British Airways flight 149

[Magda Hassan]

Another one for the "But they wouldn't do that to their own people, would they?" myth.

British hostages demand inquiry into Kuwait spying claims

• Press Association
  
• guardian.co.uk, Monday 16 October 2006 16.37 BST
  

British "human shields" taken hostage by Saddam Hussein in the first Gulf war demanded a public inquiry today into allegations that the government put their lives at risk to allow a secret operation to go ahead.They were among 367 passengers and crew seized by Iraqi troops when British Airways flight 149 landed in Kuwait hours after the invasion of the country on August 2 1990.
Their demand for an inquiry was sparked by new claims published by author Stephen Davis that the flight was being used to transport undercover agents into Kuwait.
At a press conference in the House of Commons today, crew and passengers described how around nine men joined the flight unannounced as it was delayed on the tarmac at Heathrow, then disappeared immediately after its arrival in Kuwait City.
John Major, the Conservative chancellor at the time, has previously denied rumours that the mysterious men may have been special-forces troops, insisting that no military personnel were on board.
But Mr Davis now says that he has obtained documentary evidence, along with interviews with up to six sources - including one of the men on board the plane and one of the operation's organisers - indicating that they were on a secret mission to gain intelligence on the movement of Saddam's troops.
He said that BA was wary of allowing the flight, bound for the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur, to stop off in Kuwait for refuelling while Iraqi troops were massing on the border, but the airline was assured by a British embassy official that it would be safe to land.
Mr Davis alleged that this official was in fact the station chief for MI6, which was in charge of organising the operation.
Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker today wrote to the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, asking him to meet a delegation of passengers and crew to discuss their demand for an inquiry.
"The new evidence shows that the government allowed the flight to land knowing that the passengers and crew would be endangered," said Mr Baker. "They did so in order to allow a special-forces unit to disembark from the plane. It is clear that statements made to the Commons by [then prime minister] Margaret Thatcher and John Major, both in the chamber and in written communications, were misleading to say the least."
Mr Baker called for the publication of a military police report on the human shields, commissioned by Mr Major in the aftermath of the war, which has remained classified ever since.
All of the British shields were released after up to four and a half months in captivity, during which time they were held at sites thought to be likely targets for allied bombing.
Some of them said today that their lives had been profoundly damaged by the horrifying experience.
John Chappell, 30, from Stafford, said: "I was a 14-year-old schoolboy when this took place and it was apparent to me that Iraq was very likely to invade Kuwait and it wasn't a safe place to land. I was amazed when we touched down there.
"If it was apparent to me that it was not safe, how could the government not have known? I am disgusted that for 16 years my government has denied all of this. It is not on for them to treat me like this and then lie about it, and that is why I want an apology." Mr Chappell said that, while he escaped physically unharmed, he witnessed someone being shot dead and believed he was himself going to be executed when he and other hostages were driven out into the desert.
His sister Jennifer, 29, from Cannock, Staffordshire, saw Iraqi tanks driving over cars full of people trying to flee.
She said: "I was an outgoing, naive 12-year-old girl. This experience took away my innocence. My childhood ended and I have had 16 years of psychological problems as a result.
"I now have a partner and am expecting a baby and getting my life back on track, but 16 years is a long time to have nightmares."
Some 61 French passengers on board the plane won compensation worth around £50,000 each from BA, while there have also been undisclosed payouts to American passengers held as human shields.
But a case brought by the British hostages was thrown out on a technicality by the House of Lords. While most of those involved said today that their main desire was a full explanation of the reasons for their ordeal, some said they wanted financial compensation.
David Fort, 70, from Bromley, Kent, said: "I want an apology and I want compensation. Me and my partner both lost our jobs because of this and we never worked again."
Mr Davis has detailed his findings in an upcoming BBC documentary and book, The Secret of Flight 149.
He believes that the nine men on board BA149 were not serving members of the SAS, but a so-called "increment" team made up of former secret-service agents and special-forces troops recruited for missions for which the government needed complete deniability.
"There is no doubt that valuable intelligence which saved lives was gained, but these people were put through a terrible time and governments have lied about it ever since," he said. "I think it is time it stopped.
"At every stage, there has been a very determined effort for the truth about this to be suppressed."

