NEWS
By NEW YORK TIMES NEWS SERVICE | February 20, 1999
WASHINGTON -- The United States worked for four months to help Turkey arrest Abdullah Ocalan, the Kurdish rebel leader, U.S. officials said yesterday.U.S. diplomatic pressure backed by intelligence gathering helped to put Ocalan in flight from a haven in Syria, to persuade nation after nation to refuse him sanctuary and to drive him into an increasingly desperate search for a city of refuge, the officials said."We as a government tried to figure out where he was, where he was going and how we might bring him to justice," a senior administration official said.
NEWS
By KNIGHT RIDDER/TRIBUNE | March 28, 1999
WASHINGTON -- Within minutes of receiving word that an Air Force pilot was down in Yugoslavia, an elite air commando team took off from its base in Brindisi, Italy, to rescue the flier from deep inside enemy territory.The F-117 Nighthawk fighter went down at 2: 50 p.m. EST, 50 to 70 miles northwest of Belgrade, according to a military officer knowledgeable with the rescue operation and who spoke only on condition of anonymity.A commando team launched "nearly immediately" from their base at Brindisi, guided to the crash site by a pair of E-3 AWACs surveillance aircraft, the officer said.
NEWS
By Peter A. Jay | June 8, 1997
HAVRE DE GRACE -- Most of my greenish friends are shocked and outraged at the Navy's intentions to use Bloodsworth Island, a 6,000-acre marshy archipelago in the Chesapeake Bay south of Hooper Straits, to train SEAL teams.The greens, including both a small number who know Bloodsworth well and a much larger number who have never seen it and would be distinctly unhappy if marooned there in mosquito season, are pulling out all the weapons they can find to block the plan. These range from old political IOUs to great blue herons, from '60s-style anti-militarism to baby peregrine falcons.
NEWS
By BOSTON GLOBE | April 3, 1997
WASHINGTON -- Thirty years after they were written off as dead, Vietnamese commandos who once worked for the U.S. Army are being abandoned again by a Pentagon that has refused to pay compensation approved by President Clinton, a lawyer for the commandos says.Six months ago, Clinton signed a law providing $20 million in compensation to the commandos, who were hired by the CIA and Defense Department for secret missions in the early days of the Vietnam War.But the Defense Department is balking at making payments.
FEATURES
By Chris Kaltenbach | May 23, 1997
The Memorial Day weekend kicks off with an interesting documentary on AMC detailing how a bunch of Hollywood stars spent World War II."JAG" (8 p.m.-9 p.m. and 9 p.m.-10 p.m., WJZ, Channel 13) -- Two chances (both repeats from January) to get in step with the adventures of the fine folks of the military's Judge Advocate General's office: First, the gang has to track down a super-patriot who's stolen the Declaration of Independence (man, what would that fetch on the autograph market?); second, Harm (David James Elliott)
FEATURES
By Chris Kridler | June 7, 1996
If watching burly men die really horrible deaths for two hours is your idea of fun, boy, are you going to love "The Rock." This is one testosterone-fueled movie.It's also overly long and relentless in its noise and carnage, and as a result, its interesting characters are too-often eclipsed.The film was produced by Jerry Bruckheimer and the late Don Simpson, whose action-heavy credits include a couple of "Beverly Hills Cop" movies, "Top Gun," "Days of Thunder" and "Crimson Tide."Nicolas Cage stars as a chemical-weapons expert for the FBI, the elaborately named Stanley Goodspeed.
NEWS
By NEW YORK TIMES NEWS SERVICE | June 9, 1996
WASHINGTON -- Newly declassified government documents prove that the United States, after sending hundreds of Vietnamese commandos into North Vietnam during the 1960s, deliberately declared them dead, lied to their wives and then buried their story under a shroud of secrecy.Nearly 200 of those secret agents survived capture, torture and prison and are alive in the United States. They are asking the government for back pay -- $2,000 a year, without interest, for their prison time -- and help in getting 88 fellow commandos out of Vietnam.
NEWS
By Shirley Leung | September 19, 1995
To Sedgwick Tourison, his book about a secret army of commandos in the Vietnam War is an attempt "to correct a grievous wrong 32 years ago.""It's a story we've covered up for so long. It had to be told," said the 54-year-old Crofton author, who was an interrogator during the war and later an analyst for the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). It's not easy, but it's all documented."Mr. Tourison's book, "Secret Army, Secret War," hit regional book stores this month. The 389-page book, published by the Naval Institute Press, is an exhaustive account of the Central Intelligence Agency's attempt to train South Vietnamese commandos to infiltrate North Vietnam.
NEWS
July 10, 1995
Dozens of French navy commandos storm a Greenpeace ship in the South Pacific to thwart an attempt to land protesters on an island where France plans to resume nuclear tests. The crew of Rainbow Warrior II, taken into custody, then freed 10 hours later, was attempting to call attention to French plans to set off eight nuclear test blasts. Page 3A
NEWS
By Gary Cohn | July 30, 1995
"Secret Army, Secret War: Washington's Tragic Spy Operation in North Vietnam," by Sedgwick Tourison. Illustrated. 320 pages. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press. $29.95Sedgwick Tourison, a former top analyst for the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), has written an exhaustively researched account of a Vietnam War intelligence failure that was ineffective, sustained and brutal in its consequences."Secret Army, Secret War," is the story behind Washington's unsuccessful effort to use small teams of covert Vietnamese commandos to wage guerrilla warfare in North Vietnam.