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  **Thomas Pickering, Under Secretary of State**\
  Oral Presentation to the Chinese Government\
  Regarding the Accidental Bombing of The P.R.C. Embassy in Belgrade\
  June 17, 1999

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Released July 6, 1999

I am here at the instruction of President Clinton as his personal envoy.
He has asked me to deliver a letter from him to President Jiang; to
present the official report of our investigation into the accidental
bombing of your embassy in Belgrade; and to answer any questions you may
have about the report. My remarks and comments will constitute a full
report to you.

The attack was a mistake. Our examination explains how a series of
errors and omissions led to that mistake. Let me emphasize: no one
targeted the Chinese Embassy. No one, at any stage in the process,
realized that our bombs were aimed at the Chinese Embassy.

It is entirely appropriate that we provide you with an explanation of
how this awful tragedy occurred. The U.S. Government recognizes our
responsibility to provide a full explanation. We have undertaken our own
internal investigation into this matter and want to share our results
with you.

I have brought with me a high-level delegation of representatives from
the White House, Department of State, Department of Defense, and the
Intelligence Community.

The delegation includes officials who have been directly involved in the
investigation and the preparation of the report. Let me introduce them.

With me here today are Ambassador James Sasser; Mr. James Simon, the
Assistant Director of Central Intelligence for Administration; Mr.
Franklin Kramer, Assistant Secretary of Defense for International
Security Affairs; Mr. Jeremy Clark, Deputy Director of the Defense
Intelligence Agency; Dr. Susan Shirk, Deputy Assistant Secretary of
State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs; and Mr. James Keith, Director
for Asian Affairs at the National Security Council.

My intention is to provide information and explanation as we proceed. We
will also show you some charts and photos to help illustrate some of the
basic results of our investigation. After that, we will turn to
providing answers to your questions.

**Introduction:**

First let me express the heartfelt condolences of the American people
and government to the families of the three Chinese journalists who died
in the bombing of your Embassy in Belgrade on May 7th. Let me convey
also our sympathy for the 20 Embassy staff members who were injured. We
realize that no amount of explanation will make up for the personal
tragedy suffered by these individuals and their loved ones.

I am here, as you know, to provide the explanation and the investigation
report in fulfillment of President Clinton\'s comments in his telephone
conversation and letters to President Jiang.

I want to underline that this report has been prepared by senior U.S.
Government officials from our intelligence and military organizations.

The report shows that multiple factors and errors in several parts of
the U.S. Government were responsible for the mistaken bombing. Beginning
as early as 1997, mistakes in different parts of our government
contributed to this tragic set of errors; and our operational procedures
failed to catch these errors.

The CIA and Defense Department are continuing to interview individuals
in the field who were involved in various aspects of the decisions that
led to the bombing. Because the NATO air campaign has only just
concluded, it has not been possible to debrief fully every person
involved and to reach conclusions regarding responsibility for mistakes
that led to the bombing. The Director of Central Intelligence, who is
also Chief of the Intelligence Community, has directed the conduct of an
accountability review which will go into the issue of responsibility,
the appropriate results of which will be made available.

The bombing resulted from three basic failures. First, the technique
used to locate the intended target\--the headquarters of the Yugoslav
Federal Directorate for Supply and Procurement (FDSP)\--was severely
flawed. Second, none of the military or intelligence databases used to
verify target information contained the correct location of the Chinese
Embassy. Third, nowhere in the target review process was either of the
first two mistakes detected. No one who might have known that the
targeted building was not the FDSP headquarters\--but was in fact the
Chinese Embassy\--was ever consulted.

To help better understand the circumstances which led to the mistaken
bombing, let me offer a chronology of events.

**Mistargeting:**

The first major error stemmed from mislocating the intended target.

In March of this year, officers at the Central Intelligence Agency began
considering the Federal Directorate for Supply and Procurement (FDSP) as
a potential target for NATO Allied Force strike operations. The FDSP,
because of its role in military procurement, was a legitimate target.

We had a street address of the FDSP headquarters: \"Bulevar Umetnosti
2\" in New Belgrade. But military forces require precise geographic
coordinates to conduct an attack with precision munitions. During a
mid-April selection and designation of the target, three maps were used
in an attempt to locate physically the address of the FDSP headquarters:
two local commercial maps from 1996 and 1989, and the then most recent
U.S. Government map produced in 1997.