A Foreign Office spokesman said: "This was discussed in Parliament at the time in quite some detail and we've got nothing to add to what was said then."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2006/oct/16/iraq.iraq

[Magda Hassan]

Was BA 149 a Trojan horse?: The British government faces questions over whether a passenger flight into occupied Kuwait was planned or was an intelligence failure

MIKE JEMPSON AND ANDREW MARSHALL


SUNDAY 09 AUGUST 1992




AN INVESTIGATION by the Independent on Sunday suggests that innocent people's lives were put at risk by the British government, which allowed a civil aircraft to land in Kuwait after the emirate had been invaded by Iraq.Legal cases against British Airways have been brought in France, Britain and the United States alleging that the airline was negligent in allowing Flight BA 149 to land in Kuwait after the Iraqi invasion on 2 August 1990. Though there is no evidence to suggest that BA staff knew what had happened when the plane landed, there is reason to believe that British military officials on the ground were aware, but failed to alert the pilot.
Over 300 passengers and crew suffered for up to 19 weeks as involuntary 'guests' of Saddam Hussein, in Kuwait or in Iraq. Several women crew members spent one terrifying night in a filthy Kuwaiti military base with Iraqi conscripts trying to break in, defended only by Iraqi regulars. Another group of hostages from the plane were given the leg of a giraffe to eat after the Iraqis had machine-gunned animals dying of starvation in Kuwait Zoo.
British military advisers to Kuwait had also been taken hostage. While in captivity and in fear for their lives, they told some of those on board the plane that British military advisers had been present in the control tower at Kuwait airport when BA 149 was given clearance to land. British military personnel were alleged to have taken over the control tower some hours before BA 149 actually arrived.
The Ministry of Defence hostages said they had received 24 hours' warning of the Iraqi invasion and had been issued with new job titles to obscure their true function. They had even packed their kitbags before they were picked up by the Iraqis.
The crew seem to have taken every possible action to determine what was going on in Kuwait and there seems little doubt that had they had the slightest idea that Iraqi troops were present in the emirate, they would not have landed.
On the eve of the flight there was every reason to be nervous, given the deterioration in relations between Iraq and Kuwait. Both cabin crew and flight deck officers insisted that BA check with the Foreign Office. At a subsequent security briefing the crew were told, correctly, that no invasion had taken place, but some crew members remained concerned that BA seemed peculiarly ill-informed about the current political situation.
BA managers said they had contacted the Foreign Office and Kuwait airport and would continue to keep in touch throughout the flight, which was scheduled to leave Heathrow at 16.15 GMT and arrive in Kuwait at 23.10 GMT.
While the 18-year-old Jumbo was being checked prior to departure a fault was discovered in the auxiliary power unit (APU) for the air conditioning equipment. The APU had malfunctioned on previous occasions and would not have been a cause for concern had the plane been destined for cooler climates.
But flight and maintenance crew made the most of the delay by thoroughly checking the aircraft and requesting up-to-date reports from Kuwait. The crew were aware that if the delay were prolonged a relief crew would have to take over because the flight time would exceed their set period of duty. This may have been the subject of the 'heated debate' some passengers refer to. The plane eventually left two hours late.
None of the crew admit to public rows about the security situation. Passengers and crew say that every effort was made to calm the anxieties of those who were concerned about the situation in Kuwait. Several asked whether the plane would still be going to Kuwait and cabin crew did their best to assuage their fears, both then and during the flight.
The crew made at least two further attempts to check the situation on the ground in Kuwait. There was a conversation between the crews of BA 149 and Flight BA 148, a British Airways Tristar that had left Kuwait earlier. Captain Richard Brunyate, the pilot of BA 149, was told that everything had appeared normal.
Before BA 149 landed, the pilot spoke with air traffic control. Again he was told that everything was fine. Only then was the decision made to set down. Captain Peter Clark, who had flown into Kuwait the previous Sunday, said that because he had been aware of the dicey political situation he had kept his eyes peeled and been prepared to take his plane back up into the skies right up to the point of touchdown.
No evidence has yet emerged to prove BA knew of the invasion before the flight landed; nor is there any obvious motive for BA to land its aircraft in a war zone. One theory put forward by angry passengers is that BA was using the flight to rescue its own staff. But none of the BA crews that remained in Kuwait were instructed to board the flight and the incoming crew left immediately for their hotel.
The key to why the British government may have allowed the plane to land probably lies in who was on the plane. Among the passengers was a member of the Kuwaiti royal family, travelling first class, with his bodyguard.
BA staff claim that only minutes before the scheduled departure time a group of 12 young men arrived at the airport on a private coach. Apparently their original coach had broken down and another had had to be hired at short notice.
They were 'obviously soldiers - you get used to recognising them', one BA staff member is alleged to have told a colleague. Their documentation indicated a block booking from a single travel agent in Hereford for a flight to Kuwait. Hereford is the base of the Special Air Service; but other units also train there with the SAS, as does British intelligence. BA has denied that SAS men were on the plane, or that the aircraft was used as a Trojan horse. But BA may not have known the identities of those on the plane.
