Incident At Sakhalin: The True Mission Of KAL Flight 007

Incident at Sakhalin: The True Mission of KAL Flight 007

From Library JournalThe Cold War still holds many mysteries; the downing of Korean Air Lines Flight 007 in September 1983 is one of its major puzzles. For Brun, a multilingual pilot and "aeronautical investigator," it became a personal obsession. His technically detailed, sometimes disjointed argument is that a major air battle took place near the Soviet island of Sakhalin, ending with the destruction not only of the airliner but also "ten or so (U.S.) aircraft," all "the result of a U.S. clandestine operation that had gone dreadfully wrong." Brun's case is built around conflicting newspaper accounts; published transcripts of cockpit communications; voice analysis; maps; other Soviet, Japanese, and U.S. evidence; and a junkyard of ocean debris, some of which the author collected himself. Although Brun's claim startles, his choppy style distracts. For larger collections.John Yurechko, Georgetown Univ., Washington, D.C.Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.Offers a startling new explanation of the 1983 crash of Korean Air Flight 007, charging that instead of being shot down by the Soviets, the plane was caught in an air battle between the U.S. and the Soviets. 25,000 first printing. IP.From Publishers WeeklyBrun, a pilot and aeronautical engineer, presents here the result of a decade's research into the 1983 destruction of Korean Air Lines Flight 007 when it was shot down by Soviet fighters over the Sea of Japan. He describes the tragedy as part of a clandestine U.S. operation to test Soviet air defense capabilities. Flight 007 was a Trojan horse whose destruction occurred in the context of near-simultaneous violations of Soviet air space by American planes, resulting in a sharp clash between the superpowers' aircraft. When the gamble that a civilian airliner would be safe did not pay off, the U.S. embarked on a comprehensive cover-up that endures to the present, according to the author. Brun's conclusions overlook the difficulties of concealing this kind of deception for any length of time. They also fail to take into account the elements of fog and the friction on both sides that most probably are the real roots of the 007 catastrophe. This provocative title is ultimately unconvincing.Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.From BooklistThe Soviet justification for killing 260 people aboard a Korean 747 in 1983 was that the airliner was not on an errant course. They claimed the airliner was on a military mission to provoke their air defenses, which various authors, suspecting a U.S. cover-up, have supported. Add Brun to that camp, but with an extraordinary twist: he believes that, in addition to the airliner, at least 10 U.S. warplanes were shot down in a wild U.S.-Soviet air battle on the same night. Readers minutely interested in this novel theory can follow Brun's private investigation (he's a pilot by profession) as he tramps around Japanese beaches looking for aircraft debris. The flotsam he found--six years after the incident--somehow escaped the observation of searchers in 1983, but Brun is convinced the stuff came from the airliner. He also interprets the air traffic audiotapes as proving KAL 007 was living up to its spylike flight number. Maverick though Brun's dogfight thesis appears to skeptics, it should take with readers ready to reexamine the tragedy in detail. Gilbert Taylor