None of these maps had any reference to the FDSP building. And none
accurately identified the current location of the Chinese Embassy.

As you can see, the 1997 U.S. Government city map shows the Embassy in
Old Belgrade and depicts an unidentified building at the actual Embassy
site in New Belgrade. The 1996 commercial map made no reference to the
Embassy at either location. The 1989 map predated the Embassy\'s move.

Please keep in mind that the location of the Chinese Embassy was not a
question that anyone would have asked when assembling this particular
target package since it was not connected in any way to our intent to
strike the FDSP headquarters.

In an effort to locate the FDSP building at Bulevar Umetnosti 2, an
intelligence officer in Washington used land navigation techniques
taught by the U.S. military to locate distant or inaccessible points and
objects. These techniques - which involve the comparison of addresses
from one street to another - can be used for general geographic
location, but are totally inappropriate for precision targeting, and
were used uniquely in this case. Using this process, the individual
mistakenly determined that the building which we now know to be the
Chinese Embassy was the FDSP headquarters. To use these techniques for
targeting purposes was a serious mistake. The true location of the FDSP
headquarters was some 300 meters away from the Chinese Embassy. This
flaw in the address location process went undetected by all the others
who evaluated the FDSP as a military target.

Because this first error was so fundamental, let me walk you through it.

The method for determining the location of the intended target\--the
FDSP\--was seriously flawed. It was not based on certain knowledge of
the numbering sequence for addresses on the Bulevar Umetnosti. Rather,
our attempts to determine the location of the building employed a method
that is used in the field by the Army, but is not normally used for
aerial targeting purposes. The system will provide an approximation of
location, but cannot guarantee an accurate geographic fix.

A 1997 National Imaging and Mapping Agency (NIMA) map was first used to
display the grid pattern of the streets in New Belgrade. Next, in order
to identify locations to use as reference points, they identified and
drew on the NIMA map to locate the Hyatt Hotel, the Intercontinental
Hotel, and the Serbian Socialist Party Headquarters. Each of these
buildings\--which were clearly labeled on the maps being used\--were
approximately one mile east of Bulevar Umetnosti. Using these locations
and their street addresses as reference points, parallel lines were
drawn that intersected both the known addresses and Bulevar Umetnosti.
In what proved to be a fundamental error, those same numbers were then
applied to locations on Bulevar Umetnosti, assuming that streets were
numbered in the same fashion along parallel streets. The effectiveness
of this method depends on the numbering system being the same on
parallel streets, that the numbers are odd and even on the same sides of
the street and that the street numbers are used in the same parallel
sequence even if the street names change. Unfortunately, a number of
these assumptions were wrong.

Using this approximation method, your embassy building was designated as
the target when in fact the Embassy was located on a small side street
at some distance on Bulevar Umetnosti from where the intended target was
actually located at number 2 Bulevar Umetnosti. Let me show you a
satellite photograph and some maps to illustrate the method and the
error it produced.

The identification of the building that actually was the Chinese Embassy
as the FDSP building subsequently and in error took on the mantle of
fact. It was not questioned nor reviewed up the chain of command. This
was in part because everyone involved had, as a result of so many
previously correct locations, assumed generally high confidence in our
procedures to locate, check and verify such analytical facts. In this
particular, and singular, case, our system clearly failed. In part it
failed also because every established procedure in the review of this
target was not followed.

Maps and satellite imagery were also analyzed to look for any possible
collateral damage issues near the target. There was no indication that
the targeted building was an embassy\--no flags, no seals, no clear
markings showed up. There were no collateral damage issues in the
vicinity.

**Flawed Databases:**

The second major error stemmed from flawed databases.

The incorrect location of the FDSP building was then fed into several
U.S. databases to determine whether any diplomatic or other facilities
off-limits to targeting were nearby. We do our best to avoid damage to
sensitive facilities such as embassies, hospitals, schools and places of
worship. Viewed from space, there was no indication that the office
building being targeted was an embassy. On the satellite imagery
available to U.S., there were no flags, seals, or other markings to
indicate that the building was an embassy. And unfortunately, in this
instance none of the database sources that were checked correctly
identified the targeted building as the Chinese Embassy.

