It is the same game that has been played for years and was even a scene in the movie “Top Gun.” Military planes fly out to the border of international airspace to say ‘hello’ to the foreign military that is conducting routine surveillance missions. But it was not a routine accident that occurred last Sunday.
While conducting spy surveillance inside the boundaries of international air space, an American EP-3 reconnaissance place collided with a Chinese F-8 fighter jet over the South China Sea. The American plane, loaded with top-secret information and equipment, was forced to make an emergency landing on Hainan, an island, while the F-8 reportedly crashed and its pilot is missing.
The result of the collision is being labeled all over the news as a “standoff with the Chinese government” because China is blaming the United States for the collision and demanding an apology. Meanwhile, President Bush is demanding that the 24 crew members be returned immediately, along with the plane, which he ordered the Chinese not to board and search because it is a military vessel and entitled to sovereign immunity. In response to this, China Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhu Bangzao said, “If this plane is sovereign American territory, how did it land in China?” as quoted in the Los Angeles Times.
As of yet, U.S. officials are not releasing an official statement on what happened because of limited contact that has occurred with the crew members.
Further complicating the issue is leftover bitterness from the 1999 accidental bombing by NATO forces of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, Yugoslavia. Following the bombing, anti-American protests and riots erupted throughout China.
The amazing thing in all this is that U.S. officials seem genuinely surprised that China is taking its sweet time in returning the 24 crew members and the plane. In case it was a hidden secret, China is a communist country, and they do as they please. If a sophisticated American spy plane lands on Chinese territory, no matter what the reason is, it is a pretty safe assumption that China’s military is going to be crawling all over that plane. In reality, would America not be doing the same thing if a Chinese spy plane were to land in Pearl Harbor?
Then there is the issue of the how the EP-3 ended up on the ground in the first place. It is not surprising that China is blaming the incident on America, although it makes no sense that the EP-3, which flies at about 250 mph and in a basically straight flight pattern, would crash into an F-8 fighter jet that can zip around the sky at 450 miles per hour. However fault on the part of the United States cannot be overlooked. It must be pointed out that the Navy is still dealing with repercussions after one of its submarines leveled a Japanese fishing boat, killing nine, off the coast of Hawaii in February.
While China is outraged over the spy flight and demanding an apology, they have no right to do so. For China to demand an apology from the United States is silly, unless China is going to discontinue its routine surveillance flights off the coast of the United States.
As officials from both sides escalate foreign relations into a twisted mess, Americans will watch how President Bush handles this sensitive crisis . He has already used the incident to divert attention away from the campaign finance reform bill floating around Congress, a move that is far from a coincidence.
Christine Owen, a junior journalism major, is managing editor of the Campus Times. She can be reached by e-mail at owenc@ulv.edu.
