate success of the laser test is viewed by Pentagon officials as crucial to determining whether heavy, powerful lasers on the ground can be used to fire at enemy missiles in space. In one scheme, relay mirrors orbiting high above the United States would bounce the laser beams around the globe so they could strike enemy missiles early in their flight. But critics of the Pentagon’s Strategic Defense Initiative, known popularly as “Star Wars,” said Wednesday’s incident showed how difficult it might be to develop a defensive shield. “If they can’t do a simple experiment
the Bethesda hospital at the time Billig was named the chief heart surgeon in 1983. He has been re-assigned to a “nonsupervisory position” from his current post as vice commander of the entire Naval Medical Command and faces formal censure by the secretary of the Navy, the service said. All of the disciplinary sanctions and the charges against Billig stem from an investigation conducted by a special Navy board of review. A Navy spokesman confirmed the board had discovered that Billig suffered from a severe diminishment of sight. The board ordered Billig to submit to an eye
No one had claimed responsibility yet for the blast, he said. “The actual target of the attack is still not known,” said a second police spokesman, Karl-Heinz Wagner in a telephone interview. West German television reported the bomb was planted in a waste basket near the information booth of the West German national airline Lufthansa in departure hall B. Airline ticket counters near the
4 Marines, 2 other Americans killed in El Salvador attack
SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (AP) - Gunmen dressed as Salvadoran soldiers sprayed a crowded outdoor case with automatic weapons fire, killing at least 13 people including four U.S. Marines and two other Americans, officials said today. James Williams, a U.S. Embassy spokesman, said two Marines escaped injury in the Wednesday night attack. All the Marines were embassy guards, and all were in civilian clothes, he said. The United States has U.S. Marine guards at all its embassies worldwide. Williams said officials of Interdata, a computer company, told the embassy that two of its employees who were American citizens were killed in the attack. Earlier, he said four Guatemalans and five Salvadorans had been killed. Williams said he was not sure whether the two Interdata employees were among those originially identified as Guatemalans or Salvadorans. He said Interdata did not identify the two employees. Witnesses said at least 12 people were wounded, but that number could not be confirmed. Williams said it was not clear if the attack was directed at the Marines. No group immediately claimed responsibility for the shootings. “At this point it appears to have been an act of random terrorism,” he said. He characterized the gunmen as “a squad of guerrillas dressed as though they were members of the Salvadoran armed forces.” The State Department said the Marine Corps was notifying relatives, and would then release the names of the dead. Navy Cmdr. Albert A. Schaufelberger was the only other American serviceman to be killed in El Salvador. He was shot to death when he went to a university to pick up his girlfriend in May 1983.
of customers buying sweets to give relatives and friends in celebration of the end of the Moslem fasting month of Ramadan. There was no immediate indication who was responsible for the explosion. For nine years, Tripoli has been the scene of bloody fighting between rival Moslem militias. The fighting ended last December when the government deployed 1,200 soldiers in the city under a peace plan worked out with Syrian assistance.
like this, what are they going to do in combat?” asked John Pike, head of space policy for the Washington-based Federation of American Scientists. “You can’t reschedule World War 111. Are they going to ask the Russians to come back on Saturday?” “These people are seizing on ridiculous things to try to criticize the program,” said Lt. Gen. James A. Abrahamson, director of the Pentagon’s Strategic Defense Initiative Organization. “They either have an ax to grind or don’t understand how experiments are conducted. “If your car doesn’t start in the morning, does that mean ‘Star Wars’ isn’t going to work? There’s no logic to it. We had a small procedural error. All you have to to do is wait for the rest of the mission and we’ll have a successful experiment.”
examination and found the vision of his right eye “could not be corrected to any better than 20-400” and that his depth perception “was significantly reduced,” said the spokesman, who asked not to be named. “This lack of stereo acuity could be expected to adversely affect visual tasks requiring fine eye-hand coordination,” the spokesman said. Two of the officers being disciplined have been referred for courts-martial “for willfully withholding, during the recruiting process, material information concerning Billig’s physical and professional unsuitability,” the Navy said.
bombing site included the national carriers of Iran, Spain and Greece. Hundreds of passengers threw themselves to the ground as the blast ripped through the cavernous hall, and some of the injured ran screaming from the scene until they collapsed, eyewitnesses said. Airport spokesman Wolfgang Schwalm said the bomb went off between two peak travel periods.
Arson fire at embassy WASHINGTON (AP) - A fire of “suspicious origin” damaged the Nicaraguan embassy early today, District of Columbia fire officials said. Police said the building was broken into, and the fire was started in a room on the first floor. “There was forced entry,” said Police Sgt. Ronald Pavlik. “As best we can determine, someone broke in and set the fire.” Officials said one firefighter suffered minor injuries. A fire department lieutenant, who would not allow his name to be used, said there was an embassy worker in the building at the time the fire broke out, who got out safely. Damage was confined to one room on the first floor of the building, fire department communications supervisor James Hall said. No damage estimate was immediately available, he said.
The Marines were seated at a sidewalk table when the gunmen “pulled up in automobiles, hopped out and began spraying” patrons of the case located in Zona Rosa, an area of nightclubs and restaurants in the capital. They escaped in a pickup truck, Williams said. He said there were between six and 10 assailants. State Department spokeswoman Vivienne Ascher in Washington said there were between eight and 12 gunmen. She said the case was located near the U.S. ambassador’s residence in San Salvador.
Pepsi break costs Coke worker pay c. 1985 N.Y. Times News Service BIRMINGHAM, Ala. ~- Only ice remained in Dexter Gooden’s softdrink cup when his boss found him finishing his lunch. The boss questioned Gooden about the drink he’d guzzled down with his hamburger and fries. The boss didn’t think that what had been in the cup was “The Real Thing.” Indeed, it wasn’t. The drink was “The Choice of a New Generation” a Pepsi. And that apparently is a sin, because Gooden works at the Coca-Cola Bottling Co. in Oxford, Ala. He was sent home with a three-day suspension. Gooden, 25, who’s been with the company for two years, said that he was not told that drinking the rival Pepsi was against company policy. Gooden’s wife, Stephanie, had brought him the lunch from Burger King, which doesn’t sell Coke, only Pepsi. “The boss told me all Coke people ought to stick together,” Gooden said. “He told me I should get my family, friends and buddies to drink Coke.” Charles Edwards, general manager of the Coca-Cola bottling plant where Gooden works, said Wednesday that Gooden’s suspension was an “overreaction” by a loyal supervisor. Edwards said Gooden would get back the pay he missed. Edwards said it is, however, against company policy for employees to drink competitive products on company property. He said allowing an employee to drink Pepsi on the job undermines “everything we stand for.” Gooden said, “If it was a company policy, they should have had it written on the (bulletin) board.” Luke Cranford, president of Birmingham Coca-Cola Bottling Co., said that if a new employee were found drinking Pepsi, “we would explain to him that we all make a living off the sale of our product.” He said the company “wouldn’t hestitate to lay off someone who chose to drink a competitive product.” James C. Lee Jr., chairman of Bir-mingham-based Buffalo Rock Co., which bottles the rival Pepsi, offered Wednesday to pay Gooden’s wages for the three days he would have gone without work. Pepsi’s Lee tried unsuccessfully this morning to contact Gooden to tell him he wouldn’t lose money because he drank Pepsi, said Lee’s administrative secretary Mary Allums. Buffalo Rock prefers that company workers drink Pepsi but has no official policy banning products made by other companies.