Multiple databases within the Intelligence Community and the Department
of Defense all reflected the Embassy in its pre-1996 location in Old
Belgrade. Despite the fact that U.S. officials had visited the Embassy
on a number of occasions in recent years the new location was never
entered into intelligence or military targeting databases. If the
databases had accurately reflected the current location of the Embassy,
the mistaken identification of the FDSP building would have been
recognized and corrected.

Why was the Chinese Embassy not correctly located? It is important to
understand that our ability to verify the location of fixed targets
depends heavily on the accuracy of the databases, and the databases in
this case were wrong. Further, it is difficult to keep current databases
for cities around the globe. In general, diplomatic facilities have been
given relatively little attention in our efforts to update our databases
because such facilities are not targets. Military targets are the top
priority in these databases because of the danger they pose to our own
forces. Unfortunately, locations where strikes should be avoided had
lower priority and our databases contained errors, notably in the
failure to include the new location of the Embassy of China.

Now, this is an important point, so let me expand upon it.

The databases which contained information about the physical location of
organizations in Belgrade\--including the so-called \"no hit list\" of
buildings that should not be targeted\--were faulty.

Although database maintenance is one the basic elements of our
intelligence efforts, it has been routinely accorded low priority.

The target and \"no-hit\" databases were not independently constructed.
Outdated information that placed the Chinese Embassy in its former
location in Old Belgrade was not updated when the Embassy moved. Because
various databases were not independently constructed, this wrong
information was duplicated. So when target information was checked
against the no-hit list, the error was not detected.

Many U.S. and other NATO diplomats must have visited the new building.
The address was in the phone book, the diplomatic list and perhaps other
sources, including Yugoslav maps. Certainly, many citizens and officials
of the United States were aware of the correct location of the Chinese
Embassy in Belgrade. However, in error, their knowledge was not recorded
in any of the military or intelligence databases used in the targeting
process.

In addition, the correct location of the Chinese Embassy was not known
to targeteers or NATO commanders because we were not, in fact, looking
for it. Since your Embassy was not a target, and because we were unaware
of any diplomatic or civilian facilities in the immediate vicinity of
the presumed FDSP building, no effort was made to verify or precisely
locate the whereabouts of your Embassy.

We have subsequently found some maps which show the correct current
location of the Chinese Embassy, although there are others, including
some produced in recent years by the Yugoslav government, which do not.

Since the incident, the United States has updated its databases to show
the best known location of diplomatic facilities. The databases will be
updated as new information becomes available. Maps are out of date
almost as soon as they are printed. Databases can and should be
maintained to be effective.

**Faulty Checks:**

The third problem was faulty checks.

Once the target was proposed, the focus of the review was on the
military value of the target, how best to attack it, and the issue of
collateral damage. No one in any of the succeeding reviews questioned
the accuracy of the location. The formal recommendation of the FDSP
target was forwarded in late April to military staffs both in the U.S.
and Europe, who were responsible for reviewing and identifying targets
for Operation Allied Force. Maps and satellite imagery were analyzed to
look for any possible collateral damage concerns near the target. We
conducted a target review in Europe, and again, no significant risks to
civilian or diplomatic facilities were uncovered.

Following submission by the European Command for approval, the target
package mistakenly received no additional examination outside of the
Defense Department. It did go through additional review at the Pentagon,
but this review found nothing different from the review that took place
in Europe. There were no known collateral damage concerns. From that
point on the building incorrectly identified as an FDSP facility was
included on a list of potential Allied Force strike targets.

Some of our employees knew the location of the new Chinese Embassy. But
keep in mind that we were not looking for it, since the database with
the old location was assumed to be correct. None of these individuals
was consulted as the target was reviewed and, as a result, we lost any
opportunity to learn that the building targeted was the new Chinese
Embassy. We have also found one report from 1997 which gave the correct
address of the Chinese Embassy, but unfortunately the correct address
was not entered into the database.

**To further explain:**

Once the wrong target was selected, the system of checks that NATO and
U.S. command forces had in place to catch target errors did not reveal
the mistake. The database reviews conducted by the European Command
(EUCOM) were limited to validating the target data sheet coordinates
with the information put into the database by NIMA analysts. Such a
circular process could not uncover the original error and exposes our
susceptibility to a single point of database failure.

There has been much press coverage of the fact that the U.S. and NATO
relied on out-of-date maps to check targets. In fact, since any physical
map can quickly become out of date, the key question is one of accurate
databases. These were not properly maintained and did not catch the
error. Furthermore, persons familiar with the layout of the city of
Belgrade were not consulted in the construction of the target and no-hit
databases. They were also not involved in a review of this target. This
points up a flaw in our procedures.

