DENOUNCING THE SOVIET UNION

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01070R000200880003-9
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 21, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 27, 2008
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: September 5, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

RADIO TV REPORTS, INC.
4701 WILLARD AVENUE, CHEVY CHASE, MARYLAND 20815 656-4068
Approved For Release 2008/06/27: CIA-RDP88-0107OR000200880003-9
All Things Considered
STATION WETA Radio
NPR Network
DATE September 5, 1983 5:00 P.M. CITY Washington, D.C.
Denouncing the Soviet Union
TOM JELTON: So far, the United States has taken the
lead in denouncing the Soviet Union for its attack on the Korean
airliner....
In their daily statements on the incident, Soviet
officials have come a bit closer to accepting responsibility for
shooting down the Korean airliner. In a statement carried over
official media yesterday, the head of the Soviet Air Defense
Command called the crash of Flight 7 an unprecedented accident
and suggested that the Soviet pilot following the Korean airliner
might have mistaken it for a U.S. spy plane. Colonel General
Simyon Romanov stopped short, however, of admitting that Soviet
pilots actually destroyed the Korean aircraft, and he said that
the U.S. Government must take some of the responsibility for the
loss of life because it had deliberately sent the airliner into
Soviet airspace in order to spy on Soviet defenses.
Shortly after the Soviet statement, White House offic-
ials reported that a U.S. reconnaissance aircraft had in fact
been near the Soviet coast shortly before the Korean airliner was
shot down and that Soviet air controllers might have confused the
two planes. But the aircraft were headed in opposite directions
and, according to U.S. officials, they were a thousand miles
apart by the time the Korean airliner went down. The officials
said Soviet pilots had plenty of time to identify the Korean
airliner.
George Carver was special assistant to three Directors
of the Central Intelligence Agency and a coordinator of U.S.
intelligence operations in Germany. He says it's absurd to hear
a Soviet general speculate that a fighter pilot might have been
mistaken, because under the Soviet military structure, the pilot
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Approved For Release 2008/06/27: CIA-RDP88-0107OR000200880003-9
 Approved For Release 2008/06/27: CIA-RDP88-0107OR000200880003-9
would have had to describe exactly what he saw before he fired a
missile.
GEORGE CARVER: Well, I think the decision to shoot it
down was made at [Russian term] headquarters in Moscow or
authorized. Now, there may have been a recommendation from the
regional command at Vladivostok to shoot it down. But I do not
think that the action would have been taken without at least the
approval from [Russian term] in Moscow, and if indeed it wasn't
Moscow itself that gave the order in the first place.
JELTON: And what would the role of Colonel General
Romanov been in that decision?
CARVER: He's the commander of [Russian term]. He would
have been -- had to have been the person who approved shooting it
down, if not giving the order to have it shot down.
JELTON: The U.S. reconnaissance plane apparently had
sophisticated equipment on board for monitoring communications
and radar activity. But a Pentagon spokesman would not comment
on whether the plane could have detected Soviet reactions to the
Korean plane.
Approved For Release 2008/06/27: CIA-RDP88-0107OR000200880003-9