Top brass rejects blame for Pachang

Minister of National Defense Wu Shih-wen (伍世文) yesterday said he did not think he should resign for the military's handling of its rescue efforts during the Pachang Creek (八掌) incident last Saturday, which left four people drowned.

He said the mistakes made by the military were not on the policy level, but in implementation.

"This incident is a matter of the responsibility of those who carry out rescue exercises within the armed forces. It should not involve me. It has not reached a level where policy-makers are involved," Wu said.

"People charged with executing policy at all levels have been disciplined for their respective roles in the matter," he said.

"The greatest fault of the military in the matter was its failure to take the initiative to save the victims and to acquire a full understanding of and control over the situation once it was notified of the incident."

Though he denies any personal responsibility, Wu said he submitted his resignation to Premier Tang Fei (唐飛) and that he would follow in Tang's footsteps if Tang chose to step down because of the multiple drowning incident.

Wu made the remarks yesterday at the morning session of the Legislative Yuan's Defense Committee after he delivered a report on the military's handling of requests from civilians to rescue the four drowning workmen in Chiayi County.

Also speaking at the meeting was Lieutenant General Hu Cheng-fu (胡鎮埔), director of the defense ministry's Office of the Deputy Chief of the General Staff for Operations, who defended the military against mounting criticism of its conduct during the drowning incident.

"The armed forces exist for the purpose of combat. The civilian sector cannot count on us for every single incident like Saturday's. If I fail to discover the enemy approaching us, I would accept being sentenced to death by decapitation. But not for this incident. It should have been handled by the civilian rescue forces in accordance with standard operating procedure," Hu said.

Hu was the highest-ranking of four military officials to be disciplined for their responsibility for the air force's search and rescue teams' failure to respond to rescue calls in Saturday's incident.