Cabin crew say that these men were among the 30 passengers who disembarked in Kuwait. They got off the plane along with some of the transit passengers, and had departed from the airport for Kuwait City before the incoming crew set off for their hotel, as had the Kuwaiti royal.
During the Gulf war, allied special forces liaised with the Kuwaiti resistance inside the emirate itself, and at least one member of the SAS was decorated for this work. The Kuwaiti resistance was led by members of the Kuwaiti royal family, possibly including the man on BA 149.
There are mixed views among the crew members about who was to blame for their predicament, although everyone agrees that the Foreign Office and the British government bear ultimate responsibility. But much of their contempt is for British embassy officials in Kuwait.
They say embassy staff did little to assist them either to avoid capture or escape from Kuwait in the early days when it was clear that the Iraqis were turning a blind eye to those who left the country by road and across the desert. Embassy officials who were later decorated for their work in Kuwait during the hostage crisis constantly told BA staff to 'keep their heads down'. Expatriates were similarly dismissive of the embassy.
BA has kept tight-lipped about the affair, partly because it is now facing legal action. Although at the time, the chairman, Lord King, was clearly angry about the predicament BA had been placed in, the airline was anxious not to upset the Government because of a pending decision about whether or not they would retain exclusive control of the Far East routes. When BA lost out over this, Lord King came out against the Tory government, but BA staff believe the pressure remains because of Government embarrassment about the intelligence cock-up.
There is reason to believe that Western intelligence agencies, and the Kuwaitis, expected Iraq only to occupy 'disputed territory' to the north of Kuwait City. By launching a helicopter assault on the Dasman Palace across the Gulf of Kuwait as troops crossed the border 100 miles to the north, the Iraqis took everyone by
surprise.
The British embassy is only 500 metres from the palace. US and Kuwaiti sources admit that the invasion began at least two hours before BA 149 arrived in Kuwait. The Kuwaiti ambassador in London was unable to contact the Foreign Office when he called an emergency number at midnight GMT, an hour before the Jumbo landed.
Staff have been repeatedly warned not to talk to the press, especially since BA made them ex gratia payments last year in recognition of their incarceration. There is some bitterness among crews at the level of compensation. Regardless of rank, those who were held for up to four weeks received one-off payments of pounds 6,000. Those who were there for 10 weeks received pounds 10,000. Those who remained in Kuwait or Iraq for almost five months received pounds 15,000.
All these were treated as goodwill payments, not compensation. Although their wages were being paid to relatives at home, and most were very pleased with the way BA handled their domestic circumstances ('Bloody marvellous,' said one), some of the more senior staff believe that the correct level of compensation should have been based on normal arrangements for remaining out of the country on company business through no fault of their own.
For some this would have amounted to more than pounds 180,000. Most were effectively on duty for much of their time as hostages, with responsibility for passengers and crew.
Investigation is hampered by the fact that some of the documentation relating to the flight has disappeared, including the passenger lists. BA staff say that, apparently, it is normal procedure for such lists to be withdrawn from the company's computer in emergencies - both to protect the identity of the passengers and to make sure that next of kin can be informed. The BA 149 computer list was withdrawn the day after the flight.
Faced with the threat of a series of expensive court actions for alleged negligence, BA now has to decide whether it must shoulder the burden of blame alone or demand that the British government release information to shatter the case brought by the passengers.
Either BA was deliberately kept in ignorance, or there was a monumental intelligence failure that led to the unnecessary humiliation and incarceration of British citizens on the flight. Either way, the Government has questions to answer.
COUNTDOWN TO HOSTAGE CRISIS
All times in GMT. British Summer Time is one hour ahead, Kuwait time is three hours ahead.
14.00 Passengers begin checking in for Flight BA 149 to Kuala Lumpur, via Kuwait and Madras. The 747 Jumbo had 18 first class seats, 70 in club world class and 288 in economy, and BA staff recall that the flight was almost full.
14.30 Crew report for duty. They have heard reports suggesting Iraq has moved into Kuwait and are concerned. A security briefing is held.
15.30 Cabin crew board plane.
16.00 Crew report fault on auxiliary power unit for air- conditioning equipment.
16.15 BA 149 scheduled to leave. Passengers are told there is a problem.
18.15 BA 149 finally takes off.
18.40 The ITN World News is shown to passengers.
20.00 First unconfirmed reports that Iraqi troops have crossed the border.
22.00 CIA in Washington confirms invasion is taking place.
22.13 Pilot of BA 149 talks to pilot of BA 148, a British Airways flight from Kuwait. No problems are reported.
23.10 BA 149 scheduled to arrive in Kuwait.
23.50 Kuwaiti Ambassador in London is told of invasion.
00.00 President George Bush told invasion is taking place. British ambassador in Kuwait phones Foreign Office; no answer.
01.15 BA 149 lands.
01.20 Some passengers disembark; others sleep on the plane.
01.45 Crew board plane for onward flight.
02.00 Kuwait airport closes.
02.15 Victor Mallet, Financial Times Middle East correspondent, meets Iraqi troops on his way into Kuwait City.
02.20 Iraqi planes bomb runway.
03.00 Kuwaiti radio announces that Iraqi troops have crossed the border.
04.30 Passengers and crew bussed to Airport Hotel.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/...39316.html

