Officer Charged in Friendly-Fire Deaths Seeks Exoneration : Military: He says release of secret intelligence document would help his defense in the mistaken downing of two U.S. helicopters over Iraq.

Air Force Capt. Jim Wang, the lone airman ordered to a court-martial in the worst friendly-fire case in recent military history, is spending the holidays in the city where he grew up, far from the accusations that might ruin his decorated military career.

Wang is trying to persuade his superiors to open a secret defense intelligence document that he believes will convince the Air Force he should not go to prison. Failing that, he hopes his general court-martial on three criminal counts of dereliction of duty will come swiftly next month.

He wants to exonerate himself, to prove to his country and the families of the 26 killed in two Army helicopters over Iraq earlier this year that the deaths were not intentional.

Most of all, he wants to walk shoulder-high again with the other five airmen who, after pretrial hearings, were absolved of any criminal wrongdoing in the April 14 tragedy. He doesn’t believe that he alone should carry the blame.

“You wonder whether it could have been prevented, and you know definitely it should have been,” Wang said in an interview in his parents’ Columbus home. “But there were a lot of breakdowns. And in hindsight, there were a lot of people who could have done something to break the chain of events. There were things I could have done, too, had I had the right information.”

He was born in Taiwan, the only son of a carpenter. The family immigrated here when he was 2-years-old. He became a naturalized citizen. Just down the street is his old school, Hamilton High, where he was a star athlete.

A thousand miles away--maybe more, it seems now--is the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado, where he went when he left here 10 years ago, full of promise at the start of his military service.

He is soft-spoken and subdued. He appears much younger than his 28 years. The other day, he had to show an ID to buy beer. He could almost pass as the local high school kid, had he not come home this time accompanied by his wife, Wendy, their 22-month old son, Jim Jr., and his deep, sad reflections on what has been a most terrible year.

Just across town live John and Linda Garrett, the parents of one of the U.S. servicemen killed in the accident, Army Warrant Officer 2nd Class John W. Garrett Jr. He, too, was a career military man, and he was their only child.

“I feel sorry he’s the only one being charged when so many people did so much wrong,” Linda Garrett said Tuesday. “ . . . The Pentagon already said it was a combination of mistakes made by a lot of people.”

She has not met Wang, but she would tell him this: “He feels bad he’s going to lose his career. But it’s better to still have your life.”

Wang said he feels “very much for the families” who lost loved ones. “But I don’t feel they should hold this against me,” he said. “Because before this is over, I want to air as many questions as they do.”

Wang graduated from the Air Force academy in 1988 with a basic science degree and an emphasis on computers. Almost immediately, he focused his career on radar technology. He joined the special AWACS crews--the airmen who provide Airborne Warning and Control System backup to help pilots spot enemy aircraft.

He said he has won the Air Force humanitarian medal, the Southwest Asia service medal and three outstanding unit awards. Just before April, he was accepted into a special instructor school for squadron officers at Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida.

One last assignment was a 35-day duty in Operation Provide Comfort, which enforces the “no-fly” zone over Iraq. He left the United States on April 10.

The ill-fated mission was his first deployment in Iraq. He was supervising three crew members aboard an AWACS plane that was flying in support of two F-15 jets enforcing the “no-fly” zone.

An hour or so into the flight, he said, his crew “locked up some contacts on the radar”--meaning their screens showed what could be enemy aircraft in the “no-fly” area. He and his crew passed that information to the two F-15 pilots, who he said answered that they had identified them as Iraqi Hind helicopters.

“That’s how they called them off,” Wang said. “And from all the information we had received up to that time, there was nothing contrary that said they were friendly. We even interrogated them, we asked them if they were friend or foe, and we didn’t receive any return.”

Both pilots fired, each of them blowing a helicopter out of the air.

“They followed their own rules of engagement, and there was no requirement for them to come back to us for a second opinion or for permission to fire,” he said.

Initially, Wang said, he believed the pilots fired defensively. He heard the pilots radio “Splash one Hind” followed by “Splash second Hind.”

The AWACS crew flew for another 11 hours, but within 30 minutes Wang began to worry something had gone wrong. He was told to help direct search and rescue operations, something that wouldn’t be done for a downed enemy aircraft. Then he heard radio transmissions reporting that the F-15s had shot down two Army Blackhawk helicopters carrying military personnel and civilians.

“It was unbelievable,” he said. “Nobody on board the AWACS plane wanted to believe that. It was so silent. Then everybody kept saying, ‘No way could that have happened.’ ”

In September, Wang and five other airmen were named in various criminal charges. One of the F-15 pilots was accused of 26 counts of negligent homicide. But Wang eventually learned that he alone would be court-martialed, while the rest would be exonerated.

Wang has been charged with failing to supervise his radar controllers, failing to maintain a “current and accurate” radar picture of his area of responsibility and failing to make sure the pilots knew there were Army helicopters in the area.

If convicted, he faces a maximum of three months in prison on each of the three counts, a garnishing of his wages, and possible discharge from the service.

His attorney, Air Force Maj. Donald P. Holtz, said he learned recently of a secret National Security Agency report that, if revealed, could provide evidence that would clear Wang. The exact nature of the information is not known, but so far, military authorities have refused to turn the document over, saying it is not relevant.

“To court-martial Capt. Wang for this tragedy would not only be grossly unfair,” Holtz said, “but would subject the United States Air Force to public scorn and the ridicule of the American people.”