The only question about the target information was raised by an
intelligence officer who had doubts as to whether the building targeted
was in fact the FDSP headquarters or might be some other unidentified
building. At no time was there any suspicion that the building might be
an embassy. This question was not raised to senior levels and the strike
went ahead.

Let me explain further this attempt by an intelligence officer to
question the reliability of the target information related to the FDSP.
There was information that suggested a discrepancy between the selected
target and the actual location of the FDSP. There was no information
that the target location was the Chinese Embassy, only that it was
perhaps the wrong building. However, there was a series of frustrating
miscommunications\--missed phone calls and lack of follow-up\--which led
to these doubts not being aired at a command level in time to stop the
attack. (The officer had doubts early on in the process because of his
own knowledge about the location of the FDSP building; attempted to
check with working-level contacts; was continuing to check when the
bombing happened; and was not able to communicate his suspicions to
senior officers.)

**The Bombing:**

The air strike then proceeded as planned on May 7 without any of the
mistakes having been detected or doubts about the reliability of the
target information having been addressed.

At 2146 Zulu (about midnight local time in Belgrade) on 7 May 1999 one
of the fleet of B-2 bombers from Whiteman Air Force Base (AFB) in
Missouri dropped 5 Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAM) 2000 lb.
GPS-guided bombs on the target designated as the FDSP building but which
was, in fact, the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade. All B-2 strikes on
Yugoslavia were flown from Whiteman AFB. The bombs were Global
Positioning System (GPS) guided weapons and operate in all weather and
at night using a satellite-based navigation system of a high order of
accuracy.

The air crews carried out their mission as planned. They had no idea
they were in fact bombing the Chinese Embassy. As a result, it is
obvious that they bear no responsibility for this failure; the problem,
as I have outlined, occurred earlier.

They had no way of seeing any identifying markers that would show the
building was an embassy. A flag in front of the building or any such
features would not be discernible at night and at the speeds and
altitudes at which our planes fly.

No other buildings in the immediate vicinity were hit. Our weapons hit
the target they were aimed at. Unfortunately, we did not realize the
true nature of the target.

**To Review:**

In summary, there were several crucial errors which led to the Chinese
Embassy being struck.

There was an error in locating the target. The approach used to attempt
to locate the FDSP building was severely flawed.

All sources of information used to prevent precisely this type of
accident were either inaccurate or incomplete.

The review process did not catch the locational error and did not
consult any material or any person which could have provided correct
information.

The United States is, as I speak, continuing to conduct an in-depth
review of this tragic accident. Based on our initial findings, it is
clear that this terrible mistake occurred not because of just one
organization, or because of any one individual.

There was in the immediate aftermath of the bombing some confusion as to
what had happened and some of our early public statements were confused
and contradictory. To summarize clearly and precisely: the attack on the
PRC Embassy was the result of a series of errors that led to the
destruction of the PRC Embassy instead of the Serb military target that
was intended. The use of a map containing an error\--the inaccurate
location of the Chinese Embassy\--contributed to the tragic
mistake\--but this was not due solely to a \"map error.\"

What went wrong was, first and foremost, that the approach used to
locate the Bulevar Umetnosti 2, the address of the FDSP, was severely
flawed.

Second, the databases used to check and prevent this type of targeting
error were also inaccurate, incomplete, and not fully independent.

And third, the target review process did not detect the first two
mistakes, nor did it involve people and information that could have
provided additional data to correct or detect these errors.

As the President has already expressed, we are deeply sorry that we made
these tragic errors.

Following the accident, the President of the United States and the
Secretary General of NATO separately expressed to China\'s leaders their
sincere apologies for the mistaken attack on the embassy and their
sympathy to the families of those who died and to the injured.

Our government has also undertaken corrective actions to prevent
mistakes like this from happening in the future.

New updated city maps have been published detailing locations of
diplomatic sites and other \"no-strike\" facilities in and around
Belgrade. Additionally, databases are being updated as changes occur. We
rely on these databases for our most current information, because maps
themselves are inevitably out of date the day or the week they are
published.

Intelligence and Defense organizations have strengthened their internal
mechanisms and procedures for selecting and verifying targets, and have
placed new priority on keeping our databases current.