[Magda Hassan]

[Magda Hassan]

World: Europe

BA loses Iraq hostage appeal

BA was accused of transporting intelligence agents aboard the flight

By Paris Correspondent Stephen JesselA French court has rejected an appeal by British Airways against a ruling that it had to pay £2.5m ($3.75m) in compensation to French passengers aboard a flight seized in Kuwait at the start of the Gulf war.
The appeal court confirmed the judgement by a lower court that the airline had failed in its duty to get its passengers safely to their destination.
There were 65 French passengers aboard the BA flight from London to Kuala Lumpur, which in August 1990 made an unscheduled stop at Kuwait airport.
It was just after the Gulf war started and the aircraft's passengers were transferred to a hotel where they were taken hostage by Iraqi troops and later forced to become human shields in Iraq.
After the war they sued BA, arguing the stopover in Kuwait had been unnecessary, and suggesting the aim had been to land intelligence agents - something BA and the UK Government have denied.
A court in 1995 said BA bore entire responsibility for the affair and awarded each of the French hostages several tens of thousands of pounds according to how long they'd been held, with smaller sums going to their family members.
BA initially challenged the court's decision and lost.
The aiirline was allowed to appeal once more, but only after paying over the money originally awarded by the court and it has now lost the final round.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/395492.stm

[Magda Hassan]

Flight 149 - Secret SAS Mission?

August 2nd, 1990 : As Iraqi forces rolled into Kuwait, British Airways Flight 149 (BA149) , en route from Heathrow and bound for Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, landed at Kuwait City airport for a scheduled refueling stop. This was unusual as the crew and airline were aware of the danger posed by the invading forces but, unlike other flights, had not chosen to divert to an alternate airfield in another country.

The result of the risky refueling stop was that Iraqi forces captured the airport whilst the plane was still on the ground and the crew and passengers became part of Saddam Hussein's 'human shield', effectively becoming hostages to prevent an allied military response to his invasion of Kuwait. They were eventually released after a prolonged ordeal in the hands of their captors.
This was to be the fate of all but about 12 of flight 149's passengers. The flight had been delayed at Heathrow, ostensibly for technical reasons. Some believe this was done to allow an SAS/MI6 team to board the plane. Passengers reported seeing a group of around 12 military-looking men board the plane during the delay at Heathrow only to disembark as soon as possible after it landed at Kuwait International. British Airways and The UK government have long denied that this occurred or that the flight had been carrying special forces type personnel in a so-called 'Trojan horse' operation.
There is evidence, however, that lends some credence to the conspiracy theories surrounding flight 149. Writers such as Stephen Davis cite intelligence sources that confirm that an MI6 operation had used BA149 to insert a team of intelligence officers and UKSF soldiers into Kuwait. This team's mission was most likely to gather intelligence on the Iraqi forces within the city and to link up with any Kuwaiti resistance fighters. This notion is supported by claims from the Kuwaiti resistance that 'western commandos' were in the capital city on the first day of the invasion.
Was this an Increment operation? The Increment is long-rumoured cadre of M16/UKSF personnel who carry out deniable operations. In some circumstances, an Increment cell may be made up of ex-UKSF soldiers, an arrangement which would allow the British government to truthfully state that no British military forces were involved.
It seems likely that BA149's dangerous stop at Kuwait City was a calculated risk by the British authorities, who believed the opportunity to have special forces in the heart of Saddam's invasion was worth endangering the lives of the flight's crew and passengers, many of whom were British citizens. No doubt the planners hoped that BA149 would be able to refuel and escape, although this proved to be a miscalculation on their part. As with much of the secrecy surrounding MI6/ UKSF, the continued cover up probably has more to do with political embarrassment over mistakes made than it does with national security.
http://www.eliteukforces.info/rumours/flight-149.php

[Magda Hassan]

Can we trust our rulers ever to tell the truth?

It was the great lie of the first Gulf war: that flight BA 149 to Kuwait City, from which civilians