All U.S. Government sources will be required to report whenever foreign
embassies move or are established. This information will then be
forwarded and incorporated into our intelligence and military databases.

The U.S. Government will seek direct contact with other governments and
interested organizations and persons to obtain their assistance in
identifying and locating facilities and places of interest or concern.

And as I noted earlier, we are continuing our internal reviews of the
causes of the accident, and when these reviews are completed, we will
determine whether any disciplinary action is called for.

**U.S. Intentions:**

I would like now to address various speculative theories that appear to
be held by some people in China.

We have heard that many people believe that our attack on your Embassy
was intentional.

Clearly the United States had absolutely no reason to want to attack
your protected embassy facility. Any such decision to bomb an Embassy
would have been contrary to U.S. doctrine and practice and against
international standards of behavior and established international
accords. No such decision was ever proposed or indeed made.

Bombing the Chinese Embassy also would have been completely antithetical
to President Clinton\'s strong personal commitment to strengthening the
relationship between the United States and China; he has defended this
relationship and our engagement policy in the face of vociferous
domestic criticism. It is not imaginable that President Clinton would
make such a decision.

Moreover, bombing the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade would have made
absolutely no sense in terms of our policy objectives in Kosovo. The
objective of the NATO bombing campaign was to diminish and degrade the
capacity of the Yugoslav government and military for repression in
Kosovo. The Embassy of China played no role in that set of activities.
It had always been the intention of the U.S. and NATO to bring the
Kosovo effort to conclusion through diplomatic efforts, including of the
G-8 and in the UN Security Council.

The accidental bombing of your Embassy not only intensified
international criticism of the NATO bombing campaign, it also had
negative effects on our diplomatic efforts, and affected in a deeply
negative fashion China\'s attitude and policies toward our effort in
Yugoslavia.

In particular, as Secretary Albright told Premier Zhu in April, we
always expected that China, as a permanent member of the UN Security
Council, would need to be a part of the resolution of the Kosovo crisis.
We knew we would need China\'s support in this matter. Bombing your
Embassy was hardly the way to persuade you to help.

Thus, the bombing was contrary to two critically important U.S. foreign
policy goals: the further development of U.S.-China relations and the
resolution of the Kosovo situation.

I also have heard that some people in China subscribe to the theory that
the bombing was caused by one or several individuals working in our
government who conspired to subvert U.S.-China relations or who may have
concluded that China was too friendly to Belgrade or that the Embassy
was playing some role in assisting Belgrade.

We have found no evidence of an unauthorized conspiracy to attack the
Chinese Embassy, for any reason whatsoever, or of any \"rogue element\"
within the U.S. Government. The errors we have identified as producing
the accident took place in three separate and independent areas. There
was a series of three separate sets of events, some of which affecting
the databases occurred as far back as 1997, when no one could have
predicted this present set of circumstances. It is just not conceivable,
given the circumstances and errors committed, that the attack could have
been brought about by a conspiracy or by \"rogue elements.\"

Science has taught us that a direct explanation, backed up by full
knowledge of facts obtained through a careful investigation, is always
preferable to speculation and far fetched, convoluted or contrived
theories with little or no factual backing.

In this tragic case, the facts show a series of errors: that the target
was mislocated; the databases designed to catch mistakes were inaccurate
and incomplete; and none of the reviews uncovered either of the first
two errors.

**Compensation:**

The bombing of the embassy in Belgrade was a tragic accident occurring
during a time of ongoing hostilities in Yugoslavia. While the action was
completely unintended, the United States and NATO nevertheless recognize
that it was the result of a set of errors which led to the embassy being
mistakenly targeted.

In view of these circumstances, and recognizing the special status of
the diplomatic personnel who were affected, the United States wishes to
offer immediate ex gratia payments to those individuals who were injured
in the bombing and to the families of those killed, based on current
experience internationally for the scale of such payments.

I have asked Ambassador Sasser to discuss the particulars of this offer
on our part with you in the next few days.

As for the damage to the embassy property in Belgrade, this is clearly a
more complicated question. There is also the question of damage suffered
by U.S. diplomatic and consular facilities in China in early May due to
attacks by demonstrators.

Because of their complexity, these latter issues will need to be
examined with some care. We believe they too can be discussed through
diplomatic channels and are ready to do so at a mutually suitable time.