BY STEPHEN DAVIS PUBLISHED 28 JULY 2003
On 6 September 1990, Margaret Thatcher rose to make a statement to a packed House of Commons. The previous month, Saddam Hussein had invaded Kuwait. George Bush Sr had drawn his line in the sand and was assembling his grand coalition. The countdown to the first Gulf war had begun.
But British concern was focused on the fate of the passengers and crew of a British Airways jet that had landed in Kuwait at the start of the invasion. These passengers were taken hostage by the Iraqis and were soon to join the group known as "human shields". This group included, most famously, the five-year-old Briton Stuart Lockwood, whom the world would see being patted on the head by Saddam when the hostages were paraded on television.
MPs wanted to know why a civilian flight, BA 149, had been allowed to land in a war zone. Thatcher was typically robust. "The British Airways flight landed, its passengers disembarked and the crew handed over to the successive crew, and the crew then went to their hotels. This all took place before the invasion," she said. Turning to her backbenchers, she emphasised the point: "The invasion was later.''
The statement seemed to put an end to questions about the fate of BA 149. But everything in it was misleading.
This month, a French court ordered British Airways to pay 1.67m euros (£1m) in compensation to seven passengers on that fateful flight. British Airways had argued that the carrier could not be held responsible for an act of war. But the court said the invasion was highly predictable, and that the airline had failed in its obligation to get the passengers safely to their destination.
It was the second time a French court had ruled against BA, but the verdict was barely noted in most British newspapers. Despite the row over whether the Blair and Bush Jr governments told the truth in the run-up to the second Gulf war, few made the connection with this further evidence that the country had been misled just as seriously 13 years earlier.
I began investigating the fate of BA 149 in the autumn of 1990, while working for the newly launched Independent on Sunday. Four questions drove my research, which over the past decade has taken me to Paris, Kuwait, Baghdad, Washington, Houston, Sydney and Auckland. Why was the plane allowed to fly into a war zone? Who was responsible for putting the lives of the 385 passengers and crew at risk? Why has compensation been given to some passengers but not to others? Why did Thatcher so comprehensively mislead the Commons over the sequence of events?
Iraqi tanks and troops had been massing on the Kuwaiti border on 1 August 1990 as BA 149's cabin crew headed for Heathrow. Clive Earthy, the purser, remembers hearing a radio report as he drove to the airport. "It said the Iraqis were actually massing on the border, and some reports were coming in that they were over the border.'' The flight was due to leave London for Kuwait at 4.15pm UK time, and then fly onward to Madras and Kuala Lumpur. American, British, New Zealand, French and Indian passengers had tickets for the flight.
Passengers and crew were nervous. Daphne Halkyard, a New Zealander travelling on a British passport with her husband, Henry, told me: "We had heard enough news about Kuwait to be very concerned. Waiting for two hours merely increased our fears. We expressed our concerns to everyone who would listen.''
The flight was delayed by a fault in an auxiliary power unit in the plane's tail. While it was being repaired, the BA crew discussed among themselves the advisability of flying to Kuwait. This was one hour before boarding. "The news media were saying one thing and the company was telling us something different,'' a crew member said. But it was decided that the flight would proceed as scheduled. As Clive Earthy later told me in an interview for New Zealand television: "You are there to work, and to take on a company like BA and refuse to fly an airplane and inconvenience 400 people is quite a big step.''
Just before the plane was due to take off, as the doors were about to close, a new group of passengers arrived - ten or 12 men travelling together, described by passengers as "clean-cut and muscular-looking''. They took seats at the back of the plane. Paul Merlet, a French anaesthetist, remembers thinking that they looked like oil workers or soldiers.
Another late arrival was a high-ranking member of the Kuwaiti royal family and his bodyguard. Information obtained later by lawyers for the human shields suggested that the man was a member of the ruling al-Sabah family who held the crucial post of director of state intelligence and security.
The Boeing 747 took off on the seven-hour flight just after 6pm UK time. During the first half of the flight, the pilot reported back constantly to the crew that things were looking all right in Kuwait and that it would remain their destination. Just after 10pm UK time, the pilot was in contact with BA 148, flying in the reverse direction. It said Kuwait airport, on the outskirts of Kuwait City, had been operating normally when the flight departed.
As this conversation was taking place, the invasion started. BA 149 was still three hours from Kuwait when the Iraqis poured over the border and headed down the main highway towards Kuwait City. Hundreds were killed in the first hours of the war, but apparently no word of this reached BA 149.
By the time the plane touched down, Iraqi troops and tanks were on the outskirts of the city. Yet air-traffic control gave the plane permission to land. One hour after it landed, the airport came under attack from Iraqi MiG fighter jets, as the refuelled plane sat on the runway ready to take off. The plane was abandoned and the passengers and crew evacuated. All of them would be taken hostage by the Iraqis - except for the men who had boarded the plane so late in London. They had vanished within minutes of the jet landing. None of the other passengers saw them again.
The hostages were held for up to three months. Under threat of being shot by the Iraqis or bombed by the Allies or lynched by a mob, they lived in constant fear. One day, a group of passengers found their guards had begun digging a trench, about three feet deep and eight feet square. After much prompting, they told the hostages that the trench was for them; their commander had given instructions that, at the first sign of invasion, everyone was to be shot and buried. Some hostages were taken to al-Tarmiya, a nuclear-enrichment plant near Baghdad, where they were held in a rat-infested tin shed. One man died of a heart attack while in captivity. Several others died within weeks of their release, apparently never recovering from the ordeal. One killed himself. Yet the Iraqis pretended they were honoured guests, showing a TV programme called Iraqi Guest News, which carried footage of a smiling Saddam mingling with the captive westerners.
Eventually, Edward Heath travelled to Baghdad to meet Saddam and secure the release of the hostages. The survivors of BA 149 celebrated with champagne on the way home. But when they got back and learnt of Thatcher's Commons statement, many of them were angry. It was the start of more than a decade of court proceedings.
Intelligence sources have confirmed to me that London and Washington were both informed of the attack by 11.50pm UK time. The plane did not land for another one hour and 23 minutes. So why did Thatcher - speaking more than a month after these events - get it so wrong?
John Prescott, then Labour's front-bench spokesman on transport, had no doubt that there had been a cover-up. In 1991, he said, there were rumours that SAS people had been put on the plane. "It could have been diverted . . . those people were held unnecessary [sic] . . . a wall of silence from British Airways - the Foreign Office and government are hiding what I believe was a major mistake made by them."
Speculation about the fate of the flight focused on the group of men who had disappeared when the plane landed. Paul Merlet said the French embassy told him after his release that BA 149 had landed in Kuwait because there were "special forces" on the plane. Members of the Kuwaiti resistance said later that "western commandos" had somehow arrived in Kuwait on the first day of the invasion. Clive Earthy, the BA 149 purser, later tried to find out who had checked in the last-minute group of passengers. A BA colleague told him their tickets had had a military coding. Another BA staff member recalled that the passengers had come from Hereford, the headquarters of the Special Air Service.
But Earthy's attempt to track down the woman who checked in the group came to nothing. She had left her job at BA soon after the flight, to take up a position with the Ministry of Defence.
The search for the truth became increasingly frustrating. Bill Neumann, the Texan lawyer who represented the American passengers, tried to obtain a list of those who had boarded. BA told him it no longer held a passenger list. In an interview for New Zealand TV, he summed up his conclusion in a dry Texas twang: "That probably gives some support to the notion that there was someone on board they didn't want people to know about."
In investigating this story, I have spoken to multiple military and intelligence sources who confirmed what happened. One source was directly involved in the operation. The team put on the ground was part of an MI6 operation, but one that used SAS-trained soldiers. Their job was to activate an underground intelligence network as the invasion got under way.
The SAS and MI6 quite often work closely together, with soldiers acting as spies. In the world of intelligence, best described by the former CIA counter-intelligence chief James Angleton as "a wilderness of mirrors", such blurring of roles can come in handy. In this case, because the soldiers were no longer formally designated military, Downing Street and Whitehall could repeatedly claim that "there were no military personnel on the flight".
One intelligence source told me this was not the first time that a BA flight had been used as a "Trojan horse". Before the fall of the Shah of Iran, he said, a flight was diverted to Tehran to pick up a team of agents whose lives were in danger.
BA has consistently claimed it knew nothing about any operation in Kuwait, or even that the invasion was under way. It insisted at one stage that "our passengers and senior cabin crew have stated that no passengers joined the flight during its delay at Heathrow". However, senior cabin crew confirmed to me that the group of ten or 12 men had boarded the flight during the delay.
It is clear that Kuwaiti air-traffic control gave the plane permission to land, even though the controllers must have known that the fighting had begun. One possible explanation: when in Kuwait earlier this year, en route to cover the second Gulf war, I was told by a contact that UK military personnel were in the control tower on 2 August 1990, insisting that BA 149 be allowed to land.
The plane was eventually blown up by the Iraqis. British passengers took their case to the House of Lords but got nowhere and have still not received any damages. The New Zealanders have received a few hundred pounds for lost baggage and from a UN Gulf war fund. They have never even received an apology from the airline or any government.
The French claimants, meanwhile, have all received payments running into hundreds of thousands of pounds. The American passengers, with a court system that usually favours the plaintiff, all received out-of-court settlements from British Airways, although they had to sign confidentiality agreements saying they would never discuss the details.
This grossly unequal treatment justifiably angers many of the passengers. Only now, after all these years, has it been possible to piece together the full story of what happened to BA 149. It may take just as long to learn what really happened in the inner sanctum of the British government in the weeks and months leading up to the second Gulf war.
Stephen Davis is a former Fleet Street journalist and New Zealand newspaper editor-turned-television producer. He can be contacted at: theeditor@xtra.co.nz
http://www.newstatesman.com/node/145970